Scenery

Luke Kelly - (The Bonny) Shoals of Herring

2010-05-12T20:06:00.002+01:00

Worth the wait, hopefully.

Sheila

2010-03-04T23:28:00.010Z

Scouse House

2010-02-26T12:19:00.004Z

Inside the world of Donk. I reserve my right to disapprove of that condescending southern twat while still laughing at the northern donk-ies

Happy birthday Python

2009-10-06T10:39:00.000+01:00

The Dad's Army side of militant racism

2009-08-27T17:09:00.001+01:00

Hitchens on Orwell

2009-08-17T15:44:00.002+01:00

Econtalk comes up trumps - Hitchens talks Orwell for an hour with host Russ Roberts.

In the year 3000

2009-08-17T11:13:00.002+01:00

Paul Krugman tries his hand at sci-fi - and shakes me out of my blogging ennui.

Dark festival of souls

2009-08-12T00:01:00.002+01:00

The extended Insane Clown Posse get together in some woods to get fucked up.

Obesity

2009-08-05T15:51:00.002+01:00

A typically thought provoking post by Megan McArdle. In it she outlines the arguments for essentially leaving fat people alone given evidence that dieting is not effective, critiques the left-wing view that agri-business is to blame(and that government has to do something about the issue) and critiques the right-wing view that lack of self control from the poor is to blame.

Includes a free bonus run-through of the scientific literature on weight loss.

Matadjem Yinmixan

2009-07-29T19:00:00.002+01:00

Tinariwen - Matadjem Yinmixan

More on the singularity

2009-07-27T16:29:00.005+01:00

So I've become a disciple of loopy inventor and futurist Ray Kurzweil. Ray promises me that exponential technological growth will solve all humanity's problems in a few short decades, including but not exclusive to global warming, African poverty and our limited lifespans. Appealing, no? It's hard not to sound flippant endorsing such talk, but I'm actually proper convinced.
Bill Gates is a fan of his, he's working with Google founder Larry Page on solar energy(16 years until it can power all the world's energy, we're assured), and he's setting up a multi billion dollar hedge fund to profit from his line of thinking.

From back in February, Kurzweil's TED talk giving a quick outline of his argument.

Economist David Friedman, son of Milton, delivers an interesting hour long talk on the implications of out-of-control technological progress on society and the law.

Bjorn Lumborg on how we're taking the wrong approach to climate change by ignoring tech progress.

The latest from TED:

This thing is bloody great

2009-07-27T00:30:00.004+01:00

Simple visual synthesizer thing that only seems to produce good music. Highly addictive.

Dancing man attracts dancing crowd

2009-07-26T18:32:00.002+01:00

Notice the way several others had been filming the same guy independently and put it on youtube. This internet thing is getting out of hand!

Assorted links, narcotics edition

2009-07-23T15:54:00.006+01:00

The success of Portugal's drug decriminalization program - since 2001 possession of all drugs there is legal. There's been a decline in overall use and a big increase in those seeking treatment.

A new iphone app finds the nearest cannabis dispensary.

It's 4:20 at FSJ. "Enjoy the lothar"

"Googlopoly"

2009-07-21T23:41:00.003+01:00

Wired reports on antitrust lawyers who're gunning for Google. It's an interesting topic. Google sit on masses and masses of data passed along to it every time we search or click on its ads; it uses the data to create more efficient searches and ads; in the process it makes it impossible for its competitors to break into the market. With 75% of the online ad market, it's a natural target for antitrust agencies worried about its near monopoly position. Added to this it owns a host of prominent web properties like Youtube, so its secret search formulas could well be tweaked to direct consumers onto its own sites.
On the other hand, Google uses the gold mine that is adwords to finance a huge range of innovative and often costly services at no charge. As I mentioned a while back, it's estimated that Youtube loses $400m annually. Google Chrome, Docs, Picasa, Gmail, our very own Blogger - all of these internet treats are made possible by the deep pockets of their parent corporation.
The abstract benefits of a more competitive online ad market really dont match the immediacy of being bribed with Google's latest free web-based technological trick. I'd be lost without my blogger.

Lovely

2009-07-21T19:15:00.001+01:00

via Andrew Sullivan.

Zurich is Stained

2009-07-21T11:16:00.001+01:00

Pavement - Zurich is Stained

You're infected with a parasite that has a decent chance of killing you via a road traffic accident

2009-07-21T00:43:00.004+01:00

… possibly. 20-60% of "most populations" are infected; more prevalent in Europe than elsewhere. Toxoplasma gondii is a parasite that came from rats, whose behavior it alters by making them more reckless and more likely to be eaten by cats, which it wants for some reason. Now it's with us, possibly festering in your very brain, and it makes us reckless too. Those infected are 600% more likely to be involved in car accidents.

Assorted economics links

2009-07-20T21:13:00.002+01:00

For those who like reading about economics

Creditwritedowns.com points out the similarities between Ireland and California's vicious busts. "Events have already forced Premier Brian Cowen to carry out the harshest assault yet seen on the public services of a modern Western state."
Both territories lack their own currency, meaning they can't take the easy option and depreciate out of this mess.

