Pages

Thursday, January 24, 2013

Speedy Times


There are 2 ways to lead a life, 1. Do nothing and suffer the consequences, or 2. Take the responsibility to change it.

"When you're coming to an end, you don't take any comfort in your achievements. What matters is how it went with women and how it went with children. That's what becomes important. The terrible symmetry is that men don't tend to blame themselves--it's always someone else's fault. And women tend to blame themselves. But, then, at the very end, it's the men who start blaming themselves and the women stop blaming themselves. And that's why they're happier."
-Martin Amis (quoted in The Wall Street Journal, Dec. 28, 2012)

This timeline presents significant events and developments in the innovation and management of information and documents from cave paintings (ca 30,000 BC) to the present. To keep recent electronic developments from dominating the listing, only the most significant digital innovations are included. If not us 0- who? If not now – when?

Risk of Failure: A Timeline of Information History Everything That’s Wrong with Political Journalism

So what is the job of a political journalist today? Is it to describe the reality of American politics, as a “straight” reporter would? Or is it to defend reality and its “base” in American politics… more like a fact checker would?

I was alerted to the find by Alec MacGillis of the New Republic. He was exasperated by this brief report in the Washington Post, which appeared at The Fix, the Post’s top political blog. If you don’t know it, The Fix is a reporting and analysis franchise built around the many talents of Chris Cillizza, a star reporter and key presence on its most important beat: national politics. The Fix is a group blog now; the item in question carried the byline of political reporter Aaron Blake. It’s a 700-word analysis of a Mitt Romney ad that twisted some words of Obama’s into a claim that could be more easily attacked:

Covering Wicked Problems; Vienna my boss in July 1980 Karel Schwarzenberg [THE crisis-ridden Immigration Department is poorly managed, its workers mistrust each other and its executives' financial illiteracy poses serious risks, an independent review has warned. Risk of Failure; Over the past two years, Aaron was forced to devote much of his energy and resources to fighting a relentless and unjust felony prosecution brought by Justice Department attorneys in Massachusett Aaron's tragedy also shines a spotlight on a couple profound flaws of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act ]

• · Both ancient philosophy and modern psychology suggest that darker thoughts can make us happier The Power of Negative Thinking ; [L]et’s all be clear that there is in fact loads of misery in the post-law-school world. There are literally tens of thousands of recent law-school graduates who made six-figure investments in their legal educations, many of them incurring huge nondischargeable loans to do so, who cannot find full-time, long-term employment making any substantial use of what they paid so dearly in time and treasure to acquire. Still More on What Matters Most (Or, A Guided Tour of Pandaemonium) ; Churches and pews

• · · Cornell University Announces world’s largest natural sound archive goes digital Amazing Wildlife Sounds For All Ears ; The cardiologists who think you don't drink enough Doctors Alljoy: The Old Beer Club

• · · · Navigating the Internet requires using addresses and corresponding names that identify the location of individual computers. Internet Domain Names; Some see it as amazing progress, others total madness, but there's no stopping the march of modern day living into the moment. Speedy Times; Super in US and Oz

• · · · · Commentary - the Brett Caine writing in Forbes: "We have become a society that communicates and shares just about everything we do, with one notable exception – work. Work is the place where social firewalls go up when they really should come down. After all, our teams are about teamwork. Evolving workplace extends to home and beyond ; For the most part, criminality comes to no good. The revenge story has become his favourite kind of narrative, though it isn’t only his characters who are righting wrong. Kill Bill is about a woman taking bloody revenge on her abusive ex; Inglourious Basterds is about Jews taking bloody revenge on Nazis; his latest, Django Unchained, an Oscar nominee for best picture, is about a former slave taking bloody revenge on slaveowners. Tarantino unchained - So postmodern it’s criminal ; She plays the wife of bounty hunter and former slave Django (Jamie Foxx) Scandal Sheets

• · · · · · I think that I may be the voice of my iron curtain generation. In the hottest year of the Chinese zodiac Enter the Dragons; Taxation in the Bible