Author: Serkadis

Twitter heavy users rejoice, one of the most popular desktop Twitter clients, TweetDeck, has been updated to version 0.33. It’s a pretty big update with a number of new features but also updates under the hood. One of the most visible changes is the new Column Navigator which serves as a quick way of moving between them, especially handy whe… (read more)

The Bespoke Investment Group has been doing an excellent job putting the recent market swoon into perspective.

Their latest chart (via the oil trader’s blog) may be very useful for those looking for a short-term trade. It shows markets haven’t been this oversold — with so many stocks below a one-standard eviation from their 50-day moving average — since the famous March ’09 lows.

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See Also:

• Taleb: Buffett’s Track Record Means Completely Nothing, I Have Proof George Soros Is The True Oracle
• Recent Swoon Obliterates One-Third Of Gains Since Start Of 2009
• If You’re In The Market, You Better Be Familiar With This Surging "Stock"

Article Tags: A Moment Of Clarity

With the science under siege and the politics in disarray, it may fall to civil society to keep this still crucial fight alive

Not depressed yet? This weekend a BBC poll showed a dramatic fall in the number of people who believe warming is happening; carbon markets have ­tumbled; a Guardian survey of over 30 leading figures involved in climate negotiations found almost none who believed a global deal was possible this year; in Australia a man who described climate change as “absolute crap” could soon be prime minister.

Source: guardian.co.uk

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In an ai5000 article next to a studio shot with a stuffed black swan, Nassim Taleb makes it clear he has far more confidence in the investment acumen of George Soros than Warren Buffett.

ai5000:

“I don’t want to spend too much time on Buffett. George Soros has 2 million times more statistical evidence that his results are not chance than Buffett does. Soros is vastly more robust. I am not saying Buffett doesn’t have skill—I’m just saying we don’t have enough evidence to say Buffett isn’t doing it by chance.”

We aren’t so much surprised that someone might consider the role of chance in Warren Buffett’s investment performance, but rather are surprised that George Soros’s track record might be more defensible. We’d be interested to see the data Mr. Taleb is referring to.

(Via CNBC)

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See Also:

• Taleb: "Every Single Human Being" Should Short Treasuries
• Taleb: I’m On A Break From The Internet, So I Can Understand The World Better
• Nassim Taleb: I Can’t Believe I Live In A World Where Bernanke Could Be Reappointed

Filed under: Motorsports, Hirings/Firings/Layoffs

The Triple Crown of Motorsport is an elusive distinction earned by only a handful of drivers in the history of motor racing. It’s elusive partly because it evades definition, but given its immense difficulty, we’ll take the broadest possible: To score the Triple Crown, a driver has to win either the Indianapolis 500 or the Indy/CART title, plus either the Monaco Grand Prix or the F1 drivers’ title and the 24 Hours of Le Mans. Fortunately not in the same year, but over the span of a career.

So far, Graham Hill remains the only one ever to have completed the feat, winning the Indy 500 in 1966, the Monaco GP five times in the ’60s, the F1 title twice in ’62 and ’68, and Le Mans in 1972. (Substitute the Daytona 500 for Le Mans, as some American fans suggest, and AJ Foyt and Mario Andretti would be crowned as well, with Juan Pablo Montoya poised to join them.) Jacques Villeneuve has come within spitting distance, having won the Indy 500 (and the CART title) in 1995, the F1 title two years later, and after leading at Le Mans for several hours in 2008 in the Peugeot 908, finally coming in second behind Audi. But the next winner, if by feat of pure ambition alone, could be Nigel Mansell.

The British driver is one of only a handful to have been crowned champion in both F1 and Indy, alongside Emerson Fittipaldi and the aforementioned Hill, Andretti and Villeneuve. But while Hill, Andretti and Fittipaldi are long since retired, Mansell is back at it. After racing the 1000 Kilometers of Silverstone in the Le Mans Series last year with his up-and-coming racer son Greg, Mansell will be contesting the big prize at La Sarthe this year, the three-man team rounded out by his other son Leo.

They’ll be driving in the top-tier LMP1 category in the same Ginetta-Zytek GZ09S they fielded at Silverstone last year (pictured above), with the brothers campaigning the entire season and the father joining for the headline event. And while Mansell and sons aren’t expecting to win in their first year, they’re in it for the long haul and are targeting an overall win within the next few years. To do that, they’ll have to beat the likes of Audi, Peugeot and Aston Martin with a privateer entry. But if any underdog can do it, their name couldn’t be anything other than Mansell.

[Source: Autosport]

Nigel Mansell going for the Triple Crown at Le Mans with a little help from his sons originally appeared on Autoblog on Tue, 09 Feb 2010 07:58:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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“I’m starting to hear more and more about corporations tinkering with the health insurance they provide for their employees. A lot of the tinkering is related to
the biometrics of the employees…in other words, stuff like body mass index, blood pressure and cholesterol levels.

