[BLOG] Some Friday links

• Bag News Notes’ Michael Shaw considers the remarkable cool of one of the terrorists involved in the Woolwich killing of a British soldier. Does this cool mean this is routine?
• Beyond the Beyond’s Bruce Sterling and Will Baird at The Dragon’s Tales both note astronomers who think that Saturn’s moon Titan, nearing summer, is about to experience hurricanes.
• Also at The Dragon’s Tales, Will Baird notes a new study of exoplanet magnetic fields suggesting that planet Gliese 667Cc orbits too close to its sun to avoid tidal locking, and thus has suffered a collapse of its magnetic field and erosion of its atmosphere.
• Eastern Approaches notes the contretemps between Germany and Hungary, curiously triggered by the German chancellor saying that she would not send in the cavalry (metaphorically) to deal to Hungary’s destruction of its democracy.
• GNXP’s Razib Khan notes that the Aborigines of Australia were not culturally static, among other things observing that Aborigine language groups reflect the recent dominance of a single language family.
• The Search’s Butch Lazorchak argues in favour of the development of lossless recording techniques versus lossy ones, from the perspective of long-term preservation.
• At Une heure de peine, Denis Colombi writes, in French about a recent article on race and sex. There may be tendencies, but they are only tendencies, not uniform across populations by any means. What does it take to belong to amorphous groups?
• Window on Eurasia links to a Russian commentator who argues that Russia should look not to Europe or China for models of development, but rather to the continental superpower that is the United States.

[BLOG] Some Thursday links

• The Burgh Diaspora’s Jim Russell notes that Canadians don’t migrate that much within their country in response to economic stimuli.
• Collide-a-scape’s Keith Kloor wonders why an ostensibly pro-science city like Portland, Oregon, has taken fluoride out of its water.
• Geocurrents notes the rapid fall of fertility rates in Turkey and Iran.
• Itching in Eestimaa’s Palun wonders about future multilingualism in Estonia.
• At Lawyers, Guns and Money, Robert Farley wonders what would have become of Japanese admiral Isoruku Yamamoto had he lived to the end of the Second World War.
• Tyler Cowen at Marginal Revolution disagrees with Paul Krugman on the prospects of the Portuguese economy.
• The Numerati’s Stephen Baker is conflicted about Flickr’s upgrading, not least since they make all his photos available to everyone.
• Strange Maps produces a map where the Dakotas were divided differently, west-east along the Missouri River.
• Van Waffle describes, with photos, how a picture of an exotic pigeon inspired a beautiful shawl.
• Window on Eurasia notes that Circassians are unhappy with Russia.
• Alexander Harrowell notes that once-progressive David Goodhart is now using the language of far-right fascists to describe migrants and immigration.

[LINK] Two notes on Yahoo’s work with Tumblr and Flickr

Yahoo, as any number of news media (like the Financial Post, has bought Tumblr.

Yahoo! Inc. is buying blogging network Tumblr Inc. for about $1.1 billion as Chief Executive Officer Marissa Mayer seeks to lure users and advertisers with her priciest acquisition to date.

Tumblr, headquartered in New York, will continue to host its more than 108 million blogs. Yahoo also says that “per the agreement and our promise not to screw it up, Tumblr will be independently operated as a separate business” with David Karp staying on as CEO.

Mayer, CEO of the biggest U.S. Web portal since July, is betting that Tumblr will help transform Yahoo into a hip destination in the era of social networking as she challenges Google Inc. and Facebook Inc. in the US$17.7-billion display ad market. The price she’s paying — about a fifth of Yahoo’s US$5.4-billion in cash — underscores the deal’s importance to Mayer’s turnaround effort, according to Zachary Reiss-Davis, an analyst at Forrester Research Inc.

“It’s an aggressive move,” Reiss-Davis said in an interview. “They are saying, ‘where is our next group of people who are going to spend many hours per week on Yahoo properties?’ It’s big bet that the answer is going to be Tumblr users.”

