Parliamo un sacco di limgue diverse (circa 7mila ad oggi) che dividono le popolazioni del globo in maniera irregolare ed apparentemente arbitraria. Come mai? C'è chi lo sta studiando in maniera sperimentale, giungendo a interessanti risposte.

Money quote: "Undoubtedly, a wide variety of social and environmental factors and processes have contributed to the patterns in language diversity we see across the globe. In some places topography, climate or the density of key natural resources may be more critical; in others the history of warfare, political organization or the subsistence strategies of different groups may play a bigger role in shaping group boundaries and language diversity patterns. What we have established for now is a template for a method that can be used to uncover the different processes at work in each location."

http://nymag.com/scienceofus/2017/07/the-ancient-reasons-why-we-have-so-many-languages.html

Addio facebook. Un programmatore, tra i primi a entrare nel social media, ha cancellato il suo account. Manipolazione, gestione delle emozioni, esperimenti, dipendenza. Altro che problemi di privacy.

Money quote: "Over time, we’ve become hooked on the social validation Facebook (and other services) provide. Before I hit the delete button on my account, one of the last things that kept me on Facebook—after I had largely stopped posting and reading the News Feed—was simply checking my notifications. I unconsciously craved that little hit of happiness one gets when they see, So-and-so liked your post. But that’s not real happiness. It’s an unhealthy addiction".

https://www.blakewatson.com/journal/why-i-left-facebook/

Giovani etero che si prostituiscono con anziani gay. Giappone nascosto.

Money quote: "Explain what Hayami meant about “comforting the souls” of customers.

Japanese men can’t traditionally live openly as homosexuals. Many carry with them a great deal of shame, self-hatred and other negative feelings. So a large portion of what these boys are doing is more than just a sex act, which may only last for five minutes. In these moments — bathing with someone, being held by someone, having them wash their back and stroke their hair — customers are made to feel like everything is okay. That’s a big part of the urisen experience."

https://melmagazine.com/the-straight-male-sex-workers-of-japan-who-sell-their-services-to-gay-men-9c84de2e3f88

David Carson, uno dei più irregolari tra gli eroi della grafica tipografica, contro i vizi del design contemporaneo.

Money quote: "Here, he talks with us about his ongoing hatred of the grid, his continued love affair with QuarkXpress, and why impactful graphic design is more necessary than ever."

https://magenta.as/the-father-of-grunge-typography-calls-out-lazy-design-daae470a685a

Belle immagini dello "hippie trail" scattate nel 1971 da Jack Garofalo, fotografo inviato da Paris Match

Money quote: "In the 1960s and 70s, intrepid European and American naifs were traipsing the backroads of South Asia on an unofficial network of cheap hostels and budget bus fleets known as the Hippie Trail. There they hoped to encounter enough ancient spirituality—and hashish—to inject their bourgeois existence with a trace of meaning"

https://timeline.com/hippie-trail-sexy-photos-87d44de3792

Migliaia di sviluppatori, un miliardo di documenti, 35 milioni di commit. Benvenuti nel repository di tutto, ma proprio tutto il codice di Google. Inchiesta molto molto interessante di ACM.

Money quote: "Early Google employees decided to work with a shared codebase managed through a centralized source control system. This approach has served Google well for more than 16 years, and today the vast majority of Google's software assets continues to be stored in a single, shared repository. Meanwhile, the number of Google software developers has steadily increased, and the size of the Google codebase has grown exponentially (see Figure 1). As a result, the technology used to host the codebase has also evolved significantly"

https://m.cacm.acm.org/magazines/2016/7/204032-why-google-stores-billions-of-lines-of-code-in-a-single-repository/fulltext

Qui ne parlava anche Wired USA

https://www.wired.com/2015/09/google-2-billion-lines-codeand-one-place/

Post-verità: l'America ha perso il capo per le fake news? L'Atlantic ci va giù duro, e racconta in un lungo commento cosa non va e da quanto. Non starà simpatico a molti.

Money quote: "Only a third of us, for instance, don’t believe that the tale of creation in Genesis is the word of God. Only a third strongly disbelieve in telepathy and ghosts. Two-thirds of Americans believe that “angels and demons are active in the world.” More than half say they’re absolutely certain heaven exists, and just as many are sure of the existence of a personal God—not a vague force or universal spirit or higher power, but some guy. A third of us believe not only that global warming is no big deal but that it’s a hoax perpetrated by scientists, the government, and journalists. A third believe that our earliest ancestors were humans just like us; that the government has, in league with the pharmaceutical industry, hidden evidence of natural cancer cures; that extraterrestrials have visited or are visiting Earth. Almost a quarter believe that vaccines cause autism, and that Donald Trump won the popular vote in 2016."

https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2017/09/how-america-lost-its-mind/534231/

Se avete bisogno di qualche wallpaper per il vostro apparecchio, Roger Dean ne mette a disposizione un po'. Chi è Roger Dean? Quello che ha fatto le copertine degli Yes, tra le altre cose.

http://gallery.rogerdean.com/Desktop-Downloads-2-HD/

David Letterman torna in TV per sei episodi di un talk show su Netflix. Il prepensionamento volontario non è stata una buona idea?

