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Hocus Pocus

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Daily Bafflements
May 06, 2014
• Presenting graffiti, the new luxury décor of choice. • Drones of all shapes and sizes have been officially banned from Yosemite National Park. It’s news to us that they were ever allowed? A shame, though: #innovation #stifled • The new CEO of the Bill and Melinda ...

On D.C. “Nerds” and Outsider-Wannabes
May 05, 2014
Members of the press always have plenty of chances to celebrate their accomplishments, or stand in solidarity with one another. In the last month the Pulitzer Prizes and the National Magazine Awards were given out. As for bringing attention to the more dangerous aspects of the ...

Bitcoin for Undergrads, Wall Street’s Next Pump-and-Dump
May 05, 2014
The story was everywhere last week: MIT undergraduates will each receive $100 in Bitcoin when they arrive on campus next fall. The gift comes thanks to an affluent donor and two precocious student entrepreneurs — one a sophomore computer science major, the other a first-year ...

Daily Bafflements
May 05, 2014
• The New Museum, commonly known as the Silliest Museum in the United States, has announced that “Google Glass will be the Lead Sponsor of the 2015 Triennial,” opening next February. “As part of this partnership, the New Museum will launch a visitor engagement app using ...

The Baffler’s Week That Was
May 02, 2014
Guys and gals, ladies and Libor-boys, profs and Pikettys, Rahms and race-baiters, mountaineers and May Day marchers, let’s all take a look back at the past week on The Baffler online: • This week, on the occasion of the locked-and-loaded festival of fear that is the annual ...

The Apple-Samsung Patent Wars and Our Broken IP System
May 02, 2014
The multi-billion dollar battle royale between Apple and Samsung has headed to the jury deliberation phase. To sum up: Apple is accusing Samsung of violating five patents on its iPhone and iPad products, including the ones that cover such features as slide-to-unlock and ...

The Banker Boys After the Crash
May 02, 2014
This weekend’s New York Times Magazine features a very thorough and absorbing piece by Jesse Eisinger (in a collaboration between the Times and ProPublica), “Why Only One Top Banker Went to Jail for the Financial Crisis.” It starts with the story of Kareem ...

Daily Bafflements
May 02, 2014
The sack of the past. / Photo by jericl cat • Chicago just became the latest city to ban plastic bags. • From Adam Gopnik, an appreciation of The Little Prince as a war story. • According to a new study, speaking in a language that is foreign to you will alter the moral ...

Slackersomething: “Portlandia” as Generational Therapy
May 01, 2014
Jello Biafra wakes from a coma and really, really doesn’t like what he sees. That is, in an opening sketch this season on the IFC show Portlandia, a punk character played by Biafra (lead singer of seminal 1980s hardcore band the Dead Kennedys) wakes from a coma he’s been in ...

It’s Time to Shut Everest Down
May 01, 2014
Everest has had a good run in mountaineering lore and public fascination. At 29,035 feet the world’s highest mountain, it once inspired George Mallory’s famous zen-like justification for mountain climbing in general, “Because it’s there.” It has seen its tragedies ...

Daily Bafflements
May 01, 2014
• Here are some fun facts about minimum wage. In both Georgia and Wyoming, the state minimum wage is $5.15 an hour. In Alabama, Louisiana, Mississippi, South Carolina, and Tennessee, there is no state minimum wage at all. Yesterday, Senate Republicans blocked a vote on a bill ...

It Will Just Keep Getting Easier to Oppose the Death Penalty
April 30, 2014
Last night, the state of Oklahoma tried to murder someone. They eventually succeeded (phew?), but only after torturing him for a while. To the more bloodlusty among us, this was an apt way to send a particularly nasty fellow packing. For those who don’t think the state should ...