The transaction is expected to close in the second half of 2013, Yahoo said in the statement.

Founded by Karp in 2007, Tumblr grew to log more than 13 billion global page views in the past month. The site offers a free service for publishing blogs on the Web and mobile devices, and tools for sharing photos and other content across social networks.

Yahoo has also radically upgraded Flickr.

[T]he big news is the free space — “we want all of your images,” said Cahan. He said it was 70 times bigger than what other sites offer, and said it could store 537,731 photos in “full quality.” Yahoo directly mentioned the 15GB of storage space “other” companies offer, and it was a pretty direct shot at Google — a company that has made no secret recently about making photos a key part of its services.

Yahoo also announced a new Android Flickr app, which matches the capabilities of the recently-updated iOS app. “Upload once, send to any device, any screen, any friend, any follower, on any service, and make it absolutely beautiful,” said Cahan. Along with this new service, Flickr is revamping its Flickr Pro service. Previously, free Flickr users could only display 200 photos at a time, while paid users had unlimited storage and display capabilities as well as analytical data about your photos. However, Yahoo introduced a few new paid options — for $49.99 a year, all ads on the site will be removed, and you’ll get access to the standard set of Flickr analytics. For $499.99, you can double your storage space to 2TB. All in all, it looks like a long overdue and hugely-needed update — but now Flickr has an arsenal of new tools to take on sites like Facebook and Google.

As a long-time Flickr user, I’m excited by the upgrade. As a novice Tumblr user, I only hope Yahoo doesn’t screw it up (the fact that Marissa Mayer has had to promise not to do that worries me). I do find it worth noting that, between Flickr and Tumblr and my Yahoo Mail account, I make more use of my Yahoo account than I do my Google account, and that with the impending demise of Google Reader my usage of Google will diminish accordingly. I just use Google to search; I do my business on Yahoo.

Is this common, I wonder?

[BLOG] Some Wednesday links

• Bad Astronomy’s Phil Plait picks up on the news that the Canadian federal government is only going to fund research that leads directly to economic gain.
• The Burgh Diaspora’s Jim Russell wonders about the ethics of Cuba’s export of trained doctors as contract workers.
• Could a “Nebula Winter” explain Earth’s greatest glaciations? The Dragon’s Tales reports.
• Eastern Approaches reports on the indecisive election in crisis-ridden Bulgaria.
• Geocurrents examines the reasons for Bhutan’s surprisingly high level of development for a Himalayan polity.
• GNXP’s Razib Khan wonders about the ethics of certain kinds of eugenics, arguably already in practice today (pre-natal tests for Down’s syndrome, say).
• Lawyers, Guns and Money reports on the prospects that the disastrous building collapse in a clothing manufacturing plant in Bangladesh might lead to new global standards.
• Strange Maps has fun with the unusual placenames of the Shetland and Orkney islands, off the northeastern coast of Scotland.
• The Volokh Conspiracy notes that a German family claiming asylum in the United States on the grounds that homeschooling is not permitted in Germany has been turned down.
• Window on Eurasia reports on a conspiracy theory in Russia that Siberia is going to be stolen by Muslim guest workers.

