Thinking about Pi-Calculus and corporations as automata

Hat-tip Berkan. A great article on cyclic crises etc.

Money quote :

the real growth of the world economy sets long term limits on what kind of return is, on average, feasible. I cannot help feeling that the periodic asset bubbles that we have experienced in various forms reflect an unreasonable pressure in the financial sector to promise returns that in the aggregate cannot be achieved. These promises keep being made, however, and the assets bubbles keep being
encouraged, because the incentive structures that exist inside the financial sector are asymmetric. Managers reap great personal benefits from short term-profits but pay very little personal penalty when the bubble bursts. Moreover because asset bubble bursts affect the entire economy, there is always irresistible political pressure to socialize the losses when they become too threatening.

Dubstep Rave :-)

There's a new Portishead album. Haven't heard it yet, but the obviously cool thing for them to do would be to get lots of dubstep remix action going on, invite Kode9, Space Ape etc. Maybe the way Massive Attack had the Mad Professor do a remix album back in the day.

Update: Got it (or some alleged preview, thanks SoulSeek) Not much sign of dubstep, sadly. Some quite radical sounds and musical arrangements which nevertheless soon become "normal" given the context. Not sure this is Portishead's fault. As Radiohead proved, being a megastar makes whatever you do mainstream.

Quite post-rock, howly in places. Interesting, but totally lost the souly / hip-hop aspect of the first album. Folk-rock-blues wins.

Update 2 : Dead Can Dance, Cocteaus in there too.

UN calls for revolution in food production.

Good Clay Shirky interview with thinking from his latest book.

Hat-tip Rup3rt, Manda Bala the (banned?) documentary about Brazilian corruption is now on BitTorrent.

I seem to remember Joseph_Weizenbaum worrying about this in Computer Power and Human Reason.

Now it's happening ....

Something *very* ethically ... icky ... about it.

Another digital pen

Further warnings that increase in food prices will cause mass hunger.

What are *you* doing to help produce more food and avert this?

Dismal story

Scribe on BBCWii

Remember when I said

keep Googling the term "Chumby Facebook news-feed" for a while until the obvious happens.

?

Thought I'd try it today.

Update : Chumby Social Network following widgets

William Lind flirts with Bush == Hitler thinking. But seems to reject it.

Update : Just noticed this piece is from 2005 ... still interesting but not so much news. ( He ... that's Seitz's fault ;-)

IMF selling some of its gold reserve.

More on Ward Cunningham's Bacteria inspired computing

Update : compare roBlocks

Tempting as it is, Stowe Boyd's "edgelings" is an example of the kind of utopianism that netocracy-theory wants to steer you away from.