Here's a clever way to make interstellar travel real.

"Around 50% 'hold authoritarian views'". Sounds shocking. What’s more shocking is the ignorance of the researchers (three politics professors no less, albeit from second rate universities) as to what constitutes “authoritarian”. Authoritarians would presumably favour powerful state control, right ( Read more... )

I absolutely love this series of paintings of mechs attacking early 20th century east european peasants.

The other day an RAF Chinook with a distinctive bright red tail flew right past my window. (We're high on the side of a hill and they often fly low up the river.) Turns out it was a special paint scheme for the 100th anniversary of the squadron. ( Read more... )

Later this afternoon, the New York Jets* will play the Miami Dolphins* at Wembley. Moving an entire NFL team across the Atlantic for a single game is a major logistic exercise. The New York Times recently interviewed the Jets' Operations Manager about the extra work such a game entailed.

"Degerness learned which gate the plane would pull into, ( Read more... )

Correct politicalness.

Does the USA really deserve a presidential race between Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders? Pur-lease.

The purge begins...

Robert Lewandowski is a good striker.

Using drones to build a rope bridge.

Nigel Dodds MP saying what needed to be said about the new Shadow Chancellor.

Is Pope Francis really how he is depicted by most of the ( Read more... )

19 Things You'll Only Understand If You're Absolutely Fucking Terrified of Spiders. (Like me. And don’t worry, there are no pictures of spiders in the article. And in fact, that is number 1.)

The correlation between being a Jeremy Corbyn supporter and being a conspiracy theorist nutjob.

Not one, but two fecking enormous models of the USS Missouri in ( Read more... )

The Cold War historian Robert Conquest has died. Second obituary.

The Tornado is still a useful combat aircraft.

The antirant - "What an amazing time to be alive!"

Global median income doubled between 2003 and 2013. Global income inequality declined over the same period.  Absolute poverty rates have fallen around 80%. Understanding why is very ( Read more... )

Accenture to scrap the annual performance review. I worked for a similar big professional services firm for 15 years. I’ve been an appraiser and obviously an appraisee. Nothing was more harmful to performance, morale and bottom line profitability than the annual performance review system.

When Jeremy Paxman repeatedly asks an evasive politician the ( Read more... )

Nice little collection of AVRO Vulcan photographs.

Sajid Javid is probably a better politician than standup comedian, but nevertheless this is quite funny.

Wearing skirts is considered to be indecent in Morocco...

...and in Plymstock, Devon.

Strange tales from the bad old days of search engine optimisation.

How much did the coalition government manage ( Read more... )

Never swallow a porcupine whole.

And the lesson to be learned here is this: make a self-deprecating joke to a conference that could be misinterpreted as politically incorrect if removed from the context in which it was made, then it _will_ be removed from its context, selectively quoted and used by a social media mob to hound you out of your job, no ( Read more... )

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