[BLOG] Some Monday links

• Bag News Notes features multiple interesting brief photo essays: one about the downloadable gun; one about the woman miraculously rescued from the wreckage of the factory in Bangladesh; one about how modernism, done right, can be quite beautiful.
• At Beyond the Beyond, Bruce Sterling links to a critique of the English words and terms used by European Union officials and to a description of the post-democratic “info-state”.
• Crooked Timber commemorates the conviction of former Guatemalan dictator Efrain Rios Mott by noting that Ronald Reagan spoke highly of him.
• At A Fistful of Euros, Edward Hugh introduces the work of a blogger who suggests that, between emigration and the consequences of a low birth rate, Portugal’s economy is set to crater.
• At Lawyers, Guns and Money, Robert Farley considers Edward Hugh’s suggestion that some countries might face state failure as depopulation proceeds.
• Marginal Revolution’s Tyler Cowen seems to like Feedly as an alternative to Google Reader.
• Naked Anthropologist Laura Agustín blogs about the way in people transgressed identities–national, occupational, and so on–can be quite commonsensical while others who don’t get this can be stuck.
• Savage Minds interviews journalist and anthropologist Sarah Kendzior about experience in her two professions.
• Strange Maps links to a map of chimpanzee and bonobo populations in central Africa, divided not only by their behaviour (the first violent, the second sexual) but by the Congo River.
• Une heure de peine’s Denis Colombi tackles the idea that French emigrants are refugees fleeing a hostile environment at home, as opposed to being mobile professionals in a global workplace.
• The Volokh Conspiracy’s Ilya Somin argues that judicial rulings legalizing same-sex marriage have not harmed same-sex marriage at the ballot box.
• Window on Eurasia touches on the ethnic divisions among Russian Buddhists–Kalmyks, Tuvans, Buryats–that is preventing the establishment of a Buddhist sanctuary in Moscow.

[BLOG] Some Friday links

• Centauri Dreams has more on the electric sail.
• Daniel Drezner is unimpressed with Niall Ferguson’s claims that he’s being unfairly criticized when the blogosphere, when the strongest online critiques have come from news services like The Atlantic and professors of various disciplines.
• The Dragon’s Tales notes that astronomers looking at white dwarfs in the Hyades star cluster 150 light-years away have found their atmospheres polluted by dust from asteroids which have crashed onto their surfaces.
• At the Everyday Sociology Blog, sociologist and new homeowners Karen Sternheimer notes that investment firms have been buying up real estate. What of regular homeowners?
• Language Log’s Victor Mair notes a new site seeking to document all of the various dialects and language forms of Chinese.
• Progressive Download’s John Farrell notes the Catholic Church’s qualified support for evolution.
• Savage Minds’ Carole McGranahan argues that a properly curated Twitter account can produce numerous benefits for the academic.
• Torontoist wonders if maps of Toronto showing walking routes and times might be worthwhile.
• At Window on Eurasia, Paul Goble quotes a Russian blogger who argues that the Soviet annexation of territories in Europe after the Second World War, including the Baltic States and Moldova as well as western Ukraine and Belarus, ultimately destabilized the Soviet state.

[BLOG] Some Thursday links

• Bag News Notes features photographs of the aftermath of the Bangladeshi factory collapse.
• Centauri Dreams takes a look at the electric sail, propulsion method for spaceships currently being tested.
• At The Dragon’s Tales, Will Baird links to a study suggesting that China’s Yangtze river is at least 23 million years old.
• Daniel Drezner doesn’t think that an age of cheap energy globally will necessarily destabilize the world, at least outside of oil exporters, since globalization binds in other ways.
• Eastern Approaches notes the continuing sensitivity of the post-Second World War deportation of the Sudeten Germans from the Czech Republic, as recently emphasized by the Czech president’s defense.
• Geocurrents examines the reasons for the sharp shift in most of India towards below-replacement fertility rates, suggesting that television shows featuring women with small families may be as important a factor as anything else.
• At Lawyers, Guns and Money, Erik Loomis notes that one of the first victories of organized labour in the United States occurred in 1882 with the implementation of a ban on Chinese immigration. (Canada followed in 1885.)
• The Volokh Conspiracy’s Sasha Volokh examines the implications of prisons being reviewed on Yelp.
• Window on Eurasia notes that Ukrainians and Moldovans, not Central Asians, are more likely to be undocumented migrants in Russia. (They’re less visually and culturally distinctive, apparently, and harder to catch.)

