This American Life

Podcasts:

Varieties, science, design.

* This American Life. http://www.thisamericanlife.org/

* Radiolab. http://www.radiolab.org/series/podcasts/

* Planet Money. http://www.npr.org/planetmoney

* Stuff You Should Know. http://www.howstuffworks.com/

* The Infinite Monkey Cage. http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00snr0w

* The Weekly Briefly (Shawn Blanc). http://feedpress.me/weeklybriefly

* Actuality (from Quartz). http://www.marketplace.org/topics/world/actuality-marketplac...

* Anticast (for Portuguese speakers out there - the best Brazilian podcast I know). http://www.brainstorm9.com.br/anticast/

* 99% Invisible. http://99percentinvisible.prx.org/

Technology, programming, Apple, etc.

* Debug. http://www.imore.com/debug/

* Mac Power Users. http://www.relay.fm/mpu

* Accidental Tech Podcast. http://atp.fm/

* Overtired. http://www.esn.fm/overtired/

* The Vergecast. http://www.theverge.com/verge/verge_archives/show?mode=Entry...

* What's Tech (also from The Verge, fun show). http://www.theverge.com/whatstech

* Pragmatic. http://techdistortion.com/podcasts/pragmatic

* Iterate. http://www.imore.com/iterate

* The Changelog. http://5by5.tv/changelog

* Build Podcast (each post is actually a screencast about some technology). http://build-podcast.com/

* The Talk Show With John Gruber. http://daringfireball.net/thetalkshow

* Inquisitive. http://www.relay.fm/inquisitive

* MacCast. http://www.maccast.com/

* Exponent (from Ben Thompson). http://exponent.fm/

Music and recording:

* Lauren Laverne (music and interviews from BBC Radio 6). http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p02nrv0l

* The Talkhouse Music. http://thetalkhouse.com/music

* Home Studio Corner. http://www.homestudiocorner.com/

* Simply Recording Podcast. http://simplyrecordingpodcast.com/

Blogs and news sites:

* The Verge. http://www.theverge.com/

* Web Designer News. http://www.webdesignernews.com/

* Stratechery. https://stratechery.com

* Matt Gemmel (one of my favorite writers on the web). http://mattgemmell.com/

* BrettTerpstra.com. http://brettterpstra.com/

* Coding Horror. http://blog.codinghorror.com

* Daring Fireball. http://daringfireball.net

* Guy English. http://kickingbear.com/blog/

* Ignore the code. http://ignorethecode.net/blog/

* Patrick Rhone. http://patrickrhone.com/

* Shawn Blanc. http://shawnblanc.net/

* The Brooks Review. https://brooksreview.net/

* Tools & Toys. http://toolsandtoys.net/

* George Monbiot (my favorite writer on politics & the environment). http://www.monbiot.com/

(I had to post again to get line breaks. Sorry, this is my first time commenting on HN).

This is not envy driven. Not wanting bonuses for bankers who were bailed out by public money has to do with bonus-driven bad decisions being a fundamental cause of the crash that cost everyone else trillions of dollars in wealth, economic growth, unemployment benefits and bailouts. Look up "moral hazard", and note that they are up to the same shenanigans that got us into this mess.

Furthermore, if the banks are, effectively, government guaranteed, then bankers should be paid as government employees. Greater pay is for greater skill and risk, their risk is borne by everyone but themselves and as for skill... So it is only proper (and not "envy") for the taxpayers to get those bonuses.

..old money children who have inherited a fortune but seem to have contributed little of value themselves

This is also a huge economic and social problem, no need to invoke "envy". The moneyed elites have started to decouple themselves from the rest of the world. I went to a prep school in Michigan where this was quite apparent, and scary. There was also a recent study that warned that this decoupling of the elites from everyone else could lead to (or contribute heavily to) the collapse of civilization [1]. For an artistic rendition, see "Elysium". What's so scary about that film is not the dystopian outlook, but rather how real a lot of it already feels.

They're envious of highly paid sporting or artistic celebrities who get more salary in a week than most of us make in a year.

Again, there are good economic arguments for this being a problem. Pay way in excess of the ability to consume creates a huge overhang in liquidity with which people start to gamble in the international financial casino, creating instability[1] See also "Giant Pool of Money"[2]

And so they support punitive rates of tax for those who earn noticeably more than they do

The rates are not punitive. They are stabilizing. Where this rate starts is a good question to which I don't have a good answer.

Unfortunately, what that usually does in practice is hit highly qualified professionals or modestly successful entrepreneurs

Not according to any statistics I have seen. References?

