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- The town of Innisfil is looking forward to some very futuristic developments. Global News reports.
- Jeremy Deaton at CityLab reports on how, buffered by the Great Lakes, Buffalo NY may end gaining from climate change.
- The Ottawa chain Bridgehead Coffee has been sold to national chain Second Cup. Global News reports.
- Many of the more eye-raising installations in the Gay Village of Montréal have since been removed. CTV News reports.
- Warming huts for homeless people in Winnipeg were torn down because the builders did not follow procedures. Global News reports.
- Open Democracy looks at innovative new public governance of the city budget in Amsterdam, here.
- Singapore, located in a well-positioned Southeast Asia and with working government, may take over from Hong Kong. Bloomberg View makes the case.
[BLOG] Some Tuesday links
Dec. 3rd, 2019 12:57 pm- Bad Astronomer considers how a stellar-mass black hole of 70 solar masses got so unaccountably huge.
- Alex Tolley at Centauri Dreams considers the colours of photosynthesis, and how they might reveal the existence of life on exoplanets.
- The Dragon's Tales shares some links on humans in the Paleolithic.
- Jonathan Wynn at the Everyday Sociology Blog considers the scripts of jokes.
- Gizmodo reports on the repurposed China-Netherlands radio telescope operating from an orbit above the far side of the Moon.
- JSTOR Daily considers the political rhetoric of declinism.
- Language Log considers the controversy over the future of the apostrophe.
- James Butler at the LRB Blog notes a YouGov prediction of a Conservative majority in the UK and how this prediction is not value-neutral.
- Marginal Revolution shares a paper from India noting how caste identities do affect the labour supply.
- Ursula Lindsay at the NYR Daily considers if the political crisis in Lebanon, a product of economic pressures and sectarianism, might lead to a revolutionary transformation of the country away from sectarian politics.
- Jim Belshaw at Personal Reflections looks at some of the many complicated and intermingled issues of contemporary Australia.
- The Planetary Society Blog reports on the latest projects funded by the ESA.
- Starts With A Bang's Ethan Siegel shares ten beautiful photos taken in 2019 by the Hubble.
- Strange Company reports on the strange unsolved disappearance of Lillian Richey from her Idaho home in 1964.
- Window on Eurasia shares a Russian criticism of the Ukrainian autocephalous church as a sort of papal Protestantism.
- Arnold Zwicky considers the positive potential of homoeros.
Tags:
- astronomy,
- blogs,
- china,
- christianity,
- clash of ideologies,
- crime,
- earth,
- economics,
- english language,
- extraterrestrial life,
- former soviet union,
- futurology,
- glbt issues,
- hinduism,
- homo sapiens,
- human beings,
- humour,
- india,
- lebanon,
- links,
- middle east,
- moon,
- national identity,
- netherlands,
- oddities,
- photos,
- physics,
- russia,
- sexuality,
- social sciences,
- sociology,
- south asia,
- space science,
- technology,
- ukraine,
- united kingdom
[BLOG] Some Tuesday links
Nov. 12th, 2019 05:23 pm- Centauri Dreams notes how gas giants on eccentric orbits can easily disrupt bodies on orbits inwards.
- Maria Farrell at Crooked Timber suggests that the political culture of England has been deformed by the trauma experienced by young children of the elites at boarding schools.
- Dangerous Minds looks at the haunting art of Paul Delvaux.
- The Everyday Sociology Blog looks at the work of Tressie McMillan Cottom in investigating for-profit higher education.
- Far Outliers looks at Tripoli in 1801.
- Gizmodo shares the Boeing design for the moon lander it proposes for NASA in 2024.
- io9 shares words from cast of Terminator: Dark Fate about the importance of the Mexican-American frontier.
- JSTOR Daily makes a case against killing spiders trapped in one's home.
- Language Hat notes a recovered 17th century translation of a Dutch bible into the Austronesian language of Siraya, spoken in Taiwan.
- Language Log looks at the origin of the word "brogue".
- Lawyers, Guns and Money looks at the payday lender industry.
- Marginal Revolution notes a new biography of Walter Raleigh, a maker of empire indeed.
- The NYR Daily looks at a new dance show using the rhythms of the words of writer Robert Walser.
- Starts With A Bang's Ethan Siegel looks at how, in a quantum universe, time and space could still be continuous not discrete.
- Strange Company looks at a court case from 1910s Brooklyn, about a parrot that swore.
- The Volokh Conspiracy notes an affirmative action court case in which it was ruled that someone from Gibraltar did not count as Hispanic.
- Window on Eurasia notes rhetoric claiming that Russians are the largest divided people on the Earth.
- Arnold Zwicky looks at lizards and at California's legendary Highway 101.
