Weeklinks 2024-03-15

• This is hitting home hard right now: Being Glue, or the value of generalisation and joining-the-dots, and how it largely goes against how we see careers and job roles.

• Nice quote: "Whenever you try to change an organisation it’s important to remember that the pace of change will feel glacial to those trying to effect the change, while at the same time feeling rapid and relentless to those affected by it."

Future lives

• Tech doesn’t make our lives easier. It makes them faster – there is a "rebound" effect of saving time: we (or, equally probably, our boss) sees it as a way to fit more in, rather than do less. Disclaimer: I am totally guilty of that.

• Europe’s solar crisis will cast a long shadow (FT).

  • This is one of the issues I have with an engineering-only approach to sustainability – markets are subject to global volatility and electrical infrastructure comes down to market setup, so any approach really needs to factor in a shrinking, more turbulent world. Is it possible that conflict caused by climate change will undermine the technology to mitigate it?

• Interesting analysis on how plastic particles from tyres make up ~78% of microplastic pollution in the sea. I do wonder whether moving away from car usage altogether is a much better thought experiment than how to switch to electric cars.

• A good reminder to keep away from most "smart" tech. Cheap Video Doorbells Have Terrible Security. Amazon Sells Them Anyway. We’re still not really learning much about tech, apart from functionality vs price.

Numbers

• XKCD: Goodhart’s Law

• Over 130,000 records of repair: latest Open Repair Alliance data – Open Repair Alliance. Bosh – huge numbers!

Handhelds

• Virtual Boy Emulation Arrives On Nintendo 3DS With 3D Support

• Africa by Toto but its played on instruments in Majora’s Mask

Deprecated. Too Depressing

• XKCD: Greenhouse Effect

• Leaked Russian military files reveal criteria for nuclear strike