Category: Big Picture
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Back from the beautiful Sierra Nevada, it’s clear the world has gone mad
(This post is a week late) My son, his friend and I spent a few days in Yosemite recently, mostly so I could do a practice hike up Mount Dana to get ready for next week’s attempt at Mount Whitney. We camped in Toulumne Meadows, which is way up in the mountains above 8000ft altitude.…
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In other news, Dezinformatsiya has been democratized
Many of the countless mesmerizing stories in the Mitrokhin Archive deals with the KGB’s disinformation campaigns, mostly to sway public opinion in various European countries. We, in the West with upper-case Freedom-of-the-Press were outraged to learn that the press sometimes was printing deliberately falsified information, planted, for money or otherwise, by the KGB. How Could…
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How complex systems fail, or the curious Brexit paralysis
After losing the Brexit vote, prime minister Cameron resigned. That sounds reasonable: he lost and so he resigned. But did you notice that nobody, absolutely nobody, wants to become the next prime minister? Not even senior politicians like Boris Johnson that campaigned in favor of Leave and wanted to be PM for a long time?…
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“World After Capital” Summary
When a Venture Capitalist writes a book “World after Capital“, it might be worth paying attention. If he happens to be a partner at Union Square Ventures in New York, you know it’s going to be good. Here are my notes about his draft book which is available for under a Creative Commons License in…
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The wars between tech firms and governments are beginning
First there was Apple vs. the FBI about decrypting iPhone data. As Snowden put it: The @FBI is creating a world where citizens rely on #Apple to defend their rights, rather than the other way around. https://t.co/vdjB6CuB7k — Edward Snowden (@Snowden) February 17, 2016 Now Microsoft is suing the US Justice department over secrecy orders…