Well, IMHO they have to publicly levy the maximum fines, penalties, suspensions, scorn, shame, and derision on Serena (tirade! outburst!). Because it allows the officials to not have to admit that they substituted procedural rationality for substantive rationality in a) allowing a linesperson to call an at-best 1/16 inch footfault at 15-30 at 5-6 in …
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I am preparing for classes to begin, cleaning out files and cleaning up office. And I decided last-minute, with a cheap fare, to jump to Chicago for the weekend to attend a close friend’s annual party (which I’d never been to before and seemed like the kind of thing to do at least once). As …
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One of Erving Goffman’s brilliant insights is the extent to which people engage in presentations of self. Front-stage behavior is the display meant for ‘public’ consumption: witty, urbane, dangerous, smart, smooth, down-to-earth, intellectual, anti-intellectual. This depends on the audience, of course, and it is meant to make oneself look good. Backstage behavior is closer to …
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There’s a longer post I intend on the ways political/social discourse gets hijacked by experts, well-covered territory to be sure but important nevertheless. In the meantime, I’m still on something of a news hiatus. So I am coming to this a little belatedly. Apparently, Niall Ferguson, a professor dude who writes about money, wrote an …
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Back from ASA, and it somehow feels incomplete without some kind of wrap-up. So: I am coming to appreciate my cohort and close-related cohorts at Northwestern more and more. Within a couple years or three, wow. This year, I ran into or got to catch up with Mike Sauder, Ryon Lancaster, Tim Hallett, Mike Lounsbury, …
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I was scheduled to leave for SF today, and after I arrived at the airport and waited around a half hour or so, I was somewhat horrified to learn that my flight had been irreparably delayed. My choices? Fly to Cincinnati and take an early flight out from there, or fly out tomorrow morning. So …
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It’s been a relatively slow year for movies, which are normally among my favorite forms of entertainment. So far this year, I have only seen 7 movies, a low number. I’m alarmed so far at how much more attention we have been spending avoiding the crap than seeing the gems. Good to great: Hurt Locker …
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I’m just shouting out that I love my internet hosting service, Hosting Matters. If you ever decide to host your own domain, give me a shout out, and apparently I can get you a decent deal (and possibly get a referral credit). But I would recommend them anyhow. If you hate your current service or …
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Part of my talk this coming week is a criticism of the turn from commensuration to quantification. In particular, one of the striking comparisons between (auction) art markets and financial capital markets is the extent to which art specialists decry quantification. As specialists gain more experience, they are more willing to say that their valuations …
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JL is done with her ASA prep work, and I am not. And so this is the last post for a bit of time, while I prepare then confer in SF. In the meantime, I leave you with Le Pétomane, to make up for the lack of mellifluousness vis-à-vis the last post on melon. Toot-toot, …
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‘O fleur de tous les fruits. O ravissant melon!’ It’s summer in NYC, and we’ve been enjoying as many of these Galia melons as we can get. It’s a cross between a cantaloupe and a honeydew, and a bit sweeter than either. Expensive, but delicious. I’ve heard ugly rumors that the Charantais is the best …
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One of the more interesting question post-meltdown (do we even still call it that? we really need a name for the ‘financial events of 2007-2008′) is whether structured finance is, for all intents and purposes, dead. Structured finance is the general term that includes the securitization of debt. These vehicles go by names like Asset-backed …
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Why do online movie viewing sites seem to trend towards crapitude? I thought the Roku player (which seamlessly streams Netflix to your TV) was about our best purchase of 2008. In mid-2009, we have watched many of the ‘best’ movies online already. And the latest 10 movies in the ‘new arrivals’? 1. Witch Hunt 2. …
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Over on his backstage, Piste1eh needs a hobby. It reminds me that in 2000 or so, I was close to finishing graduate school, but still so far away. I also realized that sociology had begun to overtake my life – I had few interests outside of school, and little time to pursue those few interests …
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Congress is starting to ask questions about the ways Goldman Sachs measures risk, considering their supposed switch from an investment bank to a bank holding company. And they should. Plus, I think I was wrong about GS paying its profit-makers.
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Three thoughtful posts from Martha, Daniel, and Yuval comment on the NYT article about Goldman Sachs’ high-speed trading unit. The rather critical article suggests that high-speed trading is the latest way to exploit innovation at the expense of everyone else, to the tune of $21 Billion in 2008. This issue is not new as such, …
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In what has become something of a tradition for me, I am taking August off from the news. No more newspapers, no political blogs, no following the latest developments of this, that, and the other. I am frankly looking forward to the lowering of my blood pressure, the clearing of an artificially-cranked-up news cycle, and …
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From an excellent practical handbook on writing, Howard Becker’s Writing for Social Scientists: Scholars learn to fear the literature in graduate school. I remember Professor Louis Wirth, one of the distinguished members of the Chicago school, putting Erving Goffman, then a fellow graduate student of mine, in his place with the literature gambit. It was …
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Ezra Klein and Eric Klinenberg look remarkably similar to me. Maybe it’s just me. Sadly, I never think I look like anyone. Just me.
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