Back in the Hall

No one made sketch comedy, that most Canadian of comic forms, like the Kids in the Hall — which makes their return to television a big deal

Source: Walrus Magazine
Published: Jan 1, 2010
Length: 34 minutes (8,713 words)

Google Android: on Inevitability, the Dawn of Mobile, and the Missing Leg

If for no other reason than the “Anyone but Apple” crowd NEEDS an alternative, there is an “inevitability” meme associated with Google’s Android initiative. After all, Google is formidable, has a strong brand, and their (relative) openness is the “zig” to Apple’s proprietary “zag.” And of course, mobile is strategic to Google’s future, so they can be expected to compete vigorously for market and mind share (via Android) over the long haul. But, do those ingredients combine into a recipe that makes their success in the market inevitable? Over a year after Android’s launch, I have to say that the jury is still out.

Author: Mark Sigal
Published: Dec 3, 2009
Length: 30 minutes (7,543 words)

Tycoon, Contractor, Soldier, Spy

Erik Prince, recently outed as a participant in a C.I.A. assassination program, has gained notoriety as head of the military-contracting juggernaut Blackwater, a company dogged by a grand-jury investigation, bribery accusations, and the voluntary-manslaughter trial of five ex-employees, set for next month. Lashing back at his critics, the wealthy former navy seal takes the author inside his operation in the U.S. and Afghanistan, revealing the role he’s been playing in America’s war on terror.

Source: Vanity Fair
Published: Jan 1, 2010
Length: 23 minutes (5,995 words)

The Ferality Show

This was the decade when the bottom fell out of just about everything — including the idea of authority itself. Is it any wonder that we all started screaming at one another?

Published: Dec 6, 2009
Length: 22 minutes (5,687 words)

Testing, Testing

The health-care bill has no master plan for curbing costs. Is that a bad thing?

Source: The New Yorker
Published: Dec 14, 2009
Length: 8 minutes (2,058 words)

The Post-Imperial Presidency

Even as Obama increases troop levels, he is scaling back American foreign policy.

Source: Newsweek
Published: Dec 5, 2009
Length: 35 minutes (8,976 words)

Requiem for the Dollar

Published: Dec 5, 2009
Length: 26 minutes (6,573 words)

Dead Men Walking

Why 2009’s truly top thinkers are yesterday’s news.

Source: Foreign Policy
Published: Dec 1, 2009
Length: 22 minutes (5,648 words)

The Charms of Wikipedia

The first thing I did on Wikipedia (under the username Wageless) was to make some not-very-good edits to the page on bovine somatotropin. I clicked the “edit this page” tab, and immediately had an odd, almost lightheaded feeling, as if I had passed through the looking glass and was being allowed to fiddle with some huge engine or delicate piece of biomedical equipment. It seemed much too easy to do damage; you ask, Why don’t the words resist me more? Soon, though, you get used to it. You recall the central Wikipedian directive: “Be Bold.” You start to like life on the inside.

Published: Mar 20, 2008
Length: 12 minutes (3,183 words)

The Way of the Sniper

What Scott Tyler does, and does well, is something that is essential in every war we’re fighting. And that is: eliminate important targets, sometimes from extraordinary distances, without anybody knowing he was ever there.

Source: Men’s Journal
Published: Nov 30, 2009
Length: 33 minutes (8,384 words)