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The national expansion of ABC youth radio station Triple J during the 1990s has greatly increased the visibility and availability of home-grown talent to listeners nationwide. Since the mid 1990s a string of successful alternative Australian acts have emerged - artists to achieve both underground (critical) and mainstream (commercial) success include silverchair, Grinspoon, Powderfinger, George and Jet.

Australia has a highly concentrated ownership of media companies. Newspapers are dominated by two companies, News Corporation and John Fairfax Holdings. News Corporation publishes the only daily national newspaper, The Australian, as well as a daily newspaper in every capital city except Perth. Its holdings include The Daily Telegraph (Sydney), Herald Sun (Melbourne), The Courier-Mail (Brisbane) and The Advertiser (Adelaide).

The first English explorers were Willem Dampier on the west coast of the continent in 1688, and Lieutenant James Cook who, in 1770, claimed the eastern two-thirds of the continent for Britain, despite orders from King George III to first conclude a treaty with the indigenous population. His report to London that Australia was uninhabited (see Terra nullius) provided impetus for the establishment of a penal colony there following the loss of the American colonies.

The exact date of the first human habitation of Australia is still a subject of considerable research. There is strong scientific evidence for a presence around 50,000 years ago, a period of massive ecological upheaval in Australia which is believed to be consistent with human colonisation. However, there is some speculation about considerably earlier arrivals, even as far as 100,000 or more years ago. These first Australians were the remote ancestors of the current Australian Aborigines, and arrived via land bridges and navigation of significant sea crossings from present-day Southeast Asia.

Today, many tribal Aborigines lead a settled traditional life in remote areas of northern, central, and western Australia. In the south, where most Aborigines are of mixed descent, most live in the cities.

Melbourne is the capital and largest city of the state of Victoria, and the second largest city in Australia, with a population of 52,117 in the Central Business District and 3,488,750 in the metropolitan area (census 2001).

Australia is home to the Great Artesian Basin - an important source of water for people and cattle in the parched outback. This basin is the world's largest and deepest fresh water basin.

Australian flora, in order to cope with the extreme conditions present in much of Australia, has evolved to cope with a common set of conditions, namely the ubiquitous presence of fire; soils low in nutrients (due to a lack of recent - geologically speaking - volcanic activity); and a lack of water.

Australia has had a significant school of painting since the early days of European settlement, and Australians with international reputations include Sidney Nolan, Russell Drysdale, and Arthur Boyd—not to mention the prized work of many Aboriginal artists. There are excellent art galleries (even in surprisingly small towns); a rich tradition in ballet, enlivened by the legacy of Dame Margot Fonteyn and Sir Robert Helpmann; a strong national opera company, Opera Australia, made prominent by the world renowned diva Dame Joan Sutherland; and symphony orchestras in all capital cities, in particular the Melbourne and Sydney symphony orchestras. In ths field, conductor Sir Charles Mackerras has achieved international renown.