What the companies will do first is give it a positive spin, sending a message they’re just looking out for the health of their employees. But the next step is actually making your biometric readings part of your job appraisal…because if you cost them too much insurance-wise, they’ll start thinking about cutting you loose and hiring someone younger and thinner.

Think this scenario is far-fetched? Just think about how fast the cost of health insurance is rising in this country.

Wow, aren’t you glad we don’t have the government meddling with our healthcare?”

(You can read J.Marquis daily at Major Conflict)

A bunch of folks sent over Jeff Jarvis’ recent blog post entitled stop selling scarcity, which I actually think is slightly misleading. If you read the details, he’s actually saying that you should very much sell scarcities — but that you should avoid pretending that you’re selling a scarcity when you’re really selling something that it infinitely available:

If you are selling a scarcity — an inventory — of any nonphysical goods today, stop, turn around, and start selling value — outcomes — instead. Or you’re screwed. Apply this rule to many enterprises: advertising, media, content, information, education, consultation, and to some extent, performance.

I have to admit, while I get what he’s saying, I’m not sure it’s particularly useful to most people, because they’ve always thought they were selling “outcomes” in the first place. I think that a similar post by filmmaker Ross Pruden may actually be a lot more useful, in that he talks about selling experiences, which is something that’s scarce:

You think you sell a movie–you do not.
You think you sell a book–you do not.
You think you sell a song–you do not.

You sell an experience, something communicated, something elusive and ephemeral. Something mystical and transformative and inspiring. All these abstract things simply come in the shape of a movie, a book, or a song.

Never before has it been possible to strip away these experiences from the product… until now, the Digital Age.

The Digital Age lets us duplicate products infinitely. And, for the first time in human history, creators are not deprived of their original copy.

From that he points out the simple problem that many folks who were used to the old way are facing:

…now we can read a novel without buying a book.
…now we can watch a movie without buying a movie ticket.
…now we can listen to a song without buying a record.

From there, he lists out a bunch of different scarcities that come up with you separate the experience from the physical product, and notes that this is how things have always worked in reality, it’s just that conceptually we merged the experience with the scarce physical product, which is why it’s often so difficult to separate them conceptually now that they’ve become untied in reality.

The key to the Digital Age is to recognize that many existing products already embed intangibles, which is why those products are still being bought. However, once those tangibles stop being offered, or a competitor offers better intangibles, the customer will go elsewhere.

Creators can sustain. They will sustain. The market wants to sustain creators. Yet only the ones who realize that they don’t sell products, but experiences. Only those creators are the ones worthy of survival in the Digital Age.

This is a great point, and more eloquent than my own post from a few years back on how every “product” was really a mix of scarce and infinite goods. To understand what the technology allows, and how to embrace it in a way that’s sustainable, you need to be able to break out the components, and properly figure out what’s really scarce, and what isn’t.

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Aunque la pretenmporada de la Fórmula 1 ya comenzó hace semanas, aun quedan algunas escuderías que no han presentado su nuevo monoplaza, entre ellas, Force India. Pues bien, hace escasas horas han dado a conocer el VJM03, el monoplaza que usaran en la temporada 2010.

La presentación ha tenido lugar en el Circuito de Jerez y el piloto encargado de estrenar el vehículo ha sido Adrian Sutil. Las principales diferencias con respecto al modelo anterior se encuentran en el morro que ha sido elevado y la eliminación de los alerones situados cerca de los laterales.

Related posts:

1. Force India confirma sus pilotos para la próxima temporada 2010
2. Vitantonio Liuzzi nuevo piloto de la escudería Force India
3. RB6, el nuevo monoplaza de Red Bull

“… A new report by the International Planned Parenthood Federation is advocating that children as young as 10 be given extensive sex education, including an awareness of sex’s pleasures.

The report, “Stand and Deliver,” charges that religious groups, specifically Catholics and Muslims, deny their young access to comprehensive sexual programs and education.

“Young people’s sexuality is still contentious for many religious institutions. Fundamentalist and other religious groups — the Catholic Church and madrasas (Islamic Schools) for example — have imposed tremendous barriers that prevent young people, particularly, from obtaining information and services related to sex and reproduction. Currently, many religious teachings deny the pleasurable and positive aspects of sex.” the report states.

The report demands that children 10 and older be given a “comprehensive sexuality education” by governments, aid organizations and other groups, and that young people should be seen as “sexual beings.” (source)

Does Planned Parenthood realize that just last week two different 11 year olds gave birth and one 9 year old. I don’t know about the Planned Parenthood employees, but I find this beyond disturbing. What possible reason would there ever be to teach a TEN YEAR OLD how pleasurable sex can be…are they also going to teach them that heroin packs a GREAT HIGH once you get by the nausea?

