The Inimitable Tiff

"12. What is your wpm when drunk on whiskey drinks?"

Thu, 17 May 2012 01:06:49 -0400

“12. What is your wpm when drunk on whiskey drinks?”

- About You | biblioklept

Via @hellbox. Best thing today.

"You have the advantage of human interaction? I mean: love for Tesla, but dude needed a hug now and..."

Thu, 17 May 2012 00:27:44 -0400

“You have the advantage of human interaction? I mean: love for Tesla, but dude needed a hug now and again.”

- undisclosed.

The Einhorn Effect | Crossing Wall Street David Einhorn, the...

Wed, 16 May 2012 23:05:39 -0400

The Einhorn Effect | Crossing Wall Street

David Einhorn, the famous hedge fund manager who foresaw the disaster that was Lehman Brothers, spoke at an investment conference today. When Einhorn talks, traders listen.

Today, he bashed the stock of Martin Marietta Materials. Einhorn called the CEO a “megalomaniac.” This coming from a hedge fund manager.

By looking at the chart below, can you guess when the news hit? Look closely. I bet you can.

The Facebook IPO: A Note to Mark Zuckerberg; or, With “Friends” Like Morgan Stanley, Who Needs Enemies? «

Wed, 16 May 2012 19:31:00 -0400

The Facebook IPO: A Note to Mark Zuckerberg; or, With “Friends” Like Morgan Stanley, Who Needs Enemies? «:

As posted by Dan Ariely, due to the ties about ethical behavior.

As the lead bank on your deal, Morgan Stanley is likely to get 30% of the overall take. This means that your closest investment banking “friend” will make a bit more than $200 million from your IPO.

Morgan Stanley and the rest of the investment banks involved will also make sure that their favorite fund manager client “friends” are given lots of free money. Assuming that these “friends” are given 75% of the total number of IPO shares, or a total of 291 million shares, and assuming that the stock does rise from $40 to $50, then these fund managers will collectively, in one day, make $2.9 billion dollars in realized or unrealized profits. That’s right, 2.9 BILLION DOLLARS.

Mark, by now you must be asking yourself the obvious question. “Where and out of whose pocket does this money come from?”

JaVale McGee's Crusade for Investigative Journalism and Non-Speculative, Facts-Based Reporting - Grantland

Wed, 16 May 2012 12:24:20 -0400

JaVale McGee's Crusade for Investigative Journalism and Non-Speculative, Facts-Based Reporting - Grantland:

Via @erikhinton.

Great Moments in Campaign Finance Disclosure: What Miscellaneous Filings Are For

Wed, 16 May 2012 08:39:36 -0400

Great Moments in Campaign Finance Disclosure: What Miscellaneous Filings Are For:

campaignfinance:

A message from the President/Treasurer/Grand Poobah of Why Not ZoidPAC?, filed at around 2:30 a.m.:

To Whom I May Concern: This memo is primarily intended as a test: I recognize the gravity generally attached to something like the submission of a form to the FEC, but I wanted to confirm for myself that the Federal Elections Comission lives up to its lofty goal of transparency.

It recently occurred to me that as President, Grand Poobah, and (most importantly here, anyway) Treasurer of the Why Not ZoidPAC? Super PAC, I possess the ability to submit these Form 99s electronically and have them displayed publicly at http://query.nictusa.com/cgi-bin/fecimg/?C00514646 . I also understand that these forms are primarily meant as written statements addressing the FEC directly; however, I don’t see how or why I should be limited against using this kind of form to make a publicly recorded note of assorted positions and opinions I wish to share.

I suppose my question to you, the FEC filer reading this form, is: is this OK? I don’t see many examples (any, really) of this sort of thing, but it seems like an intriguing way to submit positions and ideas to the public record on behalf of Why Not ZoidPAC.

Should this be allowed to work, I’d like to address the few hypothetical people who might have somehow discovered this document through the public filing. Hello, to you as well! I suppose this is kind of like a blog post to you. We’ll see.

Whomever may be reading this, thank you for your time.

Respectfully,

Daniel Ben-David

President/Treasurer/Grand Poobah, “Why Not ZoidPAC?

"on 7th November 1943, the 26th anniversary of the Russian Revolution, the Soviet flag was to be..."

Tue, 15 May 2012 12:18:00 -0400

“on 7th November 1943, the 26th anniversary of the Russian Revolution, the Soviet flag was to be flown over both Willesden Town Hall, in Dyne Road, Kilburn, and the electricity building in Willesden Lane, Willesden Green.”

