Nice to see, from time to time, a solid takedown of life-controlling 80 hours a week careerism. Is this a strictly American affliction?

If we were honest about what these jobs entail, we’d talk less in terms of success and more in terms of sacrifice and seclusion from the world. If we recognized the single-minded focus that drives [careerists] to think of intimacy as obstacle, as life-thwarting, we might not hold it up as the ideal, the logical next step for the best and the brightest.

(via Mark Larson)

While I still feel like there’s little likelihood it will come to pass, I enjoyed accompanying Megan McArdle on a trip to consider how learning would be different in an environment where no one spent time at traditional college campuses.

Tenured academics has worked a great scam. They’ve managed to monetize peoples’ affection for regional football teams, and their desire for a work credential, and then somehow diverted that money into paying academics to work on whatever they want, for the rest of their lives, without any oversight by the football fans or the employers.

(via Mark Larson’s more of what i like)

A very interesting consideration of a topic I’d never given much thought:

My grandmother literally never worked outside the home a day in her life.  But she would have been bewildered by the intensive parenting of today’s “stay at home Moms”.  When my mother got home from school, my grandmother gave her a cookie and told her to go outside and play.  She was not supposed to come back until dinner — rain or shine, sleet or snow.

(vía More of What I Like)

A thought-provoking discussion of what authenticity means around travel. Much to like, including this:

I think we need to keep in mind that the backpackers you’re talking about, who go to new areas and beat new paths by living close to the people and close to the earth and so on, they are in a sense—and this isn’t my line, this is from an old book I came across—the shock troops of the mass tourism industry. They’re the ones who go into a place that has no infrastructure for tourism and basically create the market for other people to come in behind them.

(via mlarson)

Mark Larson pulled together three different good links about the questionable value of the advice dispensed in most inspirational speeches. Instead of copying some or part of that, I want you just take a look at his post.

Another in the large pile of “most things about wine are bullshit” stories. This author did a statistical analysis:

Using descriptions of 3,000 bottles, ranging from $5 to $200 in price from an online aggregator of reviews, I first derived a weight for every word, based on the frequency with which it appeared on cheap versus expensive bottles. I then looked at the combination of words used for each bottle, and calculated the probability that the wine would fall into a given price range. The result was, essentially, a Bayesian classifier for wine.

(via more of what i like)

The map is interesting, but the way it’s made is what I really like. Ahti Heinla used data about number of users and photos at a given location from photo site Panoramio to tell where the most tourists are going. Surely this doesn’t yield a perfect data set, but it’s damn clever.

(via MoWIL)

To pass, a movie (or any work of fiction, really) has to have three things:

1. At least two women
2. Who talk to each other
3. About something besides a man

The title link is of a site that tests movies against the Bechdel, also an explanatory video and the full story of it’s origin (and name).

(all via Mark Larson)

Po Bronson, who wrote an admirable book a few years ago, revisits the question. He’s good at cutting through the loads of bullshit regularly dispensed to those seeking a new career.

Don’t tell me you don’t know what you want from your life. Don’t ever say that, don’t ever fool yourself into that stupor. Of course you know what you want — you know the feeling you desire — fulfillment, connection, responsibility, and some excitement. The real problem is figuring out how to get it — how to find a path that doesn’t suffocate those natural feelings in you. Which is hard. Of course it’s hard. It’s supposed to be hard. If it weren’t hard, you wouldn’t learn anything along the way, and thus you would never get there. If you don’t know how to make the best of a bad situation, you will never get there. If you are not willing to put up with some shit work, you will never recognize that a good opportunity is staring you in the face. If you are not willing to be humble and repeatedly be a beginner in new areas and learn the details faster than the next guy, you are not capable of transformation.

(via Mark Larson, who points to the printer-friendly version)

A clever retelling of the play.

(via Mark Larson, where a commenter claims it’s “a ripoff”)

Though many of these shouldn’t count — being either illustrations or stills from movies — it’s still interesting to look through.

(via Mark Larson, who points out that Fidel Castro appears nine times)

And what’s more, the structure which looks like a child’s play house, is lived in. And you get a tour from the owner who looks quite normal sized.

(via Mark Larson)