Can we let kids be kids? It’s a PARENT’S JOB to decide when and where a sex talk will take place. My guys are 9 and 11 and we’ve had the sex talk…the basics. We’ve even given them the pithy puberty books that advise pubescent boys to wear baggy pants…but I don’t want some progressive Planned Parenthood syllabus enticing my pre-pubescent son into a situation they think think is no big deal thanks to Roe V. Wade…

The other day I was wondering how close political zeal and mental illness are related. Some things just fit perfectly together –like the rituals of Catholicism and Scrupulosity, higher intelligence and Conservatism…and intense political fervor and mania.

I happened upon a running tab of current events penned by someone that used to comment here once upon a time and it was so clear…so plain…I have no idea how I missed it before. Pure, unadulterated mania. Bi-polar disorder sheathed so translucently in heated political jargon. Passionate for sure, but also too overblown. Too reactionary. Too unmedicated.

It got me to wondering about some of the more reactionary blogs (on both sides of the aisle). The ‘red-meat’ blogs and their authors. The Kos Kids, the Media Matters geeks that sit for hours ‘monitoring’ Glenn Beck and O’Reilly, and all the little blogs where the authors tirade day after day with no comments in return for their trouble.

I love that there are enough people out there that care enough about the State of our Union to sustain a blogosphere (and the cable news channels), but that little tirade I happened across was a good wake up call. A reminder that some days we need to take a step back and enjoy what we have–turn off the PC, shut the laptop, turn off the TV and ditch your newspaper. And breathe. The good fight will still be here when you return.

It’s well known that China has been making huge strategic purchases of commodities in order to support its rapidly growing economy over the coming years.

What’s also interesting is that the country is placing financial bets on these commodities as well.

The nation’s big sovereign wealth fund, the China Investment Corp, has revealed that it’s the No. #4 investor in the US Oil Fund ETF (USO), as well as a major investor in the SPDR Gold Trust (GLD), both of which are the pre-eminent market traded vehicles for their respective commodities.

One theory put forth by an analyst to Bloomberg: these investments are basically a hedge. They know that when they buy into a commodity they push up the price, so these bets allow them to recoup some of that upside.

Of course, if deflation causes commodities to slump, then they’ve got trouble on both ends.

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See Also:

• Hoarding Money Is The Only Way To Impress Women In China
• Reminder: You Can’t Like Brazil If You Don’t Like China
• The West Turns Against China, As Europe Sells Helicopters To Taiwan

Article Tags: Thomas Fuller

For a number of years the most zealous of climate activists acted as though they didn’t need to convince anybody, because they intended to compel everybody to follow their commandments. They also acted as though those commandments were chiseled on stone tablets.

We’ve reached a turning point, where (almost) everyone realizes that the IPCC reports are not holy writ. What happens next does not really depend on skeptics or lukewarmers. It depends on the faithful.

There are climate activists writing today who are pretending Michael Mann has been exonerated (he faces further investigation next month). There are those who are saying that the IPCC reports only have a few mistakes scattered among 6,000 pages of reports. The smarter activists aren’t saying much of anything these days, waiting, as they have in the past, for things to settle down so they can pretend nothing happened at all. I don’t think that’s going to work this time, but it has in the past, so…. you can’t blame them for trying.

What the really smart activist (haven’t seen signs of one… but maybe they’re swamped by the marketing drivel their team puts out) would do right now is to say some very obvious things.

Source: examiner.com

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A V6 Ferrari? That should be one of the signs that the world is coming to an end? Start preparing for Armageddon because according to Ferrari boss Amedeo Felisa, the Italian brand could build V6-engined cars in the future.

When asked about the possibility of a V6 powered Ferrari, Felisa said: “If I had to answer the question a year ago I would have said no, but attitudes are changing and we build cars for customers.”

As for an electric Ferrari, don’t hold your breath.

“If you look at global warming, the right solution is not full electric,” Felisa said. “It’s more a marketing solution than a real one, sound is just as important as design and performance for Ferrari. We will not make engine sounds with speakers.”

– By: Kap Shah

Source: AutoCar

Saqqara Digging Diary Week 4

The beginning of this week brought clouded weather and even a little rain, but then the weather improved and we had a number of days with glorious sunshine and high temperatures. All this helped to make great progress with the fieldwork. The new mud-brick tomb is gradually emerging from the sand, and since last week we have gone down about a full metre over the whole surface of our sondage. But unfortunately, so far the few limestone elements that we can see are all unfinished, undecorated and uninscribed. This goes for the doorjambs of the east entrance into the forecourt, for the jambs of the door into the central chapel, and for a pilaster against the north wall. On top of that, most of the wall revetment seems to have been robbed away.

