Links randomly selected from the stuff I saw the previous week: an essay on climate change by Zadie Smith, a tweet about baseball statistics, a photo I took of cherry blossoms in Vancouver (which itself contains further links), and an interview with the developer of a social reading service. Some links are from longer than a week ago.
climate change
Robert Scales approached me yesterday at Moose Camp asking if I could write briefly about deSmogBlog's redesign, and I told him I'd be happy to, after having subscribed to their RSS feed and listened to their occasional podcast. The project is an interesting idea: they are pointing out what they believe to be rhetoric that is designed to obfuscate the truth about climate change. The Left has had a hard time in the past 30 years with the strong challenge from the Right, which both simplified and strengthened its message (among other things). If I understand it correctly, deSmogBlog looks like one effort to both simplify and strengthen the climate change message.
It feels necessary to disclose that after Robert asked me to mention deSmogBlog's redesign, he gave me a desmogblog.com jacket. It's a nice enough jacket, but I didn't expect it: I had agreed to do it because he asked nicely and I already subscribed to the site's feed. I don't really need it, so I'll be dropping it in the clothes donation bin around the corner from my place, so that someone not as well off as me can have something to protect them from the elements.
Also, Bryght, the company I work for, hosts the site, and Raincity Studios (which also designed Just a Gwai Lo), designed deSmogBlog.