- When Willesden helped rebuild Stalingrad – a story for Victory Day | wow. the more I learn about the history of our little pocket of London, the more amazed I am. (via interestingsnippets)

dotsara: Trying to stay away from Prometheus spoilers (for...

Mon, 14 May 2012 21:07:00 -0400

dotsara:

Trying to stay away from Prometheus spoilers (for example, even though I saw a new[to-me] trailer before The Avengers on Friday, I don’t remember any of it beyond gasping and zomg-ing into my beer), but this?

Had to.

Miniature cybernetic David!

Inspired by Albert and Doreen, here’s my mom as a kid. If...

Sun, 13 May 2012 17:40:00 -0400

Inspired by Albert and Doreen, here’s my mom as a kid. If you don’t know me in person, this is a bit odd because she and I look like twins at this age. She’s currently beachside at their vacation flat in Mexico, sending paggro emails about her digital and assumptive* gifts.

As it should be.

* Dad usually buys her something she’d grump about him buying but says my brother and I conspired with him to buy it for her. My brother and I play along while sending gifts ourselves. A happy mom means a happy, pet-filled set of email forwards.

seoulbrother: Earlier this week, a friend of mine took his own life. He was 35. I keep turning...

Sun, 13 May 2012 12:30:52 -0400

seoulbrother:

Earlier this week, a friend of mine took his own life. He was 35.

I keep turning things over in my head, looking up information on the internet and talking with friends to try and make sense of it— not the reason why Jeff took his life. That’s clear. He was bipolar and severely depressed and over the last couple years hit a succession of lower bottoms— I’m trying to make sense of myself.

Read More

henryconradtaylor: community101: The Best of Dean Pelton - Web...

Sat, 12 May 2012 01:08:37 -0400

[Flash 10 is required to watch video.]

henryconradtaylor:

community101:

The Best of Dean Pelton - Web Exclusive

100% Daily Value of Dean Pelton.

Good lord I’m smiling like an idiot.

JP Morgan’s $2 Billion Loss, Explained : Planet...

Fri, 11 May 2012 16:37:35 -0400

JP Morgan’s $2 Billion Loss, Explained : Planet Money : NPR

slaughterhouse90210: “But lost chances are as much a part of...

Fri, 11 May 2012 16:01:13 -0400

slaughterhouse90210:

“But lost chances are as much a part of life as chances taken, and a story cannot dwell on what might have been.”
― Paul Auster, The New York Trilogy

Oops! Air Force Drones Can Now (Accidentally) Spy on You | Danger Room | Wired.com

Fri, 11 May 2012 12:24:49 -0400

Oops! Air Force Drones Can Now (Accidentally) Spy on You | Danger Room | Wired.com:

continuum:

As long as the Air Force pinky-swears it didn’t mean to, its drone fleet can keep tabs on the movements of Americans, far from the battlefields of Afghanistan, Pakistan or Yemen. And it can hold data on them for 90 days — studying it to see if the people it accidentally spied upon are actually legitimate targets of domestic surveillance.

geneticist: (via)

Thu, 10 May 2012 19:31:23 -0400

geneticist:

(via)

xkcd: Ten Thousand Lovely.

Thu, 10 May 2012 16:40:15 -0400

xkcd: Ten Thousand

Lovely.

Bad Dividend Math | The Baseline Scenario But this is all...

Thu, 10 May 2012 16:01:04 -0400

Bad Dividend Math | The Baseline Scenario

But this is all theory. There is actually a way to test these things. To the extent that a change in the dividend tax rate affects stock prices, it should affect high-dividend stocks more than low-dividend stocks. Even on the theory that the value of a stock is the discounted value of its future dividend stream, for a high-dividend stock, much of that value comes from dividends in the next decade, which are likely to be affected by a change in the tax rate. By contrast, for a company that doesn’t pay dividends, the value of its dividend stream is located far out in the future, where a change in today’s tax rate has little expected impact. So if Luskin is right, the 2003 tax cut (which established the 15 percent rate for dividends) should have caused not only a sharp increase in stock prices but also a sharp increase in the price of value stocks relative to growth stocks.

ECOLOGY FOR NOTHING

Thu, 10 May 2012 12:16:59 -0400

arewepayingattention:

Obama Blasts Obama's Evasive Stance On Gay Marriage | The Onion - America's Finest News Source

Wed, 09 May 2012 23:36:16 -0400

Obama Blasts Obama's Evasive Stance On Gay Marriage | The Onion - America's Finest News Source

Photo

Wed, 09 May 2012 22:53:23 -0400