Read : 2022-05-15

by shwolff

Articles for reading:

1. “The isolation of social media” by Elizabeth Gehrman (Harvard Medical School : Harvard Medicine Magazine, 2022 Spring).
2. “In praise of anxiety” by Tracy Dennis-Tiwary (The Wall Street Journal, 2022-05-06).
3. “The crypto infrastructure cracks” (The Economist, 2022-05-12). On the de-pegging of TerraUSD and (briefly) its possible implications.
4. “A hitchhiker’s guide to the blockchain universe” by Jim Waldo (Queue, 2019-01-08). Or, an overview of proof-of-work blockchains.
5. “Blockchain and trust” by Bruce Schneier (Schneier on Security, 2019-02).

Articles for reference:

Critical race theory (CRT) et al.:

1. “Critical race theory: The concept dividing the US” by Anthony Zurcher (BBC News, 2021-07-22).
2. “Don’t ban CRT. Expose it.” by Andrew Sullivan (The Weekly Dish, 2021-06-18).

Cryptocurrency:

Terra (LUNA,UST) ecosystem:

1. “Terra flops” by Matt Levine (Bloomberg, 2022-05-11).
2. “Crypto: LUNA plunges as UST stablecoin saga deepens” by David Hollerith (Yahoo Finance, 2022-05-11).

   The crash had nothing to do with blockchains/cryptocurrencies. It was just a stupid design that was never going to work.
   —Anonymous person “familiar with the events”

3. “Tether loses dollar peg as crypto anxiety hits no. 1 stablecoin” by Emily Nicolle, Muyao Shen (Yahoo Finance, 2022-05-12).
4. “The crypto infrastructure cracks” (The Economist, 2022-05-12).
5. “Crash of TerraUSD shakes crypto. ‘There was a run on the bank.’” by Alexander Osipovich, Caitlin Ostroff (The Wall Street Journal, 2022-05-12). How to measure the connectivity of financial markets? How to measure propaganda in public statements?
6. “UST and USD: Everything is monetary policy” by kyla scanlon (kyla’s Newsletter, 2022-05-12).
7. “Why financial engineering has gone full circle with Terra” by Izabella Kaminska (The Blindspot, 2022-05-12). Explains the Terra-Luna stablecoin model and its analog in traditional finance.
8. “Why bitcoin, TerraUSD and other cryptos are plunging” by Zoe Thomas, Caitlin Ostroff (The Wall Street Journal, 2022-05-13). 13m audio with full transcript. Includes discussion of Coinbase’s “general unsecured creditor” disclosure and TerraUSD’s de-pegging from the US dollar. Nonlinearity in financial markets.

Other:

1. “A hitchhiker’s guide to the blockchain universe” by Jim Waldo (Queue, 2019-01-08). Or, an overview of proof-of-work blockchains.
2. “Blockchain and trust” by Bruce Schneier (Schneier on Security, 2019-02).
3. “EE380 talk” by David Rosenthal (DSHR’s Blog, 2022-02-09). On cryptocurrency.
4. “Shadow banking 2.0” by David Rosenthal (DSHR’s Blog, 2022-03-01). A digest of the article “DeFi: Shadow banking 2.0?” by Hilary Allen.
5. “Beanstalk cryptocurrency project robbed after hacker votes to send themself $182 million” by Corin Faife (The Verge, 2022-04-18).

   Based on the duration of an Aave flash loan, the entire process [the hacker borrowing close to 1B USD from Aave, using it to buy a 67% stake in the Beanstalk project, approving code to transfer 182M USD worth of assets to the hacker’s wallet, then repaying the flash loan] took place in less than 13 seconds.

6. “Paradise at the crypto arcade: Inside the Web3 revolution” by Gilad Edelman (WIRED, 2022-05-10).
7. “Coinbase lets users know what a bankruptcy could mean for their crypto” by Jeremy Hill (Yahoo Finance, 2022-05-11). Key term: general unsecured creditor.
8. “What kind of financial asset is bitcoin?” by Noah Smith (Noahpinion, 2022-05-14).

Cybersecurity and cryptography:

Cryptography:

1. “Crypto experts issue a call to arms to avert the cryptopocalypse” by Ars Staff (Ars Technica, 2013-08-01). A call (from a decade ago) for agile cryptographic schemes based on elliptic curve cryptography.

Elliptic curve cryptography (ECC):

1. “A (relatively easy to understand) primer on elliptic curve cryptography” by Nick Sullivan (Ars Technica, 2013-10-24). Avoids almost all technical aspects.

