Tiff Fehr, a Digital Compendium

McSweeney's Lists: Actuarial Tables.

Fri, 06 Nov 2009 12:36:00 -0800

Excellent.

Earthquake hazard mitigation the Iranian way : Highly...

Fri, 06 Nov 2009 12:05:08 -0800

Earthquake hazard mitigation the Iranian way : Highly Allochthonous The Guardian reports:

Plans for a new capital were first drawn up 20 years ago, but officials only gave them serious consideration after the 2003 earthquake that devastated the south-eastern city of Bam and killed an estimated 40,000 people. Experts warn that Tehran sits on at least 100 faultlines - including one nearly 60 miles long - and that many of its buildings would not survive a major quake.

Japanese fishing trawler sunk by giant jellyfish - Telegraph

Thu, 05 Nov 2009 15:31:51 -0800

Japanese fishing trawler sunk by giant jellyfish - Telegraph

ascendingcoherence: 10/31/2009 Family Circus. I would have...

Wed, 04 Nov 2009 18:42:36 -0800

ascendingcoherence:

10/31/2009 Family Circus. I would have clipped it for my “Family Circus Wall of Shame” if I was still keeping that up. Billy, I can’t help but notice you are trick or treating alone. Wonder why?

Better, from Mark Paglia, in McSweeney’s: “Famous Authors Narrate the Funny Pages”

The Family Circus
by William Faulkner

“Incest and miscegenation!” Pa yelled as he entered the room where Billy and Dolly sat. Billy fled through the doorway, too panicked for ratiocination, and wound a peregrinating dotted line around the yard and by P.J., the deaf and dumb youngest brother.

The Recession and the ‘Paradox of Thrift’ - Economix While it...

Wed, 04 Nov 2009 13:07:41 -0800

The Recession and the ‘Paradox of Thrift’ - Economix

While it is conceivable that a few percentage points’ decline in consumption could cause a many-fold reduction in work hours, it seems more likely that the reduced consumer spending was mainly a reaction to layoffs and hours cuts. The roots of this recession go a lot deeper than the paradox of thrift.

ascendingcoherence: Before she traded in the puppies for white...

Wed, 04 Nov 2009 01:53:45 -0800

ascendingcoherence:

Before she traded in the puppies for white diamonds.

Top Web Devs Twitter List by carsonified on Listorious

Tue, 03 Nov 2009 23:53:49 -0800

Top Web Devs Twitter List by carsonified on Listorious:

So many dudes.

Hulu: “Community” credit sketch Love these.

Tue, 03 Nov 2009 22:42:06 -0800

Hulu: “Community” credit sketch Love these.

The Pragmatic Capitalist: Are Leveraged ETFs Dangerous?

Tue, 03 Nov 2009 17:36:04 -0800

The Pragmatic Capitalist: Are Leveraged ETFs Dangerous?

Play the pullback in OctoberHow to avoid being a ‘weak...

Tue, 03 Nov 2009 13:35:00 -0800

Play the pullback in October
How to avoid being a ‘weak hand’
Commentary: Look for cycles where the market offers easy money
[MarketWatch]*

…Will the bull market continue through the month of October? Anyone asking themselves that question might also want to ask a couple of other important questions.

The easy money already has been made. Anyone who is only now considering an investment back into the stock market is late to the game. Smart money investors wait for Johnny-come-lately’s to enter the market again, and then they sell into those weak hands.

Then, the cycle repeats itself when the market declines. The weak hands who bought at the peak end up selling right back to smart money investors when the market troughs. This is the way of the world, this is how Wall Street has always been and unfortunately, it will always be that way. Smaller investors, as a group, will never learn.

Okay, I get it. You don’t have to be…so accurate.

* I dislike MarketWatch’s three-tier headlines and subheads. How about just one accurate headline and some editing?

via www.hewnandhammered.com

Tue, 03 Nov 2009 12:29:09 -0800

via www.hewnandhammered.com

The Lava Project - The Long Now Blog That’s a timestamp...

Tue, 03 Nov 2009 12:27:05 -0800

The Lava Project - The Long Now Blog That’s a timestamp on *lava*. …Naturally I jump way past the point of feasibility to wishing it included a bokode and my camera/phone could pick it up when I photograph the lava field and digitally overlay lava flow timestamps. Sigh.

Ethnographic Study Looks at Gossip in the Workplace [Tierneylab]

Mon, 02 Nov 2009 21:09:56 -0800

Ethnographic Study Looks at Gossip in the Workplace [Tierneylab]

Why millions of brains love (and hate) twitter [Psychology Today]

Mon, 02 Nov 2009 01:04:44 -0800

Why millions of brains love (and hate) twitter [Psychology Today]:

Via @ario on Twitter itself.

The Meaning of Information Technology

Sun, 01 Nov 2009 23:03:48 -0800

The Meaning of Information Technology:

The first commercial computer was the Lyons Electronic Office I and was used in 1951 to perform vast calculations pertaining to the making and consumption of biscuits. You see, after the war, J. Lyons & Co., a popular chain of British tea shops, was confronted with an appetite for pastries so astronomical (which is understandable given years of tedious disputes with Germany), that the human mind was incapable of solving unaided the problem of distributing tea cakes to their customers.

Hidden in this story is the true meaning of all information technology.

Troubling new revelations about Arendt and Heidegger [Ron Rosenbaum - Slate]

Sun, 01 Nov 2009 19:39:00 -0800

Troubling new revelations about Arendt and Heidegger [Ron Rosenbaum - Slate]:

My preferred version of Ron returns in top form.

Monsters and the Moral Imagination [The Chronicle of Higher...

Sun, 01 Nov 2009 19:29:00 -0800

Monsters and the Moral Imagination [The Chronicle of Higher Education]

In our liberal culture, we dramatize the rage of the monstrous creature—and Frankenstein’s is a good example—then scold ourselves and our “intolerant society” for alienating the outcast in the first place. The liberal lesson of monsters is one of tolerance: We must overcome our innate scapegoating, our xenophobic tendencies.

I can’t figure out who first linked this but it is entertaining reading Halloween weekend on a foggy night during a full moon.

"The history of technology is the history of human weakness. The rest of history is what happens once..."

Sun, 01 Nov 2009 16:43:00 -0800

“The history of technology is the history of human weakness. The rest of history is what happens once human weakness has been compensated for, or accepted where it cannot be.
…
It seems plausible that the most significant freedom which artists acquired in the 20th century was not freedom from patronage but the unknown freedom of safely assuming that the public had good eyesight.”

- The Ruricolist: Technology Interesting way to consider technology’s human impact.

Living on $500,000 a Year

Sun, 01 Nov 2009 15:46:17 -0800

Living on $500,000 a Year:

givemesomethingtoread:

What can be learned from Fitzgerald’s tax returns? To start with, his popular reputation as a careless spendthrift is untrue. Fitzgerald was always trying to follow conservative financial principles. Until 1937 he kept a ledger—as if he were a grocer—a meticulous record of his earnings from each short story, play, and novel he sold. The 1929 ledger recorded items as small as royalties of $5.10 from the American edition of The Great Gatsby and $0.34 from the English edition.

RealClimate: An open letter to Steve Levitt

Sat, 31 Oct 2009 14:43:04 -0700

RealClimate: An open letter to Steve Levitt