markjgsmith

2024/09/11 #

• Apple must pay 13 billion euros in back taxes, EU’s top court rules - There’s something really not right with this case. It’s taken many many years, and there’s this enormous back taxes that have to be paid, yet somehow all sides, whether that’s Apple, the government of Ireland or the European Union are still literally all claiming they did nothing wrong. What the fuck happened? It feels eerily similar to my situation here in Vietnam, all be it on a much bigger scale. I wonder do any of the sides in the bigger case feel they are slaves and / or prisonners? www.cnbc.com #

• Battle of Waterloo dig uncovers horror of severed limbs and shot horses - If there’s one thing the universe is definitely not doing to me right now, that’s it being on the warpath. Definitely not a warpathy universe today. No sir. Nope. Universe !warpathing. Interestingly I once came 1 person away from meeting the queen of England in Waterloo. True story. www.theguardian.com #

• Mel B among Britons taking fight against afro hair discrimination to parliament - I love Mel. When I moved to the UK for university was the time when the Spice Girls were just taking off big time. It was totally not my type of music, I was always indie and alt rock, but they were always on the tele and newspapers, so she was part of the backdrop of me discovering my home country for the first time. I find this afro hair protected status thing quite strange. Won’t it lead to more bullying in reality for regular afro wearers? What about white people with perms? Do they get protected status too. Is Gerry going to do the same for red heads? I could get a partial beard protection in that case. What about asian straight black hair? How are we discussing hair styles as a government rule? Isn’t this a little bit ridiculous? While we are here, what about freckles? I have a lot of those. I want my freckles to be a protected characteristic! I bet I’m not allowed to say that. Definitely my favorite story so far this week :) www.theguardian.com #

• The Big Tech Sandwich (June 2022) - A piece I wrote a while back. I’m re-posting it again now just to give a sense of the scale of the challenge the world is up against. It’s no doubt an example why I’ll never be running for office anywhere, but I‘d like to live in a world where it’s a lot easier to build. We need our leaders to step up to the challenge. markjgsmith.com #

• EU ‘needs €800bn-a-year spending boost to avert agonising decline’ - Mario Draghi: "For the first time since the cold war we must genuinely fear for our self-preservation". The former Italian prime minister has published a hard hitting "we are pretty fucked" report. Where are the european challenge accepted folks hiding? www.theguardian.com #