First published by Yale University Press in 1998, James C. Scott’s Seeing Like a State is one of those rare scholarly works that have achieved wide intellectual impact beyond academia. Its core thesis is simple: states and large corporations depend on radical simplification to plan and execute, and in the process, they often ignore the skill and wisdom of the people whose lives they seek to direct. When this faith in rationality is combined with the power to coerce, disaster and misery may follow.

The case studies in the book range from collectivization in the Soviet Union to the planning of large cities. Agriculture is one of the domains Scott is most familiar with. Consequently, much of the book elucidates just how much skill and knowledge are employed on family farms and by pastoralists, even if that skill was acquired more by a “stochastic” method (trial and error) rather than a scientific one. This makes apparent the tragedy of collectivization, which devalued the skill of farmers in order to better control their productive output (or more specifically, that part of their work the state was interested in).

The book’s biggest strength are these insightful case studies; its weakness is its plodding repetition of the same argument over and over again, along with some unnecessary jargon. With better editing, the book could have easily been brought down to 300-350 pages. This makes the book a bit of a slog, but does not distract from its importance.

To be clear, the author is not merely cheerleading for free markets. Indeed, he clarifies repeatedly that powerful market actors (especially when they conspire with the state) may implement similarly disastrous schemes to maximize their own profits. He speaks of the “ecumenical” nature of a faith in high modernism and documents how some “priests” of this belief system have been willing to enter the services of communists and capitalists alike, so long as they were permitted to pursue their ultimately destructive schemes.

Socialists who have faith in nationalization and other large government schemes should read the book to better understand the risks inherent in such projects; libertarian socialists may find it useful to support their skepticism of centralized power.

The book does, of course, not account for recent developments in computing that make management of large amounts of data (e.g., soil and weather data in agriculture) more feasible, nor does it help to navigate the transition to an information economy. These 21st-century developments should not tempt us to renew our faith in rationalist central planning but strengthen our commitment to building decentralized, resilient, cooperative networks.

Charles Darwin referred to his landmark work, The Origin of Species, as “one long argument”, a title Ernst W. Mayr (one of the 20th century’s leading evolutionary biologists) adopted for this treatise on the “genesis of modern evolutionary thought”. First published in 1991, it remains useful reading to better understand how Darwin’s ideas were received and modified over time.

The most valuable insight I gained from the book is that speaking of “Darwin’s theory” is misleading, as Darwin was a proponent of many important separate scientific ideas, including:

• evolution itself: life is not static, but constantly changing;

• common descent: all life on Earth shares a common ancestor;

• multiplication of species, e.g., through geographic isolation;

• gradualism: evolution is a slow process, not sudden emergence of new types;

• natural selection: thanks to genetic variation, from a given pool of individuals, some will have a higher likelihood of survival than others, and those characteristics may spread;

• sexual selection: some characteristics may spread purely because they increase the likelihood that an organism can attract a suitable mate.

All these ideas were present in Darwin’s work, along with some others which were later refuted (such as Darwin’s continued belief in some aspects of Lamarckism). But what’s remarkable is how long it took for the full force of Darwin’s insights to become recognized.

At first, “Darwinism” was mainly identified with evolutionary thinking as such, and with the rejection of religiously motivated reasoning to explain life on Earth. Yet aspects we now recognize as fundamental, such as natural selection, were largely ignored. It would take many decades — and the work by other scientists such as August Weissman and Alfred Wallace — for evolutionary thinking to truly take shape. Understanding this history helps explain why Darwin remains so highly revered in the scientific community: on many of the key questions, he was right on target from the beginning.

This is a dry book, and at times (such as when Mayr tries to establish exactly how much influence Thomas Malthus had on Darwin’s thinking), the author’s attempt to develop a microscopic analysis of the history of Darwin’s thought processes seems almost quixotic. Nonetheless, that same methodological rigor is what gives the book its explanatory power.

For the most part, the book is understandable to a layperson; the final chapter (which deals with frontiers in evolutionary biology at the time) is both the most technical and the most noticeably dated. A glossary explains some of the commonly used scientific terms.

Recommended if you want to better understand how we naked apes came into the possession of the knowledge of how we came to be.

xkcd (reviews) is a lovely, nerdy webcomic and occasional canvas for larger scale experiments such as "Click and drag" or "Time". It’s also full of subtle references, inside jokes relying on technical or scientific domain knowledge, and easter eggs. explain xkcd, with the not-so-subtle tag line “It’s 'cause you’re dumb”, is a wiki that provides background, transcripts, and trivia on each episode.

And it doesn’t really matter how obvious the joke is — explain xkcd will still spell it out, like so:

Despite the skyline being clearly recognizable as St. Louis due to the Gateway Arch, Black Hat calls it New York City. However, the nickname he gives is neither a common New York nickname (such as “The Big Apple”) nor a St. Louis nickname. Megan tries to correct him, but it becomes clear that Black Hat is making up nicknames. Many of his suggestions are puns for real nicknames of other places.

But then look a bit further, and the same page contains a long table of all the various nicknames referenced in the comic, making the whole page a rather delightful expansion on the content of the strip.

And so it goes for almost every episode. It’s a beautiful idea, well-executed, and it’s being expanded into explain penny arcade, for the eponymous gaming focused web comic which also contains many references which may not always be obvious.

The web platform has many cynics and critics. The litany of complaints includes: incompetent developers (there’s nothing techies love more than being critical of other techies), bloated libraries, framework hell, recalcitrant browser makers, security nightmares, ever-changing specifications, and an unrelenting hype machine. All those criticisms have elements of truth. But there’s also an upside: web development is an open, decentralized, vibrant community, one which seems to inexorably stumble towards making better web applications at least possible.

And it also has open, welcoming subcultures that reject cool, detached cynicism and dominance displays. From projects like Nodeschool to the Recurse Center, there are thousands of people concerned with equipping more of us with the skills to build a better web. I associate Pony Foo with that same culture of learning & sharing. Started as a blog by Nicolás Bevacqua from Buenos Aires, Pony Foo has grown into a larger community that publishes in-depth articles about the web platform (i.e. the JavaScript language, HTML, CSS; various libraries, tools, and frameworks).

Given the rate of change in web development, such resources are indispensable for anyone who wants to do more than maintaining a legacy application. And Pony Foo helpfully provides a roundup of various findings from around the web (courses, tutorials, news, etc.), in a weekly email newsletter, which is just about the right frequency to not be overwhelmed.

While the newsletter highlights Pony Foo’s own articles, they are only a fraction of the content, and the biggest value-add is in the curation of resources from elsewhere. A typical example of a summary:

Error Handling in React 16

Dan explains how error handling works in React 16, which is out on public beta since yesterday. React 16 uses Fiber under the hood, although its async rendering capabilities aren’t turned on yet. It is expected this is enabled at some point in the React 16.x release line.

Dan Abramov

As the summary shows, occasionally the newsletter might benefit from some effort to make technical jargon more accessible or to provide a “why should I care” hook. But the headlines are easy enough to scan for stuff that seems relevant to you.

The newsletter does have sponsored posts in it, which are clearly marked. I don’t find them especially problematic and occasionally even useful. The content is under the Creative Commons CC-BY-NC-SA License, which is a bit restrictive (incompatible with Wikimedia projects, for example) but a lot better than conventional copyright. Whether you love or hate the web platform (or love-hate? :), if you regularly build upon it, I highly recommend subscribing (read a sample issue to see if it’s for you).

I’ve had an Echo since May 2015 and it’s since joined a two person household. The main functions we use it for these days are: 1) playing random music, mainly from Amazon Prime’s free catalog, 2) as an alarm clock and kitchen timer, 3) as a news/weather info source, 4) as a calendar reminder. Voice recognition is usually solid except when it occasionally can’t hear us at all, e.g. over music playing. Typically, both of us use it at least 1-2 times per day. The fact that it’s plugged in means it becomes seamlessly integrated into your day-to-day life at home without having to worry about yet another device to charge.

There’s an app library but we’ve never used it — it just seems a little clunky to do anything more complicated through this interface. We also don’t use the online shopping features. The device occasionally comes on randomly when it hears the “Alexa” command on TV or radio and starts sputtering random nonsense. It’s amusing but also a bit annoying.

Beyond that, you can converse with it through its (surprisingly large) catalog of canned jokes and limited AI. For the kinds of questions Google can give you a pre-computed answer for, it can be helpful, though I’m usually near a keyboard when I have those. Having a microphone in your room may seem a little weird at first (and continues to have that “a little bit creepy” factor), but honestly, your phone and laptop have the same capabilities.

The sound quality is good for casual listening, and the overall usability of the device is great with lots of nice touches. Very straightforward setup, a remote control you can easily attach to your fridge with a magnetic holder, multiple ways to adjust the volume including on the device itself, etc. I’ve found the Android app a bit sluggish and mostly end up using echo.amazon.com instead.

What’s nicest about Echo is Amazon’s dedication to making the product better, which you really do notice as a user. There are typically a couple of new features per month, such as calendar integration or IFTTT support. At $99 with a Prime membership, it was a good deal.

i-clip in use on Charles Darwin’s “Voyage of the Beagle”

i-clips are little folding magnets to use as a bookmark or paperclip. The front has a design (there are several to choose from), the back has a little arrow that marks the specific spot in a book you’re reading. The packs currently sell for $2.59 per pack of 8 at Amazon, and for $3.95 per pack directly from the manufacturer, Peter Pauper Press.

As someone who often has multiple books unfinished (and who prefers paper books in most situations), I find these little guys indispensable. They have two main advantages compared to paper bookmarks: they’re less likely to fall out, and they can mark the specific page and line where you stopped reading.

I can’t think of anything to improve. They make a nice gift, too.

(One note of caution — since these are metal, you do have to be a bit more careful, as they’re fully capable of tearing into a page when pushed into it. It’s only happened once so far and should be easy to avoid.)

Gwendy’s Button Box is the result of a collaboration between Stephen King and anthology editor/publisher Richard Chizmar. It’s a short novella about a young, awkward girl named Gwendy (shocking, I know) who is given an odd device by a stranger. It turns out that the “button box” has great potential for evil, but it can also change her life for the better. Will she be a responsible custodian?

At one point, Gwendy quizzes her teacher and class about what to do, using a not-so-subtle political analogy. The story invites us to reflect on the responsibilities of power — perhaps, knowing King’s liberal politics, it was prompted by the recent occupation of the White House by a bumbling demagogue.

It’s a good story that stays with you and that suffers only from being a bit too cartoonish in parts. You’ll probably devour this in one or two sittings, so you might want to go for the cheap Kindle edition (7 US$ as of this writing).

number9dream, published in 2001, is David Mitchell’s second novel. Unlike Cloud Atlas, the famous book/movie that followed it, this story stays focused on a single protagonist, Eiji Miyake. Eiji is a young man from a small island, searching for a father he has never met in Tokyo’s vast urban jungle. In the process, he loses himself in his own fantasies, gets caught up in a Yakuza gang war, falls in love, and has to figure out what exactly he’s hoping to get out of his quest.

We don’t always know for sure what is real and what is imagined, a point driven home by a departure into writings Eiji discovers during his quest: the anthropomorphic animal stories of a woman at whose house he is staying; an old World War II journal of a relative. And it’s of course no coincidence that we encounter a character from Mitchell’s first novel, the Mongolian hit man Subhataar, who plays a dangerous game with the Yakuza.

The novel as a whole succeeds in conveying the dreamlike quality that its title (inspired by John Lennon’s “#9 Dream”) promises; its strength is in its power to transport and surprise the reader, its weakness in the flatness of its characters and the limited payoff of its story arc. If you’re new to Mitchell’s work, I wouldn’t recommend reading this one first (I’d suggest starting with Cloud Atlas and Black Swan Green instead). And a fair warning—while this isn’t a horror story, there are some violent scenes that may induce nightmares.

Two Minute Papers is a YouTube channel that delivers what the name promises: short summaries (sometimes a bit above two minutes in length) of scientific papers, presented by Károly Zsolnai-Fehér, a young computer graphics researcher from Vienna. Given his own field of expertise, many of the featured papers are about graphics and neural networks: the simulation of realistic interaction between liquid and hair; the generation of images from sentences using a neural network; the beautification of selfies.

This has the advantage that the videos can often feature stunning animations and images from the papers that are summarized. The videos are lovingly put together, and Károly’s excitement is infectious (if occasionally a bit disproportionate). He stays away from the details and generally focuses on the practical application and the high-level challenges the researchers attempted to overcome, while giving links to any available open source code or data. There’s also a subreddit for additional links and discussion.

Like many YouTube channels, the project solicits public support via Patreon. With already more than 50,000 subscribers, the project will hopefully be able to raise enough funds to stay alive. It’s a beautiful idea, and it would be lovely to see the approach expanded to other topics. As it is, I recommend subscribing if you’re interested in graphics, machine learning, 3D printing, and similar topics.

Natural selection has equipped our species with brains that pay special attention to negative events. We monitor the world for threats to our well-being, and we enforce in-group social norms by ostracizing those who violate them.

Our modern media ecosystem kicks these reasonable sensitivities into overdrive and produces pathological feedback loops. A celebrity’s stupid offhand remark in an interview may trigger a multi-day cycle of outrage; a terrorist’s violent act may dominate collective attention for weeks.

This is not without consequences. We become vulnerable to manipulation and demagogy. We become polarized. We become depressed. Negativity spreads on its own. It is positive, constructive engagement with the world that takes effort.

Positive News wants to help. A public benefit co-operative based in London, owned by authors and readers, it’s both a print magazine and a website dedicated to what it terms “constructive journalism”. This isn’t about images of puppies (not that there’s anything wrong with those) or about seeing the world through rose-colored glasses. Instead, Positive News focuses on stories that show how difficult problems can be solved or at least chipped away at.

The magazine is beautifully designed, with appealing typography and layout, and large format photographs and illustrations

Background

Positive News has been around for a while. It was started as a quarterly newspaper in 1993 but was relaunched as a magazine by editor-in-chief Seán Dagan Wood in 2015. The crowdfunding campaign for the co-op raised £263K (about $340K). The co-ownership model is becoming increasingly popular in the UK — nonprofit magazine New Internationalist launched a similar campaign earlier this year and raised £704K.

As part of its crowdfunding campaign, Positive News published a business plan, which includes long-term revenue goals. I was not able to find public information about revenue and spending beyond the plan, and have not received a response to an email inquiry. That said, the numbers here are still too small to worry about excessive compensation or bloat.

With a small budget, the site has managed to build a sizable social media presence, especially on Facebook, where it has more than 250K followers. Several multi-million dollar nonprofit journalism organizations we’ve reviewed do not come close to those numbers.

Revenue Model

Positive News is largely funded by print subscriptions. Subscribers get access to a digital version, but it’s impossible to directly buy individual issues of the magazine in digital form. The “Own the Media” campaign website is still up, but no community shares are currently up for sale.

There are no ads on the site, but there is a page dedicated to “brands of inspiration” — essentially a selective approach to sponsorship. Occasionally, staff writers write longer articles about these brands (which disclose the sponsorship).

That approach isn’t without risks — would Positive News report fairly about a competitor that doesn’t want to be a sponsor? Would it include legitimate criticisms? Do readers fully understand the sponsorship relationship? While all the featured businesses tend to be in the green/organic/pro-social category, the criteria for becoming a partner are not public.

I don’t want to overstate the issue. Positive News is not in the business of writing exposés about corporate abuses, so it is unlikely the sponsorship will clash with investigative work. And in any case, only two such sponsored “advertorials” can be found on the website so far. Still, a more transparent process for selecting partner brands would be welcome.

Like the magazine, the website design puts photographs and illustrations front and center — perhaps a bit at the detriment of readability for shorter articles

Design and Content

The website publishes feature-length articles and short newswire pieces, categorized into sections such as “lifestyle” or “economics”. Just like the printed magazine, the site is very visual, placing significant emphasis on design, typography and large lead images.

The site uses Disqus for comments. Activity is low (most conversations happen on the site’s Facebook feed) but there is little trolling or negativity in the comment section.

Although the organization is based in the UK, much of its reporting is international in nature (some is syndicated from other sources, including NGOs). The articles tackle tough subjects: climate change, terrorism, racism, and so on. But they focus on people working on solutions (“on patrol with an all-women anti-poaching unit”; “5 grassroots responses to terror attacks”) rather than on simply pointing out the gravity of problems.

For the most part, this isn’t about replacing bad news with good news — it’s about restoring a sense of agency. I found the reporting reasonably dispassionate, but it typically only scratches the surface and is not evaluative in nature (“does this work?”).

Site content is under conventional copyright.

The Verdict

I recommend adding Positive News to your media diet: 4 out of 5 stars. I am swayed by the argument that constructive journalism is psychologically valuable, and it undeniably brings attention to important causes. It also may inspire readers to replicate good ideas.

The organization behind the site would benefit from greater transparency about its revenue model and its plans for the future, especially if it intends to further pursue sponsorships and advertorials which may compromise real or perceived impartiality.

The site’s large social media reach demonstrates that there is a growing hunger for this type of journalism. Other media ventures would do well to consider how they can provide similar value to their audiences, e.g., by doing more feature reporting on solutions as opposed to problems.