Category: Read

👓 An Open Letter on Why We’re Removing Usernames, Addressed to the Worst Ones We’ve Ever Seen | OKCupid

Read An Open Letter on Why We’re Removing Usernames, Addressed to the Worst Ones We’ve Ever Seen by OkCupid (Medium)
Or best, depending on how you look at it—sorry, DoritoprincessXO What’s in a name? You see, DaddyzPrincess29*, we all have names. Good, noble names that took weeks, perhaps months to choose— from Hannah to Jordan to Lady Bird. And what we’ve discovered is that those names actually work best—better than usernames—when it comes connecting with people. So listen closely laidback___stu, because this applies to you — even if you are straight chilling right now on a basement futon. Ahead of the new year, we’re removing OkCupid usernames. It’s starting with a test group and will soon be rolled out to everyone on OkCupid, so all users will need to update their profiles with what they want their dates to call them. We know, this is tough to hear — especially for StayingPawwsitive, Dootdootledootd0 and Britney__Tears. It’s because, like the recent goodbye we said to AIM screen names, it’s time to keep up with the times. We want you, BigDaddyFlash916, to go by who you are, and not be hidden beneath another layer of mystique. Even if that mystique is crucial to you and your dating life, unicorn__jizz.
A somewhat funny, but very germane take on online identities and usernames.

👓 whitehouse.gov Redesign | inkdroid

Read whitehouse.gov Redesign (inkdroid.org)
TLDR; By “redesign” I actually mean clusterfuck. As of last Thursday 47% of the 315 whitehouse.gov URLs I’ve collected during 2017 are now 404 Not Found
Dollars to donuts this goes down to switching CMSes from Drupal to WordPress–probably because the tech team doesn’t know Drupal, but also doesn’t know how to remap the URLs or to port over any of the data. I’ll bet it’s down more to incompetence than it is being evil, though being evil may be part of it too.

👓 Experiments with Instagram and WordPress | Island in the Net

Read Experiments with Instagram and WordPress by Khürt WilliamsKhürt Williams (islandinthenet.com)
Earlier this year I started using an Adobe Lightroom plugin to export my images directly to Instagram. I also use an Adobe Lightroom to WordPress plugin from Automatt...

👓 “I Have Power”: Is Steve Bannon Running for President? | Vanity Fair

Read “I Have Power”: Is Steve Bannon Running for President? by Gabriel ShermanGabriel Sherman (Vanity Fair)
On a whirlwind tour around the globe, Trump’s former aide and alter ego reveals what really went down in the White House, his unfettered thoughts on Javanka, his complicated relationship with his erstwhile boss—and his own political ambitions.

👓 Everyone Should Have the Right To Bear Mathematical Arms | Slate | Edward Frenkel

Read Don’t Let Economists and Politicians Hack Your Math: Of course kids need to learn algebra by Edward Frenkel (Slate)

Imagine a world in which it is possible for an elite group of hackers to install a “backdoor” not on a personal computer but on the entire U.S. economy. Imagine that they can use it to cryptically raise taxes and slash social benefits at will. Such a scenario may sound far-fetched, but replace “backdoor” with the Consumer Price Index (CPI), and you get a pretty accurate picture of how this arcane economics statistic has been used.

Tax brackets, Social Security, Medicare, and various indexed payments, together affecting tens of millions of Americans, are pegged to the CPI as a measure of inflation. The fiscal cliff deal that the White House and Congress reached a month ago was almost derailed by a proposal to change the formula for the CPI, which Matthew Yglesias characterized as “a sneaky plan to cut Social Security and raise taxes by changing how inflation is calculated.” That plan was scrapped at the last minute. But what most people don’t realize is that something similar had already happened in the past. A new book, The Physics of Wall Streetby James Weatherall, tells that story: In 1996, five economists, known as the Boskin Commission, were tasked with saving the government $1 trillion. They observed that if the CPI were lowered by 1.1 percent, then a $1 trillion could indeed be saved over the coming decade. So what did they do? They proposed a way to alter the formula that would lower the CPI by exactly that amount!

👓 Major update to Micro.blog today | Manton Reece

Read Major update to Micro.blog today by Manton ReeceManton Reece (manton.micro.blog)
Micro.blog is now available to anyone. There’s a limit of 100 new sign-ups each day, so that we can better respond to feedback as the community grows. Thanks so much to the thousands of Kickstarter backers and new users who have helped us improve the platform this year. We’re also rolling out th...

👓 Goodbye – Minimal Reader – A lightweight and minimal RSS feed reader | MnmlRdr

Read Minimal Reader has Shut Down (MnmlRdr)
After announcing this initially in November, it comes with great regret that after 4.5 years of operating, Minimal Reader has indeed shut down and closed its doors on December 15, 2017.

👓 Podcasting models mature and diversify | Nieman Journalism Lab

Read Podcasting models mature and diversify by Catilin ThompsonCatilin Thompson (Nieman Lab)
"When podcasting reaches its potential size, looking more like peak radio penetration thanks to these many new and improved sources of discovery, we'll start to see several revenue models arise to support the diversity of content now possible by untethering the form from RSS."

👓 Help Us Build a Third Culture | Quillette

Read Help Us Build a Third Culture (Quillette)
Last year, an anti-vaccination activist was awarded a PhD from an Australian University. She conducted her thesis in the School of Law, Humanities and the Arts. Her thesis was titled “A critical analysis of the Australian government’s rationale for its vaccination policy”. In it, she argued th...

👓 Republican-led Congress passes sweeping tax bill | NBC

Read Republican-led Congress passes sweeping tax bill (NBC News)
Congress approved a sweeping $1.5 trillion tax bill on Wednesday that slashes rates for corporations, provides new breaks for private businesses and reorganizes the individual tax code.

👓 N.Y. jail program forces families to buy from online vendors that overcharge for basic items sent to inmates | NY Daily News

Read N.Y. jail program forces families to buy from online vendors that overcharge for basic items sent to inmates by Reuven BaluReuven Balu (NY Daily News)

Infuriating inmate advocates, the state Department of Corrections has launched a pilot program that forces visitors to buy supplies for loved ones behind bars from five online vendors that they say overcharge for simple items.

State officials maintain the vendor system — expected to go statewide by fall 2018 — will reduce contraband being smuggled into facilities.

👓 Latest on abc | Peter Woit

Read Latest on abc by Peter Woit (Not Even Wrong)

I’ve seen reports today (see here and here) that indicate that Mochizui’s IUT papers, which are supposed to contain a proof of the abc conjecture, have been accepted by the journal Publications of the RIMS. Some of the sources for this are in Japanese (e.g. this and this) and Google Translate has its limitations, so perhaps Japanese speaking readers can let us know if this is a misunderstanding.

I’ve seen reports today (see here and here) that indicate that Mochizui’s IUT papers, which are supposed to contain a proof of the abc conjecture, have been accepted by the journal Publications of the RIMS. Some of the sources for this are in Japanese (e.g. this and this) and Google Translate has its limitations, so perhaps Japanese speaking readers can let us know if this is a misunderstanding.