The Economist with a quick run through of how the discipline went astray as of late. In short: financial economics turned out to be bullshit; macroeconomics turned out to be an unrealistic academic parlour game.

William Buiter on how genomics is going to inevitably lead to state-financed healthcare everywhere.

Deadliest Warrior

2009-07-19T13:16:00.003+01:00

Deadliest Warrior is a tv show that settles hypothetical "who'd win" scenarios using dubious science and computers. Who'd win: the Taliban or the IRA?

Gabrielle

2009-07-17T00:00:00.003+01:00

Ween channel Phil Lynott.

The baffling world of Yoko Ono

2009-07-16T23:31:00.005+01:00

One thing I like about twitter is the insight it gives into the personalities of celebrities, like batshit-crazy conceptual artist Yoko Ono.

"Imagine letting a goldfish swim across the sky. Let it swim from the East to the West. Drink a liter of water."

"I would like to see a sky vending machine on every corner of the street instead of the coke machine. We need more skies than coke."

"You can even assemble a painting with a person in the North Pole over a phone, like playing chess."

Reagan worried so you didn't have to

2009-07-16T22:50:00.004+01:00

Well I'm glad someone had their eye on the ball. Reagan, you were an outstanding human:

“In Hollywood he became an avid science-fiction fan, absorbed with a favorite theme of the genre: the invasion from outer space that prompts earthlings to put aside nationalistic quarrels and band together against an alien invader.

Reagan liked this idea so much that he tried it out on Gorbachev in their first meeting at Geneva in 1985, saying that he was certain the United States and the Soviet Union would cooperate if earth were threatened by an invasion from outer space. Reagan’s idea was not part of the script, and it startled his advisors.

It may have also startled Gorbachev, who did not have at his fingertips the Marxist-Leninist position on the propriety of cooperating with the imperialists against an interplanetary invasion. In any event, Gorbachev changed the subject…

(Colin) Powell… knew more than he ever wanted to know about Reagan’s preoccupation with what Powell called “the little green men” and he struggled diligently to keep interplanetary references out of Reagan’s speeches. Powell was convinced that Reagan’s unique proposal to Gorbachev had been inspired by a 1951 science-fiction film, The Day The Earth Stood Still…”

From Lou Cannon's "Reagan, The Role of a Lifetime".

The comedy roundup

2009-07-13T21:30:00.006+01:00

Bruno was pretty funny. He rarely skewered his targets in the best tradition of TV Bruno ('Wassup!' or 'Ich dont think so!') or Borat, but he still scored plenty of cheap easy laughs with his toe-curlingly embarrassing euro trash shtick. Baron-Cohen is brave, brave, brave - in his middle east bit they reportedly had trouble finding armed security willing to accompany him. Watching his interview with the Al-Aqsa terrorist its not hard to see why.

There's huge buzz about Ricky Gervais' upcoming comedy 'The Invention of Lying':

Apropos of nothing, Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle:

… and:

New Live Poll Allows Pundits To Pander To Viewers In Real Time

Comeback

2009-07-11T19:21:00.005+01:00

Matt Taibbi, author of the hysterical(and well written) attack on Goldman Sachs I linked to earlier, gets smacked down by Megan McArdle.

Michael Jackson tribute

2009-07-11T00:04:00.001+01:00

Meanwhile in Rathkeale

2009-07-09T19:20:00.010+01:00

2,000 residents of Rathkeale, co. Limerick, have signed a petition to save a tree stump they believe depicts the Virgin Mary. The local church are not entertaining (presumed) appeals to upgrade the stump to a class two relic:

Local parish priest Fr Willie Russell said on radio station Limerick Live 95FM yesterday that people should not worship the tree. “There’s nothing there . . . it’s just a tree . . . you can’t worship a tree.”

Please Say Something

2009-07-08T23:54:00.003+01:00

I mentioned this a few months back when it won the prize for best short at the Berlin film festival. Since then it's garnered more awards and acclaim for David O'Reilly. Whether it was unavailable at the time or Im just incompetent, we'll never know, but here it is. Watch it in HD.

Michael Lewis on A.I.G.

2009-07-08T18:09:00.004+01:00

Another rip-roaring yarn from Michael Lewis, in which he finds the one sap who's to blame for taking down the world financial system.

Here's his review of Warren Buffett's biography.

Dear Darkness

2009-07-08T15:31:00.003+01:00

PJ Harvey - Dear Darkness

"Create Your Own Economy"

2009-07-07T23:09:00.005+01:00

If you find yourself skulking around obscure Ireland-based blogs late in the evening, the chances are youre a heavy internet user. Tyler Cowen's latest book is about you, us, and how the internet is changing the way people absorb information. I've not yet read it but I'm very much looking forward to it - a slight problem being that Im hardly able to read a magazine article these days, let alone a book. Ben Cassnocha's extended review thrashes out Cowen's ideas and is an interesting read in its own right (and a next-best for those whose attention span sadly precludes them from tackling 200-odd pages). The idea is that our brains are highly plastic and that dicking around on the internet all day alters the way we learn about, think about and see the world. Cowen argues that this makes us richer human beings. I do hope he's right.

