Mostly, I Write – Telegram
Mostly, I Write
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Storie e pensieri suoi e di altri, raccolti da Antonio Dini http://www.antoniodini.com
Per contatti su Telegram: @antoniodini
Per iscriversi alla newsletter Mostly Weekly: https://tinyletter.com/MostlyIWrite
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Il più antico club di amanti della fantascienza (e fantasy) ancora regolarmente in funzione. A Los Angeles, ok, ma ha una sua storia che vale la pena

Money quote: "LASFS is also responsible for the founding of two major science fiction and fantasy conventions, Loscon and Westercon. In fact, LASFS is such a powerful force in fandom that during the McCarthy era the FBI placed an undercover agent in the society to monitor Communist influence in “fannish” subcultures. Later, in 1968, the society flexed its fanboy muscles and helped save Star Trek from cancellation through a national letter writing campaign directed at NBC executives."

https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/los-angeles-science-fantasy-society
Fai siti web e un tuo cliente non paga? Bisogna premunirsi. Ecco dunque la soluzione perfetta per te: basta inserire questo javanoscript e il sito pian piano si oscura. Non mi sembra per niente legale, ma sai mai te che non funzioni...

Money quote: "Add opacity to the body tag and decrease it every day until their site completely fades away. Set a due date and customize the number of days you offer them until the website is fully vanished."

https://github.com/kleampa/not-paid
O voi, grandi aziende farmaceutiche mondiali (e Goldman Sachs, ovviamente), se però fate così, poi diventa difficile spiegare che le teorie del complotto sono appunto solo quello, teorie del complotto. Perché non lo sono più.

Money quote: "Goldman Sachs analysts attempted to address a touchy subject for biotech companies, especially those involved in the pioneering “gene therapy” treatment: cures could be bad for business in the long run.

“Is curing patients a sustainable business model?” analysts ask in an April 10 report ennoscriptd “The Genome Revolution.”

“The potential to deliver ‘one shot cures’ is one of the most attractive aspects of gene therapy, genetically-engineered cell therapy and gene editing. However, such treatments offer a very different outlook with regard to recurring revenue versus chronic therapies,” analyst Salveen Richter wrote in the note to clients Tuesday. “While this proposition carries tremendous value for patients and society, it could represent a challenge for genome medicine developers looking for sustained cash flow.”"

https://www.cnbc.com/2018/04/11/goldman-asks-is-curing-patients-a-sustainable-business-model.html
Gianbattista Vico. I corsi e i ricorsi della storia. Siamo sotto un fitto bombardamento di newsletter digitali. Il modo è tornato di moda. Mi ricordo che nel 1994 suppergiù avevo lanciato la mia, "FunBits", i cui venti numeri circa stanno tutti su un hard disk che da anni dico di voler recuperare e un giorno vorrei proprio farlo, se ancora funziona. Intanto, c'è chi parla dell'attuale ondata. Quasi quasi la faccio anch'io. Che ne dite di un "Mostly, I Write Digest"? Oppure "Mostly, I Write Quarterly" (ma questo sembra più una rivista trimestrale). O magari un "Mostly, I Write Newsletter"?

Money quote: "Newsletters and newsletter startups these days are like mushrooms in an open field after a good spring rain. I don’t know a single writer who isn’t newslettering or newsletter-curious, and for many, the newsletter is where they’re doing their finest public work.

As for the present landscape of NAASes (Newsletter As A Services)"

https://craigmod.com/essays/newsletters/#fnref:3
Sta tornando alla grande, anche (e soprattutto) grazie a Netflix. È la stand up comedy una delle grandi fonti di senso della cultura americana. Ma come funziona? Qui viene spiegata la meccanica di unp spettacolo di Ali Wong, e vale più di un corso di scrittura creativa.

Money quote: "Each marks noticeable audience laughter. The circle size denotes how long the audience laughed.

In fact, this moment had the most laughter in the entire show. We’ll call it the “laughter climax.”

Why was this moment so funny? After dissecting it, we’re going to show you how form—the structure of the entire routine—played a big role. Form made the joke funnier."

https://pudding.cool/2018/02/stand-up/
Avete presente gli schermi sullo schienale del sedile di fronte negli aerei? Quelli dove si guardano i film etc? Bene, si scopre che su alcuni c’è anche una telecamera che a quanto pare non è mai stata attivata. Finora.

Money quote: “American Airlines spokesperson Ross Feinstein confirmed to BuzzFeed News that cameras are present on some of the airlines’ in-flight entertainment systems, but said “they have never been activated, and American is not considering using them.” Feinstein added, “Cameras are a standard feature on many in-flight entertainment systems used by multiple airlines. Manufacturers of those systems have included cameras for possible future uses, such as hand gestures to control in-flight entertainment.”“

https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/nicolenguyen/american-airlines-planes-entertainment-system-cameras
Una storia il cui presupposto avrebbe anche senso - la parte altissima della piramide sociale americana, l'élite che fa lavori top dopo essere stata nelle grandi università, è in realtà ricca ma per niente felice - se non fosse che secondo me alla fine chi se ne fregano. È solo una riedizione smart di "Anche i ricchi piangono" e a me, se devo proprio dire, piaceva di più Véronica Castro.

Money quote: "“I feel like I’m wasting my life,” he told me. “When I die, is anyone going to care that I earned an extra percentage point of return? My work feels totally meaningless.” He recognized the incredible privilege of his pay and status, but his anguish seemed genuine. “If you spend 12 hours a day doing work you hate, at some point it doesn’t matter what your paycheck says,” he told me. There’s no magic salary at which a bad job becomes good. He had received an offer at a start-up, and he would have loved to take it, but it paid half as much, and he felt locked into a lifestyle that made this pay cut impossible. “My wife laughed when I told her about it,” he said."

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/02/21/magazine/elite-professionals-jobs-happiness.html
Sul perché viaggiare per ritrovare sé stessi non funziona: viaggiare -come strumento per il miglioramento personale- serve ad altro

Money quote: "The virtue of travel is that it exposes you to other cultures, people and ways of life. It helps develop a global mindset, it puts things into perspective. It’s exciting and fulfilling in its own way. It’s also a status symbol. It sets you apart. It makes you nomadic, and interesting. It can make you think you are beyond the norms your peers have fallen beholden to.
But none of those things help you understand who you are, though they are all enlightening in their own ways."

https://medium.com/@briaeliza/travel-is-not-how-you-find-yourself-its-how-you-escape-yourself-c143e06a7329
Leggendo questo articolo, la cui tesi piuttosto sempliciotta è che forse potremmo trovare creature extraterrestri nella foggia di intelligenze artificiali che vagano replicandosi per l’universo, mi è venuta in mente un’altra cosa. Ragionando a questa maniera, l’essere umano dal punto di vista del credente è una forma di intelligenza artificiale, in quanto creato a immagine e somiglianza dell’essere supremo, unico “naturale” (cioè non creato da altri). No?

(Ovviamente no, il ragionamento è paradossale e non sta in piedi. Ma è stimolante secondo me).

Money quote: “In short, the way for a species to make a better AI is to let that AI and its components explore the messy Universe. As complex and nourishing as a single planet can be, a cosmos filled with worlds offers millions, billions, even trillions of natural test tubes, each with its own tale of natural selection and chance. Spreading savant AI pieces across the stars offers a way to exploit these endless natural experiments and sensory inputs.”

https://aeon.co/essays/first-contact-what-if-we-find-not-organic-life-but-ets-ai