Tags:
- animal intelligence,
- astronomy,
- birds,
- blogs,
- borders,
- california,
- economics,
- education,
- england,
- english language,
- environment,
- gibraltar,
- history,
- imperialism,
- ireland,
- language,
- libya,
- links,
- mexico,
- moon,
- netherlands,
- physics,
- politics,
- popular culture,
- popular literature,
- public art,
- russia,
- science fiction,
- social sciences,
- sociology,
- space science,
- space travel,
- taiwan,
- united kingdom
- The city of Fredericton hopes a new strategy to attracting international migration to the New Brunswick capital will help its grow its population by 25 thousand. Global News reports.
- Guardian Cities notes the controversy in Amsterdam as users of moped find themselves being pushed from using bike lanes.
- Guardian Cities looks at how many in Athens think the city might do well to unbury the rivers covered under concrete and construction in the second half of the 20th century.
- The Sagrada Familia, after more than 130 years of construction, has finally received a permit for construction from Barcelona city authorities. Global News reports.
- Evan Gershkovich at the Moscow Times reports on how the recent ousting of the mayor of the Latvian capital of Riga for corruption is also seem through a lens of ethnic conflict.
- Kingston, Ontario, is currently doing its best to cope with flood risk from the rising Lake Ontario. Global News reports.
- MacLean's reports on an appalling expansion of the iconic Chateau Laurier in Ottawa.
- CityLab reports on how Amsterdam is trying to avoid being overwhelmed by tourism.
- Guardian Cities reports on how the new government in Madrid plans to scrap a low-emissions zone because of a belief that congestion is a Madrid tradition.
- Roads and Kingdoms shares some tips for visitors to Yerevan.
Tags:
- This r/imaginarymaps map imagines a united Anglo-Dutch state. Could such have ever have occurred?
- This r/imaginarymaps map, one in a series, imagines a Patagonia divided between multiple rival powers perhaps after the Guyanas. Could Patagonia, only recently incorporated into Argentina and Chile, have seen something like this?
- This is a perhaps-optimistic depiction of the territory that a #Virginia independent of the United States might have held. In a no-US timeline, how far could it have gotten?
- This r/imaginarymaps map sees the Empire of Japan as a bulwark against Communism in Asia, even taking Australia and New Zealand under its aegis. Too, see its protectorate over the Russian Far East.
- This r/imaginarymaps map, imagining a European Federation circa 2004, makes an important point: The earlier that Europe unifies, the more geographically restricted its membership will be.
[BLOG] Some Monday links
Apr. 15th, 2019 11:14 am- Centauri Dreams notes the discovery of rocky debris indicative of destroyed planets in orbit of the white dwarf SDSS J122859.93+104032.9, 400 light-years away.
- JSTOR Daily shows how the Columbine massacre led to a resurgence of evangelical Christianity in the US.
- Language Log notes an example of digraphia, two scripts, in use in Taiwan.
- Lawyers, Guns and Money identifies the presidential run of Howard Schultz in ways unflattering to him yet accurate.
- The LRB Blog takes a look at the current, unsettling, stage of artificial intelligence research.
- At the NYR Daily, Boyd Tonkin writes about an exhibition of the works of Van Gogh at the Tate Britain highlighting his ties with England and with his Europeanness.
- Starts With A Bang's Ethan Siegel reports on the ultimate fate of the Earth, a cinder orbiting a black dwarf.
- Strange Company tells the strange, sad story of 19th century California writer Yda Hillis Addis.
- At Vintage Space, Amy Shira Teitel explains why the Apollo missions made use of a dangerous pure-oxygen environment.
- Window on Eurasia notes how, 41 years ago, protests in Georgia forced the Soviet Union to let the Georgian republic keep Georgian as its official language.
- Arnold Zwicky starts with peeps and goes on to look at dragons.
Tags:
- artificial intelligence,
- astronomy,
- blogs,
- california,
- chinese language,
- crime,
- earth,
- english language,
- former soviet union,
- france,
- futurology,
- georgia,
- humour,
- language,
- links,
- netherlands,
- oddities,
- politics,
- public art,
- religion,
- solar system,
- south caucasus,
- space science,
- space travel,
- taiwan,
- technology,
- united states
- MTL Blog shares photos from the interior of a Habitat 67 apartment on the market at $C 1.3 million dollars.
- Guardian Cities reports on more London housing estates where the ability of children to play in common spaces is determined by their parents' income.
- CityLab notes how Amsterdam is making it clear that it is cutting down on car traffic in its downtown, by removing car-related infrastructure.
- Open Democracy reports on how community activists in Odesa are responding to unrestrained property development.
- Guardian Cities reports on the background to mass evictions and demolitions of people in Tashkent.
- A statue of Queen Victoria has been vandalized in Montréal, the act claimed by an anti-colonialist coalition. Global News reports.
- Guardian Cities profiled an Instagram account, thedoorsofnyc, concentrating on the unique doors of New York City.
