Friday Hodgepodge

Four Things

1. Someone who, as a child, used to ... perplex ... adults by writing a ladder-like capital E and mentioned this on Tumblr (via Hacker News).

Others joined in and the result was an entire, somewhat mesmerizing font based on the idea.

So far I've got

• ladder letters: A, E, F, H, T
• humpback B's and P's get as many bumps as you think they need
• circle O's, you just keep spiraling in til you feel like you've made your point
• tree letters branch into smaller versions of themselves ad nauseum: X, Y
• spider Q's, so many legs

It's definitely the strangest font I have ever seen to date.

2. Below is a brief description of the central character in a long-ish, but absorbing Bloomberg piece:

Image by Gene Devine, via Unsplash, license.

[Bill] Benter, 61, walks with a slight stoop. He looks like a university professor, his wavy hair and beard streaked with gray, and speaks in a soft, slightly Kermit-y voice. He told me he'd been driven only partly by money -- and I believed him. With his intelligence, he could have gotten richer faster working in finance. Benter wanted to conquer horse betting not because it was hard, but because it was said to be impossible. When he cracked it, he actively avoided acclaim, outside the secretive band of geeks and outcasts who occupy his chosen field. Some of what follows relies on his recollections, but in every case where it's been possible to corroborate events and figures, they've checked out in interviews with dozens of individuals, as well as in books, court records, and other documents. Only one thing Benter ever told me turned out to be untrue. It was at the outset of our conversations, when he said he didn't think I'd find anything interesting to write about in his career. [bold added]

As you might expect in a story about gambling, there are elements of intrigue most of us will prefer to simply read about.

3. Manu Cornet, an engineer at Google who achieved internet fame for his cartoons that often satirized his employer, recently left the search giant. This prompted a piece at Mashable that contains many of those cartoons.

I don't agree with Cornet's apparent political leanings, but I will concede that the cartoons are good. My favorite is one in which he pokes fun at the organizational structures of several major tech companies:

Cornet gained notoriety both inside and outside of Google by comparing Google to its competitors. Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella used one of Cornet's comics about tech company org charts as the introduction to his book about making changes at Microsoft.

Getting rid of that organizational culture is surely as good a move as introducing it at Sears was a bad move for Edward Lampert, who clearly did not understand markets, sleazy Ayn Rand bashers to the contrary notwithstanding.

4. For a gallery of a different kind, mosey on over to Earth Restored.

Only 24 people have journeyed far enough to see the whole Earth against the black of space. The images they brought back changed our world.

Here is a selection of the most beautiful photographs of Earth -- iconic images and unknown gems -- digitally restored to their full glory.

In addition to the stunning images are facts about each shot. For example, site maintainer Toby Ord notes of the shot of the lunar module and Earth taken on July 21, 1969, "Collins, who remained in orbit on the Command Module, is behind the lens. Every other human is in front of it."

-- CAV