https://www.economist.com

The destructive new logic that threatens globalisation | The Economist
▻https://www.economist.com/leaders/2023/01/12/the-destructive-new-logic-that-threatens-globalisation

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America is leading a dangerous global slide towards subsidies, export controls and protectionism
[…]
Yet rescuing the global order will require bolder American leadership that once again rejects the false promise of zero-sum thinking. There is still time for that to happen before the system collapses completely, damaging countless livelihoods and imperilling the causes of liberal democracy and market capitalism. The task is enormous and urgent; it could hardly be more important. The clock is ticking.

décidément, The Economist ressent fortement une montée des périls, après le chaos possible à la Chambre des représentants états-unienne (cf. post précédent), la montée du protectionnisme et la perspective de guerres commerciales avec le retour d’une logique de jeux #à_somme_nulle.

(attiré sur cet article par la superbe illustration de couverture)

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After a spectacularly chaotic start for Congress, more discord looms | The Economist
▻https://www.economist.com/united-states/2023/01/12/after-a-spectacularly-chaotic-start-for-congress-more-discord-looms

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Europe’s freakish winter heatwave breaks records | The Economist
▻https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2023/01/12/europes-freakish-winter-heatwave-breaks-records

https://www.economist.com/img/b/1280/720/90/media-assets/image/20230114_WOT354.png

It is not a good season for Europe’s skiers.

The Economist’s daily chart

#qui_aurait_pu_prédire

Les territoires sous-dotés, moyennement dotés ou bien dotés en médecins généralistes en 2021, par commune #AFP #AFPGraphics

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Elon Musk’s $44bn education in free speech | The Economist
▻https://www.economist.com/leaders/2022/12/19/elon-musks-44bn-education-in-free-speech

He has had a crash course in the trade-offs in protecting free expression on Twitter

Elon musk’s two months running Twitter has been an unhappy experiment. The social network’s 250m users have endured a wearying saga in which Mr Musk is the central character. Advertisers have fled. Twitter, which lost $221m in 2021, is now on track to lose $4bn a year, by one estimate. The damage has spread to Tesla, Mr Musk’s carmaker, part of the reason it has lost half a trillion dollars in market value since early September, costing Mr Musk the title of the world’s richest man.

On December 19th it looked as if Mr Musk might throw in the towel, after he asked Twitter users whether he should step down as Twitter’s chief executive. It has been a costly adventure. But in one sense his turbulent stewardship of the social network has done the rest of the world a favour. In two short months Mr Musk has been through a public crash course in the principles of free speech, neatly demonstrating the trade-offs involved in protecting expression online.

From the outside, Twitter seemed simple to someone whose day job was building self-driving cars and space rockets. Mr Musk, a self-described “free-speech absolutist”, had grown concerned (with some justification) that Twitter had been captured by censorious left-wing scolds. Shortly after agreeing to buy the platform he explained his approach to moderation: “By ‘free speech’, I simply mean that which matches the law.”

In practice he has found that the right to speech conflicts with other rights. One is safety. Last month Mr Musk said that his commitment to free speech meant he would not ban a Twitter account that tweeted the whereabouts of his private jet, even though he considered this a security risk. But on December 14th he changed his mind after a “stalker” bothered his son. After suspending the jet account, Twitter introduced rules outlawing the reporting of others’ real-time locations.

As well as limiting speech in the name of safety, Mr Musk has curtailed it to avoid the lesser sin of causing offence. In October the number of views of tweets that Twitter deems “hate speech” doubled, as users tested the limits of Mr Musk’s regime. Rather than allow this legal-but-nasty content, Twitter cracked down. In November hateful tweets recorded one-third fewer views than before the takeover. Earlier this month Twitter suspended the account of Ye, a rapper formerly known as Kanye West, after he posted a picture of a swastika within a Star of David—an image that, however grotesque, is nonetheless permitted by America’s laws.

Mr Musk even limited speech when it was bad for profits. After pranksters sent tweets aping brands like Pepsi (“Coke is better”) and Nestlé (“We steal your water and sell it back to you lol”), Twitter outlawed such behaviour to stop advertisers fleeing. Then, to stem an exodus of users, on December 18th Twitter said it would ban people from linking to rival social networks or posting their usernames. When questions were raised as to whether regulators would consider such a move anticompetitive, Mr Musk apologised and free speech was restored.