[BLOG] Some Monday links

• Beyond the Beyond’s Bruce Sterling is skeptical that plans to archive vast quantities of archived data accumulated over decades, even centuries, are going to be viable.
• The Burgh Diaspora notes that for southern Europeans, Latin America is once again emerging as a destination–this time, the migration is of professionals seeking opportunities they can’t find at home.
• The Dragon’s Tales’ Will Baird links to a proposal by biologists that life initially evolved in highly saline environments.
• Democracy is still fragile in the former Soviet republic of Georgia, Eastern Approaches notes.
• Odd placenames in Minnesota are analyzed at Far Outliers.
• A Fistful of Euros’ Alex Harrowell notes the translation problems surrounding the Nazi term volkisch, liking one recent translator’s suggestion that “racist” works best.
• Razib Khan at GNXP introduces readers to the historical background behind the recent ethnic conflict in Burma.
• Itching for Eestimaa’s Guistino takes a look at same-sex marriage in Estonia.
• Savage Minds reviews Nicholas Shaxson’s book Treasure Islands, which took a look at offshore banking centres like Cyprus.
• Torontoist’s Kevin Plummer describes the background behind Elvis’ 1957 performances in Toronto.
• The negative effects of mass migration to Russia from Central Asia on sending countries, especially the republics of Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan, are introduced at Window on Eurasia.

[BLOG] Some Monday links

• Bag News Notes’ Michael Shaw touches upon the use of infrared photography to detect a hiding Dzhokhar Tsarnaev.
• The Burgh Diaspora notes the beginning of migration into Poland from western Europe, specifically of professionals fleeing southern Europe.
• Eastern Approaches describes the pragmatic deal struck between Serbia and Kosovo, hopefully allowing both states to normalize.
• Geocurrents’ Martin Lewis blogs about regional trends in economic development in China, coastal provinces rising relative to a declining northeast and interior.
• Marginal Revolution notes a recent study claiming that health in Cuba improved during the 1990s, as a result of the post-Soviet economic contraction and food scarcity. This is debatable.
• Steve Munro continues his analysis of the famously irregular 29 Dufferin bus route.
• The Volokh Conspiracy’s Eugene Volokh points to a UN committee arguing that racist Thilo Sarrazin should be prosecuted on the grounds of hate speech.

[BLOG] Some Monday blog links

• Bag News Notes’ Michael Shaw documents in photographs the docking of the Freedom Tower’s spire with the building.
• The Dragon’s Tales links to a paper analyzing the extent to which increased atmospheric carbon dioxide compensate for a planet’s relatively dimmer, or more distant, sun.
• Daniel Drezner approves of Obama’s attempt to lead public opinion by pointing out that there are a lot of good things going on in Mexico.
• Eastern Approaches notes that Polish prime minister Donald Tusk is encountering serious conflict within his Civic Platform party between social liberals and conservatives.
• The Everyday Sociology Blog’s Sally Roskoff notes that correlation is not causation, starting with an amusing graphic purporting to illustrate the connection between falling rates of Internet Explorer browser usage and falling murder rates.
• Marginal Revolution’s Tyler Cowen starts a discussion about which athletes and entertainers are more likely to come out that others.
• The New APPS Blog’s Helen De Cruz argues that there are proportionally many more female academics in Turkey than (for instance) Belgium because, among other things, the modern tradition of women working in academia is strongly implanted and female academics can easily acquire cheap household labour.
• Open the Future’s Jamais Cascio talks about the fuzzy now. If transported backwards or forwards in time, how long would it take for an observer to pick up on the many small and large changes?
• Understanding Future’s Daniel Little introduces people to some discussions on the future of Detroit.
• Window on Eurasia’s Paul Goble notes a Russian analyst claiming that the Russian elite has definitively accepted the independence of the Baltic States in a way that it hasn’t that of the other former Soviet republics.
• Alex Harrowell does not think that Labour need go out of its way to try to attract UKIP voters to its left-wing economic policies, inasmuch as the only change that Labour could make to attract these UKIP voters is become more bigoted.