Liberapay is a platform for recurrent donations to creators and other individuals or organisations worth supporting. Sign-up, loading money and setting up your recurrent donations is straight-forward, so that you really have no excuse not to support your favorite creators.

Contrary to its commercial counterparts (such as Patreon), Liberapay is a non-profit, its code is open source and it does not take a cut (except for payment fees) from the money flowing between donors and recipients. Payment fees are kept low by offering SEPA bank transfers in addition to credit card payments. This means that significantly more of your money will actually reach the intended recipient instead of paying for the profits of venture capital investors.

The only potential downside is that Liberapay is strictly a donations platform: you cannot provide “perks” to your supporters as is possible with Patreon and others. The reason for this is that this way you are really receiving donations and not providing a service, which I guess might make things easier depending on your countries’ laws (e.g. regarding taxes, social security, and/or liability).

I prefer OpenStreetMap, the open map data, to commercial offerings such as Google or (yikes!) Apple Maps - because of its open spirit, because anyone can contribute and improve the map, because you don’t get tracked about your every move and also simply because in many places in Europe OpenStreetMap these days has actually better, more accurate data.

However, OpenStreetMap is just a database - they provide a website to browse the map (openstreetmap.org), but no navigation apps or other tools when you are on the go. However, OpenStreetMap doesn’t need to, because – as the data is freely available – everyone can build navigation apps on top of the data source.

This is where Magic Earth comes into play: It uses OpenStreetMap data and I use their iPhone app almost daily:

• It provides frequent map updates: OpenStreetMap receives updates from contributors every second, but it will take a while for that to feed into your favorite navigation app, with Magic Earth providing sufficiently frequent updates in my opinion.

• It provides offline maps for free: you can download as many maps as you like (and you have storage space for) to your device, meaning you can use them offline when there is no cellphone reception, you are roaming abroad or you just want to save on bandwidth. And, contrary to some other offline maps, it also supports searching for addresses or points-of-interests (POI) while you are offline.

• It provides beautiful maps (3D views etc.) and a useful selection of POIs (restaurants etc.) which makes it easy to find your way around even if you’re not using the navigation mode.

• It implements a very good routing algorithm, providing different choices of shortest, fastest etc. routes and can take into account traffic conditions in many regions of the world.

• It’s navigation mode provides very clear indications and also supports lane indications (if the lanes have been mapped in OpenStreetMap, which unfortunately is not yet the case everywhere but is improving) and max speed warnings.

• It is free.

For me, Magic Earth is the best navigation app on iOS, beating competitors such as Maps.me (which I also like), primarily due to its superior navigation features, POI (points-of-interest) selection and just general usability. The latter, of course, is very subjective and your tastes may vary – but since Magic Earth is free, you might just as well give it a try and delete it again if you don’t like it!

We had dinner here on our way to Parc National du Mont Orford, finding this restaurant by accident, and we have seldomly been so lucky: We already knew we were in for a treat based on how busy the restaurant was, and we were not disappointed: Far from the ubiquitous burgers, Pinocchio presents a varied menu of dishes, and all of which we tasted were excellent!

The portions are reasonable, which means that you might be disappointed if you are into huge portions. However, this also means that you will have room for a dessert, which is a huge upside: definitely try the “Mi-Cuit” if you are a chocolate lover, or the “Pudding Chômeur” if you are more the maple fan.

Questo servizio è probabilmente uno dei migliori per imparare una lingua, è interattivo e semplice.

Derek Wall is a British ecosocialist and academic; if you live in the UK you may also recognize him as the Green Party candidate in Theresa May’s Maidenhead constituency. His book, “Elinor Ostrom’s Rules for Radicals”, is a ~120 page overview of Elinor Ostrom’s work. Ostrom (d. 2012) was a political economist who focused extensively on the concept of the commons, a set of shared resources available to all members of a community. In 2009, she was co-recipient of a Nobel Prize for Economics.

Wall attempts to draw lessons from Ostrom’s work that may be useful to political activists. He describes Ostrom as a pragmatic problem-solver not drawn to a specific ideology, though committed to democratic and participatory co-creation of solutions. Ostrom specifically challenged the “tragedy of the commons”, a concept popularized by Garrett Hardin—the idea that common pool resources (such as grazing lands) are doomed to degradation due to overuse by selfishly motivated individuals.