Exploits and vulnerabilities:

1. “Stop using NSA-influenced code in our products, RSA tells customers” by Dan Goodin (Ars Technica, 2013-09-19).
2. “How a dorm room Minecraft scam brought down the internet” by Garrett M. Graff (WIRED, 2017-12-13).
3. “The full story of the stunning RSA hack can finally be told” by Andy Greenberg (WIRED, 2021-05-20). Supply-chain attacks and unknown unknowns.
4. “Pro-Ukraine ‘protestware’ pushes antiwar ads, geo-targeted malware” by Brian Krebs (Krebs on Security, 2022-03-17).

   The trust factor of open source, which was based on good will of the developers is now practically gone, and now, more and more people are realizing that one day, their library/application can possibly be exploited to do/say whatever some random dev on the internet thought ‘was the right thing they to do.’

5. “Critical cryptographic Java security blunder patched—update now!” by Paul Ducklin (Naked Security : Sophos, 2022-04-20).
6. “Hackers are getting caught exploiting new bugs more than ever” by Lily Hay Newman (WIRED, 2022-04-21).

   When we look at all these vulnerabilities, they look a lot like previous vulnerabilities that people have seen before and that are publicly discussed in research… [T]hat’s not what we want. We want attackers to have to come up with a brand-new vulnerability, all new things from the beginning to the end, rather than being able to look at code patterns or copy and paste.
   —Maddie Stone, security researcher at Project Zero

Other:

1. “Microsoft: Using multi-factor authentication blocks 99.9% of account hacks” by Catalin Cimpanu (ZDNet, 2019-08-26).

   Nowadays, hackers have different methods at their disposal to get their hands on users’ credentials, and in most cases, the password doesn’t matter.

2. “Why vaccine cards are so easily forged” by Bruce Schneier (The Atlantic, 2022-03-18).

Economics:

Employment:

1. “We have a chance to end America’s great employment failure” by Joseph Politano (Apricitas Economics, 2022-05-07).

Financial markets:

1. “A new bear market in American shares” (The Economist, 2022-05-13).

   Banks play a smaller role as the middlemen in financial markets, their place taken by computers and specialist trading firms.

2. “Tech bubbles are bursting all over the place” (The Economist, 2022-05-14).

Inflation:

1. “This inflation is demand-driven and persistent” by Jason Furman (Project Syndicate, 2022-04-20).
2. “The gathering stagflationary storm” by Nouriel Roubini (Project Syndicate, 2022-04-25).
3. “The Federal Reserve does not deserve all the inflation blame” by Kenneth Rogoff (Project Syndicate, 2022-05-04).
4. “Fed confronts why it may have acted too slowly on inflation” by Jeanna Smialek (The New York Times, 2022-05-10).
5. “Even outside America, inflation is starting to look entrenched” (The Economist, 2022-05-10).
6. “Consumer price index—April 2022” (US Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2022-05-11).
7. “Inflation headed lower—but maybe not low enough” by Greg Ip (The Wall Street Journal, 2022-05-12). Comparisons to the US inflationary periods of the early 1950s and 1970s.

   [I]nflation reaching 4% is a pretty safe bet. The hope, among investors and the Fed, is that from there, inflation gradually eases to between 2% and 3%. The problem is that in a year, inflation will be driven primarily not by supply but demand…

8. “Peak inflation>” by Joseph Politano (Apricitas Economics, 2022-05-14).

Recession risks:

1. “The growing threat of global recession” by Kenneth Rogoff (Project Syndicate, 2022-04-26).
2. “Things may look shaky, but recession isn’t certainty” by Christina Pazzanese (The Harvard Gazette, 2022-05-11). An interview with Harvard economist Jason Furman.

Other:

1. “Financial stability report” (US Federal Reserve). Page hosts links to the Fed’s (twice-annual?) Financial Stability Reports from November 2018 on.

Education:

1. “Not worth it: Review of Richard Vedder’s ‘Restoring the promise’” by Max Eden (The Manhattan Institute, 2019-12-19).

Health:

1. “The morning” by David Leonhardt (The New York Times, 2022-05-10). “We look at the mental health crisis facing adolescents—and the role of digital technology.”

   [NY Times author of a series on adolescent mental health Matt Richtel] has gone out of his way to emphasize the uncertainty about the specific causes of the crisis, including how much of a role social media plays… What makes less sense to me is why our society has done so little to protect children from the apparent damages of ubiquitous digital media. They are almost certainly larger for most children than the threat from Covid.

Investing:

1. “The intelligent investor: Big Ben” by Jason Zweig (The Wall Street Journal, 2022-05-10).
2. “What to know if you want to buy the stock market dip” by Jason Zweig (The Wall Street Journal, 2022-05-13). Zweig’s advice: 1. Avoid long-term bonds and bond funds. 2. Be prepared for stocks to fall further and stay down longer. 3. Automate purchases. 4. Favor assets that benefit from inflation. 5. Don’t take big risks.

