On a weekend trip again, but managed to squeeze in quite a bit of reading during the week.

• Friends Without Benefits
  Was there a paradigm shift in Silicon Valley from hard science to pointless web 2.0 startups?
• How Universities Work
  As the title implies this is about universities in the US, but a lot of it also holds true for academic institutions in Europe.
• First World War officially ends
  92 years after the end of the war, Germany will pay the last chunk of reparations imposed by the Treaty of Versailles.
• The Shell Hater’s Handbook
  Despite the name, this presentation by GitHubber Ryan Tomyako is a nice intro to shell scripting. If you know a shell hater, send him a link to this presentation.
• Virtual vs. Real Protests
  Twitter “revolutions” and the confusion between “mobilization” and “organization”.
• Small Change
  Very much in the same vain as the previous article, Malcolm Gladwell talks about hierarchies vs. networks, strong vs. weak ties and why joining a Facebook group is not the same sort of activism as putting your life at risk in a real world conflict.
• Pay The Bills
  Interesting experiment in earning some money while looking for a job.
• Software Development for Developing Regions: Another Hat for Hackers
  Interesting idea about using skills like reversee engineering, code injection etc. for making software better suited to third world demands.
• India’s surprising economic miracle
  Will India’s economy thrive when the global economy becomes more knowledge-intensive?