Funny this

2009-07-07T20:57:00.001+01:00

Make that very funny

Nobody suffers quite like Thom Yorke

2009-07-07T20:12:00.003+01:00

Thom Yorke on Street Spirit(fade out):

'Street Spirit' is our purest song, but I didn't write it.... It wrote itself. We were just its messengers... Its biological catylysts. It's core is a complete mystery to me... and (pause) you know, I wouldn't ever try to write something that hopeless... All of our saddest songs have somewhere in them at least a glimmer of resolve... 'Street Spirit' has no resolve... It is the dark tunnel without the light at the end. It represents all tragic emotion that is so hurtful that the sound of that melody is its only definition. We all have a way of dealing with that song... It's called detachment... Especially me.. I detach my emotional radar from that song, or I couldn't play it... I'd crack. I'd break down on stage.. that's why its lyrics are just a bunch of mini-stories or visual images as opposed to a cohesive explanation of its meaning... I used images set to the music that I thought would convey the emotional entirety of the lyric and music working together... That's what's meant by 'all these things are one to swallow whole'.. I meant the emotional entirety, because I didn't have it in me to articulate the emotion... (pause) I'd crack.... Our fans are braver than I to let that song penetrate them, or maybe they don't realize what they're listening to.. They don't realize that 'Street Spirit' is about staring the f--king devil right in the eyes... and knowing, no matter what the hell you do, he'll get the last laugh...and it's real...and true. The devil really will get the last laugh in all cases without exception, and if I let myself think about that to long, I'd crack. I can't believe we have fans that can deal emotionally with that song... That's why I'm convinced that they don't know what it's about. It's why we play it towards the end of our sets. It drains me, and it shakes me, and hurts like hell everytime I play it, looking out at thousands of people cheering and smiling, oblivious to the tragedy of it's meaning, like when you're going to have your dog put down and it's wagging it's tail on the way there. That's what they all look like, and it breaks my heart. I wish that song hadn't picked us as its catalysts, and so I don't claim it. It asks too much. (very long pause). I didn't write that song.

Cant say Im a fan of the song, and I certainly can say Ive cheerily banged it out at one or two concerts. Like a dog that Thom was planning on killing... or something.

Much prefer:

This must be the place (naive melody)

2009-07-05T15:42:00.002+01:00

Wire corner

2009-07-03T19:33:00.002+01:00

The Spectator interviews Dominic West, a.k.a. McNulty, an old Etonian and a Trinity grad.

Volcano eruption

2009-07-02T22:57:00.001+01:00

Spectacular, this.

Assorted links, future of journalism special

2009-07-02T21:53:00.006+01:00

Valleywag liken influential judge Richard Posner's proposal to ban linking online to banning wheels in order to save the horse industry. They have a point...

The New York Times reader is launched, looking pretty spiffy. It's a special adobe reader that automatically updates your paper and allows you to browse just like with a physical copy. Incorporate it into some kindle-esque device and they might be onto something...

... but that doesnt mean anyone'll pay for the content. About the only major publication that one hears is doing well is The Economist, with "correspondents who scamper... across backwaters and remote deserts, spraying assured advice along the way like so much confetti" saw its advertising revenue shoot up by 25% last year. The Atlantic profiles the newspaper...

Meanwhile, the Niemen Journalism Lab laud The Guardian's recruitment of 20,000 online volunteers to sift through the parliamentary expenses data. Pretty interesting really - they got scooped by the Telegraph, who'd bought the information and had a team of professional journalists trawling it for a month. The Guardian paid £50 to rent some servers and let the nerds at it. Good thinking.

Assorted links

2009-07-01T23:55:00.003+01:00

Life as a schizophrenic: "noisy"

The fascinating story of Argentina's divergence after 1900, "The Superpower That Never Was"

Hedge fund manager's rousing up and at 'em high school commencement speech on the topic of failure.

The easy solution, or how mankind could plausibly (and cheaply) pump tonnes of ash into the atmosphere to cancel out global warming.

Dawkins watch

2009-07-01T19:18:00.004+01:00

The blasphemous bastard is up to his old tricks again: stealing the souls of innocent children by brainwashing them at his (not at all boring sounding) atheist summer camp. Kids will be invited to prove a negative, be lectured on moral philosophy and marvel for hours at a time at the wonders of evolution. Older children will be taught how to swear by none other than Christopher Hitchens.

Glastonbury '09

2009-07-01T01:09:00.002+01:00

As seen by The Big Picture.

Gannet Man

2009-06-30T23:49:00.006+01:00

"We're always looking for exciting new ways to go fishing" explains the Gannet Man, moments before diving headlong from the helicopter into the ocean, onto the back of a 10 foot marlin. No shit Gannet Man!

Sweat!

2009-06-30T11:43:00.006+01:00

I cant stop imagining Will Ferrell in 'more cowbell' mode working that wood tapper thing during the first minute.

Eagles of Death Metal play Dolan's, Limerick, and the Academy, Dublin, in late August.

