Good Reads

[Laurel]

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Citing “new technologies” and “economic realities,” the Times Herald-Record in Middletown, N.Y., laid off its four remaining staff photographers earlier this month, joining the growing ranks of newspapers that are shrinking or eliminating their photography staffs.

Along with their newsroom colleagues, news photographers have not been immune to the layoffs affecting the newspaper industry. But a landmark moment occurred this past May, when the Chicago Sun-Times axed its entire 28-person photography department. Another major U.S. daily, The Atlanta Journal Constitution, announced in October that it would lay off a significant number of its staff photographers.

Indeed, the annual newsroom census from the American Society of News Editors indicates that photographers, along with other visual journalists, represent the category of newsroom staffers hit hardest by the numerous rounds of job cuts.

The ranks of photographers, artists and videographers have been trimmed by nearly half (43%)—from 6,171 in 2000 to 3,493 in 2012, according to ASNE. By comparison, the number of full-time newspaper reporters and writers dropped by 32%—from 25,593 to 17,422. In the same period, 27% of copy and layout editor and online producer jobs were lost, falling from 10,901 to 7,980.​

- read the full article At newspapers, photographers feel the brunt of job cuts (from Pew Research Center)​

 

[Laurel]

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NEW YORK—Parenting magazine released its annual list of the best and worst places to raise a child this week, once again naming the Mariana Trench—an undersea chasm located 36,000 feet beneath the western Pacific Ocean—as the least desirable location for rearing children.

The periodical’s staff reportedly selected amongst thousands of locations, weighing a diverse range of criteria such living costs, air quality, and local amenities, categories for which the pitch-black, silt-covered abyss unanimously received an “F” rating.

“In all categories, the Mariana Trench consistently got our lowest marks as a good place to start a family,” the 14-page article read in part. “The school system is nonexistent, the nearest playground is 300 nautical miles away, and at over 15,000 pounds per square inch, the hydrostatic pressure is enough to crush a child in less than a second.”

“While the area does contain a low crime rate, that benefit is quickly negated by the Mariana Trench’s lack of a police department, not to mention fire, sanitation, highway, or public works departments,” the article continued.​

- read the full article Mariana Trench Once Again Named Worst Place To Raise Child (from The Onion)​

 

[Balladeer08]

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​

It would appear they forgot to seal off the floor.

Bug In A Rug, anyone?

(NEW! From RONCO!)​

 

[Laurel]

It would appear they forgot to seal off the floor.

Bug In A Rug, anyone?

(NEW! From RONCO!)

True!

 

[Laurel]

A legal scholar says Christ got a fair trial and crucifixion was not unusual for the time

http://farm4.staticflickr.com/3475/3317349573_f02aa5e311.jpg
image from philophilosopher (Flickr)

A Spanish legal scholar who spent 25 years researching Jesus’s trial has concluded that the man believed by Christians to be the Son of God received due process under Roman law.

Jose Maria Ribas Alba says that Jesus’s trial and punishment were consistent with other contemporary cases, and that the “criminal proceedings against him were legal,” the New York Daily News reports. The finding disputes Biblical accounts that say that the charges against Christ were exaggerated and that his punishment was unusually cruel.​

- read the full article Study: Jesus’ Crucifixion Was Legal (from Time Magazine)​

 

[Laurel]

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Between the beginning of October and early November, the following eight companies were among more than twenty that began trading on the New York Stock Exchange: OCI Partners, Springleaf Holdings, Brixmor Property Group, Essent Group, 58.com, Mavenir Systems, Midcoast Energy Partners, and Twitter. They’re a diverse group of tech, energy, property, and finance companies, valued at their respective I.P.O.s between three hundred and sixty million dollars (Mavenir Systems) and $24.5 billion dollars (Twitter).

