Interesting Links for 30-11-2020

[andrewducker]

What Is the Signal Encryption Protocol?

(tags:encryption communication Android )

Secretive licensing system allows UK weapons to reach repressive regimes

(tags:UK weaponry secrecy )

What it's like playing a complex board game for the first time

(tags:games funny video )

How Joe Biden Stole the Election

(tags:elections USA )

Boris Johnson Dumps Tory Manifesto Pledge Of Superfast Broadband For All By 2025

(tags:internet UK broadband conservatives lies )

"Accentism" is real, but impossible to end

(tags:speech bias UK France )

Sculpting a Selfie Girl, with Maths

(tags:art mathematics sculpture video )

An open letter to people who complain about the cost of restaurants

(tags:restaurant money food business reviews )

Comments

[aldabra]

Actually I think they should go easy on the cars and holidays and fashion and tech too. I stopped reading the travel porn some decades ago, and am happier for it. If we could do our status signalling more through theatre and less through consumption we might generate fewer externalities on the people who already can't afford restaurants.

I am not made more likely to eat out by being told it's my fault restaurants are struggling. What people "begrudge" is very strongly correlated to their resources and obligations, and while food is Maslow 1, restaurants are unambiguously 3+. It's never attractive to see people indulging in Maslow 3+ berating people who are still caught at 1 and 2. (The problem is that housing has been allowed to absorb income; if we had more housing than households then the households would be able to afford luxuries.)

I think 98% of those complaints aren't about the existence of the restaurants but about his conspicuous and flaunted recommendation of them.

[calimac]

Restaurant reviewer comes across as a real dick, and the interjections in the comments section sneering at anyone who disagrees just confirms it.

Export Licencing

[danieldwilliam]

I'm not sure the open general export licences are exactly the problem with export licencing.

It's the fact you can get one for e.g. Saudi Arabia.