Daily Bookmarks to GAVNet 02/12/2021

THREAD:

80 Films with the biggest Plot Twists that will blow your mind.

1. Fight Club

2. Predestination

3. Seven

4. Requiem for a Dream

It’s underremarked upon that stablecoins accomplish basically all of the original design goals for Bitcoin qua a transactional mechanism (instant free value transfer anywhere), but that nobody cares about this because nobody ever cared about that part of the pitch.

“Why do people care about stablecoins then?”

A mix of “they encourage dollar-denominated liquidity in the cryptocurrency ecosystem and discourage withdrawal of the same” and “they’re good for money laundering.”

“But they make value transfer between exchanges much faster!”

This was a solved problem in traditional finance, too, mostly through the extension of credit. (It doesn’t matter how long settlement takes if there is sufficient trust to enable credit.)

The Bitcoin ecosystem is *positively allergic* to credit, so you have to call it a coin for them to accept it. And after you call it a coin they ignore everything the world has learned about credit, like risk management.

“Stablecoins aren’t credit!”

They’re pretty much exactly credit? A tether is a zero-coupon Bitfinex bond with a non-functioning call option. I

This post is pretty bizarre, but it manages to hit on so many false beliefs that I've seen hurt junior data scientists that it deserves some explicit

(1) The notion that R is well-suited to "building web applications" seems totally out of left field. I don't feel like most R loyalists think this is a good idea, but it's worth calling out that no normal company will be glad you wrote your entire web app in R.

(2) It is true that Python had some issues historically with the 2-to-3 transition, but it's not such a big deal these days. On the flip side, I have found interesting R code that doesn't run in modern R interpreters because of changes in core operations (e.g. assignment syntax).

(3) "Most of the time we only need a latest, working interpreter with the latest packages to run the code" -- this is where things get real and reveal some things that hurt data scientists. If this sentence is true, it's likely because you don't share code with coworkers.

(3) Really is a broader issue in data science: people only think of what they need to do their work if no one else existed and code was never maintained. Junior data scientists almost always operate on projects they start from scratch and don't have to maintain for long.

why do I hear boss music

1/n
The kingdom of Sindh was ruled by its last Hindu king Raja Dahir during the 8th century. When Muhammad-bin-Qasim invaded Sindh, he decimated Sindh in his savage bloodlust. The chronicles of his advent are described in the Chachnama.

2/n
The Chachnama describes in detail how the Arabs led by butcher Qasim conquered Sindh. It tells the terrible tale of bravery, treachery, & carnage marking the entry of Islamic conquest of India’s Hindus.

3/n
When Muhammad-bin-Qasim attacked Sindh, Dahir had collected an army of 50,000 horses and marched from Brahamanabad to Rawar to face the invader. Qasim had an army that numbered in the tens of thousands with camels & horses.

4/n
Earlier Arab Alafis - Syeds from Prophet Mohammed’s own family had fled from Mecca with 500 men to Sindh and Raja Dahir had given them asylum. Trusting these Muslims would prove to be the fatal mistake for the downfall of Sindh & pave the way for Islamic invasion.

5/n
On an “auspicious day” in A.D. 711, fixed by astrologers, Mohammed Bin Qasim started for Sindh at the head of the Iraqi, Syrian, and other Arab soldiers. His horses and camels were disguised to look like lions and elephants. Rebel Jats also joined Qasim’s army.