By the end of their first day of trading, Midcoast, Springleaf, 58.com, and OCI had risen in value, whereas Essent, Brixmor, Mavenir, and Twitter had fallen. At first it’s hard to discern a difference between the early appreciators and the early depreciators. Many experts argue that it’s impossible to reliably forecast stock prices in the short run. In his classic 1973 guide to investing, “A Random Walk Down Wall Street,” the Princeton economist Burton Malkiel famously claimed that “a blindfolded monkey throwing darts at a newspaper’s financial pages could select a portfolio that would do just as well as one carefully selected by experts.” Investors, Malkiel argued, were at the mercy of the markets, and though prices generally rise in the long run, it’s impossible to beat the market reliably and consistently. Malkiel’s book has sold more than a million copies.

Short-term investing is certainly a gamble, but if you look back at the eight companies, you’ll find one subtle feature that distinguishes the climbers from the fallers: whether their ticker symbols are pronounceable according to the rules of English—that is, whether it’s possible to read them out loud as if they were words, without adding extra sounds. The pronounceable OCIP, MEP, LEAF, and WUBA (OCI, Midcoast, Springleaf, and 58.com, respectively) appreciated by between one percent and fifteen per cent, whereas the unpronounceable ESNT, BRX, MVNR, and TWTR (Essent, Brixmor, Mavenir, and Twitter) depreciated by between half a per cent and fourteen per cent. Eight stocks is a tiny sample by any standard, and stock prices are shaped by far more powerful forces—but the relationship between ticker pronounceability and early performance seems to hold with larger samples, too. (The trend holds if you include all twenty-three stocks that began trading between early October and early November: after twenty-four hours on the market, seventy-five per cent of the companies with pronounceable symbols appreciated, but only forty-seven per cent of those with unpronounceable tickers appreciated.)​

- read the full article The Secret Science of Stock Symbols (from The New Yorker)​

 

[trysail]

- read the full article The Secret Science of Stock Symbols (from The New Yorker)​

Sorry, but this article is nothing but one more addition to the vast literature on investing that is entirely snake oil. IPOs are for suckers.


If you want a good read on investing, I recommend two:

1) The guy who taught Warrren Buffett was Benjamin Graham. He wrote a book called The Intelligent Investor.

2) Read all of Warren Buffett's annual Letters To Shareholders of Berkshire Hathaway Corporation. They are easily obtainable.


Above all, remember Buffett's advice:

[ Italics are mine ]



Excerpted from the 1996 Annual Report of Berkshire Hathaway

Let me add a few thoughts about your own investments. Most investors, both institutional and individual, will find that the best way to own common stocks is through an index fund that charges minimal fees. Those following this path are sure to beat the net results (after fees and expenses) delivered by the great majority of investment professionals.

Should you choose, however, to construct your own portfolio, there are a few thoughts worth remembering. Intelligent investing is not complex, though that is far from saying that it is easy. What an investor needs is the ability to correctly evaluate selected businesses. Note that word "selected": You don't have to be an expert on every company, or even many. You only have to be able to evaluate companies within your circle of competence. The size of that circle is not very important; knowing its boundaries, however, is vital.

To invest successfully, you need not understand beta, efficient markets, modern portfolio theory, option pricing or emerging markets. You may, in fact, be better off knowing nothing of these. That, of course, is not the prevailing view at most business schools, whose finance curriculum tends to be dominated by such subjects. In our view, though, investment students need only two well-taught courses - How to Value a Business, and How to Think About Market Prices.

Your goal as an investor should simply be to purchase, at a rational price, a part interest in an easily-understandable business whose earnings are virtually certain to be materially higher five, ten and twenty years from now. Over time, you will find only a few companies that meet these standards - so when you see one that qualifies, you should buy a meaningful amount of stock. You must also resist the temptation to stray from your guidelines: If you aren't willing to own a stock for ten years, don't even think about owning it for ten minutes. Put together a portfolio of companies whose aggregate earnings march upward over the years, and so also will the portfolio's market value.


