Tuesday, October 24, 2017

When the revolution eats itself


There are other hints around us that here we are in the Age of Don Trump, Az Nok, Dr Of

“We are what happens when the seemingly unthinkable celebrity rises to power.  Our existence makes my eyes hurt. People are forever thinking that the unthinkable can’t happen.”
“In preparing this memoir, I have stuck to facts except when facts refused to conform with memory, narrative purpose, or the truth as I prefer to understand it.”



An Idiot’s Guide to Running Trump Out of Office Vanity Fair  On the 25th Amendment route.
Without Saying ‘Trump,’ Bush and Obama Deliver Implicit Rebukes NYT. The rehabilitation of George W. Bush continues apace



In attempt to sow fear, Russian trolls paid for self-defense classes for African Americans CNN. Apparently, being whacked by the cops wouldn’t be enough to do that….


Russia Is Using Marxist Strategies, and So Is Trump Cass Sunstein, Bloomberg. Nudge, nudge. Wink, wink. See footnote 1. It’s the best ever. 
  1. (I am giving a brisk summary of some famously complex and ambiguous arguments from both Marx and Lenin.")


    Can Private Entities Censor Speech In The U.S. Without Violating The First Amendment?


    A parishioner can flip off a pastor in church, and that's protected free speech. What if you're an employee, though? "In bars and parlors across the country, the issue of the flag and the anthem are being aired—and one massive misconception is that, because the players are private employees performing in a private venue, the First Amendment doesn’t apply to their protest." … [Read More] 



How “Big Data” Went Bust Slate  “[T]he bigger problem is that the [Big Data] data you have are usually only a proxy for what you really want to know. Big data doesn’t solve that problem—it magnifies it.” And integrating multiple proxies is hard; witness the F-35 helmet debacle, which faced exactly that technical problem.



Search Engine Land, Tom Demers: “…As Kristine Schachinger points out in her excellent article on image optimization, resizing and compressing images can often be the easiest and highest-impact action for speeding up pages on your site




WHEN a revolution happens, the consequences are not obvious straight away. The British referendum on EU membership in June 2016 was seen as a revolt of ordinary people against a globalised elite. The politicians who led the Leave campaign did not seem to expect to win. As wags remarked, they were like “the dog that caught the car”.
This helps to explain the general chaos that has enveloped British policy since the result. The Leave campaign had contained two contradictions. The first was that Britain could have all the advantages of EU membership without the bother of actually belonging; the country could “have its cake and eat it” as Boris Johnson, Leave campaigner and now foreign secretary put it. The second was the split between the free market, Liberal brexiteers, who envisaged Britain as open to the world, and the nativist camp led by Nigel...
Political Risks





What the original government Nudge unit has been up to.
Public sector procurement could benefit from a new feedback tool based on evidence from consumer markets showing that feedback platforms benefit new and smaller companies. (Civil Service World)


CBA takes a quantum leap into quantum computing.
Commonwealth Bank has come together with UNSW and US-based quantum computing & data analytics software company QxBranch to give Australia a leading edge advantage on quantum computing.


The pragmatic case for moving Britain’s capital to Manchester.
"America aside, the countries where right-populists are doing best are those in which elites are concentrated in single geographical enclaves."






Search Engine Land, Tom Demers: “…As Kristine Schachinger points out in her excellent article on image optimization, resizing and compressing images can often be the easiest and highest-impact action for speeding up pages on your site



YVES SAINT LAURENT, Lady Gaga, David Bowie. Some people do not operate by the same rules as everyone else. Might the same be true of companies? Most bosses complain of being slaves to short-term profit targets. Yet a few flout the orthodoxy in flamboyant fashion. Consider Tesla, a maker of electric cars. This year, so far, it has missed its production targets and lost $1.8bn of free cashflow (the money firms generate after capital investment has been subtracted). No matter. If its founder Elon Musk muses aloud about driverless cars and space travel, its shares rise like a rocket—by 66% since the start of January. Tesla is one of a tiny cohort of firms with a licence to lose billions pursuing a dream. The odds of them achieving it are similar to those of aspiring pop stars and couture designers.
Investing today for profits tomorrow is what capitalism is all about. Amazon lost $4bn in 2012-14 while building an empire that now makes money. Nonetheless, it is rare for big companies to...Firms that burn up $1bn a year are sexy but statistically doomed




George Soros Looms Large in Democratic Party Circles and Far Left Groups




Czech president waves mock rifle 'at journalists' during press conference



Moscow journalist in coma after stabbing



China's Communist Party has dismissed allegations of interference and espionage in Australia and New Zealand, insisting that it encourages all Chinese people living overseas to respect the local laws and regulations. A senior Chinese official said the allegation were "totally groundless and extremely irresponsible".


China dismisses allegations of spying and interference in Australia ...


Dewey B Strategic


HALL OF FAME: Since 2011, Jean P. O’Grady has been a voice for the rarely sung but invaluable information professionals in the industry. Emerging technologies have changed the landscape for law librarians; O’Grady’s blog provides guidance on the newest tools available to the profession and on opportunities for librarians to be a driving force for innovation.