Archive for October, 2009
Surely we can reconcile this
I don’t have time to go into depth about this, but two stories caught my eye today.
From the New York Times, ‘Experts Worry as Population and Hunger Grow‘:
Scientists and development experts across the globe are racing to increase food production by 50 percent over the next two decades to feed the world’s growing population, yet many doubt their chances despite a broad consensus that enough land, water and expertise exist.
Meanwhile, in today’s South China Morning Post, ‘Waste Food Issue Could be a Real Pig to Solve‘ (content behind a pay-wall):
One solution to the city’s growing waste food problem might come from an unlikely source: turning it into pork.
The suggestion to turn the waste into pig feed came from farmers, businessmen and green campaigners after the government announced in the policy address that a recycling centre would be built in Siu Ho Wan on Lantau Island to tackle increased food waste in Hong Kong by turning it into compost or biofuel.
On the one hand, we have a massive food shortage. On the other, we have so much food that it’s causing a problem. How come we humans in this globalised world smart enough to fix this already? If it was money we were talking about, I’m sure we’d have no problem in figuring it out.
Steps in the right direction
Gallup’s October Crime poll finds 44% of Americans in favor of making marijuana legal and 54% opposed. U.S. public support for legalizing marijuana was fixed in the 25% range from the late 1970s to the mid-1990s, but acceptance jumped to 31% in 2000 and has continued to grow throughout this decade.
Two nifty vids: Street View and Shanghai
Cool and cute videos time!
In case you ever wondered how Google does Street View… the mystery is no more! See this video from Google Japan.
Hat tip: Sleepy Animal
And now, I present to you, Shanghai in miniature time-lapse.
Hat tip: Shanghaiist via Made in China
Damn, I can’t figure out how to embed Vimeo videos on WordPress. Can anyone let me know how?
Pay-as-you-go columnists
This blog post seems to argue for an era of hyper-measurement-dictated capitalism in journalism.
The Washington Post recently laid off a columnist because his blog posts didn’t get enough web traffic.
Of course, in the old days, the newspaper had no real way to tell which columns got read and which ones didn’t. So journalists were lulled into the sense that it didn’t really matter…
In fact, in a digital world where everything can be measured, we all work on commission. And why not? If you do great work and it works, you should get rewarded. And if you don’t, it’s hard to see why a rational organization would keep you on.
My nerdy girlfriend shared this on Google Reader, and I was compelled to leave this comment:
This is an old argument that applies to TV and the arts, too. It’s this rationale that actually serves us up the likes of Fox News and consigns the sort of more balanced and investigative journalism found on NPR and PBS to government-funded operations. Or for some arts to not be funded at all, no matter how important or excellent. All that has to happen is for them to only appeal to a small crowd (even if that’s an influential crowd).
And I don’t think blogging and column writing are the same things. I also wouldn’t automatically disagree with an argument that suggested someone could be a popular columnist while at the same time being an unpopular blogger.
Consider this shared item totally commented on.
New things on timeout.com.hk
It’s only a couple of new things, but they’re small strides to increased awesomeness on timeout.com.hk, my esteemed place of work.
First up, we launched a music podcast last week, presented by Sean Hocking, the man behind ace boutique indie label Metal Postcard. The podcast features tracks from bands playing in Hong Kong this fortnight, including DP, Chochukmo, and British Sea Power, and a couple of picks from Sean of cool new stuff.
We’ve also made a video (well, I did) using Animoto, which lays out the cocktails made by various hotels for a column by Angie Wong about the hunt for Hong Kong’s signature cocktail.
Keep your eye on timeout.com.hk for new developments in the near future.
