I’m an explorer, ok? I get curious about everything and I want to investigate all kinds of stuff.
The New Yorker: Requiem for a Dreamliner? →
Surowiecki’s article does a nice job of synthesizing many of the practical (and emotional) complexities Boeing currently faces. A good introduction article if you have no idea what the heck is going on.
Spurred on by the coolness[1] that Viper007Bond (aka Alex Mills) enabled with his v007.me site-specific URL shortener, I have also implemented a similar functionality, also using YOURLS. a-n-d-r-e-w-f-e-r-g-u-s-o-n-.-n-e-t is 18 characters. I’ve managed to reduce that down to a mere seven (a 61% reduction in effort). http://afdn.me is primarily designed to serve at the short…
Bloomberg: The Largest U.S. Banks Aren’t Really Profitable At All →
This makes me frustrated. No one should ever be “too big to fail”. That’s a poppycock soundbite to maintain the status quo. How do we, as everyday citizens, bring about actual change for things like this?
From www.bloomberg.com:“In other words, the banks occupying the commanding heights of the U.S. financial industry — with almost $9 trillion in assets, more than half the size of the U.S. economy — would just about break even in the absence of corporate welfare. In large part, the profits they report are essentially transfers from taxpayers to their shareholders.[1]”
- Emphasis added [↩]
In my opinion, there are two critical events that must occur when making something happen. The first is you have to choose to decide to do it. This may seem intuitively obvious and perhaps even easy, but I think it’s actually the hardest. Decide comes from the Latin dēcīdō…from dē (“down from”) + caedō (“cut”).…
How to Improve American Presidential Elections in Four Steps →
It’s obviously never as easy as it sounds, but I think there are some good ideas here. In particular, I would be in high favor of amending the Constitution to move our election system to Instant Runoff Voting (or similar) system.
While such a system could be done at the Electoral College level, my opinion is that it would be better to abolish the Electoral College entirely if we moved to an IRV (or similar) system.
via Alex King
The art in assertiveness is to ask strongly for what you want then to let go of it if the answer is No. You tread the fine line between consistent perseverance and the stubborn persistence that can feel to others like abuse. Passive people do not ask for what they want. Aggressive people demand (openly)…
— "How To Be An Adult" by David Richo
Awesome video, well worth the eight and a half minutes. via Devour
Currently, I’ve been laying low with Mononucleosis. I got sick right after the first of the year with what I suspect was the flu. It came and went and then I got really tired. I did the tired thing for a couple of weeks, including a trip to San Diego. Eventually though it got to…