However, the people these punitive taxes don't hit are the ones that the popular moneylust craves, because the super-rich are the people who have the flexibility to move their assets and/or themselves around to avoid high-tax environments. Absent serious international co-operation to overcome the naturally competitive tax environment that today's globalised society creates, these people will continue to be super-rich no matter what

So should we not do this because it is wrong or because it won't work? It seems it can't work if we don't start somewhere. Certainly finance has globalized, so it seems it is time for enforcement to catch up. This seems to start happening, see the crackdown on Switzerland as a tax-haven/money-laundering center.

[1] http://www.sesync.org/sites/default/files/resources/moteshar...

[2] http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=n&pre...

[3] http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/355/t...

>I don’t think I can fully describe the heart-wrenching pain of seeing your life & career crumbling around you and feeling utterly powerless to stop it. I thought I was fast approaching my inevitable and permanent end. I don’t cry often, but I cried a lot that night.

The author has harsh words for his previous behavior, but the question I have is about the sentiment at the center of his reflection on the experience: if he had agency in the attacks on him. I certainly believe that he does not think he does.

A lot of this comes down to deeply personal questions about how to address misbehavior and what we expect from other people. I do not know the details of what Noah did or what the people he mistreated want, but in his incomplete account I can certainly think of things that jump out to me.

- He says that no one has accused him of raping them. I personally know people who were raped and never accused their rapists. It was not worth the trouble or they did not have the social capital or they did not want to pursue law enforcement. How much introspection Noah should have depends a lot on the specifics but is it certainly not clearly enough to say that you didn't do something because no one accused you. That's not reflection.

- At the end of the day no one has an obligation to like you. It is not up to the perpetrator to decide what the appropriate restorative process is. We do not need a legal system to give us permission to dislike someone.

- He says, towards the end "If you’ve been cancelled and want someone to talk with who won’t shame or judge you, shoot me a message." I mean...I suppose I get what he means, but it seems hard to simultaneously put forth that your previous behavior was wrong and should be judged harshly and also that you will not judge others for their previous behavior. I am all for a path to restoration, but if I am to believe in reform I would like to see a more complex understanding than I get from this essay. I believe any real path to restoration must include judgement about past misdeeds.

I think about the Dan Harmon apology for the sexual harassment her perpetrated against a coworker[1]. It has its own flaws and, to a degree, I think it overly-centers Harmon, but one thing I think it gets very right is that Harmon made sure to apologize in a way that was accepted by his victims and was detailed about his misbehavior. He is clear-eyed about the way that he took advantage of his power, how selfish and small his motivations were, and how much damage he did to his victims. His apology feels merciless to his past self in a way that I do not see in Noah's account.

Now maybe Noah has fully satisfied his victims and they simply do not want to go public and ofc that changes my understanding of this situation. But I do not get the same unceasingly unsympathetic treatment of Noah's past behavior. He seems like he wants it to go away rather than make it part of his story and, I think, that approach feels less fully-engaged than others that I've seen.

Ultimately accounts like this, where we are all judging behavior of strangers we haven't meet in past events we did not experience, are always questionable. I don't feel certain at all about Noah. I also think it is easy to read this account of his experience and be uncertain about how he has changed. He mentions, at the start, that cancelling "those who are attempting to grow is such a counterproductive and potentially dangerous trend" - but I do not understand from this article how he is attempting to grow. Instead, I see a disagreement about how to deal with his past behavior.

[1] https://www.thisamericanlife.org/674/transcript

I think you're missing my point about perception. The world runs on perception. When presented with the same facts, even two identical twins may come up with a different conclusion. They each lead different lives.

I understand where you're coming from because I used to believe in hard truths too. This is the main point of our disagreement, and it's not worth discussing the details of the situation in Austin further without first agreeing on this point. I know we'll disagree on Austin because of our disagreement about perception of facts. Perhaps the world's most famous diplomat, Henry Kissinger, discusses this frequently, for example here [1], here [2], and here [3]. I think [3] is the best example because it shows when Kissinger changed his point of view on the subject of facts vs. perception. This is a man who opened up China to trading with the rest of the world after 30 years of disconnect. He's not perfect but he knows how to work with people and make things happen.

> How would negotiating for the same rights as any other business help Uber and Lyft? Please sir, may I have the right to buy gas, serve passengers, etc?

