Tag: November

November! A month of cooling off in many ways. Of endings. Here’s what’s happening plus the usual ramblings (i.e. the November 2023 edition of my not-a-newsletter newsletter)

November is a month of chills and cooling off. Not just literally but figuratively. So many things have been cooling off, dying off, or just ending this month. Many things, but not all things.

Dying: A year ago crypto exploded in a fireball. Now all that’s left are the embers. Last month the fraud / conspiracy trial of Sam Bankman-Fried (SBF) was underway. How did it go? Well, not great for SBF. He was evasive under cross examination. His lawyers did not do well with their closing arguments. It didn’t help that so many of his coworkers plead guilty and cooperated with prosecutors. In the end it took the jury less than five hours to find him guilty on all charges. No doubt pictures like this couldn’t have helped his case:

What a mess.

If you want to read more about it all, this piece by Zeke Faux is good. Check out his book too. You can read the book Going Infinite by Michael Lewis as well, though this review which discusses how he fell for the antihero (SBF, not Taylor Swift) makes me wonder if I would bother, even though I like Lewis’s other books.

The other big player in crypto is Changpeng Zhao (CZ) of Binance. Is? Was. The SEC has been cleaning the Aegean Stables that is crypto and went after him and forced him to plead guilty and step down from him company.

In the end the only people I felt sorry for in all this  debacle was SBF’s parents. Do I feel bad for crypto investors? Well in April of 2022 the Financial Times sat down with SBF and more or less explained how SBF’s crypto yield farming was a ponzi scheme. If you had major money in crypto after reading that, then you got what was coming to you, I’m sorry to say.

Cooling off: after being heated in all the ways, China is starting to cool off. Last year China and Xi were at their aggressive peak, lecturing Trudeau and others with their wolf warrior diplomacy.

Well that’s gone, and Xi recently adopted a milder manner in this month’s meeting with President Biden. Wolf warrior diplomacy is dying off. No doubt some of that has to do with the many problem that China is suffering, from real estate problems to high youth unemployment to the decline of  their belt road loans program.

That said, while China seems to be backing away from invading Taiwan, they are still being very aggressive in dominating the South China sea, as these two stories here and here show. They are still aggressive at home, too, as this piece on China spies campaign shows.

It’s not all bad news for Xi and his country. This is good news, for instance:  China’s war on pollution has great improved air quality for their citizens. But things could be better. Will they be under Xi is the question. Read The New York Times piece on  Xi’s rule and decide for yourself. Don’t miss this piece by Noah Smith either. Smith thinks the Chinese leader is incompetent and he makes a compelling case.

Dying off: Culturally we may be seeing the dying off of the superhero movies that have dominated screens big and small for so long. The Marvels, the latest film from Marvel Studios just came out and it recorded the worst ever North American opening weekend performance of all those films. The Times put it simply: it floundered.

500

This has all led Disney, the owner of Marvel Studios, to do some backtracking.  They are delaying  Deadpool 3 and other such films. TV wise, Disney is not doing great either, as their new series, Ahsoka shows.

Will bringing back the  X men help? Maybe fantastic four will do it? Or maybe it’s the beginning of the end of the superhero movies, as this piece examines.

On death’s door: well, that would be twitter. I mean it’s been dying all year since Musk took over. But his increasingly mismanagement of the site and his own terrible behavior has led to many companies pulling their advertising dollars from it. Not only that, but increasingly people I used to follow regularly have moved to sites like Threads and Bluesky. I am not sure when it will die off: Musk could keep it on life support for a long time. Dan Sinker’s has a good piece on the site known still as Twitter to read while we sit by its deathbed and wait for the inevitable.

Moving on, office work is also waning. A sign of this is wework going bankrupt. Some of the Toronto locations have shut down. That’s too bad: I am a fan of wework. In better news, in New York some financial district offices have been  converted into housing. Here’s to more of that.

Gone but not forgotten: I hadn’t realized that November is JFK season in the US. Or so says Mark Bittman in this piece: JFK season. Perhaps it always will be, until the last of the Baby Boomers in the US has passed away.  Meanwhile we get people still second guessing the JFK assassination. And RFK Jr is hanging around the current election, cashing in on his family name while he spouts his toxic views on disease and race.

The pandemic is not dying, but heating up in many places, including Nova Scotia, which reported 35 covid-19 deaths since august. In China there has been an increase in respiratory diseases in children. The Times has more on where we are in this article.

Wars in Ukraine and Israel/Palestine continue to burn on as well. Here’s to better days in both places and soon, though right now soon is no where soon enough. In the mean time I am going to the New York Times for news on the latest developments in Ukraine and Israel/Palestine and I recommend you do so too.