Through broad, multi-disciplinary research Ostrom demonstrated that there are countless examples of successful commons. She derived from this a set of design principles for sustainable management of commons resources. Wall’s book motivated me to read Garrett Hardin’s original essay, and I find it frankly astonishing that the idea of a “tragedy” of the commons gained so much credence to begin with. Hardin’s 1968 essay is mostly about population control in line with the kind of neo-Malthusianism that was very fashionable at the time. It concludes:

The only way we can preserve and nurture other and more precious freedoms is by relinquishing the freedom to breed, and that very soon.

Hardin’s ideas are so reductionist that I find it hard to take them seriously at all. My impression is that Ostrom deconstructed, through solid empirical and theoretical work, an argument that rested on very weak foundations to begin with.

Elinor Ostrom. Manitoulin Island, 1968. (Credit: Elinor Ostrom Collection, The Lilly Library. Fair use.)

But Wall’s book only dedicates one of ten chapters to the commons. His “rules for radicals” are a broader reflection on Ostrom’s work and approach. Wall reminds us repeatedly (to the point of tedium) that Ostrom herself a) was not a radical, b) was a pragmatist, c) was a problem-solver, d) was very collaborative. With this framing, he examines her approach to topics like climate change, or to economic activity that is not easily captured in the classical distinctions of market vs. state.

Interspersed are Wall’s own observations regarding contemporary politics, from the revival of right-wing populism to the experiment in democratic confederalism known as Rojava. He also contrasts Ostrom’s economic views with Marxist theory, and attempts to examine potential blind spots they share.

Unfortunately, the book does not stay with any subject long enough to convey deep insights. For instance, Wall mentions the intersection of Ostrom’s thinking about the commons with projects like Wikipedia. But he does not examine this topic closely, and indeed towards the end commits the faux pas of calling Uber an “open source transportation service” (Uber is no such thing).

The Verdict

Wall’s effort to make Ostrom’s work more accessible to a broad audience is commendable. However, this particular book only gives a very light introduction. It provides only a few quotes from Ostrom’s own work, perhaps enough to whet your appetite. While short, the book is a bit more tedious than it needs to be because the author repeats himself quite frequently.

That could have been avoided through more rigorous editing, along with smaller issues such as sentences with swallowed words or syllables. 3.5 out of 5 stars, rounded down.

Babbel is my favorite app to learn a foreign language (French, in my case) and I use their website and iOS app for learning.

While I started out with Duolingo (which, contrary to Babbel, is free), in my experience Duolingo will become pretty repetitive quite soon and you will reach the end of their learning ladder without really speaking the language all that well. Babbel includes a ton of content for learning French, which starts with the basics but moves on to very advanced vocabulary – I’m still not all the way through it! I also prefer that they actually have human-made dialogues (some of them are actually quite nice mini-stories) and actually explain the grammar to you (not only by trail-and-error translation exercises but by actually explaining the concepts behind it).

Thanks to Babbel, I feel far more confident speaking French these days. I would argue that none of these apps can replace human interaction, especially to train your speaking skills, so you might still want to invest in a French teacher, but they are a good way to get started and for low-friction learning when you’re waiting for a bus etc.

What I would prefer is for Babbel to include more gamification like Duolingo does - you can argue that it is a bit sad to need such artificial encouragement to stay on it, but I will admit that Duolingo’s “streaks” and points really do motivated me to keep going, while Babbel requires more self-discipline. If they would include these features, they would get five stars from me.

This afghan restaurant is one of our two favorite restaurants in the city! It’s Afghan dishes (best to be shared with your group) are wonderfully delicious, the staff is very friendly and in the summer you can also sit outside. To be honest, I’m getting hungry by just thinking about their wonderful, wonderful food while writing this review.

It’s also “apportez votre vin”[1], which means that the final bill will end up even more modest than you might expect from only looking at the (anyways very reasonably priced) food on the menu.

[1]: “Bring your own wine”, or BYOB, which means they do not sell alcohol but you can bring your own bottle of wine and they will open it for you with no charge.

We have tried the Rideau Rouge the first time during Poutine Week, trying their (awesome!) poutine creation. We passed the Rideau Rouge a couple of times on Avenue Cartier before, but it’s downstairs entrance has never really motivated us to actually go there (it has a bit of a red-light look from the outside, which I guess is intentional but not in any way representative). Now we know that we have missed out all the time!

The Rideau Rouge is a unique combination, in that it looks and feels just like your run-of-the-mill American bar (in a good, laid-back way), but at the same time offers an unexpectedly diverse and delicious selection of food. They delight by adopting their food to the occasion: for Super Bowl, you will find typically American bar food, while two weeks later for Valentine’s Day, they will present an almost “haute cuisine” romantic dinner menu.

