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Category: Health and Science

Midweek links

Published October 12, 2016 6:48 am by Claire
  • Thinking like a government: Desperate Yahoo tries to make it difficult for its fed-up customers to leave. (H/T ML)
  • There’s a new Wikipedia in town. It’s called InfoGalactic: The Planetary Knowledge Core. It’s a fork from Wikipedia that claims not to try to define reality for the user. I’m not exactly sure what that means, but it’s clearly intended as another anti-secret-censorship move.
  • I am not prone to nostalgia. But there was a time, not long ago, when nation-states were actively discussing getting rid of passports and restoring free travel.
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    • Midweek links

    Published October 5, 2016 1:41 am by Claire
  • Niall Ferguson on simplifiers vs complicators and how they can both be big problems in politics and government.
  • What the hell is a “security directive,” anyway? Sounds like something Ayn Rand would make up for her villains to impose. And why would any supposedly private company jump to comply with one? And furtherwhy, after the righteous drubbing the big ‘Net companies took for kissing the NSA’s butt (post Snowden) would Yahoo (and probably others) be so eager to continue osculating stinky feddie posterior?
  • Speaking of security, Bruce Schneier says, “Stop trying to fix the user” and fix the underlying systems. (I think he’s a lot right and a bit wrong, as spotted by his commentors.)
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    • Monday links

    Published September 26, 2016 1:38 am by Claire

    The economy slides closer to that black hole. Confirmation of that unlikely truth: pot users are thinner than contemporaries with similar lifestyles. And confirmation of an unsurprising truth: pot prohibitionists have as much respect for the law and for truth as anti-gunners. Second Amendment sanctuary cities. Imagine it; government actually serving the people and our rights for a change. “For the first time in a generation, Democrats are betting they’re on the winning side of the gun issue.” And they’re sending out Giffords and Kelly as their “majority” representatives to the swing states. There’s not a reason in the world…

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    12 preparedness items you might not strictly need but would be glad to have

    Published September 24, 2016 11:50 am by Claire

    This being the OFFICIAL National Preparedness Month, I’m sure you’ve diligently been working on your preps for the last three-plus weeks. Right? Wait. What’s that, you say? You’ve been working diligently on your preps for lo these many years and you hardly have to concern yourself with some belatedly declared month? Of course! You’re pretty well set by now, right? But everybody’s always lacking something. With that in mind, here are 12 preparedness items you probably don’t strictly need but would be great to have if you don’t already. And yes, these are Amazon Associates links. 1. Can organizers, trackers,…

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    Weekend links

    Published September 10, 2016 5:35 pm by Claire
  • Twenty-nine strategic lessons from people who’ve been there. Business-oriented. But some good lifehacking material there, too. (Tip O’ hat to Shel.)
  • Alan Gura examines the court after Scalia — and explains why the next “conservative” justice may not help save the Second Amendment.
  • John Hinckley is now free to walk among us — as long as we live in the gated community where his mommy resides. I’m no shrink, but Hinckley always came across to me more as a spoiled rich boy throwing a tantrum than an authentic crazy person.
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