The Independent Variable
The Independent Variable
Kevin Humdrum
Welcome to The Independent Variable, the official linkblog of the interwebs covering culture, politics, sports, and tech since 2012.
Latest Posts
.new - Google RegistryBrowse the full list of .new shortcuts available today from Adobe, Spotify, and many more.Whats.NewI have long been a frequent user of "docs.new" to quickly create new Google Docs. TIL that there are far more '.new'...
LithubTons of awesome looking and sounding books here. Support small presses this holiday season! The dream is for a Foofaraw book to one day be featured on a list like this.
SF ChronicleAlthough Michelin has positioned its inspectorsā anonymity as a key component of its process in evaluating restaurants and hotels, the wine inspectorsā visits will not be anonymous.I find the Michelin Guide to be absolutely...
The EconomistFootball still struggles in America, though. MLS remains a dull watch, despite its sprinkling of foreign mega-stars such as Lionel Messi, who plays for Inter Miami.Not surprising that a country with one of the highest...
The New YorkerSince Trump returned to office his Administration has fired or muzzled government scientists with disfavored views on nutrition and climate change; cancelled funding for long-running surveys on food insecurity and global...
The New YorkerMaybe my brain is replaying my life now because I have a terminal diagnosis, and all these memories will be lost. Maybe itās because I donāt have much time to make new ones, and some part of me is sifting through the...
BBCHernƔndez was found guilty in March 2024 of conspiring to import cocaine into the US, and of possessing machine guns. He was sentenced to 45 years in prison.Bombing boats from Venezuela without any (publicly released) evidence, while...
HarvardThe dismantling of USAID, according to models from Boston University epidemiologist Brooke Nichols, āhas already caused the deaths of six hundred thousand people, two-thirds of them children,ā Gawande wrote.Four hundred thousand...
Short of the WeekIncredible animated student short film from France. Produced in a stunning knitted stop-motion animation style to create some beautiful visuals. And if you stick around for the whole thing, it gets pretty deep.
MediumLeCun thinks we need completely different approaches, including what he calls āworld models,ā before we can talk seriously about AGI. His timeline? At least a decade, probably much longer.Iām obviously no expert, but Iāve been...
Manu MorealeNew newsletter that Iām excited for from Manu kicking off in the new year.
FuturismCoca-Cola is back with another series of AI-generated ads to herald the holidays ā and they look just as bad as they did last year.What an expensive and ugly ad. People keep saying āThIs iS ThE WoRsT AI WiLl EvEr bE,ā and sure,...
Apple MusicDidnāt catch this yesterday, but what a great three song set from White with Eminem joining for the second, rapping āTill I Collapse over Hello Operator.
*FTBased on a total cumulative deal value of up to $1.8tn, OpenAI is heading for a data centre rental bill of about $620bn a year ā though only a third of the contracted power is expected to be online by the end of this decade.The charts...
SF StandardWhen I pressed Foody on his utopian vision, and why he thinks tech companies wonāt hoard the spoils of the AI boom, he waved his hand and described a future in which everyone has $10 million in purchasing power, lives in a...