The year is 50 BC. Gaul is entirely occupied by the Romans. Well, not entirely… One small laboratory of indomitable Gauls still holds out against the invaders…
(thanks to Pradeep Shenoy)
The City of Chicago has a big open data initiative, and they are putting data online at the City of Chicago Data Portal. Lots of interesting stuff here, and some potential to get data sets for machine learning tasks.
A really touching video about Tamale Lady in Chicago.
The voices of the CTA. Reminds me a bit of the article on the Voice of the MBTA.
How to visit Chicago like a Chicagoan (h/t Mimosa) — warning, it’s pretty profane.
Ta-Nehisi Coates interviews Harold Pollack of the UChicago Crime Lab.
An animation of integer factorizations. Goes well with music. (h/t BK).
Graphics from the Chicago L (via Chicagoist)
Tony Kushner is kind of a tool. I find this unfortunate. But I still want to see Lincoln.
Aaron Roth reports that the DIMACS tutorial videos have been posted. A perfect time to brush up on your differential privacy!
An analysis of the Thai government’s menu served to President Obama.
A Choose Your Own Adventure version of Hamlet, from the creator of Dinosaur Comics.
The ACME Catalog, for your roadrunner-catching needs.
This is an amazing video that makes me miss the Bay Area. (via Bobak Nazer)
Also via Bobak, we’re number 8 and 10!
Since it’s holiday season, I figured it’s time to link to some profanity-laden humor about the holidays. For the new, The Hater’s Guide to the Williams-Sonoma Catalog, and the classic It’s Decorative Gourd Season….
A Game of Food Trucks. (via MetaFilter)
Larry Wasserman takes on the Bayesian/Frequentist debate.
LCD Soundsystem + Miles Davis youtube mashup.
My friend Erik, who started the Mystery Brewing Company, has a blog called Top Fermented. He is now starting a podcast, which also has an RSS feed.
Via Erin (via Bruce Schneier’s blog), I found out about S. Parthasarathy‘s proposal to replace Alice and Bob with Sita and Rama. I have been known to use Alice and Bob on occasion (unlike some people I find the anthropomorphizing to be good, on the balance), but perhaps I should develop some cultural pride and make the switch to “a smarter alternative to these characters.” According to Parthasarathy, there is greater literary relevance to the scenario where Sita wants to send a message to Rama. The dramatic personae in this version are:
There are a number of other appealing allusions in this scenario.
I think it’s a fun exercise — can one come up with other settings? Perhaps based on Gilgamesh, or Star Wars. I’m sure at least one reader of this blog could come up with a Battlestar Galactica scenario. Adama to Baltar?
Also, I couldn’t help but point to this chestnut, the real story of Alice and Bob (h/t to my father).
Troubles in how science is marketed to girls.
Human remains at Richard III’s grave! (That sounds like a cryptic clue but it isn’t).
An interesting take on Karachi, but I’d want a local’s opinion of it…
The case of Aseem Trivedi is a real travesty.
Bad Lip Reading does a number on Mitt Romney. They’ve also done Obama.
TTI Chicago is located on the University of Chicago campus. I am a UChicago affiliate, which means I get to use the libraries here. Unfortunately, the University is almost opposed to the idea of engineering, so things like institutional subscriptions to IEEExplore are out. Compounding this is a kind of old-fashionedness about the university which makes a lot of their collection… dated. However, since information theory is math-like, the university does have a fair number of information theory books and resources, including a number of textbooks and monographs which I had not seen before. One such is Stanford Goldman’s book, whose first chapter is entitled:
Le charme discret de l’entropie?
There is also a cute figure:
Moo!
This is an awesome approach to getting consensus on neighborhood boundaries in Boston. They should do that for Chicago!
A history of currywurst.
Classical Movies in Miniature Style. I like the horses in the Terminator II picture.
I have a rather long-ish commute on public transit, and sometimes it’s hard to get a seat on the train/bus, so I’ve been listening to a lot more podcasts. Here are a few which I’ve been enjoying recently:
Music with giant Tesla coils.
Dogs and cats and babies can get along.
I’m being lazy about more ISIT blogging because my brain is full. So here are some links as a distraction.
Via John, George Boolos’s talk entitled Gödel’s Second Incompleteness Theorem Explained in Words of One Syllable.
D’Angelo is back!
This short video about a subway stair in New York is great, especially the music.
Crooked Timber is on a tear about workplace coercion and its proponents.
Luca’s thoughts on the Turing Centennial are touching.
Muriel Medard said that the IT Society is only 1% of the IEEE. All you other Electrical Engineers : you are the 99%!
ETA : Only 0.1% become Fellows! We are the 99.9%!
An Ergodic Walk 