My wife and I have started a practice we call The Friendship Meal. What happens is something like this: we take a person or a couple and invite them to come have dinner with us. It’s almost always a disorienting thing to begin with — we don’t know them, they don’t know us, and everyone’s pretty shy. And sometimes the meals stay there: shyness and lack of connection, we eat and go separate ways. But sometimes that special spark happens, and, all-of-a-sudden, the conversations last for hours. And that makes the risk worth it!
Censorship factories
Workers like Mr. Li show the extremes of that approach — one that controls what more than 800m internet users in China see every day. Beyondsoft employs 4000 workers like Mr. Li at its content reviewing factories. That is up from 200 in 2016. They review and censor content day and night.
NYC Art
Elmhurst Restaurants
It would be easy to characterize Elmhurst as simply Queens’ second, smaller Chinatown after downtown Flushing, or as a bustling Little Bangkok. Strong cases can be made for both, but the dining options here are as diverse as Queens itself. Tibetan dumplings, Venezuelan sandwiches, Indonesian noodles, Malaysian curry, and top-flight Thai can all be had along with some amazing old-school pizza. Herewith, a globe-trotting lineup of Elmhurst’s absolute best restaurants.
Re-Imagining Central Park
The results of the LA+ ICONCOCLAST competition have been published, asking designers to reimagine and redesign New York’s Central Park following a fictional eco-terrorist attack. In total, over 380 designers from 30 countries submitted over 190 designs, culminating in 5 equal winners. Hailing from the UK, USA, China, and Australia, the winning entries ranged from “megastructures to new ecologies and radical ideas for democratizing public space.” Jury chair Richard Weller praised the winners for “how designers can move beyond the status quo of picturesque large parks and embrace the challenges and opportunities of the 21st century.”
Tunisian techno
From cheeky rappers to explosive hardcore punks, we introduce 50 artists sure to make an impact in the coming year
crypto to zero
All the crypto junk heading towards zero is the best climate-related news of 2018.
Raging Rudolph
In its December 16, 1995 episode, MADtv aired “Raging Rudolph”, which also parodied Martin Scorsese’s films. In it, Sam The Snowman narrates in a Joe Pesci-like voice how Rudolph and Hermey got violent Mafia-style revenge on their tormentors. This was followed by 2 sequels: “The Reinfather”, spoofing The Godfather trilogy and “A Pack of Gifts Now”, spoofing Apocalypse Now.
Development expertise
“How do you get better as a software developer?” What does expert performance look like? To facilitate continuous development of their employee’s software development skills, employers should:
- Encourage learning (e.g. training courses, conference attendance, and access to a good analog or digital library)
- Encourage experimentation (e.g. through side projects and by building a work environment that is open to new ideas and technologies)
- Improve information exchange between development teams, departments, and even companies. E.g. lunch and learn sessions, rotation between teams, pairing, mentoring, and code reviews.
- Grant freedom (primarily in the form of less time pressure) to allow developers to invest in learning new technologies or skills.
Amazon Marketplace Fraud
Fascinating article about the many ways Amazon Marketplace sellers sabotage each other and defraud customers.
Defacement: Sellers armed with the accounts of Amazon distributors (sometimes legitimately, sometimes through the black market) can make all manner of changes to a rival’s listings, from changing images to altering text to reclassifying a product into an irrelevant category, like “sex toys.”
Phony fires: Sellers will buy their rival’s product, light it on fire, and post a picture to the reviews, claiming it exploded. Amazon is quick to suspend sellers for safety claims.
Gregor J. Rothfuss 