Isla de la Muñecas

2009-06-30T00:07:00.004+01:00

Near Mexico city is the Isla de la Muñecas. It is a strange and frightening place where the obviously troubled hermit Don Julián Santana displayed his huge collection of spooky dolls and figurines. It is said that the dolls were collected to calm the spirit of a dead girl who haunted Santana.

"The Great American Bubble Machine"

2009-06-29T21:43:00.007+01:00

Keen readers will recall Matt Taibi as the author of the Rolling Stone bank bailout piece("The Big Takeover") I posted on a while back. Here, he profiles world leading investment bank Goldman Sachs, "a great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity, relentlessly jamming its blood funnel into anything that smells like money".

Tricksters

2009-06-29T15:47:00.004+01:00

Amaze friends and family with falseexpense.com's (novelty use only) IMITATION RECEIPTS. Pin them to your fridge, keep them in your wallet - there'll be no end to the receipt-based hijinks.

Bullshit detection

2009-06-25T16:57:00.004+01:00

Reason magazine editor and sceptic at large Michael Shermer on smart sceptical thinking. Learn the ten easy criteria and never be known as a credulous idiot again.

(From 'RDFtv', the Richard Dawkins Foundation's tv operation. He's got a tv channel now...)

Return of Fake Steve

2009-06-25T10:58:00.004+01:00

Fake Steve Jobs is back. The piercingly funny satirical blog was suspended last year out of respect for Real Steve and his ailing health. Jobs is obviously fine, so we can all get back to laughing at him.

Look at this fucking hipster

2009-06-23T13:35:00.003+01:00

... is a blog. Book on the way.

Photo essay: a day in the life of a white trash family

2009-06-23T13:09:00.003+01:00

Here.

Assorted links

2009-06-23T10:47:00.005+01:00

From fully one month ago, Zarakia at Newsweek: What You Know About Iran is Wrong.

Creepy unseen photos of Hitlers private life.

Insider account of Chinese dictators at work.

50 scientifically proven ways to be persusasive. You should read this because it'll help you to manipulate others.

Herbivorism is huge movement among young Japanese men, who shun sex and material wealth. Is that the distant sound of society crumbling?

On Father's Day

2009-06-22T13:09:00.003+01:00

Published: Irish Times, June 14th 2008

Every time the seasons change I think about my father. In early spring I see him jotting down the names and dates-of-birth of his latest crop of Under-10s, gleefully identifying future corner-backs and budding centre-fielders. When the sun comes out in May, I envision us striking out for the beach at Enniscrone. (You always know when it’s summer there, he’d say, because the old ladies wear their overcoats unbuttoned.) In August, he’s picking blackberries to make jam. And when the frosts return in late November, he’s making breadcrumbs for the birds that come to forage in our garden.

On the balmy summer evening I write, I can imagine I’m standing on the pier at Urlar Abbey. My father is sloshing about in the lake, wiggling his toes in the air and making all sorts of improbable claims about the approximate water temperature. When he gets dressed, we sit on the wall of the graveyard where his grandparents are buried, and chat about this and that. If there’s something on my mind, he’ll light a cigar and listen awhile. Then he’ll tell me a story – usually one he’s told me many times before – but one which contains some nugget of wisdom he thinks is worth imparting again.

My father was a kind, witty man who enjoyed the simpler things in life: a Hamlet cigar, the bit of rasher and an occasional outing to Croke Park. He was a voracious reader who never had the opportunity to study in university, but who was proud to attend the graduations of all four of his children. He was a teetotaller and an avid indoor soccer player who was studying history through the Open University when he died of a heart attack at the age of 58.

When a loved one passes away, particularly when they pass away unexpectedly, it’s tempting to hope that a beautiful funeral service, a well tended grave and the kind remembrances of friends and neighbours can somehow fill the void. In my initial grief, I felt that my father was still very close by, perhaps just dozing on the couch in the other room. But as time passed, the illusion of that proximity began to fade. Eighteen months after his death, I’d love to know what he makes of Barack Obama, the books I’ve read and Billy Joe Padden at full back for Mayo. At times it felt as though he had abandoned me. That he had neglected to return my call. But even anger faded over time, replaced eventually by a kind of grudging acceptance.

Every time the seasons change I dream about my father. It’s always the same dream. It’s a beautiful Sunday morning and we’re walking down from the church in Kilkelly to dinner in my grandmother’s house. I want to tell him that I love him: an awkward sort of transaction I would not have inflicted upon him while he was alive. But in the weird logic of this dream, while I am aware my father is dead, I also know that he is as yet unaware of this development. I don’t want to arouse his suspicion. So I say nothing, and just savour his company, while he regales me with another anecdote that he has, more than likely, told me a thousand times before.

Tomorrow is Father’s Day. To be honest, I doubt my father Barry would be too upset at missing the occasion. He never cared that much for cards or presents. As long as his family were happy and healthy, it could have been Pancake Tuesday or Paraguayan Independence Day for all he would have known or cared. But I know that I will miss him. To any other Irish men out there lucky enough to be spending tomorrow with their fathers, I don’t for a moment advocate you make any rash declarations of affection. Maybe hit the auld fucker a box on the arm. And if he starts to tell you that story about how he could have played for Real Madrid, smile affectionately and listen as though he were telling it for the very first time.

