Mostly, I Write
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Storie e pensieri suoi e di altri, raccolti da Antonio Dini http://www.antoniodini.com
Per contatti su Telegram: @antoniodini
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Io ho il terrore degli insetti in generale e di api e vespe in particolare. In più soffro di vertigini in modo patologico: non riesco neanche a salire in barca perché penso che il mare sia in realtà solo un abisso velato dall'acqua in cui precipitare. Salire sulla sedia per cambiare una lampadina è al di là delle mie possibilità. Preferisco il dentista.

Per questo solo l'idea che in Nepal ci siano "cacciatori di miele himalaiano" che vengono quasi ammazzati dalle punture mentre si ciondolano sull'abisso per prendere miele e cera dalle arnie mi azzera la mente e vedo solo colori pulsanti mentre vorrei riuscire a dimenticarmi che esiste il mondo, soprattutto il Nepal.

Poi però penso al potere psicotropo di alcuni di questi mieli e capisco che la motivazione in effetti si può anche apprezzare... però, mamma mia lo stesso!

Money quote: "Himalayan honeybees make several types of honey depending on the season and the elevation of the flowers that produce the nectar they eat. The psychotropic effects of the spring honey result from toxins found in the flowers of massive rhododendron trees, whose bright pink, red, and white blossoms bloom each March and April on north-facing hillsides throughout the Hongu Valley. The Kulung people of eastern Nepal have used the honey for centuries as a cough syrup and an antiseptic, and the beeswax has found its way into workshops in the alleys of Kathmandu, where it is used to cast bronze statues of gods and goddesses."

http://www.nationalgeographic.com/magazine/2017/07/honey-hunters-bees-climbing-nepal/
Confessioni di un programmatore di app: cosa si impara se la tua app viene scaricata sei milioni di volte?

Money quote: "I’ve read a bunch of blogs recently about people that hit the jackpot, got their app featured, and were looking at figures like 100,000 downloads a day. In comparison, I’ve only been moderately successful. Class Timetable has never made the App Store #1 position, I didn’t become rich overnight, and I’ve failed more times than I’ve succeeded. I’ve invested a lot of time, probably thousands of hours all up, unlike some hit apps that were created in a weekend. Sure, three million downloads is a lot, but that’s happened over more than six years."

http://jordansmith.io/lessons-ive-learned-from-three-million-downloads/
Siete tutti attivisti, fissati con le cose più estreme, e se non avete niente da nascondere perché proteggere i terroristi?

La retorica è questa, ma il ragionamento è in realtà molto più complesso. Perché dobbiamo proteggere i nostri dati e soprattutto i metadati?

Money quote:

"We protect ourselves and the people we care about, not against the government, but the possibility of government. We don't speak unless we have an attorney present. We plead the fifth.

We encrypt our data.

Smarter people before us have understood the unstoppable nature of government power, and have put in provisions such as separations of power and the Miranda rights precisely for this reason.

And today, smart people advocate endlessly for the encryption of your data as a form of self-protection. With anti-privacy legislation being signed today with a flick of a pen, it's more important than ever to understand that even metadata can and will be used against you. And, in the court of law, even if you have nothing to hide, or are fully innocent, you are still advised and even required to have a lawyer present before you can testify. Why? Because history."

https://standardnotes.org/blog/4/metadata-is-the-data
Addio al celibato o party per il divorzio? È la nuova frontiera: si va sempre nel locale degli spogliarelli, ma non per festeggiare l’ultima sera da uomini liberi, bensì per riaprire una vita da scapoli impenitenti. Ma cosa distingue un party dall’altro?

Money quote: “[Aguilar] adds that there are also some parties that don’t fit into either category. Once, for example, he took a couple out immediately after their quickie wedding ceremony. They said they wanted to go to a strip club. At first, everything was fine. The new wife bought her new husband lap dances and cheered on the strippers as they performed. But when he disappeared to the private VIP section without her, things took a turn for the worse. She hunted him down, threw a drink in his face, screamed about his tiny dick and then blurted out: “I want a divorce!!!!!”

Aguilar still can’t figure out if this qualifies as a wedding reception or a divorce party.”

https://melmagazine.com/scenes-from-a-divorce-party-9e7bf5c0625e
Com'è e come va Firenze Rocks nel nuovo spazio Visarno Arena? Nella mia città natale come sempre si riesce a mescolare buone iniziative con furbate piccine piccine.

Money quote: "Il venerdì erano stati Aerosmith e Placebo ad aprire le danze, nella steppa della Visarno Arena. La posizione centrale e ben servita dai mezzi, a sole due fermate di tramvia dalla stazione Santa Maria Novella, rende la location sicuramente interessante per il futuro, e non solo per i fiorentini. Ma un grande festival ha bisogno di spazi dove ripararsi dal sole e dove svaccarsi per ore, i prossimi mesi dovranno servire a migliorare questo aspetto. Oltre che di navette che permettano a chi ha problemi di mobilità di arrivare agli ingressi. I bar tornano ad essere un problema, non dissimile da quello che è stato per gli Idays: code lunghissime, spine insufficienti per l’afflusso di persone, i Token come unica moneta interna. E come a Monza anche a Firenze la fastidiosa dimensione minima d’acquisto di 5 Token, non rimborsabili né utilizzabili i giorni seguenti"

http://www.radiopopolare.it/2017/06/ottimi-i-concerti-ma-lorganizzazione/
Alcune cose interessanti da sapere sul giorno dell’Indipendenza americana

Money quote: “Americans have been celebrating independence from British rule on July 4 for more than two centuries, but a more accurate date to celebrate may actually be July 2.