© 1997 Warren E. Buffett

 

[Laurel]

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Earlier this month, Mother Jones described the early days of the CIA as "Mad Men with security clearances." Men were the spies; women were the secretaries. But over the years, things have changed, and now, women make up nearly half of the CIA, and at least 40% of undercover operatives (spies) are female.

In fact, as Ann Curry reports for NBC news, women hold 5 of the top 8 positions in the organization. Avril Haines is the deputy director, Meroe Park is the executive director, and the Director of Intelligence is Fran Moore. All women.​

- read the full article Boys Club No More: Now Women Make Up Nearly Half of the CIA (from Jezebel)​

 

[Laurel]

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A tropical lake where divers swim with jellyfish has become a top tourist attraction on the Pacific island of Eil Malk, in Palau.

Every day, millions of golden jellyfish migrate across the lake, following the sun's rays as it passes overhead.

The species has been isolated from their ocean-dwelling descendants for 15,000 years, and over time their sting has weakened.

Now it is safe to swim with them, as the sting generally has no effect on humans.​

- read the full article & watch the video Swimming with jellyfish: divers snorkle through clouds of jellies in Jellyfish Lake (from The Telegraph)​

 

[Phelia]

https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/-YnaaPZDgztM/UlU893PAIuI/AAAAAAAAFqI/wSAHy2bxkJ4/w634-h423/Swimming%2Bin%2BJellyfish%2BLake%252C%2BEil%2BMalk%2BIsland%252C%2BPalau%2Bby%2BDAVID%2BKIRKLAND.jpg

A tropical lake where divers swim with jellyfish has become a top tourist attraction on the Pacific island of Eil Malk, in Palau.

Every day, millions of golden jellyfish migrate across the lake, following the sun's rays as it passes overhead.

The species has been isolated from their ocean-dwelling descendants for 15,000 years, and over time their sting has weakened.

Now it is safe to swim with them, as the sting generally has no effect on humans.​

- read the full article & watch the video Swimming with jellyfish: divers snorkle through clouds of jellies in Jellyfish Lake (from The Telegraph)​

OH MY SWEET JELLY JESUS. I MUST GO THERE.

 

[rosco rathbone]

OH MY SWEET JELLY JESUS. I MUST GO THERE.

are you mad?

jellies have driven me from the sea pretty much single handed. i used to enjoy swimming in the surf.

 

[Laurel]

What they don't mention in the article is that Miles just thought he was going to SF to play dress-up in a Batman costume. He had no idea what Make-A-Wish and San Francisco had planned for him.

Seriously teary.

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What began with a cancer-stricken boy named Miles and his dream of fighting crime ended up captivating celebrities, firing up the president, and bringing regular office folks to tears at their desks. A little boy's wish to be Batman became a city's command, and a nation's shared moment.

Make-A-Wish grants thousands of requests a year to children with life-threatening illnesses, from trips to Disney World to meetings with sports heroes, yet this was a little different. Miles Scott, who recently finished treatment for leukemia, wanted to be Batman. On Friday, the charitable organization's San Francisco branch ran with it and turned an entire city by the bay into Gotham, setting up crimes for 5-year-old Miles to solve. There was a damsel in distress, a Riddler trying to rob a bank, and the kidnapping of Lou Seal, the San Francisco Giants mascot. Miles, dressed up as Batman, would be charged with saving the city.

He not only saved the city, he arrested the nation. And he did it in what was arguably a first-of-its-kind fashion.

BatKid's fans mostly watched the crime-fighting not on television (although there was some broadcast coverage) but on social media. Updates bounced around Twitter from the San Francisco Make-A-Wish account, from the press, and even from ne'er-do-wells like The Penguin. As Miles made his rounds, popular accounts normally devoted to other, newsier subjects began to cheer the boy on. "Holy adorable moment, Batman!" raved the Major League Baseball account. The Washington Post's account blared, "UPDATE: BatKid is hot on the Penguin's tail." People who weren't a part of the Make-A-Wish plan but heard about BatKid via social media began posting messages on Facebook about leaving work to check out San Francisco's new superhero.

