May 2007

There’s a fantastic piece in today’s Times about the sad, sorry state of universities in Africa, and particularly, Senegal: Africa’s best universities, the grand institutions that educated a revolutionary generation of nation builders and statesmen, doctors and engineers, writers and intellectuals, are collapsing. It is partly a self-inflicted crisis of mismanagement and neglect, but it is also a result of international development policies that for decades have favored basic education over higher learning even as a population explosion propels more…

I realize that I’m probably the only person among my peer group who watches/listens to The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer even on a semi-occasional basis. Basically, my radio is either tuned to KQED or KALX, or I’m listening to music via CD/iPod. So that means if I happen to be listening to KQED between the hours of 3 and 4 pm, I catch part or all of The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer. On May 8, there was a ridiculous “debate”…

I’d heard some people talk about train links between North and South Korea when I was there last month, and now, it’s finally happened. For the first time since the Korean War that a train has crossed the DMZ. Yes, it’s historic and emotional and all that, but really, as Reuters points out, this deal is all about the money: To entice the North to allow the historic rail crossing, Seoul has offered $80 million in aid for its light…

I just found Paul Wolfowitz’ home address using Google. The New York Times just published the above picture of Paul Wolfowitz coming out of his Chevy Chase, Md., home. The street address, 7104, is clearly visible. So, as an experiment, I typed in 7104 chevy chase wolfowitz into Google. My first result came back with this: Report from Paul Wolfowitz demo at his 7104 Pinehurst Pkwy, Chevy Chase home. Wow.

I’m in a featured article on MediaBistro today — that’s a journalism industry site. The piece is meant as a helpful guide for struggling freelancers (like me), as to how to get published in big, brand-name magazines. Unfortunately, MediaBistro puts their good stuff behind a paywall ($49/year), so even I can’t get access to this article. I didn’t even know the piece was running today until a Columbia classmate emailed me a copy and asked about it. Here’s the opening…

On his blog, Daniel Hernandez notes that there have been a couple really neat proposals for a proper subway system for LA. The first one, designed by Numan Parada, would put a subway stop at 26th and Wilshire, about 2 blocks from my parents’ house. It would take two transfers to get there from LAX, which would be freakin’ sweet. The second one would put a stop at 23rd and Santa Monica Blvd., about 6-7 blocks from my parents’ house,…

Oh man — what could be better than Stephen Colbert singing a mock Korean pop song (à la Rain)? Exactly. [via Metropolitician]

Most journalists take comfort in the fact that their jobs can’t be outsourced — that is, until they are. FP Passport: What do you do if you are a struggling website peddling local Pasadena, Ca., news, but can’t afford to hire more U.S. reporters? Outsource the job of covering all things Pasadena to Bangalore. That’s exactly what James Macpherson, publisher of Pasadena Now, has done, offering to pay two India-based journalists he found on Bangalore’s craigslist site a combined $20,800…

I’ve just gotten a new gig as a space blogger for Wired News‘ blog: Wired Science. My first post can be found here. Occasionally I get to do longer articles that show up in the blog, like this one: A team of astronomers has created the first map of an extrasolar planet, HD 189733b, located approximately 60 light-years from Earth. By measuring brightness and other data collected over time by the Spitzer Space Telescope, the scientists constructed a map of…

ZOMG! It’s official! My life is now complete — TJ’s is moving in to the old Albertson’s location on College Ave., opposite Zachary’s, just north of the BART station! That means that there’s a TJ’s within a 15 minute walk of my house. SWEET!