Fragments of a blog
Fragments of a blog
Electrical sound recording, which relies on microphones and amplifiers, became the industry standard around 1925. From Edison’s invention of the phonograph in 1877 to the mid-1920s, sound was only recorded acoustically, the sonic vibrations transmitting themselves directly from the horn…
The media is anxious to find evidence of Trump’s deals with Russian oligarchs to prove Putin’s influence over the candidate. Since Russian oligarchs are but Putin’s puppets – so the logic goes – the man in the Kremlin can either…
I have argued that some of Trump’s views on allies, trade, and the USSR/Russia, can be traced to his opinions shared with the media 25-30 years back. He’s not as volatile as mainstream opinion has it but he can improvise moves…
The great Russian urine scam of the 2010s, as reported by the press and the anti-doping watchdog WADA: Before the Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia created a storage bank of clean, frozen urine. (BBC) The report noted evidence that FSB…
At first glance, it seems that Ireland would be the natural domicile for companies wishing to move their addresses from Britain. In particular, Dublin should be in a position to take in refugees from the City. It speaks English and,…
Leicester City, Trump, Brexit, England losing to Iceland, and now, Erdoğan apologizing or at least writing something as close to an apology as the man can manage without killing himself. Russia’s loss to Wales, although a face in the mud…
This is Brexit for you, in one neat GIF, with apologies to whomever it may offend. I have just noticed this fine day that George Osborne, God bless his seal, has a hint of both Mr. Bean and subcomandante Medvedev…
The Financial Times’ latest poll of polls had a Remain-Leave-Undecided ratio of 48%-46%-6%. The Economist’s tracker had 44%-44%-9% (not sure where the missing 3% went). The actual vote went 52%-48% for Leave. Were the polls misleading or misinterpreted? First, the…
A year or two ago, I first saw a “feminist coloring book for children” mentioned in the media – where else but in The Guardian? I thought the thing was a facetious outlier but it’s becoming mainstream. More than that,…
Mary Dejevsky keeps telling her “Western” readers that they don’t understand Putin but never asks whether the man actually thrives on misunderstanding and confusion – other people’s confusion, of course. Writing in The Financial Times (a surprise to me), she…
On a pretty much randomly googled web page, I read that G. H. Hardy had failed to visit an ailing Ramanujan out of snobbery and “Bourbakist inhumanity.” I’m going to boast that I guessed the author of this (remarkably incongruous) claim within two or three…
I have been told that population aging is hardly the disaster certain natalists are making it to be: just look at how well Germany and Japan have handled it. Unfortunately, it is a rear-mirror view, reminiscent of the proverbial optimist…