Money quote: ""Here's what I have learned, if you retire to spend more time with your family, check with your family first." "

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/live-feed/david-letterman-returning-tv-netflix-talk-show-1027577

Come meglio dimostrare che il capitalismo è il male che non con un gioco? Con il Monopoli, per la precisione. Solo che, come per Madame Bovary, abbiamo preso tutto fischi per fiaschi. E che fiaschi...

Money quote: "The game’s little-known inventor, Elizabeth Magie, would no doubt have made herself go directly to jail if she’d lived to know just how influential today’s twisted version of her game has turned out to be. Why? Because it encourages its players to celebrate exactly the opposite values to those she intended to champion"

https://aeon.co/ideas/monopoly-was-invented-to-demonstrate-the-evils-of-capitalism

Un ottimo Filippo Facci sulle idiozie attorno alle "temperature percepite" e sui trucchetti dei siti meteo (quelli meno seri) per fare più click.

Link: http://bit.ly/2vv5Xg5

Scrivere codice con il portatile. Quale comprare? Beh, spero sviluppiate per il web, e virtualizziate o containerizzato poco, altrimenti sono problemi...

Money quote: "You can write code on most laptops. Yet, your productivity will improve if you use a machine suited to the type of tasks that you perform.

There are different types of development, and various tools are required with each specialization. So, there is no one-size-fits-all approach to buying a development machine."

https://medium.freecodecamp.org/how-to-choose-a-laptop-for-programming-a9e36f8b4cfe

MacBook 12 pollici 2017, la terza volta è la migliore - il mio articolo per La Stampa

http://www.lastampa.it/2017/08/09/tecnologia/prove/macbook-pollici-la-terza-volta-la-migliore-ChWEqGIEpG1UgpTjBa9kiN/pagina.html

Letture estive. L'universo è talmente gigantesco che neanche la fantascienza riesce a catturarne la reale dimensione.

Money quote: "In practice, this means that most science fiction takes place in relatively relatable settings, on a planet or spacecraft. The real challenge is to tie the story to human emotions, and human sizes and timescales, while still capturing the enormous scales of the Universe itself"

https://aeon.co/ideas/our-universe-is-too-vast-for-even-the-most-imaginative-sci-fi

La mia recensione del romanzo di Orfani per Fumettologica

http://www.fumettologica.it/2017/08/ringo-orfani-romanzo-recchioni/

Le conseguenze dell'elettrico. Finisce la corsa all'oro nero, comincia quella alle terre rare e ai minerali pregiati. Non è detto che sia meglio.

Money quote: "Rising Chinese demand for lithium-ion batteries needed for electric vehicles and energy storage is driving significant price gains and an asset boom in Australia, already the world’s largest lithium producer. The fast-developing hub is drawing investment and deals from global producers as well as chemical-to-battery manufacturers in China, the top consumer.

Western Australia has four operations in production and three more major projects being advanced to begin output. Major players are likely to continue to scope for deals in the state to secure supply for the next 20 or 30 years, according to consultant Benchmark Mineral Intelligence."

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-08-06/electric-car-boom-drives-rush-to-mining-s-90-billion-heartland

Tre letture di fantascienza per l’estate 2017 - i miei consigli su Fumettologica

http://www.fumettologica.it/2017/08/libri-fantascienza-estate-2017/

Il test per l'intelligenza emotiva che potrebbe cambiare la vita a molte persone

Money quote: "A few weeks ago, after receiving a 21-page PDF report breaking down my so-called “emotional intelligence,” I did the logical thing and forwarded it to my boyfriend. He glanced at the list of categories on the second page and exclaimed—before reading my results—”Flexibility, uh oh!”"

https://www.fastcompany.com/40434451/this-emotional-intelligence-test-was-so-accurate-it-was-creepy

Internet riuscirà a sopravvivere all Internet of things? Secondo Bruce Schneier, il mio guru per la security, a meno che non intervengano i governi, no.

Money quote: "Our computers and smartphones are as secure as they are because there are teams of security engineers working on the problem. Companies like Microsoft, Apple, and Google spend a lot of time testing their code before it's released, and quickly patch vulnerabilities when they're discovered. Those companies can support such teams because those companies make a huge amount of money, either directly or indirectly, from their software—and, in part, compete on its security. This isn't true of embedded systems like digital video recorders or home routers. Those systems are sold at a much lower margin, and are often built by offshore third parties. The companies involved simply don't have the expertise to make them secure"

https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/ezpq3m/we-need-to-save-the-internet-from-the-internet-of-things

Harold Hering era un maggiore dell'aviazione americana, USAF, e stava completando il corso per fare quello che gira la chiavetta su ordine del Presidente e lancia i missili termonucleari.

Aveva un dubbio: si può discutere l'ordine del Presidente se lui è fuori di testa? (all'epoca Nixon lo era di brutto). Poche settimane dopo il maggiore era un ex militare che faceva il camionista. La domanda era molto vietata.

Money quote: "“I assumed there had to be some sort of checks and balances so that one man couldn’t just on a whim order the launch of nuclear weapons,” Hering, now 81, told Radiolab in a remarkable interview earlier this year."

https://www.washingtonpost.com/amphtml/news/retropolis/wp/2017/08/09/what-if-the-president-ordering-a-nuclear-attack-isnt-sane-a-major-lost-his-job-for-asking/