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The Rise and Fall of the Manufactured Home – Part I
A recurring theme of this newsletter is the failure of prefabrication (building homes in factories instead of on-site) to revolutionize the housing industry.
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Why Pessimism Sounds Smart
Optimism requires believing in an unknown, unproven future
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T-Mobile USA doesn't comply with its German parent company’s GDPR policies
The Practical Nomad: Edward Hasbrouck's blog
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Lockdown: The coming war on general-purpose computing (2012)
This article is based on a keynote speech to the Chaos Computer Congress in Berlin, Dec. 2011.
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SAT score distributions in Michigan
The state of Michigan required all public HS seniors to take the SAT last year (~91k out of ~107k total seniors in the state). This generate...
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I finally got Twitter after years of not getting it
I finally got Twitter after years of not getting it. Here's what I know.
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Some discouraging anecdotes on how services handle account deletions
I asked 124 services to delete my user account. The results were mixed. 21 never responded, and 16 responded by created even more accounts. Some outright lied.
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Walking Tokyo for Seven Days
A pop-up newsletter running from August 15-21, 2022
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Inflation, part 1: On shelter futures
A deep-dive
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World military expenditure passes $2T for first time
(Stockholm, 25 April 2022) Total global military expenditure increased by 0.7 per cent in real terms in 2021, to reach $2113 billion. The five largest spenders in 2021 were the United States, China, India, the United Kingdom and Russia, together accounting for 62 per cent of expenditure, according to new data on…
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What Le Corbusier got right about office space
A century ago, the father of modern architecture, Le Corbusier, was commissioned by a French industrialist to design some homes for factory workers near Bordeaux. The resulting development, Cité Fr…
704
What the Hell Is Up with Dilbert?
The normally innocuous workplace comic strip is arguably trying to get itself canceled after three decades in syndication. But why?
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Computers are an oppressive technology
This may seem a strange heading for someone whose career is in computers, yet I feel that this article has been a lifetime in the making. It is the product of intuitive observations and things that have stood out to me, even as a child, who even then could sense the sinister side of the most banal of technologies.
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The fake artists problem on streaming platforms
Recent revelations from an alleged industry insider paint a disturbing picture
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How do poor countries get rich?
An overview of 4 theories
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'Zero trust’ security is a poor choice of words
Consider the user's perspective when naming a security initiative
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EU DSA: Industry and government interests prevail over citizens’ digital rights
After 16 hours of discussion, negotiators from the European Parliament and EU governments have just made deal on a new EU Digital Services Act. Pirate Party MEP Patrick Breyer sat at the negotiating table as Rapporteur for the Committee on Civil Liberties (LIBE) and summarises: "We were able to p
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There are not enough BTUs
Y'all ready for it?
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Humanity’s broken risk perception is reversing global progress
Human activity and behaviour is contributing to an increasing number of disasters across the world, putting millions of lives and every social and economic gain in danger, warns a new UN report.
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Inflation is differential and restructuring (2021)
When it comes to inflation, economists get it wrong. Inflation is always and everywhere differential.
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Why hasn’t technology disrupted higher education already?
The key question about AI and school is about the past
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Bye, Twitter
Today I’m leaving Twitter, because I don’t like making unpaid contributions to a for-profit publisher whose proprietor is an alt-right troll. But also because it’s probably going to break down. Read on for details.
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“Privacy”.com–Yeah Right
At the behest of a friend of mine, I decided to get myself a Privacy.com account. I filled it out with my personal information, activated the account, and...