   The Fed put is kaput… The Fed can’t possibly respond to the cries of the stock market when inflation is such a big problem.
   —Ed Yardeni, president of investment-strategy firm Yardeni Research Inc.

   The idea…that we can engineer a painless reversal in inflation without sustaining damage to the real economy…is not based on prior historical experience, and I don’t think it’s in the cards.
   —Carmen Reinhart, chief economist at the World Bank

Literature:

1. “Shakespeare’s plays, sonnets, and poems” (The Folger Shakespeare Library).
2. “Ozymandias” by Percy Bysshe Shelley (Poetry Foundation).

Politics:

1. “Three friends chatting: How the Steele Dossier was created” by Alan Cullison, Aruna Viswanatha (The Wall Street Journal, 2022-05-09).
2. “The Indian economy is being rewired. The opportunity is immense” (The Economist, 2022-05-13).

President Biden’s speech on inflation:

1. “Remarks by President Biden on the economy” by Joe Biden (The White House, 2022-05-10).
2. “Democrats misleadingly claim ‘Republicans’ would ‘end’ Social Security, Medicare” by Robert Farley (FactCheck.org, 2022-04-29).
3. “An 11 point plan to rescue America” by Rick Scott (Rescue America, 2022-02). In my opinion, vague propaganda pandering to targeted voters. Included for reference only. Archived page linked in FactCheck article above.
4. “Here are the Republicans who have come out in support of Rick Scott’s ultra-MAGA agenda” (Democratic National Committee, 2022-05-10). This perplexes me. As of 10 May 2022, the page lists thirteen quotes from or about people who give “support”. Their endorsements include such tepid phrases as “It’s a positive thing” (Ron Johnson), “I think it’s good that people offer ideas” (Marco Rubio), and “generally agreed with some of [the Scott plan’s] major points” (Ted Budd, via Fox). From neither the breadth nor the depth of the endorsements does Scott’s plan seem a Republican party’s plan.

Psychology:

1. “Why you stay up so late, even when you know you shouldn’t” by Ashley Lauretta (WIRED, 2021-03-24).
2. “Unhealthy social-media habits? Blame your early childhood experiences” by Julie Jargon (The Wall Street Journal, 2022-05-07).

Science:

1. “Testosterone: The story of the hormone that dominates and divides us by Dr Carole Hooven review” by Stella O’Malley (The Evening Standard, 2021-06-25).
2. “Altering perceptions on pshchedelics” by Allison Eck (Harvard Medical School, 2022-05). On psychedelic-assisted therapy.
3. “New approach may help clear hurdle to large-scale quantum computing” by Juan Siliezar (The Harvard Gazette, 2022-05-03).
4. “Grandma’s workouts may have made you healthier” by Alvin Powell (The Harvard Gazette, 2022-05-10). Interview with Harvard Medical School professor Laurie Goodyear and postdoctoral fellow Ana Alves-Wagner.
5. “A troubling trend” by Catherine Caruso (Harvard Medical School, 2022-05-11). An interview about covid-19 with doctors and professors on the Massachusetts Consortium on Pathogen Readiness.
6. “First image of black hole at the heart of Milky Way” by Juan Siliezar (The Harvard Gazette, 2022-05-12).

[US] Supreme Court

1. “The justices have no clothes” by Nicholas Reed Langen (Project Syndicate, 2022-04-08).
2. “The Supreme Court’s legitimacy crisis is here” by Nicholas Reed Langen (Project Syndicate, 2022-05-04).
3. “America’s leaky justice” by Aziz Huq (Project Syndicate, 2022-05-05).

Technology:

1. “Plaintext” by Steven Levy (WIRED, 2022-05-13). A plaintive reminiscing on the now-retired iPod.

   We’ll remember the iPod as the totemic gizmo that took us from our historic bounds of scarcity to dizzying abundance.

William White (economist):

1. “Ultra easy monetary policy and the law of unintended consequences” by William R. White (Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas, 2012-09).
2. “William White: Financial fault lines, central banks, and the law of unintended consequences” by Demetri Kofinas (Hidden Forces, 202?). Podcast (1h08m) and transcript (paywalled). Interview starts at 5m55s.
3. “It’s worse than ‘reverse’: The full case against ultra low and negative interest rates” by William White (Institute for New Economic Thinking, 2021-03-05).
4. “Comments on Marvin Goodfriend’s paper: Financial stability, deflation and monetary policy” by William R. White (Bank for International Settlements, 2000-07-03).

Other:

1. “Intermittent fasting may have cognitive benefits, new research shows” by Daniela Hernandez (The Wall Street Journal, 2022-05-12). Though the comment is quick, take heed:

   [N]obody should try it without talking to their doctor first.

   Hernandez talks to researchers Mark Mattson and Courtney Peterson.