While Congress formally adopted the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776, it made the formal call for freedom on July 2. The Declaration of Independence became official only on Aug. 2, 1776, after members of Congress signed the document, according to the National Archives.”


http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/six-things-you-didn-t-know-about-fourth-july-n779331

E poi, qualche numero (perché agli statunitensi i numeri piacciono, in omaggio al neopragmatismo quantitativista)

Money quote:
“150 million
Number of hot dogs eaten on the Fourth of July. According to the National Hot Dog and Sausage Council, that's enough hot dogs to make a line from Washington, D.C., to Los Angeles more than five times.”

http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/how-many-hot-dogs-do-americans-eat-on-the-4th-of-july-and-other-independence-day-numbers/article/2627577

E se poi avete voglia di guardarvi un “bel film patriottico” (per l’Indipendenza americana, non per il Risorgimento nostrano, non ci sbagliamo) eccone qui ben 15, a partire da “The Patriot” di Mel Gibson.

Money quote: “While there’s no shortage of patriotic programming, there is certainly a handful of movies and TV shows that stand ahead of the pack in terms of quality and entertainment value.
Here’s a list of 15 patriotic movies and TV shows that you can watch on your day off.”

http://www.cleveland.com/entertainment/index.ssf/2017/07/15_patriotic_movies_and_tv_sho.html
Un Paese che non è normale, convinto del suo eccezionalissimo e manifesto destino

Money quote: "By definition, America can’t be a normal nation. It stands for more than getting and keeping. Its greatness is a greatness of spirit. And its failures — such as slavery, segregation and the shameful treatment of Native Americans — are not only legal but also spiritual failures. They are blasphemy against our country’s creed."

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/america-isnt-a-normal-country/2017/07/03/5e6b82a0-6024-11e7-a4f7-af34fc1d9d39_story.html
🙋🏽‍♂️💰#Migranti #Welfare
“Bisogna dire la verità agli italiani: senza immigrati l’Inps crollerebbe. Chiudere le frontiere significherebbe una manovra economica in più ogni anno. Se i flussi di entrata dovessero azzerarsi, avremmo per i prossimi 22 anni 73 miliardi in meno di entrate contributive e 35 miliardi in meno di prestazioni sociali destinate a immigrati, con un saldo netto negativo di 38 miliardi per le casse dell’Inps”.
Queste le parole pronunciate dal presidente dell’Inps, Tito Boeri, durante la presentazione del rapporto annuale dell’Istituto avvenuta ieri a Montecitorio. Ecco una di quelle notizie che dovrebbero campeggiare sulle prime pagine di tg e giornali. Pregiudizi, stereotipi, fake news si combattono anche e soprattutto con una informazione corretta.
Un documentario svedese su New York girato nel 1911 è una eccezionale testimonianza della vita nella Grande Mela prima della Prima guerra mondiale

Money quote: "Produced only three years before the outbreak of World War I, the everyday life of the city recorded here—street traffic, people going about their business—has a casual, almost pastoral quality that differs from the modernist perspective of later city-symphony films like Paul Strand and Charles Sheeler’s Manhatta (1921). Take note of the surprising and remarkably timeless expression of boredom exhibited by a young girl filmed as she was chauffeured down Fifth Avenue in the front seat of a convertible limousine."

https://www.moma.org/calendar/exhibitions/3858?locale=en
L'odorato come chiave per la memoria. Discorso scientifico e non banalmente appoggiato sulla madaleine di Proust.

Money quote: "he first attempt to empirically disentangle the Proustian effect was published in 1984. Researchers at Duke University in North Carolina performed two experiments in which autobiographical memories evoked by odours were compared with those evoked by photographs or words. The research showed that odour memories were less frequently reminisced upon, prior to the experiment, than those cued by the other sensory modalities. So, it seemed that (as could be inferred from Proust’s narrator) odour-induced memories were relatively novel and remote: that’s perhaps why actively seeking out such experiences does little to recreate the effect"

https://aeon.co/essays/how-exactly-does-smell-unlock-buried-memories-from-the-past
Fake news o l'antica legge del contrappasso? A patire di più gli effetti del riscaldamento globale sarà l'America che ha votato il negazionista Donald Trump

Money quote: "The study, published Thursday in Science, simulates the costs of global warming in excruciating detail, modeling every day of weather in every U.S. county during the 21st century. It finds enormous disparities in how rising temperatures will affect American communities: Texas, Florida, and the Deep South will bleed income in the broiling heat, while some chillier northern states gain moderate benefits"

https://www.citylab.com/environment/2017/06/the-american-south-will-bear-the-worst-of-climate-changes-costs/532392/
La Stampa questa mattina ha un bel montaggio sull'acqua. Gli sperperi dell'acqua pubblico-privata (il referendum ve lo ricordate? Ne fu campione Stefano Rodotà, da poco scomparso, ma il portato del voto è stato praticamente azzerato in sede esecutiva) ma anche un più complessivo discorso per quanto riguarda la resilienza richiesta adesso per costruire risposte alla crisi montante dell'acqua, che nei prossimi decenni ci travolgerà se non costruiamo adesso una risposta. Molto interessante.

