“If a thing can be said in ten words, I may be relied upon to take a hundred to say it. I ought to apologize for that. I ought to prune, pare and extirpate excess growth, but I will not. I like words – strike that, I love words.” – The Fry Chronicles   A

I was saddened, like many others, to hear of the death of Eric Hobsbawm today.  What I didn’t expect was that it would make it as a trending topic on Twitter. I think he must have been more popular than any of us realised.  

The Misbehavior of Markets: A Fractal View of Financial Turbulence Benoit Mandelbrot was one of the great innovators of the twentieth century and will be forever linked with the science he named, fractal geometry.  Fractals pop up all over the place, but one place that they can be found is in economic data.  Could you

Easter Island is famously one of the remotest places in the world.  It is also famous for its huge statues.  They are both relics of and key components of one of the most haunting of tales of environmental destruction.  The inhabitants of Easter Island arrived by boat and created a unique culture, of which the

Telstar – the satellite (thanks to Wikipedia) I was 3 when Telstar came out, so I probably don’t remember it when it was actually a hit record. But I heard it often enough as a small boy that it formed part of my experience of growing up.  It was always my favourite.  It was just

Pussy Riot (Thanks to Wikipedia for the image)   Pussy Riot are the only Russian punk group I have heard of.  I think I am in good company on that, as they seem to be a lot more interested in getting publicity for their political protests than their art. On the whole I don’t approve