Russell Ackoff on the Philosophy of W Edwards Deming. Vs the reality of A corporation says that its principle value is maximizing shareholder value. That’s non-sense. If that were the case executives wouldn’t fly around on private jets and have Philippine mahogany lined offices and the rest of it. The principal function to those executives is to provide those executives with the quality of work life that they like. And profit is merely a means which guarantees their ability to do it. (more)

The shadow docket (or non-merits docket)[1][a] refers to motions and orders in the Supreme Court of the United States in cases which have not yet reached final judgment,[b] decision on appeal, and oral argument. This especially refers to stays and injunctions (preliminary relief), but also includes summary decisions and grant, vacate, remand (GVR) orders. The phrase "shadow docket" was first used in this context in 2015 by University of Chicago law professor William Baude. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shadow_docket (more)

Google Nest, formerly branded Google Home, is a line of smart home products including smart speakers, smart displays, streaming devices, thermostats, smoke detectors, routers and security systems including smart doorbells, cameras and smart locks.[2] The Nest brand name was originally owned by Nest Labs, co-founded by former Apple engineers Tony Fadell and Matt Rogers in 2010.[3] Its flagship product, which was the company's first offering, is the Nest Learning Thermostat, introduced in 2011. The product is programmable, self-learning, sensor-driven, and Wi-Fi-enabled: features that are often found in other Nest products. It was followed by the Nest Protect smoke and carbon monoxide detectors (smoke alarm) in October 2013.[4] After its acquisition of Dropcam in 2014, the company introduced its Nest Cam branding of security cameras beginning in June 2015.[5] The company quickly expanded to more than 130 employees by the end of 2012.[3] Google acquired Nest Labs for US$3.2 billion in January 2014, when the company employed 280. As of late 2015, Nest employs more than 1,100 and added a primary engineering center in Seattle. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Nest (more)

cf home automation

video camera used for place security; may be monitored by company like ADT, or be self-service smart home system

Wirecutter: The Best Smart Home Devices to Help Seniors Age in Place. For this guide, I interviewed doctors and experts who specialize in smart-home technology for those aging in place. (more)

Ring LLC is a manufacturer of home security and smart home devices owned by Amazon. It manufactures a line of Ring smart doorbells, home security cameras, and alarm systems. It also operates Neighbors, a social network that allows users to discuss local safety and security issues, and share footage captured with Ring products. Via Neighbors, Ring could also provide footage and data to law enforcement agencies to assist in investigations with user’s consent constraint. The company was founded in autumn 2013 by Jamie Siminoff as the crowdfunded startup Doorbot; it was renamed Ring in autumn 2014, after which it began to receive equity investments. It was acquired by Amazon in 2018 for approximately $1 billion.[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ring_(company) (more)

Helion Energy, Inc. is an American fusion research company located in Everett, Washington.[2] It is developing a magneto-inertial fusion technology to produce nuclear fusion power by combining deuterium with helium-3 via aneutronic fusion. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helion_Energy (more)

Fusion power is a potential method of electric power generation from heat released by nuclear fusion reactions. In fusion, two light atomic nuclei combine to form a heavier nucleus and release energy. Devices that use this process are known as fusion reactors. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fusion_power (more)

The demand for computing power is so fierce that OpenAI’s departure barely mattered to Nscale, which has quickly become one of Europe’s hottest startups, valued at $14.6 billion. Known as a “neocloud,” so called because it is built primarily for the needs of new AI models, it is part of an emergent category of tech companies that have risen up to satiate the market’s ravenous hunger for AI computing power. Nscale is barely two years old, but business is booming, with five data centers in various stages of construction in the U.S., U.K., and Norway. Investors are lining up in advance of a possible IPO later this year. In March Nscale raised $2 billion, the largest round of its kind in European history. Josh Payne, the company’s 32-year-old CEO, tells TIME he wants to turn Nscale into a “$1 trillion hyperscaler”—a new cloud company that can compete with the likes of Amazon, Microsoft, and Google. (more)

Default Friend: Meditations on the self-diagnosis. I constantly think about self-diagnosis and the Internet. (more)

R U Sirius converses with Joseph Heath, author of Nation Of Rebels: Why Counter-Culture Became Consumer Culture. The story we tell in the book is not one about how the system has systematically co-opted countercultures, but rather about how counterculturalists have systematically deluded themselves into thinking they were challenging the system....That having been said, I should note that we think the evils of Consumerism are extremely serious. The problem is not that countercultural thinking goes too far in criticizing it, but rather that counterculturalists misdiagnose the problem - attributing it to manufactured desires, rather than competitive consumption - and therefore recommend solutions - individualistic nonconformity, DIY - that have, over the years, manifestly exacerbated the problem.

