Check out this great site www.instructables.com. It offers instructions on how to do or build useful things. It’ll be enjoyed by “boys”, but also craftspeople, DIYers, people on a budget, people who can’t get cool stuff in their neighbourhood and people who are trying to reuse and recycle or just live with less. Examples include …
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Author:astraea
China now has more internet users than the US
China has jumped past the U.S. in terms of total Internet users. In March 2008, China had more than 230 million people online according to the Beijing based research firm BDA China; that’s only 17% of the population and its growing at about 50% a year. The U.S. by comparison had 216 million users at …
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Charles Darwin on-line
Some of the notes of Charles Darwin were first put on-line in October 2006. Today they become more complete with the addition of the first draft of the book which changed the world’s attitude to evolution. The draft notes are among 20,000 archive items created by the 19th Century naturalist during his lifetime, which include …
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IMF World Economic Outlook
IMF Predicts Slower World Growth Amid Serious Market Crisis. Global growth will decelerate in 2008, led by a sharp slowdown in the United States, amid a housing correction and a financial crisis that has quickly spread from the U.S. subprime sector to core parts of the financial system, the IMF says in its latest World …
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The uncomfortable view from the top
Today’s BBC article Thailand’s Wealthy Untouchables touched a nerve. It describes the chasm between rich and poor and the failure of the rich to take responsibility for themselves. It is interesting to see the emotions of the downtrodden becoming visible. And it illustrates the motivation for changing my career a decade ago. When I looked …
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We’re running out of planet …
Even the capitalists are beginning to ask if earth’s resources are now being exhausted: BusinessWeek’s article The Age of Scarcity asks if this is our Malthusian moment. They offer evidence to support that point of view but conclude that policy changes will allow new technologies to make resources go further. Unfortunately this is wishful thinking. …
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Check out the BBC website
It looks as though the BBC website has been revamped recently. And its even better. (No we don’t get commissions.) The main pages have better summaries. There is more audio and video. The navigation is easier. It looks good. Maybe even make it your home page (if astraea.net isn’t 🙂 ) – its not a …
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Costly prejudice against eco-homes
A UK study shows that consumers perceive costs of eco-homes but are unaware of the benefits. The survey suggests that people believe the quality of domestic services in eco-homes to be lower but more costly. This is in contrast to those that are buying or building eco-homes who do so because energy savings repay build …
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GM contamination proves more persistent
Swedish researchers have found transgenic seed persists in nature far longer than previously thought – further evidence that the permissive policy of governments and bio-tech companies is damaging nature in a more disastrous way than advertised. This should concern all of us as our food supply has now been jeopardiesd by the open sowing of …
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Bernanke thinks there might be a recession – duh!
“Fed boss says recession possible.” Its a bit worrying when the big cheese is pussyfooting around with language like “we’ll have to wait till the data is in” and “the economy might shrink in the first and second quarter” and ” a recession is a technically defined term” … When the ship is in trouble, …
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