Interesting Links for 22-10-2014

[andrewducker]

• Poor kids who do everything right don’t do much better than rich kids who do everything wrong
  (tags: inequality wealth society )
• The Internet: A Glossary
  (tags: funny internet ciph )
• A journalist investigates Gamergate to find the true basis for it. Can you guess what they find?
  (tags: games society sexism feminism )
• Mexican drug cartels are worse

Comments

[abigail_n]

That ISIL/cartels article makes me a little uncomfortable. I take the point that the danger of ISIL is overblown, but I wonder if there isn't a better way to make that point. For one thing, you can hardly say that American culture treats the cartels as benign (though you might argue that their danger is used mainly for entertainment purposes, given how often the bad guys on films and TV shows are cartel honchos). And for another, it feels as if the article is saying "instead of bombing ISIL, we should be fighting the cartels," which indirectly validates the whole war on drugs approach that helped make the cartels what they are today, and which is being replicated in the war on terror.

[cairmen]

WoW selfies got an upgrade last week with the release of the new character models, hence why they're arriving just now!

About high-speed rail in United States

[strannik01]

I agree with the whole "concentrated cities" thing. Here in Chicago, Amtrak is working on speeding up the Chicago-St.Louis route to 110 mph. I think there is something to be said for speeding up Chicago-Milwaukee Hiawatha route, or Chicago-Indianapolis Hoosier State service, or even Chicago-Detroit Wolverine service. But I'm not sure longer-distance routes like Southwest Chief or Lake Shore Limited would really benefit from being sped up - even at high speeds, they would take longer than planes, and they do provide useful service by stopping at small towns/villages that otherwise don't get a whole lot of service.