- Billionaire urbanism is identified by this article at The Stranger as the downfall of the waterfront of Seattle.
- CityLab notes that the government of Amsterdam is now requiring owners of new homes to live in their property, limiting the ability to rent them out.
- The Atlantic notes the criticisms of many urbanists in Istanbul that restorations of the city's ancient heritage are actually destroying them, at least as survivals from the past.
Reddit's imaginarymaps forum has a lot of great alternate history maps.
- This r/imaginarymaps map depicts a Dutch Formosa crica 1900.
- This creation imagines a joint German-Polish invasion of the Soviet Union.
- this map imagines a different Cold War, with a largely Communist Germany opposed by a Franco-British Union.
- This map of an alternate Cold War circa 1960 that actually made it into a history book as our timeline
- This map shows the remarkably fragmented Central America of Marvel Comics's famous Earth-616.
- Motherboard reports on the Millennium Cameras of Jonathon Keats, who will be taking photos with a thousand-year exposure from the Lake Tahoe shoreline to document climate change.
- Oliver Wainwright at The Guardian reports on the growing impact of Instagram, and social photography generally, on architecture and design.
- JSTOR Daily reports on the photography of love and obsession of Sophie Calle.
- Drew Rowsome looks at the photography of QSize.
- Peter Rukavina shared a link to a documentary telling the story of photographer Fernando Bengoecha, whose photo of Amsterdam has become iconic thanks to its IKEA association.
- In remembering Stan Lee, CityLab points to the evocative image of New York City that he and Marvel Comics created.
- Global News notes that Calgary is approaching the day of its referendum over the 2026 Winter Olympics. (Calgarians, vote against the idea.)
- Guardian Cities shares these images depicting what London would look like if any number of plans for new architectural wonders had come to pass.
- CityLab notes how community activity helped reclaim Zeedijk street in Amsterdam.
- Guardian Cities shares photos of the final days of the traditional fish market in the Senegalese capital of Dakar.
- CityLab takes a look at how greening vacant lots can improve the mental health of the people living in different neighbourhoods.
- Paul Soucy at Global News reports on the lost villages of the St. Lawrence, drowned in the 1950s by the creation of the St. Lawrence Seaway near Cornwall.
- There is controversy in Vaughan over a plan to sell public parkland to a developer. The Toronto Star reports.
- Is Amsterdam at risk of being hollowed out as mass tourism makes it a destination for partying tourists? Guardian Cities reports.
- David Farrier writes for Guardian Cities about his experiences in the strange new model city of Ashgabat, capital of Turkmenistan.
Tags:
- In response to a desire to remove an almost bizarre controversial statue of a cow from its location in a neighbourhood in Markham, the owner has sued the city for $C 4 million. The Toronto Star reports.
- The mayor of Hamilton, Ontario, would like housing incorporated into shopping malls, to deal with issues of housing and retail in one go. Global News reports.
- Brexit threatens to decidedly destabilize the picture for the Dutch port city of Rotterdam. The Independent reports.
- Bloomberg notes that the controversial Chinese-owned port of Hambantota, in Sri Lanka, is doing terrible business.
- Newly-discovered documents provide confirmation of the belief that the Nazis planned to utterly destroy Warsaw. The National Post reports.
- For perhaps understandable political reason, Québec premier Philippine Couilllard wants Bombardier to get the Montreal metro renewal contract. Global News reports.
- Utrecht, Noisey notes, has a thriving black metal scene worthy of extended exploration.
- The bohemian enclave of Užupis, in the middle of the Lithunian capital of Vilnius, is starting to face pressure from gentrification. Politico Europe reports.
- Ciku Kimeria at Okay Africa makes the case for the old colonial capital of Saint-Louis, in Senegal, to become a major destination for international tourists.
- The Guardian profiles a serious proposal to split Sydney into three different cities, each with its own development needs, to better manage the wider conurbation.
- What does the impending demolition of the venerable Union Carbide tower, at 270 Park Avenue, to make way for a new ultratall skyscraper say about changing New York City? New York reports.
- The South China Morning Post observes how the cities of Shenzhen and Guangzhou, though still behind Hong Kong, are starting to advance past it as a result of these cities' sustained investment in innovative technologies.
- Aldi in Berlin will apparently build affordable student housing on top of at least some of its new discount food stores in Berlin. Bloomberg reports.
- This VICE article looking at the lives of lonely people in Amsterdam, many newcomers, is affecting.
- The Crisis Group looks at how Syrian refugees, of diverse ethnicities and religions, are finding a new home in the multiethnic Istanbul neighbourhood of Sultangazi.
[BLOG] Some Friday links
Feb. 16th, 2018 12:24 pm- Bad Astronomer Phil Plait shares photos of rings around a distant galaxy's central black hole.
