Showing 1 - 9 of 9
Greenland enjoys a taste of Thailand
Roger Crutchley, Published on 11/01/2026
» We are only 11 days into 2026 and I am already worn out trying to keep up with what's going on in this crazy old world. In addition to Venezuela, countries which must be a wee bit nervous about what lies in store include Colombia, Cuba, Mexico, Iran and Greenland. However, we will leave the heavy news to the experts.
Welcome spell of fashionable weather
Roger Crutchley, Published on 19/01/2025
» By Thai standards the weather has definitely been on the chilly side in recent weeks. Or to use the correct meteorological term, it's been "a bit nippy" in the early morning and evenings.
Will AI create more fake news than it exposes?
News, Tyler Cowen, Published on 08/04/2024
» The best large-language models can already write like humans, especially if prompted properly. Photos and images can be faked at low cost. Yet-to-be-released technology can create convincing voice simulations. There are signs that some academic papers contain traces of GPT-4. If even professors are faking it, then surely the dam has burst.
The true cost of our 'wars' and 'wreckonomics'
Oped, David Keen & Ruben Andersson, Published on 16/02/2024
» In Constantine Cavafy's poem Waiting for the Barbarians, the much-feared barbarians never turn up. "Now, what's going to happen to us without barbarians?" the poem asks. "Those people were a kind of solution."
The eyes have it in the big cover-up
News, Roger Crutchley, Published on 09/05/2021
» Coming from our Not Particularly Surprising News Department is a report that owing to the Covid pandemic lipstick sales have slumped quite markedly. With most people wearing masks there seems little point for the ladies to bother with lipstick.
A song that takes you off the beaten track
News, Roger Crutchley, Published on 07/02/2021
» Surfing through YouTube this week, I came across the novelty Australian song I've Been Everywhere, which I haven't heard for a long time. It doesn't have much of a melody, but it's fun, something we could all do with these days. It is also a useful geography lesson.
In the Land of the Midnight Sun
News, Roger Crutchley, Published on 25/08/2019
» Living in the tropics probably explains why I tend to enjoy reading books and watching films set in places where really cold weather prevails. It must be that perverse, but comforting, feeling that once you step outside the cinema or put down the book you are immediately back in the more friendly temperatures of the tropics again.
What's scary about Facebook's new troll findings
News, Leonid Bershidsky, Published on 03/08/2018
» Facebook's widely publicised discovery of a possible influence operation through "inauthentic" accounts warrants some scrutiny -- and some reflection about the difference between a genuine political debate on social networks versus its simulated version.
Lady Mondegreen and electric boobs
News, Roger Crutchley, Published on 15/04/2018
» In a futile attempt to escape the Songkran madness, I have holed up at home this week, soaking in lots of music and in doing so have rediscovered the wonderful world of "aural malapropisms". This is not an obscure medical condition, but involves mishearing something, as in song lyrics.