Speaking of endlings, that’s the end of this month’s newsletter. Thanks for reading it. May the next one be merry and bright.

What was new in our crazy mixed up world, November 2022 edition

Yowza! It’s been a crazy month, this month, between surges in diseases, Twitter turning into a dumpster fire, crypto imploding, inflation hanging on, the war in Ukraine intensifying with seemingly more attacks on civilians, the US GOP becoming more Nazi curious….you name it.  Let’s take a look.

Pandemic: we are still seeing the effects of the pandemic rippling through our society. In Ontario the ICUs of our children’s hospitals have been slammed, with usage up to 108% at one point. Blame the pandemic on that. Other things to blame the pandemic on? Nursing shortages. In fact work shortages in general: long COVID continues to affect many people and has taken many of them out of the workforce.

In response, people are still wearing masks, though not many. Some people are carrying their own CO2 monitors to tell them when internal air quality is risky. Other people are even making their own. Fortunately new vaccines are rolling out, and you can still get COVID tests for free at some places, although that may be going away. Get that flu shot too, don’t end up being a flu statistic.

Will things gradually improve? I believe they will, but who knows. Some people thought worse variants would come along, but so far so good.

Social media: after years of something of a status quo, social media has entered a meltdown/transformation phase. This has been lead by Elon Musk, who has taken over Twitter. Initially people were wondering: will it matter? Turns out it mattered a lot. He started by firing lots of people. Then he told those left to either be “hardcore” and work under insane work conditions or quit. Not surprisingly, many quit. Other people quitting? Celebrity users. And most importantly, advertisers like GM. It doesn’t help that Musk has loaded up the company with a lot of debt. It’s going to get worse before it gets better, if it even can get better.

With Twitter in chaos, what can users do? Some people like me are considering moving on to other platforms, like Hive and Post and Mastodon. However, the alternatives have not really taken off yet, and in some cases, they are not keen for people like journalists to take their business there.  (Maybe they should have read these mastodon tips.) Who knows how it all shakes out.

One good thing about the twitter debacle: it has lead to some good essays. Like this one: Welcome to Hell, Elon. Or this one on the fraudulent king. This one by McSweeney’s was funny.  Also this. Last but not least, this piece with a rundown on how Musk is a terrible person.

If Twitter is quickly imploding, Facebook/Meta is slowly collapsing. Like Twitter, it has had its shares of layoffs. The whole Meta project seems to be failing or at least flailing. It has suffered security problems, too. Generally the company is seen poorly, as this piece by Om Malik shows. It doesn’t help that much of the popular content is trash on Facebook, though they have tried to clean it up. I’m not sure what will happen with this company either, so I’ll leave the last word on Facebook/Meta to Stratechery.

In other news, Trump’s Truth Social continues to be a dud. Tumblr is allowing nudity. And Youtube, which is kinda social, struggles with ad targeting. Just one dumpster fire after another.

How to consider all this? Maybe by reading this piece in Nature on collapsing social networks. I found it very insightful.

Crypto/NFTs: other things melting down recently is the whole crypto currency business. This was lead by Sam Bankman-Fried and his FTX company.  Not that the lunacy is limited to him: Peter Thiel had a new company that lasted three months.  Relatedly, NFTs are not doing well, but people are still flogging them. Companies are looking to incorporate them into TVs.  Into the restaurant scene. Even into famous paintings like the work of Hilma af-Klimt. Ugh. Crypto winter can’t come soon enough.

Christmas: speaking of winter, for those of you celebrating Christmas, here’s a few links you might like. Here’s some gift ideas for those of you on a budget. Here’s more gift guides you can use. I especially thought this would be a good gift for young and aspiring scientists. For people looking for cool decorations, check out that link.

Other Cool stuff:  I’ve recently got an Apple Watch and it is excellent for anyone worried about their heart. Here’s something on how it detects arrhythmia. I recommend the Apple Watch just as a health device. In terms of other devices, if you use a Kindle, I recommend Libby. This is also a cool plant device (shown below).

Inflation: Inflation is like a tenacious beast, hanging on. One place in particular that people are experiencing it is in food prices. Lots has been said about the cost of food these days. Companies like Loblaw have done quite well in turn. There has been some attempt by them to respond to this, despite these moves, I expect there will be more pressure on them in the months ahead. For one thing, the Walmart giant is waking up. Maybe more people will join me and get their groceries there. I’m a happy customer. Let’s see.

