My Life, Economics, and Finance

Earlier this year, Iceland decided not to reimburse UK for insuring the UK citizens’ accounts held with Icelandic banks. Leading to (in my opinion justified) threats by UK to block Iceland’s potential accession to the EU.

Now, Icelandic volcano is churning out thousands of tons of ashes, paralyzing the air-traffic throughout Europe. It looks as if even the nature was on the side of the proud (though currently shipwrecked) vikings of finance, fighting the evil, outside world.

I understand that some (the guy in a You Tube video) have very strong negative feelings about Iceland.

Wow, who would have expected THIS. (Make sure you read the whole thing and check out the “learn more about the program” page).

The Economist reports on a new pipeline from Russia to the EU; it will send olive oil from vast olive grooves, planted on the steppers freed from permafrost.

The BBC reports on William Shakespeare’s origin.

Russia unveiled its new invisible tank. (James Bond had an invisible car cca. five years ago, but we haven’t seen a tank so far.)

I wanted to use the number of incoming links to university web sites as a proxy for the quality of the institutions.
The idea is simple, the more prestigious is the university perceived to be and the more quality research it produces, the more others write about it and link to its website. Unlike other rankings, this approach takes in to account not only the number of scientific publications, but also otherwise unobservable (unmeasurable) prestige.

Like with many (presumably) good ideas, someone already did it. It can be accessed here.

Sitting can apparently be more dangerous than one would think. Not only that it’s one of the most passive things (makes you fat because you are not burning any calories), but it also prevents production of certain for the body beneficial chemicals that are produced only when muscles flex. In other words the body stops being nice to itself when you sit too much.

I am standing in the bus starting tomorrow!

more can be found HERE.

Tufts, one of the three famous universities located in the Boston area encourages students to supplement their application with a Youtube video. In my opinion a brilliant idea, the world around us is changing and the university applications should keep up with the trend.
The only think I don’t like is that it might further disadvantage kids coming from low income families. Today some of the wealthy parents are hiring professionals to write application essays for their kids, tomorrow they’re going to hire Hollywood directors to make short films about their “young geniuses”. Wonder if Cameron would do an application video in 3D…

Rich Indonesian families seek refuge in luxurious hotels as their servants make their annual pilgrimage at the end of Ramadan.
I wonder to what extent  is this exodus of rich families phenomenon of last years, during which has Indonesia experienced fast GDP growth.

source : nationmaster.com