Tuesday, June 06, 2017

Tax Reform in Smart Cities: Making a Killing


Find a few interesting facts inside a bold new paper, Optimizing Criminal Behavior and the Disutility of Prison. The authors, Mastrobuoni„ and Rivers, use extensive data on bank robberies to model bank robbery as a second by second optimization problem ... The Modern Bank Robberies in 2017 in Melbourne Fake Passports and foreign syndicates

Rising prices and rising power. 
Wotif Travel.com and Expedia paid tax?  WhatIf

Story image for tax Ato from The Australian Financial ReviewATO anticipates $4 billion pay day


First home buyers need 40 years' worth of savings for a Sydney deposit: UBS






EU Commission Report (CCCTB) - Modelling corporate tax reform in the EU: New calibration and simulations with the CORTAX model 



The murder of a young Democratic National Committee staffer became a story that conservative conspiracy theorists love to share. The Washington Post examines that story's life span while FactCheck.org critiques former U.S. House Speaker Newt Gingrich's role in its dissemination. And Fox News retracts its story but vows to "continue to investigate."  

Hilarious Winners of the First Annual ‘Comedy Wildlife Photography Awards’ – FLOW ART STATION


The Digital Transformation Agency has created a special section on its Digital Marketplace for local governments to seek the high-tech products and expertise they need for smart city projects. Smart Cities





Angela Merkel shows how the leader of the free world should act Guardian (furzy). When Merkel’s the best in the show, you know things are bad. Very bad.

Angela Merkel, Donald Trump and the end of the west FT. Gideon Rachman disagrees and thinks Merkel’s blundered: “The final flaw in Ms Merkel’s approach is that it displayed an uncharacteristic deafness to the echoes of history. One of the truly impressive things about modern Germany is that, more than any other country I can think of, it has thought hard about the lessons of history, and learnt them with thoroughness and humility. So it is baffling that a German leader could stand in a beer-tent in Bavaria and announce a separation from Britain and the US while bracketing those two countries with Russia. The historical resonances should be chilling.”

There Is Only One Subject

 

Sydney socialising loses and privatising profits 

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There will be cats. Murakami novels feature felines, detective heroes, and creepy sex. Readers are so hooked on the formula that the variations hardly matter Formula UNO Making A Killing 


What Makes A Good Conductor?


Angel Gil-Ordóñez: “Authority through knowledge. People respect you if you know what you are asking them to do. Then you have to be able to convey what you want. All simply. Through gestures and communication that goes beyond language. I think the orchestra is the most extraordinary achievement of humanity. Can you imagine something more sophisticated than that? One hundred people without verbal communication playing together for one hour? That goes beyond everything. Beyond thinking. To me [it] is the most incredible achievement. People making music together. It’s a miracle.”


Climate Feedback scored two corrections in relatively quick succession. First, the Daily Wire updated the most inaccurate parts of an article downplaying climate change, then Think Progress removed references to a "runaway feedback" that thawing permafrost was alleged to have.


A look at the mandates, tasks and competences of Israel’s cybersecurity measures and institutions finds the country at the forefront of transparency, innovation and investment in digital security infrastructure. The report, by Deborah Housen-Couriel for the NATO Cooperative Cyber Defence Centre of Excellence, is part of a series on national organizational models for ensuring cybersecurity. With widespread broadband penetration and Internet utilization, Israel offers many platforms for intra-governmental activity, government-to-citizen and citizen-to-government fora, and the infrastructure for provision of services to the public. Supporting this are secure portal and biometric data initiatives. With an online-savvy population and the challenges of military and civilian threats, Israel launched a National Cyber Bureau and National Cyber Security Authority (together constituting the National Cyber Directorate and operating under the prime minister’s office) as a national advisory and consolidating body for cybersecurity, while the Israeli Defense Forces approaches cyberspace as a military realm.


Complementary strengths and weaknesses can noticeably boost productivity when two people are seated near each other — or increase the chance of both being fired. Fascinating new research says the right combinations can increase productivity and effectiveness by a decent margin. Seat of Power


(1) Summer beach reading: three — yes, three — new books about post-truth.  (2) An editor tells readers that mistakes in his newspaper are due to "long hours and a short staff."  (3) Wikipedia's founder says the Daily Mail has mastered one thing: "running stories that aren't true." (4) Fake newsies don't care about the partisan divide. (5) Global Fact 4 is coming. Registrations are closed, but here's the provisional agenda and participants list. (6) The South African minister of communications says "fake news is a symptom of a much larger malaise."  (7) Try this "Factitious" game with your readers and students. (8) Most people don't think "the media" are accurate — unless it's "the media" they personally use. Read API's report on "my media vs. the media." (9) Is Scottsdale, Ariz., a hub for fake news sites? (10) For Africa Day, Africa Check gives factual answers to the five most Googled search questions on the continent. (11) Is this Italy's Comet Ping Pong? (12) In a TedX talk, Lupa's director calls for an "army of fact-checkers." 

The five best laptops your money can buy, just in time for tax rebates - Opinion piece on the five best laptops in time for tax year-end deductions