All this holds two lessons for whoever follows Mr Musk as Twitter’s boss, should he leave. One is to keep content moderation at arm’s length. The person deciding whether a post is acceptable is compromised if they are also responsible for boosting engagement among users and spending by advertisers. Mark Zuckerberg (whose reputation has risen in light of Mr Musk’s pratfalls) realised this and outsourced Facebook’s moderation headaches to an independent “oversight board” in 2020.

The second lesson is that moderation has no clean solutions, even for “technokings” with strong views on free speech. Free expression is not a problem with a solution bounded by the laws of physics that can be hacked together if enough coders pull an all-nighter. It is a dilemma requiring messy trade-offs that leave no one happy. In such a business, humility and transparency count for a lot.

These are novel concepts to some in Silicon Valley, who are impatient to tear up the established ways of doing things. But just as cryptocurrency enthusiasts have recently received a bracing lesson in the value of boring old financial prudence, Mr Musk and his fellow free-speech enthusiasts are learning why free expression has caused so many to scratch their heads for so long. Tech valuations have suffered a sharp correction in 2022. It has also been a chastening year for tech egos.

Thread by andrewsweiss on Thread Reader App – Thread Reader App
▻https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1603448186831618061.html

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The changing ideology of Silicon Valley | The Economist
▻https://www.economist.com/podcasts/2022/12/14/the-changing-ideology-of-silicon-valley

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Podcast avec Margaret O’Mara et Adrian Daub.

STARTUP FOUNDERS in Silicon Valley are often motivated by an almost religious idealism: young tech workers, looking to move fast and break things, want to use technology to make the world a better place. But 2022 has brought about a reckoning: the business models of once-star firms, such as Uber and Meta, are under threat; the allure of the dishevelled whizz-kid has been undermined by the downfall of Sam Bankman-Fried; and the expense of Palo Alto has pushed plucky startups out. The Bay Area has often been populated by liberals, but many of tech’s heroes, like Elon Musk and Marc Andreessen, have shifted to the right.

On this week’s podcast, hosts Mike Bird, Soumaya Keynes and Alice Fulwood ask whether Silicon Valley has lost its religion. Margaret O’Mara, professor of history at the University of Washington, reveals the Valley’s past. And Adrian Daub, the author of “What Tech Calls Thinking”, tells us that the secret of the successful founder is to bamboozle regulators while they make a bit more money. Runtime: 41 min

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#Adrian_Daub

Hydrogen hype is rising again—will this time be different? | The Economist | 14.11.22

▻https://www.economist.com/the-world-ahead/2022/11/14/hydrogen-hype-is-rising-again-will-this-time-be-different

Investors have been excited, and disappointed, before [...] But the biggest force pushing hydrogen forward in 2023 will be a tidal wave of government money in America.

There is much enthusiasm about green hydrogen in Europe too. “Europe has been pregnant with a lot of projects but will finally give birth in 2023,” says Daryl Wilson of the Hydrogen Council, an industry body. He expects the regulatory uncertainty that has held back many of those projects to be cleared up. Mr Heid [Mc Kinsey] predicts that Europe will conduct the first global auction for hydrogen supply and demand, and that the European Commission will set up a European Hydrogen Bank in 2023.

The Inflation Reduction Act, which is really a climate-change law, offers a staggering $3/kg in subsidy for green-hydrogen projects. Unlike Europe’s thicket of rules, America’s hydrogen policy is clear and extremely compelling, experts say. Many green-hydrogen projects, currently unable to compete against dirtier forms of hydrogen (which typically cost around $2/kg), will suddenly enjoy costs below $1/kg. In sun-kissed or wind-swept areas, some may even see negative costs.

Mr Heid predicts that America will leapfrog Europe in attracting hydrogen projects, with total investments possibly reaching $100bn by 2030. The global hydrogen race is hotting up, and 2023 looks to be a make-or-break year. Watch this gas.

