Technology & Innovation

Social networks like Twitter not only blur the line between public and private selves, but also between authentic and contrived ones. An author finds herself inventing her own psychology.

“Chevy Volt will sell for $41,000 before a federal tax credit, while the Nissan Leaf will go for $32,780 before the credit. The two cars are trying to jump-start the US electric-car industry.”

“I’m sure that Julian Assange is now regarded as one of the very most dangerous men and he should be quite proud of that,” says Daniel Ellsberg, who leaked the Pentagon Papers.

“Why learn about the glass ceiling in a sociology class if you are going to hit it anyway a decade after graduation?” A liberal arts professor meditates on the the liberal arts conundrum.

“It is the poor, not the rich, who are inclined to charity.” The Economist reports on a study that finds the less affluent are quicker to compassion and more willing to give to the needy.

What is a collateralized debt obligation (CDO) anyway? And why did it get the United States into so much trouble? According to NYU economist Robert Engle, CDOs are “wonderful creations” […]

Microfinance—a system of small loans and money services geared toward small businesses—has been heralded as a bold new financial frontier, opening up a wealth of opportunity to those otherwise unable […]

“The most surprising thing about WikiLeaks’ released trove of officially secret documents is how few surprises it contains.” Doyle McManus says the government has been candid with us.

A new study by economists Mark Zandi and Alan Blinder says the U.S. economic stimulus averted a worse downturn, says The Guardian. Conservatives maintain the spending was ineffective.

History professor Mark LeVine examines the complex relationships between immigration, globalization, and natural resource extraction. He sees a system that stratifies wealth.

Job retraining seems like an ideal solution for the unemployed, but problems persist. Are Americans being trained for the right jobs, and what if nobody is hiring in the first place?

A $20m refit aims to cut the Empire State Building’s energy use by 40% and save emissions equal to 20,000 cars, says the Guardian. The motive is profit rather than conscience.

Conservative columnist Jonah Goldberg says the democratization of the media is an improvement over alleged moral gatekeepers like Walter Cronkite, the ‘saint of bourgeois America.’

A group of leaders spread across the globe have been given secret keys and are “charged with rebooting the web if it is sent into meltdown by a terror attack or mass hacking.”

“Digital freedom campaigners have welcomed a US ruling that loosens Apple’s tight control over what users of its iPhone can do with the device.” The Independent on digital copyrights.

The U.S. education system is based on the meritocratic principle that no matter what the circumstances of a child’s birth, each should have a baseline level of education and the […]

“Anti-luxury politics are often a hit with the public. But Ben Franklin argued that wealth accumulation is a positive, and that government should not interfere.”

The knowledge-based economy is dead because its goals have been accomplished so well, says a British CEO. The new economy will be driven by ideas and value-added products.

The recent assessment of European banks’ stability was a public relations exercise, says Al Jazeera. Banks look unprepared for the long term, but few are being moved to act.

“Google is not making us stupid, PowerPoint is not destroying literature, and the Internet is not really changing our brains.” The L.A. Times tells its readers not to sweat new technologies.

The Washington Post’s report on the bloated and secretive American intelligence community is more a story of today’s information overload than villains with cloaks and daggers.

“Let’s not have a conversation about race.” Tina Brown at The Daily Beast says that Shirley Sherrod’s firing isn’t a teachable moment, but rather a “dangerous distraction.”

Runaway executive bonuses on Wall-Street are here to stay, says John Cassidy at The New Yorker. The financial writer laments Washington’s failure to curtail abusive payouts.

Should the governments take action to reduce national debt or spend money to create jobs? Mark Weisbrot says the U.S. should fund the stimulus until unemployment is lower.

“Today’s technology may be determining not just how we spend our time: It actually may be ‘rewiring’ the way we think, how we experience the world around us.”

“To me, the unsung villain of the mortgage crisis is the 30-year fixed rate self-amortizing mortgage with no prepayment penalty,” says Megan McArdle at The Atlantic.

“We’re not in a double-dip recession yet. We’re in a one and a half dip recession.” Robert Reich says the President should advocate a WPA-style public works program.

Publishers are irrevocably changing their industry as they make more and more titles available as e-books, says Goodnight Gutenburg. Soon agents may be publishing their authors electronically.

“I think the primary technological barrier that keeps us from being more emotionally engaged with video games is the barrier of speech,” says Jesse Schell, the video game designer and […]