Moneyt quote: "E poi un grande investimento culturale e politico per prevenire i conflitti, che inevitabilmente sorgeranno quando l’acqua sarà meno abbondante e tutti la pretenderanno. Si chiama resilienza e bisogna costruirla prima dell’emergenza, dopo sarà tardi. "

Qui il commento di Luca Mercalli sugli effetti e le conseguenze dle riscaldamento globale:

http://www.lastampa.it/2017/07/07/scienza/ambiente/sempre-pi-scarso-e-inquinato-cos-loro-blu-scatener-i-conflitti-kr99TmzsdbK01hfjMt0o5I/pagina.html

E qui invece l'inchiesta sulle "quattro sorelle" dell'acqua nostrana: Acea, Hera, Iren e A2a

http://www.lastampa.it/2017/07/07/scienza/ambiente/focus/le-quattro-sorelle-dellacqua-ecco-i-padroni-dei-rubinetti-italiani-IT6QgaAqBQ81mvga1ULv9K/pagina.html
Se volete che il vostro cervello cominci a urlare e non la smetta più, probabilmente per sempre, leggete questo pezzo. E chiedetevi chi siamo veramente e quale sia il nostro posto in questo pianeta, almeno per la durata delle nostre (brevi e scontate) vite.

Money quote: "Rewards were smaller a half century ago, but there was just as much entrepreneurship. What can I possibly have done in the seven years that I’ve been accumulating stuff to justify rewarding me and my successors with a perpetually growing stream of work-free income? In short, nothing. I do not exaggerate. I’ve studied the market as an economist and as a political theorist. I’ve lived it as a wage earner and as a business owner. It’s not just me and my wife. It’s how the economy works."

https://www.opendemocracy.net/beyondslavery/karl-widerquist/my-own-private-basic-income
La respirazione volontaria nei delfini e nelle balene, opposta alla nostra che è involontaria, provoca delle conseguenze singolari.

Come dormono senza annegare i delfini e le balene?

Money quote: "When marine mammals sleep and swim at once, they are in a state similar to napping. Young whales and dolphins actually rest, eat and sleep while their mother swims, towing them along in her slipstream--a placement called echelon swimming. At these times, the mother will also sleep on the move. In fact, she cannot stop swimming for the first several weeks of a newborn's life. If she does for any length of time, the calf will begin to sink; it is not born with enough body fat or blubber to float easily."

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-do-whales-and-dolphin/
Forwarded from The Squid
Se vi è piaciuto tipo F•Town, o Serial, beh c'è questo podcast uscito tra febbraio e marzo, Missing Richard Simmons. Dovrebbe interessarvi altrettanto.
La folle vita, piena di folli idee, di Stepan Pachikov, inventore tra le molte altre cose di Evernote

Money quote: "Pachikov had been obsessed with the human brain, and particularly with developing software that would ensure that children go through the essential stages of brain development faster. This, he believes, would make them potentially smarter as they grew. From those questions about the brain came yet another idea: what if you could make a copy of your brain? What if he could develop a system to have your brain backed up? “The idea was that if you die, you could be resurrected, maybe in a few hundred years. It was easy to come to that idea because we can already replicate genes, but when we die, we lose our memory.”"

https://medium.com/taking-note/evernote-founders-impossible-mission-f769b5af8594
Uno sguardo ottimista sulle piattaforme Apple dopo la WWDC del 2017

Money quote: "While the ecosystem might be the most robust right now, we also know how quickly the landscape can change. That is why the importance of how Apple evolves software that takes advantage of their market position is so critical. I believe this WWDC had some incredibly interesting developments in this regard."

https://medium.learningbyshipping.com/wwdc-2017-some-thoughts-3ff3230cdd58
La risposta è Offshore Journalism?

Money quote: "Our understanding of the past will be dramatically hampered by the chunks of content that disappeared from the web. What if a key element of your next leader's biography was deleted from the archive of your country's newspapers?"

http://www.offshorejournalism.com/#/
Nei supermercati si sta consumando un omicidio: lo smartphone sta ammazzando le gomme da masticare...

Money quote: "Longtemps le gros des ventes de chewing-gum s'est fait au niveau des caisses de supermarchés. Un point stratégique, où les clients attendant le passage en caisse se laissaient toujours tenter par les confiseries placées à cet endroit ou en achetaient pour calmer les enfants. Aujourd'hui, tout le monde est plongé dans son smartphone et bien peu nombreux sont ceux qui regardent encore autour d'eux lorsqu'ils font la queue."

https://www.lesechos.fr/industrie-services/conso-distribution/030405772382-le-chewing-gum-victime-des-smartphones-2097169.php