Posts Tagged ‘London’

Mittwoch, 4. Januar 2012

Wenn man für die Arbeit lebt

Tatsachenbericht eines direkt Betroffenen über die Bombenanschläge in London:

The obvious thing to do was to go home, but the default was to go to work.

Quelle: The bomb that changed my life

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Labels: Allgemein

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Montag, 19. Juli 2010

Vuvuzelas for BP

Vor einigen Wochen habe ich einer Internet-Aktion 10 US-Dollar überwiesen, damit sich einem Flashmob gleich wildfremde Menschen vor dem BP-Hauptquartier in London versammlen und auf Vuvuzelas während mehreren Minuten rumtrompeten. Die Guerilla-Aktion nannte sich Vuvuzelas for BP.

Der Grund hinter diesem digital mobilisierten Protest: Die versunkene Ölbohrinsel im Golf von Mexico.

Einzig wenn man überlegt, aus was diese Vuvuzelas eigentlich gemacht sind — Plastic, welches wiederum aus Erdöl hergestellt wird — hinterlässt die Aktion doch einen etwas schalen Nachgeschmack. Dies sind die latenten Widersprüche unserer Konsumegesellschaft.

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Labels: Allgemein

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Mittwoch, 14. April 2010

Häppchen von The Economist (Ausgabe vom 10. April 2010)

Leecher

In its case against the FCC, Comcast argued that peer-to-peer file-sharing was hogging bandwidth. It was. But the most efficient way to allocate bandwidth among customers is to charge heavy users higher prices, which Comcast chose not to do. The real sin, then, was that the file-sharers wanted a service that Comcast did not care to provide. This is not a moral issue, but a market failure.

Quelle: Comcast v the FCC: Raze the mystery house | The Economist

Steuern

… The federal tax code, which was 400 pages long in 1913, has swollen to about 70,000. … even the head of the Internal Revenue Service, Douglas Shulman, gets someone else to do his taxes. …

Every wrinkle in the tax code represents a favour to some group. It could be a small group, such as loggers, or a huge one, such as homeowners. Politicians use the tax code to encourage things they like, such as driving hybrid cars, and to discourage things they don’t like, such as work. A typical loophole has passionate defenders but no opponents. Those who benefit from it, benefit a lot. Those who would gain from its repeal (ie, taxpayers in general), have never heard of it. So the mess gets ever messier. Happy April 15th.

Quelle: April 15th: The joy of tax | The Economist

Männermangel unter den Afroamerikanern in den USA

“I thought I was a catch,” sighs an attractive black female doctor at a hospital in Washington, DC. Black men with good jobs know they are “a hot commodity”, she observes. When there are six women chasing one man, “It’s like, what are you going to do extra, to get his attention?” Some women offer sex on the first date, she says, which makes life harder for those who prefer to combine romance with commitment. She complains about a recent boyfriend, an electrician whom she had been dating for about six months, whose phone started ringing late at night. It turned out to be his other girlfriend. Pressed, he said he didn’t realise the relationship was meant to be exclusive.

Quelle: Economist.com

Im Schnellzug in 48 Stunden von London nach Shanghai

As for high-speed railways, from a standing start China’s are the world’s fastest and longest. The government has plans to roll out a high-speed network across Asia and even Europe. It proposes three main routes to connect two dozen countries, from Singapore in the south to Germany in the west (with a tunnel from mainland China to Taiwan to boot). By 2025, if the railway ministry is to be believed, it will take two days to travel from Shanghai to London.

Quelle: Economist.com

Wie man früher nach Kriegen Besitzfragen klärte

WHEN the tribes of ancient Israel defeated the Midianites, the victors got the losers’ 675,000 sheep, 72,000 oxen, 61,000 asses and 32,000 female virgins (males and non-virgin women were slaughtered), as well as the gold and jewels. The biblical account suggests that, in that era at least, this was a standard post-conflict resolution of property questions.

Quelle: Economist.com

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Labels: Medien, USA

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Mittwoch, 2. September 2009

Britischer Frass

Wir sind in London angekommen. Das Wetter ist gar nicht so schlecht wie angekündigt. Das lokale Essen verstösst halt noch immer gegen die Genfer Konventionen aber man kriegt hier ja glücklicherweise an jeder Ecke Essen aus aller Welt.