A day late but worth revisiting. From Eoin Butler.

Back in the saddle

2009-06-22T12:39:00.003+01:00

How I've missed the limelight! The adulation, the emails, the tick-tick-tick of fresh hits!

From now on readers, things are going to be different. Scenery has my undivided attention. I've accumulated a good month's supply of illuminating articles, tunes, entertaining anecdotes and whatever else it is this blog is supposed to supply over my break.

"No flipping!"

Summertime clothes

2009-06-05T23:10:00.004+01:00

Scenery's taking a week off.

Scenery will be back tanned, rested, and ready to improve on a frankly disappointing blog performance over the past fortnight or so.

Assorted links

2009-06-03T23:34:00.005+01:00

Microsoft takes the ball and runs with it; the future of gaming

Myles Na Gopaleen on the death penalty, 1959

"What I learned as a car czar", the tragi-comic tale of Ceausescu's attempt to build a car industry

The Beatles Rock Band intro

2009-06-03T23:33:00.004+01:00

Also available here.

Seen in Dublin

2009-05-29T15:26:00.001+01:00

Woody Allen, Larry David, New York

2009-05-28T16:34:00.003+01:00

Woody Allen has dusted off a script from his Annie Hall golden era and returned to New York, casting Larry David in the Woody Allen role. New York magazine has the story of the movie, its two great talents and their uniquely Jewish sense of humour.

Freddie King - Goin' Down

2009-05-27T16:14:00.001+01:00

Church abuse in Ireland

2009-05-26T16:49:00.007+01:00

Moving speech by an audience participant on Questions and Answers last night on abuse in religious institutions.

Other recent developments since the commission's findings were made public: the congregations have declined Cardinal Brady's suggestion to revisit the sweetheart indemnity deals offered by religious nut and former minister for education Michael Woods; the gardaí have revealed that most of the full contents of the report will be shredded.

Google's secret sauce

2009-05-26T13:09:00.006+01:00

Wired on Hal Varian, Google's chief economist and caretaker of the golden goose that is adwords.

Selling ads doesn't generate only profits; it also generates torrents of data about users' tastes and habits, data that Google then sifts and processes in order to predict future consumer behavior, find ways to improve its products, and sell more ads. This is the heart and soul of Googlenomics. It's a system of constant self-analysis: a data-fueled feedback loop that defines not only Google's future but the future of anyone who does business online.

NO BLOOD FOR GOG

2009-05-26T10:57:00.005+01:00

Clive Anderson reports that George W. Bush told Jacques Chirac that the biblical creatures Gog and Magog, agents of the apocalypse, were at work in the middle east and needed to be vanquished "before a new age begins". In the same year he told the Palestinian foreign minister that he was on a mission from God, and was receiving commands from the lord.

What a relief!

We're all going to jail

2009-05-23T11:44:00.005+01:00

It seems Last.fm passed on user listening data to the RIAA. They deny it, but this techcrunch post is very convincing.

Oh dear.

Grizzly Bear

2009-05-22T12:46:00.003+01:00

Grizzly Bear - Two Weeks

Roubini profile

2009-05-21T21:53:00.007+01:00

Nouriel Roubini has been embraced by the media as 'the one who saw it coming'. An economist at NYU, he was CNBC's stock possimist over the past couple of years and is now basking in vindication and celebrity(left).

The New Republic's profile raises interesting questions about the crisis, not least about the validity of predictions.

Coachella 2009

2009-05-21T00:13:00.004+01:00

I've always wanted to go to Coachella. Sure, the acts arent much better than our native festivals and the desert location is a bit shit if you think about it, but there's something very appealing there. That, and the largely America-based internet press are all over it so one gets an earful. Pitchfork did a nice artist-by-artist festival review which has really whetted my appetite for summer.

The grey goo problem

2009-05-18T13:46:00.004+01:00

Reading about this really messed up my weekend. Prince Charles himself has endured a few sleepless nights because of it. Now it's your turn to know humanity's inglorious fate.

High definition

2009-05-18T13:44:00.002+01:00

Pretty impressive 1000fps footage of a Stade Francais pre-match show, some guys playing hockey and blocks of jelly being dropped onto concrete. Ensure HD is turned on.

Snatch Wars

2009-05-15T11:53:00.002+01:00

Squeezing the lemon

2009-05-14T20:38:00.002+01:00

The Atlantic reports on a compelling 72-year study on what makes for a good life.

Play him off, Keyboard Cat

2009-05-13T13:43:00.003+01:00

Featuring Glenn Beck.

Swoon

2009-05-13T12:33:00.002+01:00

Finally

2009-05-09T14:59:00.001+01:00

Dr. Dre's The Chronic with everything removed except the swearing. Still five minutes long!

Back on the gold standard?

2009-05-06T15:52:00.008+01:00

Martin Wolf asks uncomfortable questions about monetary policy. For all the furore about greedy and venal Wall St types, the problems ultimately stem from the boardrooms of one or two central banks in my opinion.

