In the last few weeks The Economist has started up a new technology blog called Babbage. I've been posting a few items on this. I suspect that it is an attempt by my employer to mop up every last creative word that I have inside of me, and the attempt seems to be working. Since Babbage launched I've not posted a thing.
Things have been busy. The section head is away, I've been writing and editing at times. In no particular order, and not necessarily comprehensively. I had a lot of good feedback over these two pieces in particular.
Leader - Ban the trade in tuna but set a path to sustainable exploitation, March 18th, 2010.
A ban on the trade of bluefin is rejected, March 18th, 2010.
Oh, one other piece of information. Apparently I upset the elephant people so much at CITES, with my daring questions about where the evidence is to show that ivory sales increase poaching, that I became known as "the Dragon lady from The Economist". I really like that. Thanks to Iain Douglas Hamilton for letting me know. I'm thinking of getting a tattoo or something.
(* Update -4.5.10-: One of the authors of a recent Science paper, on the ivory trade, which includes Iain Douglas Hamilton, writes to tell me that this paragraph may imply to some readers that one of the authors of this paper dubbed me "The Dragon Lady". Such a suggestion was absolutely not my intention and I have no evidence, nor reason to believe, this is the case at all.)
To everyone working on ivory and elephants, please direct your time and attention to producing some good evidence that links one-off sales with increases in poaching. It is far more productive than hurling abuse, and it will give me something to write about when it arrives.
Recent articles
The fly - in a flap about Drosophila, April 29th, 2010
Whales - the fiant compromise (jointly authored with Ken Cukier in Tokyo), April 29th, 2010.
Cosmic archeology - new ways to hunt for extraterrestrials, April 15th, 2010. (One letter writer accuses me of ignoring UFOs as evidence for aliens.)
Endangered species
Leader - Ban the trade in tuna but set a path to sustainable exploitation, March 18th, 2010.
A ban on the trade of bluefin is rejected, March 18th, 2010.
Aftermath of CITES - How the elephant hurt the bluefin, March 25th, 2010
Green.view, While stocks last, March 16th, 2010.
And various Babbage posts, GPS, Building Design, Electronic voting,