Links - April 25, 2016
- The Average 29 Year Old Derek Thompson - The Atlantic
In this short and data-centric piece, Thompson makes the argument that since most mainstream media is based in large cities, “…well-educated journalists in these dense cities wind up with a skewed impression of the world” and they feed us their biases. “An irony of digital media is that the Internet distributes journalism, but it concentrates journalists.”
- Bots won't replace apps. Better apps will replace apps. Dan Grover
Everyone talks about “bots”, but “bots” are not new. Grover makes a great analogy between early iOS skeumorphism and the metaphors of “conversational UI” that have leaked into these new user experiences. He goes on to argue that the notification systems in modern operating systems are broken, which I fully agree with, and suggests the rise of meta-platforms like WeChat and Facebook Messenger as the path forward.
- Why Write in English? Tim Parks - The New York Review of Books
A few months ago, an article titled Teach Yourself Italian was published in the New Yorker. In it, the author (Jhumpa Lahiri) discusses her journey from the United States to Italy, and her discovery of how language affected her identity as she wrote a book in a language that wasn’t her own. Parks discusses Lahiri’s work, compares her to other authors that went through similar transitions, and ultimately explains why he still writes in his mother tongue, even after years of living abroad.
- Minimum Viable Superorganism Kevin Simler - Ribbon Farm
Perhaps a bit too paranoid, discussing conspiracy theories more than it should, but interesting nonetheless. Simler explains the economics behind the social structures that align our incentives to work together toward common goals.
- Machine Learning Meets Economics, Part 2 Nicolas Kruchten - Datacratic MLDB
If you haven’t yet, go read Part 1.
- Making 1 million requests with python-aiohttp Paweł Miech
- The Rich Don't Work Anymore—Working Is for Poor People Robert Reich - Alternet