The smartest cities rely on citizen cunning and unglamorous technology | Cities | The Guardian “But, for whatever reason, this is not the face of urban innovation official India wants to share with the world – perhaps small-scale projects or the tactics of the poor simply aren’t dramatic enough to convey the magnitude and force of national ambition. We hear, instead, of schemes like” tags: weekly scale technology India Politwoops – Deleted tweets from politicians They just log quickly deleted tweets from politicians. Crazy. tags: twitter politics tweets weekly tweet Super Punch “If you’ve ever stopped to charge your cell phone in a Metro station, you should know that Metro considers that stealing and it’s not okay with them.  …  Metro spokesperson Paul Gonzales confirmed to KPCC that three people have been arrested and charged with theft of utilities for doing just that.  …  Update, 1:45 p.m.: Mayor Eric Garcetti, who is also Metro Board Chair, has told Metro to stop arresting people for charging their phones” tags: weekly charging phones Ayn Rand Helped the FBI Identify It’s A Wonderful Life as Communist Propaganda | Open Culture “The 1947 HUAC hearings, writes the blog Aphelis, led to “the systematic blacklisting of Hollywood artists.” Among the witnesses deemed “friendly” to capitalism were Gary Cooper, Walt Disney, and Ayn Rand. Prior to […]

The British amateur who debunked the mathematics of happiness | Science | The Observer “”The answer,” says Brown when I meet him in a north London cafe, “is because that’s how it always happens. Look at whistleblower culture. If you want to be a whistleblower you have to be prepared to lose your job. I’m able to do what I’m doing here because I’m nobody. I don’t have to keep any academics happy. I don’t have to think about the possible consequences of my actions for people I might admire personally who may have based their work on this and they end up looking silly. There are 160,000 psychologists in America and they’ve got mortgages. I’ve got the necessary degree of total independence.” “ tags: research weekly freedom truth lies psychology happiness math numbers data Do what you love, love what you do: An omnipresent mantra that’s bad for work and workers. “DWYL is a secret handshake of the privileged and a worldview that disguises its elitism as noble self-betterment. According to this way of thinking, labor is not something one does for compensation but is an act of love. If profit doesn’t happen to follow, presumably it is because the worker’s passion and determination were insufficient. Its real achievement is making workers believe their labor serves the self and […]

Hitchhiking robot’s cross-country trip in US ends in Philly “With the robot destroyed, Zeller said, she was most concerned about children who loved hitchBOT and followed it on social media. Her team doesn’t plan to release the last photo of it to protect young fans who might be distraught. “I hope that people won’t be too disappointed, too sad,” she said.” tags: weekly usa robot sociology Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.