I’m haunted by that scene in 2001. What makes it so poignant, and so weird, is the computer’s emotional response to the disassembly of its mind: its despair as one circuit after another goes dark, its childlike pleading with the astronaut—“I can feel it. I can feel it. I’m afraid”—and its final reversion to what can only be called a state of innocence. HAL’s outpouring of feeling contrasts with the emotionlessness that characterizes the human figures in the film, who go about their business with an almost robotic efficiency. Their thoughts and actions feel scripted, as if they’re following the steps of an algorithm. In the world of 2001, people have become so machinelike that the most human character turns out to be a machine. That’s the essence of Kubrick’s dark prophecy: as we come to rely on computers to mediate our understanding of the world, it is our own intelligence that flattens into artificial intelligence. (Nicholas Carr, The Atlantic, July 2008)

New Yorker brief: Sex and the City goes away. What steps in ? The Obama odyssey.

Romania faces a fiscal dilemma of having to pour cash into infrastructure and anti-poverty programmes as it struggles to compete on EU markets, while keeping spending down to contain inflation and a large current account deficit. (Luiza Ilie, Reuters)

Seit Monaten steckt die Europäische Zentralbank in einem Dilemma. Einerseits steigt die Inflation – was eigentlich höhere Zinsen nötig machen würde. Andererseits trübt sich die Konjunktur ein – weshalb viele niedrigere Zinsen fordern. (FAZ Wirtschaft)

Later edit: Knew it !

2. tax evasion scandal in Germany: capitalist fools, forgetting in what world they actually live in. Why do you feed socialist ideas with your behavior ? It’s your fault if lefts are voted heavily.