Soon, even the president was caught up in it, sending out his first-ever Vine.​

- read the full article http://news.yahoo.com/batkid-%E2%80%93-a-good-deed-gone-viral-165006958.html (from Yahoo! News)​

 

[JohnnySavage]

I had a thread about that.

You should follow me more closely and it would be very enlightening.

 

[Laurel]

Ah. I've been busy the last few days. Closing threads and linking threads and such.

 

[Laurel]

Also, I'm already stalking someone else. When that gets boring, I promise to stalk you next.

 

[JohnnySavage]

I'm all aquiver.

 

[Phelia]

are you mad?

jellies have driven me from the sea pretty much single handed. i used to enjoy swimming in the surf.

But these ones can't hurt you; their stings don't have an effect on humans! Look at that picture! You really don't want to swim through an underwater galaxy of jellyfish? A lush, gelatinous forest of squishy things?

I hate to quibble but since we're talking about jellies it would probably be "single-tentacledly" and you would not believe the size of the idiot grin on my face as I typed that.

Oh and yes, I am mad about jellyfish. I know they are a pestilence and will overtake us all but they are so whooshy and lovely.

 

[lovetoread]

Isn't it sad that when humans do something good it's so out of the ordinary?

Most of my donation gets sent to make a wish, as my company is a big supporter. It's one of the rare things we all agree upon.

 

[Laurel]

But these ones can't hurt you; their stings don't have an effect on humans! Look at that picture! You really don't want to swim through an underwater galaxy of jellyfish? A lush, gelatinous forest of squishy things?

I hate to quibble but since we're talking about jellies it would probably be "single-tentacledly" and you would not believe the size of the idiot grin on my face as I typed that.

Oh and yes, I am mad about jellyfish. I know they are a pestilence and will overtake us all but they are so whooshy and lovely.

Bow Down to Your Future (soft and squishy ocean-going) Overlords!!!

Isn't it sad that when humans do something good it's so out of the ordinary?

Most of my donation gets sent to make a wish, as my company is a big supporter. It's one of the rare things we all agree upon.

It's awesome. Of course, I saw a few grouches complaining about the cost or whatever. I think unhappy people hate nothing more than to see other people happy, even a 5-year-old with cancer. lol

 

[rosco rathbone]

I hate to quibble but since we're talking about jellies it would probably be "single-tentacledly" and you would not believe the size of the idiot grin on my face as I typed that.

I see that you hit the slow pitch I served you out of the park.

I don't know what could be more nighmarish than swimming in a three dimensional volume full of invertebrates, unless maybe you took a massive dose of acid beforehand.

 

[Laurel]

Being covered in slugs? That's literally my worst nightmare.

I don't mind ocean-going slimeys. Fish, eels, jellies, even seaslugs - they're beautiful and lovely as they float like flowers in the water, and I'll happily poke them with my finger. But land-living slimies - especially those big-ass banana slugs - give me the major heebie jeebies.

 

[Laurel]

Sam Riches went to the Canadian competitive laughing championship. He met a 103-year-old man, a one-eyed person named Eyeborg, and a bunch of people trying to elevate the pursuit of joy into a sport.

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On Sunday night in Toronto, Albert Nerenberg sits on a grey plastic folding chair inside The Great Hall, a historic building in the west end of the city. He’s three hours away from hosting the first-ever Canadian competitive laughing championship.

In front of him, there are three male “laughletes,” who will be performing later in the evening. Behind Nerenberg is a small black stage, and a low-hanging video screen that reads, “It’s Laughter Night in Canada.” Red velvet curtains are drawn across the stage, and a golden trophy sits on a mantle, on top of more crushed red velvet.