Emma Loker: Agreeableness and Neuroticism: What's the Relationship? Are agreeableness and neuroticism two sides of the same coin or inherently different?... Evidence suggests that agreeableness and neuroticism share an inverse relationship. People who score high on agreeableness typically score low on neuroticism and vice versa. (more)

Lion’s Roar: Metta Meditation: A Complete Guide to Loving-Kindness. Increased compassion for ourselves and others, better relationships, and decreased stress and anxiety are just some of the benefits of metta meditation, or loving-kindness practice. In this step-by-step guide, we lead you through the how and why of compassion practice with written, audio, and video instruction. (more)

Sasha Chapin: Novice Meditator's Notes, Late December. Meditation is, right now, one of the most meaningful parts of my life. But I’m not an expert; I’ve probably practiced for somewhere between 500-1200 hours in my life, which is, like, one-twentieth of what people do before they get called Roshi, or start a sex cult, or whatever. So I share these reflections with you in a spirit of curiosity, rather than authority. (more)

The New Left was a broad political movement that emerged from the counterculture of the 1960s and continued through the 1970s. It consisted of activists in the Western world who, in reaction to the era's liberal establishment, campaigned for freer lifestyles on a broad range of social issues such as feminism, gay rights, drug policy reforms, and gender relations.[1] The New Left differs from the traditional left in that it tended to acknowledge the struggle for various forms of social justice, whereas previous movements prioritized explicitly economic goals. However, many have used the term "New Left" to describe an evolution, continuation, and revitalization of traditional leftist goals. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Left

Herbert Marcuse (/mɑːrˈkuːzə/ mar-KOO-zə;[4] German: [maʁˈkuːzə]; July 19, 1898 – July 29, 1979) was a German and American philosopher, social critic, and political theorist, associated with the Frankfurt School of critical theory. Born in Berlin, Marcuse studied at the Friedrich Wilhelm University of Berlin and then at the University of Freiburg, where he received his PhD under the supervision of Martin Heidegger.[5] He was a prominent figure in the Frankfurt-based Institute for Social Research, which later became known as the Frankfurt School. In his written works, he criticized capitalism, modern technology, Soviet Communism, and pop culture, arguing that they represent new forms of social control.[6] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herbert_Marcuse (more)

the supposed war on terrorism following the World Trade Center bombings

The Gulag[c][d] was a system of labor camps in the Soviet Union.[8][9][7] The word Gulag originally referred only to the division of the Soviet secret police that was in charge of running the forced labor camps from the 1930s to the early 1950s during Joseph Stalin's rule, but in English literature the term is popularly used for the system of forced labor throughout the Soviet era. The abbreviation GULAG (ГУЛАГ) stands for "Glávnoye upravléniye ispravítel'no-trudovýkh lageréy" (Гла́вное управле́ние исправи́тельно-трудовы́х лагере́й or "Main Directorate of Correctional Labour Camps"), but the full official name of the agency changed several times. The Gulag is recognized as a major instrument of political repression in the Soviet Union. The camps housed both ordinary criminals and political prisoners, a large number of whom were convicted in accordance with simplified procedures, such as NKVD troikas or other instruments of extrajudicial punishment. The agency was established in 1930 and initially was administered by the OGPU (1923–1934), later known as the NKVD (1934–1946) and the Ministry of Internal Affairs (MVD) in the final years. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gulag (more)

Samizdat (Russian: самиздат, pronounced [səmɨzˈdat], lit. 'self-publishing'), also samvydav (Ukrainian: самвидав), was a form of dissident activity across the Eastern Bloc in which individuals reproduced censored and underground makeshift publications, often by hand, and passed the documents from reader to reader. The practice of manual reproduction was widespread, because printed texts could be traced back to the source. This was a grassroots practice used to evade official Soviet Union censorship. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samizdat