And France is now back to red.

I am planning to watch these.

Here is a short list of misdirected attempts at providing aid: - One million t-shirts for Africa - TOMS Buy-One-Give-One - Machine gun preacher - 50 Cent ransoming children in Somalia - Donor fund restrictions (conditionality) - Making food aid the same colour as cluster munitions - Making USAID a foreign policy tool

Incredibly interesting article about the future of manufacturing. It will be so disruptive that they talk about a third industrial revolution: The first began in Britain in the late 18th century with the mechanisation of the textile industry. In the following decades the use of machines to make things, instead of crafting them by hand, spread around the world. The second industrial revolution began in America in the early 20th century with the assembly line, which ushered in the era of mass production. As manufacturing goes digital, a third great change is now gathering pace. It will allow things to be made economically in much smaller numbers, more flexibly and with a much lower input of labour, thanks to new materials, completely new processes such as 3D printing, easy-to-use robots and new collaborative manufacturing services available online. The wheel is almost coming full circle, turning away from mass manufacturing and towards much more individualised production. And that in turn could bring some of the jobs back to rich countries that long ago lost them to the emerging world. One important foreseen change is the return of manufacturers in rich countries: As the number of people directly employed in making things declines, the cost of labour as a proportion of the total cost of production will diminish too. This will encourage makers to move some of the work back to rich countries, not least because new manufacturing techniques make it cheaper and faster to respond to changing local tastes.

Here is a nice article from Annie Leonard (the woman behind "the Story of Stuff") which puts a bit of sense in the utopian corporate responsibility idea. The problem with believing the best way to make change is by voting with our pocketbooks is that it defines us as consumers, not citizens. It implies that the most important choices are made in the supermarket aisles rather than in the halls of government and corporate towers.

This is a controversial video, made by the not-for-profit organization Invisible Children, in order to raise awareness around Joseph Kony and the Lord's Resistance Army. After watching the video, you should also read this article in The Atlantic: http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2012/03/solving-war-crimes-with-wristbands-the-arrogance-of-kony-2012/254193/ The article claims that the video is arrogant and that the solution it is upholding is wrong and not all that helpful. Also, here is a more long-term view of the polemic: http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2012/03/the-decline-of-american-nationalism-why-we-love-to-hate-kony-2012/254929/

Here's an article suggesting that the international community spend some time building a united front in Syria. And start thinking about what will happen when Assad's regime is toppled. The current national structures are geared exclusively towards buttressing the regime and with the regime's fall, these structures might collapse -- rending the country in two.

That leaves the opposition as the great hope for keeping Syria together, either by taking power when the regime collapses under its own weight or by wresting it directly from Assad. And here the news is dismal. The only thing that has matched the bravery of Syrian opposition is its lack of unity.

As the journalist Nir Rosen contends, "The longer the conflict drags on, the more likely it is to devolve into a battle of Sunni militia fighting Alawite militia." In other words, the shooting will not stop just because Assad is gone.

Here is a good provocative article on modern feminist factions. The conclusion reads:

You cannot say that, because women suffer injustices far more severe in other parts of the world, a woman who's had to give up work in Harlesden because her tax credits were cut is not a feminist issue. You cannot hope that a belief in equality will lead everybody to the same conclusions about body shapes, or all-women shortlists, or gender essentialism. When we try to present a united front, we're not asking too much of ourselves, we're asking too little: waiting for an unattainable unity is just another way of doing nothing. When we divide, we can burn more brightly in many places.

Another related article summarizes the current representation of women in political bodies. The charts and graphs are quite good: http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2012/mar/07/women-representation-in-politics-worldwide

This is a good summary of Obama's speech to AIPAC.

Mr. Obama made it clear that he considers diplomacy, and the policy of sanctions set in motion by the United States and Europe, as the best hopes for getting Iran to not pursue a nuclear weapon. It was at times a defensive speech, delivered by a president who was initially criticized for pushing Israel too hard to make concessions for peace with the Palestinians. Over three years, Mr. Obama’s relationship with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel has deteriorated as Mr. Netanyahu balked at American demands. Mr. Obama has retreated, largely putting aside the Palestinian issue for the rest of this term. But at the same time, a far more vigorous sanctions policy against Iran’s nuclear program has gone into effect on Mr. Obama’s watch, with Europe agreeing to impose an oil embargo on Iran, a step that was unthinkable as recently as four years ago.

This is an opinion piece written by five European foreign ministers in the NYT. The piece criticizes the ruling elite of Ukraine and denounces 'selective justice'. This criticism is of course nothing new and is the last piece of a growing movement. Ever since Yulia Tymoshenko was imprisoned last August, criticism has come to Ukraine from both Europe and the US. More information on the association agreement mentioned in the article can be found here: http://eeas.europa.eu/ukraine/index_en.htm

Kickstarter is getting a lot of press after a project promising to build an amazing iphone dock raised more than a million dollars. The record was recently broken by a new project, for creating an old-school adventure game, that as of now raised more than 2.3M dollars. I find it amazing how Kickstarter allows ventures to cut the middle man and raise money straight from the audience, skipping the investors altogether. Another interesting project -- promising long-form journalism -- also raised an astounding amount of money in no time at all: http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/readmatter/matter

This is a video by Dan Pink where he discusses the things that motivate us. He states that three factors lead to better performance in people: - A sense of autonomy or self-direction - The satisfaction that comes from mastery - A sense of purpose The main takeaway is that the normal incentive schemes we are used to, where better performance is rewarded by higher cash rewards, work well when the work is mechanical. When the work is creative, these schemes do not work. Worse, they backfire.

Very interesting article written by a super-rich (early investor of Amazon.com) with an "eight-figure income" who provides a good testimony of how wrong trickle down economics is. The crux of the argument is that job creation will only occur if one has both parts of the equation: a middle-class which has money to spend as well as investors who have products to offer. He highlights the fact that the current American tax system primarily benefits the rich and is thus counter-productive to the objective of job creation. My favorite para is this, which is a great counter-example of trickle down economics: It’s true that we do spend a lot more than the average family. Yet the one truly expensive line item in our budget is our airplane (which, by the way, was manufactured in France by Dassault Aviation SA), and those annual costs are mostly for fuel (from the Middle East). It’s just crazy to believe that any of this is more beneficial to our economy than hiring more teachers or police officers or investing in our infrastructure.

Here's an interesting talk about how we could harness the skills of gamers to make the world a better place. The presenter argues that gamers are getting better at "something", whatever that "something" is. She says games bring about: - Urgent optimism - Social fabric - Blissful productivity - Epic meaning All things that could help solve real-world problems. The talk is interesting for its hugely optimistic portrayal of gamers. Her point of view clashes with the stereotypes about gamers. Although gamers might be active and hyper-stimulated in game worlds, I think they are often apolitical and tuned out in the real world.

This is funny! Coming from The Economist, that's even more funny :) The company's name is just too good: "Zilch Capital LLC".