Quelle: London on Flickr – Photo Sharing!

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Labels: Allgemein

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Freitag, 3. April 2009

Was die G20er mit Antikapitalisten gemein haben

These dumbbells are just as confused and hopeless as the G20 big shots they are trying to impress. Both believe the world would be a better place – if people would just listen to them!

Quelle: Economy Not As Bad As Expected

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Labels: Funny, Wirtschaft

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Dienstag, 30. Dezember 2008

Feiern bis der Booze Bus kommt

Hoffentlich reichts bei den Bankern auch nur noch für den billigen, gepanschten Fusel …

In diesen Nächten macht der Booze Bus Überstunden, der Spezialwagen der Rettungsdienste fürs Aufsammeln von Schnapsleichen. […] Mit Kochsalzlösungen versuchen die Sanitäter, die Opfer unmässigen Alkoholkonsums in ihren verschmutzten Nadelstreifen-Anzügen oder weissen Seidenblusen zu retten.

Quelle: Londons Banker: Suff and the City – News Panorama: Vermischtes – tagesanzeiger.ch

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Labels: Funny

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Donnerstag, 23. Oktober 2008

Bye bye, Oyster?

Transport for London may replace its Oyster card with with new ticketing systems operated through mobile phones or bankcards.

Quelle: TfL considers life without Oyster • The Register

Mist! Wieso bewahre ich dann ein Exemplar dieser RFID-Karte seit Jahr und Tag in meiner Schreibtischschublade auf?

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Labels: Allgemein

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Dienstag, 14. Oktober 2008

Fürchterliches Essen in London

Nobelpreisträger Krugman über die Ökonomie hinter der Nahrungszubereitung in London:

by the time it became possible for urban Britons to eat decently, they no longer knew the difference. The appreciation of good food is, quite literally, an acquired taste–but because your typical Englishman, circa, say, 1975, had never had a really good meal, he didn’t demand one.

Quelle: Supply, Demand, and English Food

Daraus leitet er (wohl) einer seiner Theorien ab:

a free-market economy can get trapped for an extended period in a bad equilibrium in which good things are not demanded because they have never been supplied, and are not supplied because not enough people demand them.

Soviel zum Segen der Marktwirtschaft …

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Labels: Allgemein

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Dienstag, 18. März 2008

Intelligenter als die Bank erlaubt

„Don’t worry,“ the bright young man at a London private banking told us, „we maintain the highest levels of professionalism and use the most sophisticated tools of modern portfolio management.“

That was just what we were worried about. […] Handsome, well-dressed, well spoken in three different languages, he had spent years learning the principles of economics, finance and business management. His palaver to prospective clients was flawless. Yes, he said, the research department is keenly searching for alpha…but it knows that 80% of performance comes from careful asset allocation, which the bank’s strategists have calculated based on risk/return analyses going back a hundred years. The expected return from Japanese equities over the next five years, for example, will be precisely 7.56%…but with an anticipated volatility of 20.43%.

[…] They ought to give special parking places to anyone who studied business, economics or finance in the last 30 years. Higher education has lowered their I.Qs. Years of toil in academia have weakened their vision and taken the common sense right out of them.

A blind man could have seen the blow-up in sub-prime coming. But somehow, the geniuses missed it. What went wrong?

Quelle: Prometheus, With The Cuffs On

Recht hat er. Gesunder Menschenverstand, und viele Auswüchse zu laxer Geldpolitik wären null und nichtig. Einer der besten Artikel, den ich in den letzten Monaten über die Finanzwelt gelesen habe.

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Labels: Wirtschaft

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Dienstag, 19. Februar 2008

London, Stadt der Superreichen

[…] there are now more finance sector workers in Britain than there are construction workers, farmers and factory workers COMBINED. So rich and important has the City become that you cannot drive through drunk without running over a millionaire.

Quelle: Those Who Toil in Finance are Unhappy

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Labels: Allgemein

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