Archive for the 'Economy' Category
Peak… Sand?
March 26th, 2015Via: Wired: Apart from water and air, humble sand is the natural resource most consumed by human beings. People use more than 40 billion tons of sand and gravel every year. There’s so much demand that riverbeds and beaches around the world are being stripped bare. (Desert sand generally doesn’t work for construction; shaped by […]
“The messengers do talk… They end up asking each other which apps they work for”
March 25th, 2015It’s not Portlandia. Baylandia? Oh yeah, Silicon Valley. Via: Medium: Angel the concierge stands behind a lobby desk at a luxe apartment building in downtown San Francisco, and describes the residents of this imperial, 37-story tower. “Ubers, Squares, a few Twitters,” she says. “A lot of work-from-homers.” And by late afternoon on a Tuesday, they’re […]
Some of Tesla’s Papers Remain Classified by U.S. Government
March 25th, 2015This is from 2013. Via: National Geographic: 5. Many of Tesla’s inventions were classified. When Tesla died in 1943, during World War II, the Office of Alien Property took his belongings, Alcorn said. Most of his things were later released to his family, and many ended up in the Tesla Museum in Belgrade, which opened […]
Amazon Now Wanting to Automate Pick and Pack
March 25th, 2015Via: MIT Technology Review: Robots will use the latest computer-vision and machine-learning algorithms to try to perform the work done by humans in vast fulfillment centers.
47% of American Households Have No Savings
March 24th, 2015Via: Business Insider: This could be the scariest chart in the world, from Deutsche Bank’s Torsten Sløk. Nearly half of American households don’t save any of their money. If it isn’t obvious, this has a broad range of implications. People who don’t save won’t have any buffer should the economy turn and they lose their […]
Wife of Presidential Candidate Ted Cruz Takes Leave from Goldman Sachs
March 24th, 2015Via: Bloomberg: Heidi Cruz, a managing director at Goldman Sachs Group Inc. in Houston, has taken an unpaid leave from her private wealth-management job to help with her husband’s campaign for the U.S. presidency, a person familiar with the matter said. Ted Cruz, 44, a Republican senator from Texas, said on Twitter early Monday morning […]
Technology and Persuasion
March 23rd, 2015Via: MIT Technology Review: The idea that computers, mobile phones, websites, and other technologies could be designed to influence people’s behavior and even attitudes dates back to the early 1990s, when Stanford professor B.?J. Fogg coined the term “persuasive computing” (later broadened to “persuasive technology”). But today many companies have taken that one step further: […]
Cost to Earthquake-Proof L.A.’s Crumbling Pipe System? $15 Billion
March 23rd, 2015Bone dry death trap… I wonder when I first used that term on here to describe where I’m from. Google spits up results from 2007, but I’m almost sure there are earlier ones. Anyway, quick hint about the phrase “mass evacuation”: You won’t want to be a part of that. Mmmkay? Via: Los Angeles Times: […]
The Little “Fighter” That Couldn’t: Moral Hazard and the F-35
March 21st, 2015And next up from the same imbeciles that brought you the F-35: Long Range Strike Bomber. Via: John Q Public: As Air Force senior officials prepare for posture hearings this week with the House and Senate Armed Services Committees, the subject of modernization promises to be front and center. Core to that discussion will almost […]
France Decrees New Commercial Buildings Must Be Partially Covered in Plants or Solar Panels
March 20th, 2015Disclosure: I sell solar power systems in New Zealand. — While I’d be thrilled to see more commercial buildings with plants and solar panels on top of them, I’m not so thrilled with the strong arm legislation used to get there. On the overall scheme of things, green rooftops and solar panel systems would be […]