The new mud-brick tomb is gradually emerging This means, of course, that we are unable to give you the name of the mysterious tomb-owner. The few inscribed fragments of objects dating to the New Kingdom and found in the sand fill of the tomb are not decisive: they may have come from adjacent tombs, and some of them look Ramesside in date whereas we would be tempted to date the tomb itself to the late 18th Dynasty.

Brooklyn Museum

With some great pics.

A view south from the precinct’s north enclosure wall of the whole area where we are now working. At the left are Chapel D and the Taharqa Gate; in the center the paving of the approach to the gate; and in the upper right the two squares we have opened on the high ground west of the gate.

Before I get to the work, I want to welcome back William and Elsie Peck, who arrived this week. Bill has been with the Mut Expedition longer than anyone except me, while Elsie joined us in 1979, which was also Mary’s first year. Bill’s first job this season is to map the new paving west of the Taharqa Gate. Elsie once again has taken on keeping the digging records, beginning with what Mahmoud Abbadi is doing in the corridor south of the Taharqa Gate.

Proyecto Djehuty

Joan ha comenzado topografiando algunos sectores del exterior, especialmente en lo alto del yacimiento, donde está excavando Carlos. En uno de los extremos ha comenzado a salir a la luz un depósito de cerámica de principios de la dinastía XVIII, por lo que decidimos ampliar la cuadrícula de excavación. Un par de horas después, Joan y el mudir se han sumergido en las profundidades del pozo funerario de Djehuty para topografiar en detalle la cámara sepulcral, no sólo la estructura, sino también los detalles más sobresalientes de la decoración y de la disposición del texto, las faltas de estuco y las grietas.

Egyptology News Blog, Andie Byrnes

Wow. Robert Prechter, the Elliot Wave guru sure knows how to get quoted, even if his timing is sometimes a little off.

Speaking to the Society of Technical Analysts in London, according to WSJ, Prechter warned that nowhere will be safe in the coming bear market and that the market is at a “grand, supercycle top.”

We’re not sure exactly what that means, but yeah, it definitely doesn’t sound good.

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See Also:

• Did This Robert Prechter Interview Tank The Market?
• Prechter: Gold To Fall 40% From Here
• Prechter: This Is It, The New Bear Market Has Begun

The Brown Daily Herald (Anna Andreeva)

Anthropodermic books are not all the Hay has to offer by way of eccentric collection pieces, as independent researcher S.J. Wolfe found. Nestled among the John Hay Library’s rare book collections is an 1859 broadside printed on paper made of processed mummy wrappings.

Wolfe, a senior cataloguer and serials specialist at the American Antiquarian Society in Worcester, Mass., is currently working on a comprehensive database of all the Egyptian mummies and mummy parts that remain in the U.S. The database has around 1,249 entries, Wolfe said, and represents about 550 individuals.

Each entry in the database covers 25 categories, including the sex of the mummy, when it was first imported into the U.S. and the museum in which it is currently located. While the database is not currently available online, Wolfe said she hopes to post the information on the Web.

Ten years ago, Wolfe began collecting information on Egyptian mummies imported to the U.S. after coming across references to 19th-century American paper allegedly made of mummy wrappings.

Egyptology News Blog, Andie Byrnes

Google rules online advertising, but there’s one area where it hasn’t made too much inroad, not for lack of trying, display advertising. This is where Yahoo shines, and has always done so, and 2009 was no different. In terms of raw impressions (views), Yahoo had a strong lead in the US with 512 billion impressions. Coming in second, though with a… (read more)

Expedition Magazine

In PDF format.
Tracking East African Cattle Herders from Prehistory to the Present
By Kathleen Ryan, Photography by Jennifer Chiappardi
Expedition Volume 51, Number 3 Winter 2009

Cattle herding, as well as dairying, has long been a staple of the subsistence economy in those areas of sub-Saharan Africa suitable for the survival of cattle: the Sahel region and those parts of eastern and southern Africa at sufficient altitude to be free of the tsetse fly. In the semi-arid parts of this vast area, which are unsuitable for agriculture, herding became the primary food production system.

Cattle herding is attested in northern Africa as early as ca. 9000 BP. On present evidence, its earliest appearance in eastern Africa was between 5,000 and 4,000 years ago. The Laikipia Plateau, in north-central Kenya, has evidence of many early Pastoral Neolithic sites, and for this reason our project is concentrating on that area.
The goals of the Laikipia Regional Survey project are to identify Pastoral Neolithic sites, to investigate the inter-relationship between these early pastoralists and the indigenous Later Stone Age hunter-gatherer groups of the area, and to ascertain (via analysis of fat residues on the sherds) whether dairying was practiced. In addition, our earlier ethnoarchaeological research on the subsistence economy of the Maasai (1990–2002) will provide models of settlement and subsistence strategies against which to assess our archaeological findings in Laikipia.

Egyptology News Blog, Andie Byrnes