Work: workwise, things are still unsettled post pandemic. Wages aren’t rising, despite inflation. Some employees are returning to the office, but aren’t necessarily happy about it. Indeed, employees seem to be unhappy in general. It doesn’t help to be reading of layoffs in many places, even Amazon. Odd times.

Ukraine: the war in Ukraine slogs on. It could be a very tough winter for Ukrainians, though they continue to fight back in many ways. I don’t think anyone knows how to end the war. Either one side will collapse or it will be a stalemate. Zelenskyy wants it to end. The head of Turkey says Putin wants it to end. Let’s hope and pray for a quick ending.

Finally: for new fans of football watching the World Cup, here’s how to determine offsides. You’re welcome. 🙂

Thank you to those who have read this far. Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to you! Enjoy the last few days of 2022: here’s to a brighter 2023.

 

It’s coming up on Christmas. Here’s my pandemic highlights and ramblings for November, 2021(a newsletter, in blog form)

Happy holidays to you! It’s hard to believe we are almost at the end of the 2021.  It’s also hard to believe at times that we are still in the midst of a pandemic, but we are. Let me reflect on that and more in my latest and relatively short blog newsletter for you.

Pandemic: The big pandemic news this month has been the rise of the new variant: Omicron. It’s all very new, as this shows:  WHO discusses new COVID-19 variant with unusual mutations.  As I write this there is still much happening to determine its impact.

Even before the new variant, there were problems. Another Ontario region had reinstated some lockdown restrictions amid surge in cases this month. I don’t know why, other than the cold weather has more people inside and that leads to more cases, perhaps.

To prevent this,  people like me have been getting boosters. If you can, get yours too. Lots of young people have been getting their first shots. When I got mine on Saturday, there were lots of old people like me and lots of kids with their parents.

While there is still so much to be done to vaccine all of the world, people are working hard to do so, as this story shows:  Drones Ferry Pfizer as Precious Deep-Frozen Vaccine to Africa’s Remote Villages.

Meanwhile, there are people in rich countries refusing to get vaccines, like the Chicago police. Fortunately when push came to shove, most people accepted vaccine mandates and got their shots, although some quit. At this point I have zero tolerance for hold outs.

Workwise, The Great Resignation is still ongoing, at least in the US. It will have big ramifications for business going into the new year (and already has is 2021.) Speaking of that, I suspect we will not be going into the office for at least until the first quarter of 2022. Indeed, nearly 80% of downtown Toronto office employees are still working from home . I can’t see that percentage dropping much.

As for me and my work,  I am still engaged on this:  Alberta launches app to read COVID-19 vaccination QR code. It’s good.

This story struck me: Cape Breton woman says CERB will most likely make her bankrupt . I can’t say why she applied for CERB when she was not eligible. I can say the government should not be so harsh in how it claws back the money. The pandemic is hard enough: impoverishing people is not a good way to fix things.

That’s the reality of the pandemic. In fantasy news, Royal Caribbean is offering a 9-month-long ‘World Cruise’ visiting 150 destinations . I think you need your head examined if you signed up for such a thing. Likewise, this call for a New Public Spirit in the US after the failures of the pandemic sounds nice and dreamy and won’t happen.

In other economic news, there are still shortages these days due to the pandemic and the supply chain problems it caused. For example, Ikea won’t be selling Christmas trees in Toronto this year due to shortage . My favorite example of this though is a Santa shortage! Despite all that, I believe the supply chain issues will clear up fairly soon.

Non pandemic: I thought this was a good summary of the bizarre age we live in: The Golden Age of Grift . I think such grift happens in any era when there is an abundance of capital and a spirit that compels people to capture it. In such an era you get things like this happening: A one-ton tungsten cube was just bought by a crypto cabal for $250 000 . And you get decadence like this socially, as well as a desire to punish it: Chrissy Teigen Is Catching A Lot Of Heat For Hosting A Lavish “Squid Game”-Themed Party. Maybe this decade is going to be more like the Roaring Twenties of the 20th century than I thought.

Finally: this video mocking the Metaverse and Mark Zuckerberg made the rounds this month and it was excellent: Introducing the Icelandverse

Last word: I hope the holidays are good to you. If you need help during this time, I wrote a number of posts on Christmas over the years. I think they are hood and helpful. You can find them here.

November pandemic highlights and ramblings (a newsletter, in blog form)

Hi there! It’s time for my monthly newsletter-but-not of highlights and ramblings. As always, thanks for stopping by and reading this.