Is it dumb to ask what's wrong with a monetarist style monetary policy rule?

Outstanding

2009-05-04T11:57:00.004+01:00

Today's the day

2009-05-02T09:21:00.003+01:00

KAL

2009-05-02T00:26:00.003+01:00

Moderat

2009-05-01T16:49:00.004+01:00

New Modeselektor Apperat collaboration. See you at EP.

Funny anecdote

2009-04-29T00:04:00.003+01:00

Kevin Smith and the canned Superman movie.

TED: Steven Johnson on epidemics

2009-04-28T23:38:00.005+01:00

I don't buy this swine flu bullshit for one second.

I know a certain Sky News presenter who's a huge fan of the blog though - this one's for you Kay!

Glenn Beck

2009-04-27T20:41:00.004+01:00

Charlie Brooker's newest series Newswipe takes the tried and trusted Screenwipe formula and applies it to TV news, which adds a troubling subtext to his usual light hearted sniping. Enter Glenn Beck, a manic looking fucker giving the public what it wants on Fox News. He features about two thirds into this Newswipe excerpt.

Brain Food

2009-04-26T18:02:00.006+01:00

The New Yorker recently ran a piece on "the underground world of 'neuroenhancing' drugs". ADHD drugs like ritalin, adderall and their derivatives are common on American campuses and in high schools, helping pressurised students to keep up.

"As a history major, Alex wrote about a dozen papers a semester. He also ran a student organization, for which he often worked more than forty hours a week; when he wasn’t on the job, he had classes. Weeknights were devoted to all the schoolwork that he couldn’t finish during the day, and weekend nights were spent drinking with friends and going to dance parties. “Trite as it sounds,” he told me, it seemed important to “maybe appreciate my own youth.” Since, in essence, this life was impossible, Alex began taking Adderall to make it possible."

Their popularity is driven by their efficacy. They help focus - stopping the familiar compulsion to scan one's inbox or facebook for the fifth time. There are some startling accounts: a poker player who went on ADHD meds and went on to win $1.6m the following six months; at Slate, a mathematician who credits the drugs with greatly extending his working life.

Any drug as useful as these claim to be must come with serious pitfalls. Even if they're not inherantly addictive, one could imagine a serious dependency developing. A user on drug-story forum erowid:

"One man, who identified himself as a former biochemistry student, said that he had succeeded in kicking cocaine and opiate habits but couldn’t stop using modafinil. Whenever he ran out of the drug, he said, “I start to freak out.” After “4-5 days” without it, “the head fog starts to come back."

Whether or not early forays into 'neuro enhancement' like ADHD meds are worth the risks, it seems that theyre here to stay. In a future world where smart pills are more commonplace and more potent, there's a difficult decision we'll all need to make.

Neuroenhancers are perfectly suited for the anxiety of white-collar competition in a floundering economy. And they have a synergistic relationship with our multiplying digital technologies: the more gadgets we own, the more distracted we become, and the more we need help in order to focus. The experience that neuroenhancement offers is not, for the most part, about opening the doors of perception, or about breaking the bonds of the self, or about experiencing a surge of genius. It’s about squeezing out an extra few hours to finish those sales figures when you’d really rather collapse into bed; getting a B instead of a B-minus on the final exam in a lecture class where you spent half your time texting; cramming for the G.R.E.s at night, because the information-industry job you got after college turned out to be deadening. Neuroenhancers don’t offer freedom. Rather, they facilitate a pinched, unromantic, grindingly efficient form of productivity.

Narcissism!

2009-04-24T00:35:00.005+01:00

The Wall St. Journal reported recently that there are more professional bloggers in the United States today than lawyers. Having only read the gist of the article Im going to dismiss it as complete rhubarb - there's no f'ing way that there're tens or hundreds of thousands of Americans making a living spouting off on the web. Cant be. Just to give you an idea, a blog that receives 100,000 unique monthly visitors - i.e. a blog very different from the one you are reading - will earn its author about $25,000 per year. This leaves us tail-dwellers with nothing but google analytics charts and maps for compensation. Which, to be fair, Im not yet tired of.

Blogging is fantastic for the consumer. There's something about the combination of information with a personality that tickles me just right. So what's in it for the average blogger?

Dirty Projectors

2009-04-21T17:26:00.006+01:00

Dirty Projectors - Stillness is the Move

Frozen robbery

2009-04-19T15:40:00.001+01:00

Neat!

Wire corner

2009-04-17T16:36:00.001+01:00

Good post featuring scripts, David Simon's opening pitch for the show and his initial outline of the first season.

Andrew Sullivan

2009-04-17T15:46:00.007+01:00

He's got to be one of the most influential men in the world. Blogger Andrew Sullivan is British, conservative, religious, gay, HIV positive, and supports Obama. The Economist recently did an interesting profile on him.

Enjoy it while it lasts?

2009-04-17T15:10:00.006+01:00

It's a depressing thought, but the huge expanse of free online services we've recently come to take for granted might not be economical in the long term. Facebook, flickr, youtube, even your beloved blogspot.com - all incur sizeable costs delivering the goods. We consumers dont pay and we're even a bit sniffy about being subjected to advertising.
This slate piece looks at youtube, who're struggling to cover the mammoth costs that go along with housing the entire world's home video collection.

