Delicious LiveJournal Links for 10-10-2008

[andrewducker]

• Turning finance into science fiction
  What if any financial software smart enough to make money was also smart enough to become self-aware. What if the financial crash was a strike against Skynet? Very nice piece of flash-fiction.
  (tags: fiction sf finance economics)
• COUNCILS INVESTED £1BN IN TINY VOLCANO SURROUNDED BY FISH
  LOCAL authorities across the UK were yesterday stunned to discover that Iceland is nothing more than a volcano surrounded by two million haddock.
  
  As the volcano's banks refused to pay out, councils said they were convinced Iceland was a small, landlocked country next to Belgium with a long history of expert financial management. But after 15 minutes on the internet they confirmed it was nothing more than a slab of stinking lava populated by a handful of wilfully eccentric musicians and half a dozen heavily bearded trawler captains.
  (tags: funny true economics)
• EU Directive to Force Apple to make iPhone battery changable
  Should be interesting to see how this one plays out...
  (tags: eu politics electronics apple)
• Antisocial: a Javascript demo
  Anyone remember the Demo scene? Here's one written in Javascript, taking the piss out of social networking. Which goes to show you can do anything if you try hard enough.
  (tags: javascript music animation 3d demo)

Comments

[drdoug.livejournal.com]

What if any financial software smart enough to make money was also smart enough to become self-aware.

*laughs* You do know that most financial software is terrible, kludgey Excel macros? Yes, even the rocket-science fancypants quant stuff. In fact particularly that.

[andrewducker]

Yup - I do work in a financial company. Lots of VBA and VB6 about the place :->

[drdoug.livejournal.com]

Ah - I'm sure your company's stuff is exceptional and is all beautifully-structured and well maintained. :-)

(Actually, remembering some of the stuff you've said about work, it does sound like it's not quite a run-of-the-mill operation.)

[andrewducker]

It's better than many - but yes, lots of bits and pieces that were hacked together by simians on crack.

[sbisson.livejournal.com]

Far too much Excel - such that Microsoft had to develop a hosted 64-bit version so the *really* big Monte Carlo sims could run in a reasonable amount of time...