Nerenberg is dressed in a navy blue blazer over a black sweater, black dress pants, and shiny black shoes. The scuffed hardwood floors creak as he shifts forward in his chair, leaning in to address the three competitors.

“Remember, this is a game,” he tells them. “And the great advantage of play is that you win and lose. You’re in it to win, so be crazy—but if you lose, there’s always next year.”

He then explains that laughter paralysis is the pinnacle of a good laugh, warns the competitors to be careful not to fall off the stage, and reminds them that anything can happen.

“The woman who won the American Championship last year,” he says, “she didn’t tell anyone until afterwards, but she pissed her pants in the final round.”

NERENBERG IS A LAUGHOLOGIST. He’s also a filmmaker, an actor, and a journalist. His most recent film, a 2009 documentary called Laughology, posits that laughter is the original peace signal and led to the rise of human civilization. He invented Laughercize, a series of joy-inducing exercises based around the contagiousness of laughter. He hosted the first competitive laughter competition in Montreal in 2011. It led to additional competitions in Japan, France, Austria, Slovenia, the Czech Republic, the United Kingdom, and elsewhere. Along with Dr. Madan Kataria, the founder of Laughter Yoga, Nerenberg is at the forefront of the laughter movement.​

- read the full article Inside the World of Competitive Laughing (from Pacific Standard)​

 

[crazychemgirl]

Being covered in slugs? That's literally my worst nightmare.

I don't mind ocean-going slimeys. Fish, eels, jellies, even seaslugs - they're beautiful and lovely as they float like flowers in the water, and I'll happily poke them with my finger. But land-living slimies - especially those big-ass banana slugs - give me the major heebie jeebies.

SAME!!!!

 

[JohnnySavage]

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The sprawling 200-acre, 22-building compound in Laurel, Md., once housed thousands of the District’s most mentally disabled residents. Some 23 years after shuttering its doors, it sits as a monument to a failed policy of institutionalization, a decrepit reminder of decades of abuse and mistreatment.

When the Asylum opened in 1925, it was a progressive institution, a farm colony that taught people with intellectual disabilities useable skills and aimed to get them gainfully employed. Residents milked cows, planted and tended to crops, and lived in dorms surrounded by trees, with peaceful, pastoral names like Beech or Elm cottage. Their routine included exercise and recreation: athletic fields and basketball courts filled some of the green space between buildings.

But as attitudes towards treatment of the mentally disabled evolved, Forest Haven did not. Institutionalization was rapidly becoming a last resort; more humane alternatives were provided, and many asylums closed altogether, replaced by group homes and more individualized care.

--Read the full article Abandoned DC: Forest Hill

 

[Laurel]

http://everythingisdirty.com/blogimg/fhaven_1.jpg

The sprawling 200-acre, 22-building compound in Laurel, Md., once housed thousands of the District’s most mentally disabled residents. Some 23 years after shuttering its doors, it sits as a monument to a failed policy of institutionalization, a decrepit reminder of decades of abuse and mistreatment.

When the Asylum opened in 1925, it was a progressive institution, a farm colony that taught people with intellectual disabilities useable skills and aimed to get them gainfully employed. Residents milked cows, planted and tended to crops, and lived in dorms surrounded by trees, with peaceful, pastoral names like Beech or Elm cottage. Their routine included exercise and recreation: athletic fields and basketball courts filled some of the green space between buildings.

But as attitudes towards treatment of the mentally disabled evolved, Forest Haven did not. Institutionalization was rapidly becoming a last resort; more humane alternatives were provided, and many asylums closed altogether, replaced by group homes and more individualized care.

--Read the full article Abandoned DC: Forest Hill

LOVE these sorts of stories. They absolutely fascinate me.

Anyone who also finds these sorts of things interesting might enjoy The Lives They Left Behind: Suitcases from a State Hospital Attic by Darby Penny. Sad, but moving and beautiful too.