Europe’s Liveability Index : Back to Normal | The Economist | 19.09.22

▻https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2022/09/19/the-most-and-least-liveable-cities-in-europe

For many people in western Europe, the pandemic is a thing of the past. Mask-wearers are a small minority and lockdowns are a distant, if painful, memory. This return to normality is reflected in a survey of “liveable” cities compiled by the eiu, our corporate cousins. The index compares 172 cities around the world across five categories: culture and environment, education, health care, infrastructure, and stability. Many of the world’s most liveable cities in this year’s edition are in western Europe: Vienna took the top spot for the third time in five years. Two others, Copenhagen and Zurich, make it into the top five.

The reopening of cities across western Europe has returned the region’s average scores to something close to their pre-pandemic norms. That also makes it the most liveable region globally.

The Economist – Frozen Out – How the world is leaving Europe behind
▻https://view.e.economist.com/?qs=706216167d7a949d1a8bf6762ff02aee5f6fad9c0f66eae10826eea83914a3

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Vladimir Putin, Russia’s president, is using energy as a weapon. Our data journalists set themselves a difficult question: how many people is this weapon likely to kill outside Ukraine? The answer they came up with was alarming. Although heatwaves get more press, cold temperatures are usually deadlier than hot ones. To estimate the relationship between energy costs and deaths, we built a statistical model that predicts how many people die per winter week in each of 226 European regions. This model found that a 10% rise in electricity prices is associated with a 0.6% increase in deaths, concentrated among the elderly and infirm. If the historical relationships between mortality, weather and energy costs continue to apply—which they may not, given how high current prices are—the death toll from the energy weapon could exceed the number of soldiers who have died so far in direct combat from bullets, shells, missiles and drones. It is one more reason why Ukraine’s fight against Russia is Europe’s, too. 
 
Our data team’s work sets the scene for our cover this week. Europe faces a crisis of energy and geopolitics that will weaken it—and could threaten its global position. If you ask Europe’s friends around the world what they think of the old continent’s prospects they often respond with two emotions. One is admiration. In the struggle to help Ukraine and resist Russian aggression, Europe has displayed unity, grit and a principled willingness to bear enormous costs. But the second is alarm. A brutal economic squeeze will pose a test of Europe’s resilience in 2023 and beyond. There is a growing fear that the recasting of the global energy system, American economic populism and geopolitical rifts threaten the long-run competitiveness of all European countries, Britain included. The worry is not just about the continent’s prosperity; the health of the transatlantic alliance is at risk, too.

The Brazilian Amazon has been a net carbon emitter since 2016 | The Economist
▻https://www.economist.com/interactive/graphic-detail/2022/05/21/the-brazilian-amazon-has-been-a-net-carbon-emitter-since-2016

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Brazil has pledged to end illegal deforestation by 2028. However, Jair #Bolsonaro, the president, has relaxed enforcement of environmental safeguards. Satellite images suggest that twice as much forest has been lost in 2022 as the average for January to April in 2010-21. The future path of global warming depends in part on whether Mr Bolsonaro is re-elected this year.

Monkeypox : même pas peur | The Economist | 20.05.22

▻https://www.economist.com/the-economist-explains/2022/05/20/monkeypox-is-popping-up-in-more-countries-how-worrying-is-this

The virus is not very good at spreading, and existing vaccines can protect those at risk

A GROWING NUMBER of countries are reporting cases of monkeypox, a rare viral illness typically found in parts of Africa. On May 7th Britain reported a case in a traveller from Nigeria. By May 20th America, Australia, Canada and at least eight European countries had reported dozens of confirmed or suspected cases. Britain reported 11 new cases on May 20th, more than the total in the previous two weeks. Many have no links to African travel, which means they were transmitted locally. In the past sporadic cases were almost always imported. All of this is alarming. But the world is far from helpless.

Monkeypox is caused by a virus similar to smallpox, which was declared eradicated in 1980. Infections are usually mild, with flu-like symptoms. A rash that spreads all over the body can develop, turning into blisters and scabs. Infected people usually recover in a few weeks. As with other poxviruses, the disease is more severe in young children and people with weaker immune systems. How dangerous it is depends on which of the two strains of the virus is involved. One, mostly found in past outbreaks in the Congo basin, is fatal about 10% of the time. The other, west African strain is less severe, with mortality estimated to be around 1%. These estimates are from outbreaks in remote places in Africa with poor health care. In rich countries monkeypox would probably be a lot less deadly.