If you find yourself in the area, give that downstairs entrance a try!

I was in Bordeaux a couple of weeks last year and was thus looking for a co-working space during the day. What can I say - I discovered Le Buro des Possibles and fell immediately in love with this cozy café and co-working place in the middle of the old town!

Le Buro des Possibles has a small coffee area and a separate area that is dedicated for co-working, where you can rent a place by the hour (or about 20 EUR for the whole day). This includes a seat plus free coffee, tea, water, delicious cakes (dangerous!) and a very fast and reliable wifi connection (they change the password every week, which increases security and ensures that it is really reserved for the co-working customers).

For lunch, they offer the choice between usually two to three vegetarian options, which you can add to your co-working bill. They are not the largest portions, which can sometimes be a pity as they are always very delicious, but that probably compensates for your cake consumption (see above). ;)

If you are looking for a coworking space in Bordeaux, I can whole-heartedly recommend Le Buro des Possibles, and when I come back to Bordeaux I will definitely start working there again!

In a previous life, Theodore Gray co-founded Wolfram Research and led the design of the user interface for Mathematica, a comprehensive technical computing software package used in many fields. Since leaving Wolfram Research, Gray has focused on conveying his own passion and excitement for science through books, iOS apps and artistic projects like a physical periodic table.

The Elements, Molecules and Reactions is a trilogy of richly illustrated books best enjoyed in their beautiful hardcover editions, written by Gray with photographer Nick Mann and other collaborators.

As you might expect, the first book, The Elements, takes the reader on a journey through the periodic table. I found this book the weakest of the trilogy; the structure forces the author several times to say that element so-and-so is just not very interesting, so why don’t we just move on. That said, the photographs are still gorgeous, and the book contains a good introduction to concepts like the atomic orbitals.

In contrast, Molecules and Reactions are much more substantive, offering powerful explanations for why atoms stick together in certain configurations—or come apart—while introducing just enough jargon to give you the foundation for learning more, if you want to. The explanation for entropy offered in Reactions is, by far, the best I’ve ever come across.

The Elements, Molecules and Reactions opened up to a random page (Credit: Theodore Gray and Nick Mann. Fair use.)

A Cabinet of Curiosities

The books rely heavily on Gray’s vast personal collection of objects that represent different elements and molecules, including rare and dangerous ones. Opening up a few random pages, I find photographs of opium boxes, a Kevlar glove, trombone oil, and an antique tin of saccharin.

Rather than lots of text with smaller photos, the images take center stage. In The Elements, each element in the periodic table gets at least one full photo page (you can preview the pages here). In addition to photos, Molecules and Reactions also make frequent use of chemical drawings in a simplified style that is easy to understand.

The text and images are presented in an unusual free-flowing layout that doesn’t always work perfectly if you’re reading in one sitting, but which makes the books a pleasure to pick up and open to a random page, even after you’ve finished them. Gray writes in an informal, casual style, for example (from Molecules):

“Undecane—a straight-chain hydrocarbon with eleven carbons—is, I swear, a moth pheromone. They use it to attract mates, in much the same way the human male uses it in sports carts (it’s one of the higher-numbered hydrocarbons in gasoline).”

The books also use lots of humor and personal anecdotes, but unlike a book like “We Have No Idea”, it’s on the whole more focused on explaining things than delivering puns or jokes. Reading any book in the trilogy feels a bit like visiting a museum (or a cabinet of curiosities) with your personal tour guide who explains everything with a wink and a half-smile.

The Verdict

I personally started with Molecules; if I had begun with The Elements, I’m not sure I would have kept going. It’s not a bad book, it’s just not nearly as gripping as the other two. As it is, I finished all three books within a few weeks (there’s not that much text).

I was neither especially good nor especially bad at chemistry in school, but I never felt that the explanations I got out of it actually helped me understand the “why”. Why do atoms prefer certain configurations over others? Why do chemical reactions release energy? Why can small changes in a chemical formula represent such massive changes in a molecule’s appearance or behavior?

Gray’s books help any reader to at least grapple with these questions in a more informed and intuitive way. They make a great gift for curious teenagers, but I would also recommend them to any lifelong learner. If you can, you’ll want to buy or borrow the whole set, but if you just want to check out one book, I suggest making it Molecules or Reactions.