- Inspired by Finland's Olympic team, the Toronto Public Library's The Buzz shares some interesting books on knitting and for knitters.
- Centauri Dreams notes the surprising news that the Milky Way and Andromeda galaxies actually have the same mass. This changes everything about what was thought about the future of the Local Group. D-Brief also reports on this news.
- JSTOR Daily notes how the conversion of tobacco fields into solar farms is not just potentially life-saving but economically viable, too.
- Language Hat rounds up links relevant to the discovery, by field linguists, of the Malaysian language of Jedek.
- Lingua Franca, at the Chronicle of Higher Education, shares a story from Lucy Ferris of Paris of old and the bookstore Shakespeare and Company.
- The LRB Blog notes that the privatization of military officers' housing in the United Kingdom was another disaster.
- Marginal Revolution considers if Los Angeles is the most right-wing major American city, and what that actually means.
- The Power and the Money's Noel Maurer notes that, even in the face of subsidence in Groningen around gas fields and cheap wind energy, even the Netherlands is not moving away from oil and gas.
- Drew Rowsome reports on porn star/actor Chris Harder and his new show, Porn To Be A Star. (NSFW.)
- Starts With A Bang's Ethan Siegel examines the factors which distinguish a good scientific theory from a bad one.
- The Volokh Conspiracy makes a decent argument that the politicized pop culture fandom around supreme court judge Ruth Bader Ginsberg is not good for the future of jurisprudence.
- John Scalzi, at Whatever, reviews the new Pixel Buds from Google.
Tags:
- agriculture,
- anthropology,
- astronomy,
- blogs,
- books,
- bookstores,
- california,
- cities,
- energy,
- finland,
- france,
- futurology,
- google,
- health,
- language,
- libraries,
- links,
- malaysia,
- military,
- netherlands,
- physics,
- politics,
- popular culture,
- popular literature,
- science,
- sexuality,
- social sciences,
- southeast asia,
- space science,
- technology,
- theatre,
- united kingdom,
- united states
- CNN reports on the rise of slender skyscrapers, in New York City and elsewhere.
- VICE notes how badly the temporary shutdown of the L line has been hurting the Queens neighbourhood of Astoria.
- National Observer wonders what Montréal can do to be friendlier to seniors. (Being open to consulting broader demographics is a good start.)
- Global News notes concerns in Vancouver that excessive condo development could block the view of the mountains surrounding that metropolis.
- CBC reports on the South Korean city of Gangneung, a place that has become the locus of that country's coffee culture.
- VICE reports on the effect that licenses allowing nightclubs to operate 24 hours a day has had on nightlife in Amsterdam.
[BLOG] Some Monday links
Jan. 29th, 2018 08:32 am- Crooked Timber links to John Quiggin's article in the Guardian about how formerly public companies should be renationalized.
- The Dragon's Tales notes that Lockheed has just signed a $US 150 million dollar contract to deliver a 60 kilowatt laser weapon to the US navy by 2020.
- Hornet Stories ranks the different performances at last night's Grammies, giving Kesha top placing.
- JSTOR Daily looks back to contemporary coverage of the 1918 flu epidemic. How did people react, how did they cope?
- Language Hat looks at a multilingual comic by Japan-born artist Ru Kawahata, Stuck in the Middle.
- Lawyers, Guns and Money suggests that, rather than hoping for Trump to perform to minimal expectations in the upcoming State of the Union address, it might be more profitable (and enjoyable?) to wait for the inevitable meltdown. What will it be?
- Marginal Revolution notes a proposal in Rotterdam for police to arrest people wearing expensive clothes and jewellery and, if they cannot explain where they got them, confiscate them. Of course this policy could not be misused.
- Towleroad notes that drag queens have quit Burkhart's, a prominent gay bar in Atlanta, in response to that bar's owner's racist and alt-right statements on Facebook.
- Paul Cassell at the Volokh Conspiracy argues Judge Rosemarie Aquilina was entirely correct in allowing all the victims of Nassar to speak at sentencing.
- Window on Eurasia notes that radical Islamists are increasingly using Russian to communicate, not the traditional languages of Russia's Muslim populations. Linguistic assimilation does not equal cultural assimilation.
- Malcolm Campbell reports for CBC on how the Island's organic agriculture sector is dealing with ineffective provincial regulation.
- At the Toronto Star, Ainslie Cruickshank describes new measures to reserve GTA farmland in the Greenbelt for agricultural uses only.
- Leonid Bershidsky reports for Bloomberg View on how climate change is making Russia--and Ukraine, and Kazakhstan--a major agricultural force.
- At the Toronto Star, Alex McKeen reports on a North York warehouse that hosts a highly productive vertical farm.
- Frank Viviano's National Geographic article looking at the enormously productivity of high-tech agriculture in the Netherlands shows the future.
