Josh Kron reported on a rising craze in Rwanda: Motorcycle Polo. Details of the sport include:

• It’s like standard polo except you’re on motorbikes rather than horses.
• One person drives the motorcycle and is considered the real star, while the other sits in the back with a mallet and scores the goal.
• There are five player teams and 15 minute quarters that are broken up by beer breaks.
• The game has spread to Uganda.
• Drivers are paid $20 for an hour long game, and all damage sustained by motorcycles is paid for by organizers of the game.

To read about some of the rules of the game, how and when it originated, the rivalry between North and South United States, and a version of the game that was played in 1912 but was lost to history click here.

Source: New York Times

Via: Chris Blattman

The Economist reviewed some of the computing technologies that are being developed to predict civil wars. Some of the more notable ones include:

• Tribal links are necessarily strong in Iraq and Afghanistan as it’s difficult to trust the motives of people from other tribes. This means that bombs will be planted in tribal territory, close to the places they are made. Using data about previous bomb locations and the ethnic-lingual distribution within the region algorithms can predict where ammunitions dump can be located.
• In East Africa a computer program called RiftLand tracks the migration of people and analyzes who they might clash with in times of conflict and drought, helping the US navy to predict conflict.
• Another system called Condor tracks data from social media, ranking the individual users based on their influence, and identifying the types of messages they send out. Based on this data it is possible to predict how long protest movements will last. In particular when tweets become cynical it means that a protest movement will soon burn out.
• Lockheed Martin is developing a system that can forecast “riots, rebellions, coups, economic crises, government crackdowns and international wars.”

To read many more examples, some of the advantages and drawbacks of these systems, a system that can recommend strategies to deal with conflicts, what this means for terrorist networks, and the $10 million bounty that might soon be won by one of these computer systems, click here.

Source: The Economist

Via: Chris Blattman

Claudia De La Roca interviewed Matt Groening – the creator of The Simpsons and Futurama. The interview focused on the Simpsons and some highlights include:

• The Simpsons family is named after Groening’s own family. His father is named Homer, his mother, Margaret, and his two sisters Lisa and Maggie.
• Groening’s father, Homer, does not like donuts.
• Groening originally planned to name Bart’s character after himself however he felt that studio executives wouldn’t like it.
• Bart was selected because it sounded like Bark and Groening thought that sounded funny.
• The surname Simpsons was chosen because it has the word ‘simp’ as in ‘simpleton’ in it.
• Groening was bullied as a child but (possibly) got his revenge by naming the bullies in Simpsons after some of the bullies he encountered in real life.
• Writers enjoy writing for the show because there is no network interference, and as a cartoon there are no constraints on reality meaning that they can let their imaginations go wild.

To read more about the rules that Groening’s father set down about the way that Homer treated his wife, Groening’s relationship with Portland and how it influenced the show, which city Springfield is named after, and why the focus of the show shifted from Bart to Homer, click here.

Source: Smithsonian

Via: Chris Blattman

PlanIT Valley is a city being built in Northern Portugal that comes straight out of our latest science-fiction novels writes Will Doig. In an article that looks at the dangers and problems of having such a city, his description of the city itself stands out:

• The city is being built with 100 million sensors embedded into it. These sensors will send back a constant stream of data that will be used to alter the city.
• The city will have 150,000 residents and will cost $19 billion to build.
• Because of the experimental nature of the city all of the people who live in it will also likely work for the companies that built it.
• Features of the city include:
  • Cars will be told where they can find empty parking spots.
  • Rooms will be able to detect you leaving and will automatically turn off the air-conditioning if the computer system believes that it would be efficient to do so.
  • Leaky faucets will be detected and either automatically repaired or flagged for a plumber’s attention.
  • In the case of a fire residents will be directed to the nearest exit, and fire-fighters will be presented with the most efficient fire-fighting strategy based on the location of the fire.

To read more about what the city will be able to do, why cities built from scratch have generally failed, how PlanIT Valley compares to Brasilla and New York City in the 60s, and a better alternative to the creation of such a city, click here.

Source: Salon

Pete Wells, the current restaurant critic for The New York Times paused for a moment to reflect upon the inspiration for him and every other critic today: Craig Claiborne. Highlights of the mini-biography include:

• The first in a series of restaurant reviews written by Claiborne appeared 50 years ago in May 1962.
• Within a few years every major newspaper had its own food critic.
• Wells argues that Claiborne elevated the status of food in American society. Chefs now grace magazine covers and are invited to the White House in part because of the efforts of Claiborne.
• A year later, in May 1963, Claiborne added a 3-star ranking scale. A year after that it became a 4-star scale and it has remained the same ever since.
• Claiborne had very strict policies about the way he reviewed restaurants. He tried to eat anonymously, have the paper pay for the meal rather than the restaurant, and would eat at least three meals before reviewing the restaurant.
• Claiborne was one of the first critics to focus on the food offered by the restaurant rather than other qualities such as the social status of the customers.
• Claiborne grew to hate his job, increasingly turning to alcohol to cope with the stress of constantly dining out.

To read many more details and find out how Claiborne compared to his contemporaries, how he was one of the first to seriously consider food from other countries, his association with the White House, the $4,000 dinner in Paris, the restaurant where he could hear gunfire, and his experiences with moose liver, click here.

Source: The New York Times

In India there has been a recent surge in interest in chess reports Rajini Vaidyanathan. Highlights from his article include:

• Some of the reasons for the interest in the game include:
  • The opening up of India’s economy in the early 90s allowed Indians to travel abroad and gain international experience.
  • The rise of the internet gave chess players the opportunity to simulate millions of games at the click of a button.
  • Indians believe that there is an inherent educational value to the game, and education is seen as being extremely important.
  • Indians believe that chess was invented in India.
• The number of grandmasters in India has tripled in the past 7 years.
• Eight Indians are ranked in the world top 100.
• Chess is now on the school curriculum of several Indian states.
• The Mughal Emperor Akhbar is said to have played live games of chess with real animals and soldiers moved around on a giant board.

To read about the 15 year old chess grand-master, the 4 year old who started playing at the age of 2, how Indian women fare at the game, the rise of chess coaching in India, and why it is still difficult to make a living from chess, click here.

Source: BBC

How do the reviews critics offer differ from the popular opinion of Amazon review scores written by individuals? One study sought to find out and Alison Flood reported on the results:

• In aggregate, professional viewers and Amazon reviews agreed about the quality of a book.
• This is despite the fact that there is no quality assurance in Amazon reviews and that they can easily be gamed.
• In fact, at times it appears that Amazon reviews are better evaluators of quality. Professional reviewers are more likely to give prizewinning authors or those with a lot of media attention better reviews.
• Amazon reviews are also good at identifying good books written by authors that aren’t well known.
• Media outlets are also more likely to review, and give better reviews to books written by their own journalists.

To read details of how the study was conducted, what one expert reviewer thinks it takes to be a good reviewer, and some other conclusions from the study, click here.

Source: The Guardian

Via: Marginal Revolution