But as Benjamin Wayne points out, those deals won't solve YouTube's fundamental problem; even if it does begin to make respectable profits from, say, showing old feature films, it'll still have to keep paying huge infrastructure costs... As Wayne argues, there's a very real possibility that YouTube as we know it is doomed. The company may have to institute restrictions to keep its bandwidth in check, or it could unveil any number of pay-per-use schemes (as some other video sites have done). Then the video free-for-all that we've grown to love will come to an end.

That would be unfortunate. Time wasn't wrong: YouTube and its fellow user-contributed sites really did change the world. Too bad nobody could find a way to pay for it.

The banks, Iceland, now Youtube? For fuck's sake!

Bye for now

2009-04-14T10:14:00.002+01:00

Scenery will be away tackling the Dingle Way for the next couple of days. Should I not return by Friday, please raise the alarm.

Tyler Cowen

2009-04-10T12:07:00.002+01:00

Tyler Cowen's blog, Marginal Revolution, is great. He's an economist first, but also a wise man with an huge breadth of knowledge and interests. The blog offers an intelligent take on daily events and a good dose of miscellany. He was interviewed recently:

Eastbound & Down

2009-04-10T00:45:00.002+01:00

Great new comedy on HBO starring Danny McBride. The central character is a washed-up baseball pitcher who lands back in his home town having squandered his talent and money. The opening montage of episode one gives the gist:

Tune

2009-04-09T13:42:00.005+01:00

Belting song with a nice eccentric video.

Rainbow Arabia - Omar K

Hunting swans

2009-04-08T14:38:00.006+01:00

'Ten principles for a black swan-proof world' is a quick, pithy outline of what needs to be done from the brilliant financial theorist Nassim Taleb.

Gillette lemon and lime shaving foam smells fucking fantastic

2009-04-03T16:46:00.002+01:00

Seriously, do yourself a favour.

DOOM

2009-04-03T14:14:00.008+01:00

MF DOOM is now DOOM. His new album's meant to be good. It certainly is if this cracking Thom Yorke remix is anything to go by.

DOOM - Gazillion Ear (Thom Yorke remix)

... Thom Yorke does remixes now??

Hush falls over prison population as Madoff stabs cellmate in the throat

2009-04-03T12:59:00.001+01:00

NEW YORK—Witnesses reported that a tense, grim silence fell over the cafeteria of the Metropolitan Correctional Center Monday as inmate No. 61727-054, Bernard Madoff, repeatedly stabbed a sharpened toothbrush into the jugular vein of his cellmate, Donald Orlando. Facing a life sentence for securities fraud, Madoff, 70, was reportedly restrained by six guards after he nearly decapitated Orlando with a series of vicious, powerful jabs to his throat. "That guy's loco, man," fellow prisoner Luis "Viper" Ortiz said. "Donnie should never have disrespected him. Everyone in here knows you don't cross Mad Dog." Officials would not confirm whether Madoff was responsible for a brutal incident last week in which an inmate was forced to bite down on a shower faucet and then repeatedly kicked in the back of the head.

Ant slaves' murderous rebellions

2009-04-01T15:48:00.004+01:00

From the journal Evolution via Boing Boing:

Humans aren't the only species that have had to deal with the issue of slavery. Some species of ants also abduct the young of others, forcing them into labouring for their new masters. These slave-making ants, like Protomagnathus americanus conduct violent raids on the nests of other species, killing all the adults and larva-napping the brood.

When these youngsters mature, they take on the odour of their abductors and become the servants of the enslaving queen. They take over the jobs of maintaining the colony and caring for its larvae even though they are from another species; they even take part in raids themselves. But like all slave-traders, P.americanus faces rebellions.

Some of its victims (ants from the genus Temnothorax) strike back with murderous larvae. Alexandra Achenbach and Susanne Foitzik from Ludwig Maximillians Universty in Munich found that some of the kidnapped workers don't bow to the whims of their new queen. Once they have matured, they start killing the pupae of their captors, destroying as many as two-thirds of the colony's brood.

Ants that are targeted by slave-makers take massive hits to their colonies and they are under intense pressure to resist these marauders. But all the defences discovered so far happen before the raids have been successfully completed. They involve better fighting skills, quicker reaction times when enemies are spotted, hastier escapes and so on.

Some scientists have suggested that strategies like this would be impossible to develop because the enslaved workers are caught in an evolutionary trap. Far away from their own colony, and sterile themselves, there is no way for them to increase their reproductive success. But Achenbach and Foitzik have rejected this idea - their conclusion is that by conducting assassinations within their new home, they severely reduce the slave-makers' numbers and their ability to conduct raids. That safeguards the future of their relatives.

Achenbach and Foitzik collected 88 colonies of the slave-making P.americanus ant that had abducted workers from three species of Temnothorax. They found that the workers clearly care for the larvae, and nearly all of them were raised until their pupated. But at that point, the slaves' behaviour changed dramatically, taking on a more homicidal bent.

