This cracks me up. I vividly remember how some of these principles were hammered in a few TV reporting classes. I knew it then and I know it now that I should have listened to my gut feeling. But I did not and my reports were just as formulaic as the above.
1. Felix Salmon on the NYT’s paywall
2. Interview with Eugene Fama - how does he believe what he says is a mystery to me.
3. Sergey Brin on witnessing the devastation in Haiti
4. Why are modern scientists so dull?
5. The truth dogs reveal about evolution
Honorable mention get Avatar (beautiful effects but terrible script), District 9, The Messenger, Up in the Air, Tyson and Star Treck. I have not seen Fantastic Mr. Fox yet but from what I gather it is great. Let me know about my terrible omissions. Then let me shoot them down.
1. What the LHC is really looking for (I can’t stop linking to LHC)
2. A few insights about fast news junkies
4. Reuters.com has a new design. I like it.
5. A Collection of George Soros lectures in Central European University
6. The Biology of B-Movie Monsters
Your flight has an impact. Plane Stupid’s new cinema ad, written and commissioned by creative agency Mother and made by production company Rattling Stick. Director Daniel Kleinman.
You will probably find it either daring or tasteless depending on which side of the green line you stand. The fact is that flying imposes negative externalities on the environment. If this video’s primary objective is to stimulate discussion on the problem it is a hit. However, the group that came up with it seems to be looking at the wrong solution - they want to limit commercial flying in order to reduce its impact on nature. This could hardly work. A much better way to tackle the issue is to invest heavily in research and implementation of better flight technologies that would increase efficiency and reduce emissions.
The discovery presents a great business opportunity. I am looking for a venture capital company to finance moon water extraction, bottling and delivery to earth. Next on the to do list - negotiate with the Michael Jackson estate to license his moonwalk moves for the Super Bowl commercials. This will be a smash hit.
I used to follow Belle de Jour - the diary of a London call girl - back in the days when I was still living in the UK capital. It was titillating and seemed authentic despite the anonymity of the author. The writing was excellent and the subject matter was naturally quite interesting. I was not surprised when the blog won the Guardian best written blog award in 2003. The online success was followed by a few books that proved quite popular (but I never read). However, the identity of the author remained elusive. Until now.
Behold, Belle de Jour is Dr Brooke Magnanti, a PhD in informatics, epidemiology and forensic science. She is a specialist in neurotoxicology and cancer epidemiology currently working at the Bristol Initiative for Research of Child Health. In an interview for the Sunday Times she confirms that she was a call girl for 14 months:
From 2003 to late 2004, Brooke worked as a prostitute via a London escort agency; she started blogging as Belle de Jour — after the Buñuel film starring Catherine Deneuve as a well-to-do housewife who has sex for money because she’s bored — shortly into her career as a call girl, after an incident she thought funny enough to write down.
She charged £300 an hour for her services, of which she got £200. The average appointment lasted two hours; she saw clients two or three times a week, “sometimes less, sometimes a great deal more”. How many men has she slept with for money? “A lot.” Dozens? Hundreds? “I can’t honestly remember,” she says, laughing. “Somewhere between dozens and hundreds.”
1. Deep Thinkers - the more we study dolphins, the brighter they turn out to be
2. Overoptimism
5. Efficient Market Theory and the Crisis
6. How an American soldier is made (in pictures)
Apparently today everyone who goes by Dimitar or some derivative has a name day. I had totally forgotten about it. So when my boss saw me in the morning and headed toward my desk smiling I thought, “Damn, I must be really good at this job if I’d accomplished something praiseworthy even before fully waking up.” Alas, my parents had done the laudable deed by following the naming convention of the day. A bit of a downer.
Here is what wikipedia has on Saint Demetrius of Thessaloniki:
During the Middle Ages, he came to be revered as one of the most important Orthodox military saints, often paired with Saint George. His feast day is 26 October for Christians following the Gregorian calendar and 8 November for Christians following the Julian calendar.
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The earliest written accounts of his life were compiled in the 9th century, although there are earlier images of him, and accounts from the 7th century of his miracles. The biographies have Demetrius as a young man of senatorial family who was run through with spears in around 306 AD in Thessaloniki, during the Christian persecutions of the emperor Diocletian or Galerius, which matches his depiction in the 7th century mosaics.
That is right - I have not one but two name days. But if I remember correctly, as a kid I would have much preferred to have two birthdays instead.