I think you have to come to the table with a mindset other than "you're out to get us". You need to believe that there is some merit to the government or people's position, and that they might have reason to believe that the public perceive a government background check is more secure than a private one, and would vote accordingly (as they did). Whether the fingerprint-based background check is better or not becomes irrelevant at the negotiating table. One can't wave a magic wand and change public perception to align with what you believe. Politicians will negotiate based on the public's view. The facts about background checks are useful to present on U/L's website or in media, but the only thing that matters to the politician will be public perception. This is why you see some politicians flipping on things like gay marriage. They weren't necessarily ideologically against it in 1990, they just felt they didn't have the strength to change the voters' view on the topic. You can call that weakness but there are tons of issues like this and gauging public opinion is really hard. Politicians spend all their time at it. There's a pretty good podcast from This American Life on the subject [4]. Politicians spend all their time calling people asking for money, which is a way of connecting with people and hearing their views. Barney Frank says,

"If the voters have a position, the votes will kick money's rear end any time. I've never met a politician-- I've been in the legislative bodies for 40 years now-- who, choosing between a significant opinion in his or her district and a number of campaign contributors, doesn't go with the district." [4]

[1] https://youtu.be/wooGL__-OvA?t=10m06s

[2] https://youtu.be/wooGL__-OvA?t=57m24s

[3] https://youtu.be/_eM_z4vRxrA?t=5m52s

[4] http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/461/t...

I would recommend the following (you can get most of these books in kindle edition and most of the documentaries are online in one form or another:

Web:

* http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fibonacci

* Liber Abaci, his most famous book: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liber_Abaci

* History of money: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_money

* More on Liber Abaci: http://liberabaci.blogspot.com/

* More again on Liber Abaci: http://www.math.utah.edu/~beebe/software/java/fibonacci/libe...

* This American Life episode on the invention of money: http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/423/t...

Books:

* The Ascent of Money: http://www.amazon.com/Ascent-Money-Financial-History-World/d...

* The Origins of Value (hard to find): http://www.amazon.com/Origins-Value-Financial-Innovations-Cr...

* History of Money (I haven't read this yet, but plan to): http://www.amazon.com/History-Money-Ancient-Times-Present/dp...

Documentaries:

* NOVA's 'The History of Money': http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/ancient/history-money.html

* BBC's 'The Ascent of Money' series: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Ascent_of_Money

* The Secret History of the Credit Card: this was PBS again, can't find it online but if you Google around I am sure you could find it somewhere.

There is a lot more out there - if you follow links, wikipedia, amazon recommendations and reviews etc. you will find a lot of good sources. A fascinating topic and fascinating characters involved in the creation of money (like the Rothschilds and their involvement in toppling governments and funding conflict).

Every financial instrument we use today - from bonds, stocks, notes, interest, credit, debit, trade finance instruments etc. have an interesting story around their origin.

Fibonacci bought over the Arabic number system, base 10 notation (which makes interest easier to calculate), and set formulas for conversion, standard units of weight etc. It was a bit like an early draft standard for merchant traders.

With the history, you soon realize that money is just a promissory note or a debt, and that all money is borrowed. With a wallet full of notes what you have is a promise from the US Government that the notes can be readily exchanged.

The more recent fascination with gold-backed currency seems a bit ridiculous if you understand the history and why we went into gold and then back out of it.

The problem occurs at two points:

1) when you then use the results of those tests more broadly than applicable.

Comparing results in the same school year on year is generally valid (although you have to watch out for events like a big employer closing). Comparing two different schools close in location requires a bit of finesse. Comparing schools in completely different locations with completely different demographics is generally useless--yet NCLB effectively tries to lump all schools together with the same tests.

2) when you apply those tests to provide punitive measures

Why don't people get that doing this is going distort the system? Software people wail continuously about "you can't judge my craft with objective measures." Practically any measure in software I can dream up: number of bugs fixed, number of bugs found, number of commits, number of lines of code written, etc. will be met with cries of "that doesn't measure my ability" AND "if you promote on those measures, people will start gaming the measures". And they will be right.

Why can't people see that the exact same thing will occur in teaching?

The standard complaint is that only programmers can judge programmers and that non-programmer managers can't judge correctly. Yet, with respect to teaching, we magically think that any moron can judge teaching ability and that non-teaching managers are well equipped to judge teachers.

This is one of my hot buttons. Tech folks are so very quick to defend their own area with "you can't objectively judge and punish me" and so quick to apply "but I can objectively judge and punish you."

And, even when a school is doing things right, it's really hard to keep it going. Positive results take years to show up unequivocally while negative results can appear almost immediately.

See: http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/275/t...

The bit about how quickly things dropped one year when they didn't have parents come in 3-times-a-year to review report cards is particularly enlightening. Achievement is getting a lot of little things right, and only the teachers can see when they're right and when they're wrong.

By contrast, it took 10 years to move from 15% passing reading and math to 66%. That's roughly 5% a year, and I suspect the first years were slower than that. 5% is statistical noise to a test--which means that all of the things that were occurring in the first years would have been filtered out by a test. Not the result you wanted.

So, given that achievement at that school is now dropping, what does the test tell us to do? Where does the test say: "Whoops. The teachers are the same, so A) either the children got worse or B) we need to unroll every single change made by administrators in the last year." Where is THAT application of the test?

Now do you see the problem with testing?