Two-thirds of pupae died before they hatched. The mortality rate was even higher (83%) for pupae containing queens, but very low (3%) for those containing males. The duo saw that the captives were deliberately killing the healthy pupae. In about 30% of cases, as in the photo, the workers would gang up to literally pull the developing ants apart. Another 53% of the pupae were killed by neglect, by workers who moved them out of the nest chamber.

These murders were solely the acts of the slaves. No P.americanus worker ever lifted a mandible against its own pupae. Nor are the deaths a reflection of a generally poor standard of care on the part of Temnothorax. In their own colonies, the majority of pupae hatched, with just 3-10% dying before that happened.

Rugby corner

2009-04-01T11:56:00.007+01:00

Local competitors for your blog dollar Hoge Spot and Chalk Board have posted their Lions XV. Mine's better. Check it!

1. Gethin Jenkins (Wales)
2. Jerry Flannery (Ireland)
3. Euan Murray (Scotland)
4. Donncha O'Callaghan (Ireland)
5. Paul O'Connell (Ireland) (c)
6. Stephen Ferris (Ireland)
7. David Wallace (Ireland)
8. Jamie Heaslip (Ireland)

9. Mike Phillips (Wales)
10. Stephen Jones (Wales)
11. Shane Williams (Wales)
12. Gavin Henson (Wales)
13. Brian O'Driscoll (Ireland)
14. Luke Fitzgerald (Ireland)
15. Lee Byrne (Wales)

16. Andrew Sheridan (England)
17. Rory Best (Ireland)
18. Alun Wyn-Jones (Wales)
19. Martyn Williams (Wales)
20. Dwayne Peel (Wales)
21. James Hook (Wales)
22. Delon Armitage (England)

The key will be having the courage to pick the back five of the Irish pack en masse. O'Callaghan, though an inferior all-round second row to Wyn-Jones, is a perfect foil for O'Connell as a tough-nut, hard-working 2 jumper. Ferris is a must if you want a physical specimen to go toe-to-toe with Spies, Burger etc. For the same reason Wallace wins out over Williams. Heaslip is the form no.8, and his soft hands round out the back row nicely.

Compromises have been made at half-back. Phillips isnt having his best season, returning as he is from injury, but then neither is Blair or Peel. Phillips gets the nod for his bulk. Jones is the only reasonable option at 10 with O'Gara out of sorts. Hook is yet another player having an off year but he's capable of changing a game and makes a better option in that role than the erratic Cipriani, so he gets the bench slot.

The other selections to deviate from predictability are Henson at 12 and Fitzgerald on the right wing. A fit Henson is head-and-shoulders above the competition for 12 in my opinion, even stronger than Shanklin with world class passing and a huge boot. Fitzgerald is accommodated on the right. He's not excessively left-sided from his years playing at full back and centre, so I wouldnt expect the switch to cause problems, and I think a player of his class will excel in the company of Byrne, Henson and Williams. Bowe unlucky to miss out.

O'Connell for captain needs no explanation.

Thoughts?

Cover letter

2009-04-01T00:05:00.000+01:00

More along these lines here.

To: Human Resources
Re: Radiographer Position

Thank you for taking the time to consider me for the position of Radiographer with your company. The first time I ever saw an X-Ray machine, I was coming through customs, with my dad. I must have been eight years old at the time, and the customs official put my teddy bear through the machine just like my mom said he would.

He took the whole family into this little room, and my dad told him "We can do this the easy way or the hard way," and the official laughed and patted the gun on his side.

"Oh yeah?" he said, and my dad just nodded, real slow.

"The easy way," my dad said, "is I knife you."

Later on, when I was in my first year of university, I lived with a friend named Jeff. When I found myself covering Jeff's rent money, my mom took me aside to tell me "Never lend money to a friend, because you lose both the money and the friend," but my father told her to mind her own business. He said "Let him make his own mistakes, Karen,"

After three months of covering his rent, I was out of money and desperate. Week after week Jeff kept telling me that he'd pay me when he had the money to spare, and I didn't know what to do. When I called my father, he told me exactly what had to be done. His voice was quiet and calm. I woke up early the next morning, and went into Jeff's room, where he was sleeping. I carefully set a phonebook on his stomach, open halfway, and then I took a hammer to him.

Waiting for the taxi to take us to the hospital, I told him, "We can do this the easy way, or the hard way," and Jeff just stared at me, clutching his stomach, tears on his face. "The easy way," I told him, "is I knife you. The hard way, is you start giving me straight answers about my money, and we can work on rebuilding the trust that is essential to our friendship,"

At the hospital I watched as the doctors X-Rayed him, looking for internal damage. I thought to myself, "This is a cushy job. All you have to do is push a button, and, from time to time, keep your god damned mouth shut." I decided that I wanted to be a radiographer.

Joey Comeau

Gruesome

2009-03-31T01:25:00.003+01:00

Scientists film HIV spreading for the first time. Reminds me of a big cat killing a gazelle or something.

Playing a Blinder

2009-03-30T20:46:00.004+01:00

Alan Blinder is a noted economist. He does a great run-through of "who dropped the ball" in the financial muck.