A vaccine for monkeypox developed by Bavarian Nordic, a Danish biotechnology firm, was approved by American regulators in 2019. The vaccine is also approved for smallpox and data from Africa suggest that past smallpox vaccination is at least 85% effective in preventing monkeypox. America’s Centres for Disease Control and Prevention says the jab is most useful if given before or within four days of exposure to the virus. Even if it is given up to 14 days after exposure it may still help, by reducing symptoms. Evidence from animal studies suggests that some antiviral medicines used for other poxviruses may be useful too.

Also encouraging is that the monkeypox virus is not particularly good at spreading between people, and nowhere near as contagious as (for example) measles. It was first discovered in Denmark, in a laboratory monkey (hence the name), but is thought to be mostly harboured by small rodents in Africa. In that continent many cases are acquired from wild animals, when people hunt them, handle the raw meat or eat it. For the virus to spread from one person to another requires close contact. It spreads through droplets from coughs and sneezes that enter the nose, throat or eyes. It can also be picked up through contact with the skin, clothes or bedding of an infected person who is shedding the virus from pustules or scabs. Symptoms usually appear five to 21 days after infection.

The tricky part is diagnosis. A monkeypox rash looks a lot like chickenpox. Confirming it requires sending samples to a specialist laboratory equipped to handle highly dangerous pathogens. At the moment, Britain has only one rare-pathogens laboratory designated to run tests for monkeypox.

That said, containing outbreaks of monkeypox should be relatively easy. Isolating confirmed or suspected cases and tracing their potentially infected contacts can stop chains of transmission. The smallpox jab will probably be used for “ring” vaccination of the close contacts of infected people and health workers at high risk. Britain and Spain are looking to stock up on the vaccine already. Ring vaccination of close contacts was successful in curbing some of the recent Ebola outbreaks in Africa.

In the next few days and weeks more cases of monkeypox are sure to be found. But it is unlikely that the outbreaks will spread out of control. Covid-19 caught the world unprepared, with no drugs or vaccines at the ready. Monkeypox, however, is in an entirely different—and lesser—league.■

La veracidad accidental de Kevin McCarthy
▻https://www.economist.com/united-states/kevin-mccarthys-accidental-truthfulness/21808964
Uno de los congresistas favoritos de Donald Trump consideró un desastre el comportamiento del expresidente

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The Economist - Statistically significant - 05.02.22

The Economist’s election modelling should cheer Emmanuel Macron

France’s president has a 79% chance of keeping his job

[...]

The pandemic has engendered a huge expansion of state spending at a time when some of his labour-market reforms might have caused more tensions. He has also used the pandemic as an excuse to shelve pension reforms that might have hurt him.

▻https://www.economist.com/leaders/2022/02/05/the-economists-election-modelling-should-cheer-emmanuel-macron

#Europe is bankrolling a force that routinely abuses African #migrants | The Economist
▻https://www.economist.com/middle-east-and-africa/an-eu-funded-horror-story/21807126

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#sous_traitance_criminelle

Protection contre les #aérosols
▻https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1478804143837954056.html

Thread: How do we make the air in classrooms safer?

All you need to know about HEPA filters, CO2 monitors and ventilation. Contents: basic ideas; how to with links to resources; caveats; links to studies / evidence (that I’ll add to cos takes more time)”

The price of zero - A cluster of covid-19 cases in China prompts a citywide lockdown

Measures in Xi’an are China’s toughest on such a scale since early in the pandemic

▻https://www.economist.com/china/a-cluster-of-covid-19-cases-in-china-prompts-a-citywide-lockdown/21806929

#zero_covid (bashing ?)

As Americans cut the cord, Europeans sign up for more pay-TV | The Economist (11/09/2021)
▻https://www.economist.com/business/2021/09/11/as-americans-cut-the-cord-europeans-sign-up-for-more-pay-tv

Why has American media’s mega-trend missed Europe? One reason is price. America’s cable industry may look competitive: the largest player, Comcast, has only a quarter of the market. But it is highly regionalised, so most homes have few options, says Richard Broughton of Ampere. The result is an average monthly cable bill of nearly $100. British homes pay less than half as much. Tax loopholes have made pay-tv an even better deal in parts of Europe. Take-up in France rocketed from 30% to 90% between 2004 and 2014, after the government imposed a lower rate of vat on television services than on telecoms, unintentionally giving phone firms an incentive to throw in a cheap tv package and pay the lower rate of tax. The loophole has been closed, but subscriptions remain high.