It’s been an intense period of time since October. Starting with the pandemic…

Pandemic – bad: we have terrible new statistics coming out of many places, including Canada. Months ago people were talking about the second wave, and now it seems to be crashing over us in so many places. I am fearful it is going to take a dreadful toll on us this winter. I think so much has collapsed and as I feared in the last newsletter, people are just dropping the ball. Here in Canada I see a number of provincial leaders just floundering and since healthcare is their jurisdiction, I am not hopeful things will get better soon.  And it’s not just Canada: many other countries seem to be either flailing or bringing in stricter measures. I think sooner than later many places will head back to lockdown.

And it’s not just Canadian politicians. I think people have become more social and the natural outcome of this is more spreading of the virus, more people getting sick, and more people dying.

Pandemic – good: the silver lining is the news of the vaccines coming out. It can’t happen soon enough, though obviously it is going to be well into 2021 before we get them.  Let’s hope there is enough will and discipline to crack down on socialization and other contributors to the spread of COVID-19 until they are widely delivered.

Pandemic – otherwise: I thought this was an interesting approach to the pandemic: Self-care in 2020: I’m handling the election and the pandemic by throwing a series of tantrums

There’s been much good said about how the Atlantic Provinces have been handling the pandemic. But it has come at a cost. For example my home of Cape Breton has no air travel in or out of Sydney airport: Air Canada flights cancelled between Sydney, Halifax | CBC News. There is no rail either: that was cancelled long ago. Sad.

Personally,  I have not done much differently since March. I went to two indoor restaurants with plenty of social distancing in the summer, and I have had two indoor gatherings with two other people outside my tiny bubble of four, but that’s it. What I have found is I am just am accepting things as normal now. I don’t have any special projects or activities on the go the way I was earlier in the pandemic. But I am not putting things on hold either: I find I am looking forward to things that I can afford to look forward to.

The USA : the other big news of the last month is the defeat of Donald Trump by Joe Biden. Whatever shortcomings President Biden will have, they will be nothing in comparison to the shortcomings of President Trump. I argued some time ago that Trump was not the worst US President ever. I think Buchanan still might be. But I think Trump might be the second worse now, given the number of preventable deaths due to COVID if he had acted sooner. Like I said, I think Buchanan is still the worst, but with the deaths, corruption, lying, nepotism, and so many other faults, Trump is the second worst. At least he is no longer President, come January. All the world will benefit from this.

Speaking of Trump, this was quite a story: Donald Trump Has At Least $1 Billion In Debt, More Than Twice The Amount He Suggested. . I suspect he will be having more than his fair share of difficulties starting with his time out of office.

Restaurants: restaurants still continue to have a tough time of it, and come winter in Canada, I don’t know how many we will lose. Likely a lot. So I am always on the lookout for any sliver of hope out there. One I found was this innovative way to provide food.

Related to that is this article: Has the pandemic changed how we eat forever? – The Globe and Mail. Not sure if it has changed it “forever”, but it will have changed it substantially and for a long time to come.

Newsletters: Not sure if I am going to keep highlighting them. But for now I will mention that if you want a really good newsletter on the law, and I think you do, I highly recommend The Popehat Report. The author, Ken White, goes by the name of Popehat on twitter. I learn something new an in depth every time I read it.

Speaking of newsletters, the Substack service seems to be on a roll when it comes to signing up big names to provide newsletter services. I suspect this will build for awhile as a gold rush of sorts occurs. Lots of people will think they will be able to cash in. But as always the Long Tail effect will occur, and just a small number of people will really benefit from the monetization of newsletter.

Climate Change: Between the pandemic and the US election, it has been easy to forget there is still a climate crisis occurring. There are so many examples of it, but this struck me: Phoenix to break record for most 100-degree days in calendar year – The Washington Post. Eventually many parts of the world will be uninhabitable as time passes and Climate Change worsens.

Cool science: gravitational waves were first discovered in 2015. Since then, scientists have captured 50 events pertaining to gravitational waves. Here’s what that means: What 50 Gravitational-wave Events Reveal about the Universe – Scientific AmericanI love that this new tool is already letting us learn so much more about our universe.

Cool tech: I have been a fan of Raspberry Pis for a long time. They continue to come out with new and improved versions of the technology. Case in point, this: Raspberry Pi 400 – Complete Kit – BuyaPi.ca. It could be a great way to get someone interested in computers.

Plants: I’ve written number of pieces on plants; you can find themhere. I used to be terrible with them. But one good thing about the pandemic is that I am home all the time. This helps me keep a better eye on my green friends. Partially as a result of that, they are thriving. If you have problems with plants, I recommend that you read this: How to stop killing your houseplants – Vox

Finally: I realize the pandemic is getting you down. Your not alone. But there are vaccines coming, so find ways to deal with it until then.

Remember: