There is a monumental battle of the wills happening in Egypt. There is also the creeping, crassest of attitudes circulating among a minority of casual observers, a fatigue, like the weariness that exculpated some people's consciences over natural disasters and other unseemly catastrophes. I have a lot of sympathy for the struggle and for the dangling disappointment and hope.
Friday 11 February 2011
zagazig
Thursday 10 February 2011
fusionen und รผbernahmen
The Deutsche Bรถrse, the marketplace for the perhaps more familiar sounding DAX (Deutscher Aktien IndeX), is in acquisition talks to take over a controlling share of the New York Stock Exchange. Though the deal may inspire some resistance politically and with cartel-considerations, the impending sale seems to me like a last, desperate attempt to revitalize American stocks with a mortgage that is already over one's head, rather than a consolidating of power and control.
Like anything in large amounts, this concentration of trading certainly has impetus but the equally cavity-causing mob of debt and poisonous liabilities are likewise influential. Making financial hardships diffuse makes it more palatable and opaque. Together in a ten-billion euro quiver, some frantic business can gain legitimacy and even the appearance of value, besides in the swapping. A unified front for managing trades and protection for minority-interests in a monopoly are important and should be weighed against each other, but foremost, I believe, that the German titans of industry should take a close look at what they are committing to. Merging marketplaces makes former paying clients overseas into partners, scouts for new customers. Compared to the sedate and efficient, post-modern Star Trek look of the German Stock Exchange, the NYSE, noisy, crowded, and littered, looks like a scene one would find at the greyhound races.
Wednesday 9 February 2011
freeware or zeroth law
The BBC has a neat, inventive profile of a Swiss initiative to equip the thinking machines with the communication substrate that tinkerers and programmers--and regular users--may take for granted. Though developers, engineers in either robotics or software or chariots of exploration, are not having to reinvent the wheel on a regular basis, though taking a second look at first-principles or learning by rebuilding the family jalopy are experiences more tactile and perhaps more valuable than ethereal modeling, but their inventions succeed and struggle in a relative vacuum.
catagories: ๐ค, technology and innovation, ⓦ
Monday 7 February 2011
sabbatical
The German English daily the local has picked up on a rumour propagated that has Egyptians' disenfran- chised president taking extended convalescent leave in Germany. This would be a controversial maneuver as getting Mubarak out of the country might defuse the violent clashes and placate the protesters to some extent. The intent, however, seems less than satisfactory since it will allow the vice-president designate the chance to act with the authority and autonomy vested in the presidency, in Mubarak's absence. There is precious little guarantee that this change of power will work towards legitimate coalition talks, however well-intentioned Germany's hosting of the president would be and promising that no possibility of sanctuary, asylum was in the offer--nor not of true exile, neither. It would mark a popular victory, exit the king but not exuent omnes, but I am sure it would not curry much favour for Germany, whose residents are staging parallel protests in Berlin and Nuremberg and all across the country in solidarity with the people.
catagories: ๐ฉ๐ช, foreign policy, revolution
Sunday 6 February 2011
sunday drive: hรผgelland
Many of our adventures begin with the prospect--very hit or miss, of a good flea-market (Flohmarkt). Never admitting disappointment, it is always a good excuse to take a leisurely drive and explore a bit. First, we walked around the grounds of a castle and chapel in a village in the Haรberge. This, I admit, was not an honest discovery, since I had stumbled across an event held at in the courtyard of this place some months ago and later researched it a little bit:
though its information site failed to mention that it was closed for the winter, the castle did want to be one's friend on bookface. I thought the castle needed some real friends and visitors. Next, we drove on to a more remote village in the foothills of the mountain range, known for its excellent examples of Fachwerk (half-timbered) houses. It was quite enjoyable to admire the architecture, especially in this well-maintained concentration.
One of the sons of Kรถnigsberg, as the village was called, was the fifteenth century mathematician, astronomer and astrologer, Regiomontanus (born plain old Johan Mรผller, but styled in Latin after his hometown, Kรถnigsberg or King's Mountain).
I remembered his bust in the halls of Walhala, honored for his achievements, which were instrumental in the development and revival of astronomy as a science. Regiomontanus was later affiliated with the first observatory and helped with Copernicus' errata, and then worked for the Pope.
He was, however, promptly and probably disposed of for espousing unorthodox views and the motion of the stars, although it was surely easy to cover up such intrigues with blaming his Bavarian pedigree for bringing the plague (die Pest), which he is said to have gotten sick from, to the Roman court.
Nonetheless, it was a nice lesson and a scenic experience for a lazy afternoon, and there is surely a lot more history and tall-tales and things to marvel at in our backyard.