A second factor is content. American cable tv is running out of shows as studios move their best ones to their own streaming platforms. In Europe, where some streamers have yet to launch, pay-tv firms retain the rights to many of the most popular titles. Britons seeking the third season of WarnerMedia’s “Succession”, for instance, must go to Sky, a Comcast-owned satellite firm, since Warner’s hbo Max has yet to stream outside the Americas.

The last reason Europe still favours cable is that American streamers have forged partnerships with European pay-tv firms rather than competing with them. In the race for subscribers, the quickest way for streamers to bulk up in Europe has been to join forces with satellite and cable incumbents. They are the ones with access to consumers and the ability to handle local marketing and ad sales. In Spain, Vodafone offers bundled subscriptions to Netflix, Disney+ and others. Next year Viacomcbs’s Paramount+ will launch in six European countries on Sky’s platform.

Will cord-cutting eventually cross the Atlantic? As long as Hollywood studios continue to license their programming to local players, consumers will have every reason to stick with pay-tv. For the studios themselves those deals are lucrative, points out Mr Broughton: “Doing a Disney and cancelling all those contracts, then replacing them with your direct-to-consumer service, leaves you with a bit of a gap in your financials.”

In the long run, though, studios would rather bring viewers onto their own platforms, as in America. In that scenario, pay-tv firms may be left with little to offer but sport, alongside streaming bundles of the sort offered by France’s Orange or Britain’s Virgin Media. Warner plans a gradual European roll-out of hbo Max over the next few years. By the time the fourth season of “Succession” is out, audiences may be watching it online.

#svod #streaming #télévision #audiovisuel

Movie Business / Streaming has changed the economics of talent : how Hollywood’s biggest stars are losing their clout | The Economist (13/11/2021) ▻https://www.economist.com/business/how-hollywoods-biggest-stars-lost-their-clout/21806186

(…) In total, streaming firms’ content spending could reach $50bn this year, according to Bloomberg.

Yet despite the largesse it is a turbulent time in Tinseltown, as everyone from a-list stars to the crews who style their hair goes to war with the film studios. Some of the disputes have arisen from the pandemic, which has upended production and release schedules. But the tension has a deeper cause. As streaming disrupts the tv and movie business, the way talent is compensated is changing. Most workers are better off, but megastars’ power is fading.

#industrie_culturelle #audiovisuel #streaming #svod

Why Europe is a great place for digital nomads | The Economist
▻https://www.economist.com/europe/2021/10/02/why-europe-is-a-great-place-for-digital-nomads

https://www.economist.com/img/b/1280/720/90/sites/default/files/images/print-edition/20211002_EUD001_0.jpg

Why Europe is a great place for digital nomads
A varied continent with good WiFi and few internal borders
AFTER MONTHS in lockdown in grey Berlin, Chris Bloom, a personal coach and blogger, planned his escape. Risking the ire of jealous Instagram followers, he took a covid-19 test, flew to Lisbon and settled into the Outsite co-working and co-living space, a pleasant blue-and-white tiled property with the essentials—stable internet and a coffee shop. Mr Bloom is part of a growing brigade of digital nomads in Europe, who work remotely while satisfying their wanderlust. This kind of itinerant lifestyle is as old as laptops and free internet. But covid-19 has given it a boost. A game of lockdown arbitrage began earlier this year as border controls eased and people fled congested cities like Berlin and London. Some headed for other cities, such as Lisbon and Madrid, which offered sunshine and looser lockdown rules. Others chose remote spots on the Mediterranean and in the Alps. Now covid-19 restrictions are easing but the trend continues as many Europeans reject a traditional office routine after a year and a half of remote work.

#Covid-19#migration#migrant#europe#sante#digitalnomade#frontiere#confinement#modedevie#technologie#travail