Surveillance society, or, there is no privacy on the ‘net

Privacy on the Internet is gone. It’s toast.

That is the point of Bruce Schneier’s post, Our Internet Surveillance State.

We leave crumbs of data spread around every time we use our computer or smart phone. With the cost of storing data essentially zero, every provider keeps a record of everything you do. And why not? The cost is zero to record your last Internet search or which cell tower has connection to your phone this moment.

Our privacy is shot when you put huge numbers of crumbs together.

Continue reading “Surveillance society, or, there is no privacy on the ‘net”

2013 Impact of the Eagle Ford Shale field

The University of Texas San Antonio released their 2013 study of the impact of drilling in Eagle Ford. You can get the full report here.

I’ve read through the slide deck for the presentation on 3-28-13. Here a few cool things I think are highlights:

Check out the explosion in drilling permits: Continue reading “2013 Impact of the Eagle Ford Shale field”

Economic impact of Eagle Ford – $61 billion – 2013 report

The University of Texas San Antonio released today their 2013 study of the impact of drilling in Eagle Ford.

I’ll have comments on the report in the next few days. It is a great report.

You can get the report here. If you want more details, the appendix is here.

Continue reading “Economic impact of Eagle Ford – $61 billion – 2013 report”

Economic destruction from the New Deal just keeps rolling on

Did you know that in the 1930s raisin producers had to give a portion of their harvest to the government with the feds deciding what portion of the crop every producer had to turn over and what price they would get?

Neither did I.

(Cross post from my other blog Freedom is Moral.)

Did you know that program is still in place today, 80 some odd years later?

Neither did I.

Did you know that in the 2002-2003 season Continue reading “Economic destruction from the New Deal just keeps rolling on”

Lots of drones for lots of individuals and lots of governments

Drones are becoming quite popular for individuals and governments. I haven’t spent enough time talking about drones – their popularity is growing rapidly.

Cheap drones for individuals

For a few hundred dollars you can buy an easy-to-fly drone that can stream HD feed to your smart phone. That according to the video at Spying eyes or a bit of fun, drones fly off the shelves at Sydney Morning Herald.

Continue reading “Lots of drones for lots of individuals and lots of governments”

Inconvenient production data – Peak Oil #21

Vaclav Smil has an article at The American, “Memories of Peak Oil” that looks at oil production data over the course of a decade.

He pulls data from BP’s annual energy report. Great stuff there.

These are some highlights he points out for production between 2001 and 2011: Continue reading “Inconvenient production data – Peak Oil #21”

Deal reached to bail out Cyprus banks

A deal has finally been reached. Form of the agreement is hard to figure out. Most articles don’t outline the details.

I finally found an article that gave a good explanation – Scratch one stupid idea at the Financial Times Alphaville blog. (free registration required)

Here is my very short summary:

The second largest bank (Laiki) will be liquidated. Continue reading “Deal reached to bail out Cyprus banks”

Cyprus update, evening of 3-24

Time is running out. The deadline appears to be opening of business on Tuesday. That puts it sometime extremely early in the day Monday here in California.

One of the fascinating things I’ve learned about blogging is you have to write and lock your words in print (pixels?) not knowing how events will turn out. Know what? That’s part of what is making it so much fun.

Current plans being floated

Continue reading “Cyprus update, evening of 3-24”

Mali update – 3-24-13

3-22 – Wall Street Journal – Mali Militants Attack Airport

The Timbuktu airport was attacked with a suicide-bomber and follow-on infiltration attempt. Airstrikes drove off the attackers. Claimed losses are one Malian soldier killed, two wounded, and 15 attackers killed.

3-21 – Wall Street Journal – U.S. Sanctions Mali Terror Group

The U.S. State Department and Treasury Department officially sanctioned Ansar al-Dine as a terrorist group on Thursday.

3-22 – Africa is a Country – Welcome to Mali

Gregory Mann has a superb discussion of the goals of various parties. His description is that there are multiple wars underneath the visible battle with all the players having different goals. France, the Malian civilian government, the Malian military (which is not quite under the control of the civil government according to the article), the Tuarag people group (MNLA), and the mujahideen (AQIM and Ansar al-Dine) are each fighting a different war. France has one of several possible goals, none of which are in sight at the moment.

Great article, which also shows the complexity of the conflict there. Also shows how much I have to learn.

Bailout of Cypriot banks taking shape

Legislation passed by the legislature in Cyprus places capital controls on currency. Full plans to rescue the banking sector are still on the drawing board.

The short description of the capital restrictions from the Wall Street Journal:

The proposals will allow authorities to restrict noncash transactions, freeze check cashing, limit withdrawals and even convert checking accounts into fixed-term deposits.

Continue reading “Bailout of Cypriot banks taking shape”

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Thanks for checking out my blog.

You might enjoy posts categorized with these tags:

You could also click “Peak Oil” or “Peak Oil Vol 2” at the very top of the page to see compilations of my posts on peak oil.

Thanks to Mr. Oksol for the link!

Hope you enjoy the site.

Cyprus government pondering how much private wealth to seize to save banks

Latest news from Cyprus is banks will be closed all this week and reopen next Tuesday (3-26-13) at the earliest.

After the parliament voted down the plan to take 9.9% of all large deposits and 6.75% of smaller deposits, the government is working on an alternate plan.

Current ideas appear to include some combination of: Continue reading “Cyprus government pondering how much private wealth to seize to save banks”

Even with Cyprus’s parliament voting “never mind” to the plan of taking depositor’s money, an invisible line has been crossed

Status as of this moment is the Cyprus legislature voted down the plan to tax all bank depositors in the country to bail out two banks. Background here.

That does not revoke the idea that lots of regulators think your deposits belong to them and the only issue open for negotiation is what percentage of your money they are going to take.

Remember this is a deal to bail out the two largest Cyprus banks. The plan didn’t just hit the uninsured depositors and bondholders of those two banks. If that were the case, this would have been the normal liquidation of a bank. That would be fine.

Instead, here was the status over the weekend: Continue reading “Even with Cyprus’s parliament voting “never mind” to the plan of taking depositor’s money, an invisible line has been crossed”

Role of regulatory failure in the sinking of the Titanic

(Cross-post from my other blog, Freedom is Moral.)

The sinking of the Titanic is usually blamed on that careless, horrible Captain Smith and the greedy, capitalist shipowner who didn’t want the expense or inconvenience or clutter of enough lifeboats.  Rarely discussed is the role of the regulators in the tragedy.

Chris Berg points out in his Wall Street Journal article a year ago, The Real Reason for the Tragedy of the Titanic, that the regulators, the British Board of Trade, required all boats over 10,000 metric tons to have 16 lifeboats. It didn’t matter how many passengers were on board. Just put 16 lifeboats on.

Was the Titanic in compliance? Yes.

Continue reading “Role of regulatory failure in the sinking of the Titanic”