Hi everybody. It's Friday. Light the smoking lamp early. Run the cocktail flag up the mizzen before you're under sail. It's noontime somewhere. Bust out the tonsil polish while the sun rides high. Bunk off. Take a mental health day. Slack. Don't kill the job. Make up your mind to procrastinate. Indole.
Read the links first, though.
Get ready for the 'tech alt-right' to gain power and influence in Silicon Valley
The right calls the kind of people who went after Damore by the derogative term “Social Justice Warriors” (SJWs). SJWs hold progressive views on diversity and identify politics and, supposedly, find virtue in harming those with heretical beliefs. Many on the right fear SJWs.
If you've always wondered what a conservative is, and you work in hi-tech, the nice man will tell you in fourth-grade syntax about this rare but terrifying animal.
What fraction of social programmes don’t work?
Education: Of the 90 interventions evaluated in RCTs commissioned by the Institute of Education Sciences (IES) since 2002, approximately 90% were found to have weak or no positive effects.
All of them work just fine, thank you -- if you're running them. Duh.
When Beethoven Met Goethe.
[Beethoven’s] talent amazed me. However, unfortunately, he is an utterly untamed personality, who is not altogether in the wrong if he finds the world detestable, but he thereby does not make it more enjoyable either for himself or others.
That's the best definition of blogging I've seen.
Why Everyone Is Hating on IBM Watson—Including the People Who Helped Make It
Amazon, Apple, Facebook, Google, and Microsoft are all retooling their businesses around the belief that AI and machine learning are the future of the tech industry. IBM is in a more vulnerable position than all those companies. Even though IBM was an AI pioneer it has let its lead slip and damaged its reputation with overhyped marketing. There’s a rising sentiment in from tech and finance experts that, for all the idealism, Watson just can’t deliver on its promises.
IBM should get with the times and appoint a female CEO to straighten out this mess. Oh.
A New Way to Tell Your Airline You Hate It
Two airlines have dipped their wings into the waters of two-way texting. Hawaiian Holdings Inc.’s Hawaiian Airlines is adding the feature while JetBlue Airways Corp. took a stake in a software startup that will allow its call center staff to start texting customers in the coming months.
Listen, iPhone drones. There's only one way to tell your airline you hate it. It has a steering wheel.
Pouncing beasts
Bestiary texts offer animal-lore as a source of allegorical lessons for moral spiritual guidance. The earliest bestiary manuscripts date to the beginning of the 12th century. They were made throughout North-Western Europe, but the genre flourished most in England, eventually declining in popularity in the late 13th and 14th centuries.
I and Pangur Ban my cat, 'tis a like task we are at; hunting mice is his delight, hunting words I sit all night...
How Two Brothers Turned Seven Lines of Code Into a $9.2 Billion Startup
Much of the software that processes the transactions is decades old, and the more modern bits are written by banks, credit card companies, and financial middlemen, none of whom are exactly winning hackathons for elegant coding. In 2010, Patrick and John Collison, brothers from rural Ireland, began to debug this process. Their company, Stripe Inc., built software that businesses could plug into websites and apps to instantly connect with credit card and banking systems and receive payments.
An Irishman, late for an appointment, prays, "Lord, if you give me a parking space, I'll give up Guinness and go to Mass every Sunday." A parking space immediately opens up. The Irishman sticks his head out the window, looks up, and says, "Never mind, I found one."
One Quarter Of Basic Industry Firms’ Debts Are Near Speculative Grade
Of nearly 230 North American chemical, metals and mining, paper, forest products and packaging companies, nearly a quarter are within two notches of the investment-grade/speculative-grade border as of mid-year, but that doesn’t mean it’s time to panic. Donovan writes that the sector should remains strong at least through 2018m, and he doesn’t expect any “crossings’ before 2019.
Debts backed by physical assets are so 20th Century.
Just announced: Applebee’s is closing up to 135 restaurants
In May, the expectation was that between 40 to 60 restaurants would be shuttered in fiscal 2017. No list of the affected locations has been released. Applebee’s says the expected closures will be based on several criteria, including franchisee profitability, operational results and meeting brand quality standards.
As long as Flinger's and Chotchkie's stay open, I don't care. You want to come over and watch Kung Fu?
Trump declares national emergency on opioid abuse
The declaration could help unlock more support and resources to address the drug overdose epidemic, such as additional funding and expanded access to various forms of treatment, and it gives the government more flexibility in waiving rules and restrictions to expedite action.
Perhaps we should declare war on it. You know, a war on drugs.
Man in his 50s is dead after a fight with his girlfriend prompted an hours-long SWAT team standoff at the $14million Pacific Palisades mansion of Joseph Gordon-Levitt's mother in law
The man - who has not been identified - was found dead around 11am when police finally stormed the home. His death ended an hours long standoff that started late Wednesday, when he showed up drunk at the 9,000-square-foot home where his estranged girlfriend lives and the two got into a fight.
It's unclear to me where Kevin Bacon fits into this.
U.S. producer prices record biggest drop in 11 months
Fed Chair Janet Yellen told lawmakers last month that "some special factors" were partly responsible for the low inflation readings. Inflation, which has remained below the U.S. central bank's 2 percent target for five years, is being watched for clues on the timing of the next interest rate increase.
Janet Yellen can't even cause inflation right. Where's Arthur F. Burns when you need him?
Tracked: Aug 13, 09:26