Recommended Readings... 080629

Several more interesting reads lately...

• Siemens has been in the news for being "Too German" -- which strikes me as a ridiculous thing to assert about an engineering company -- as well as too white and too male, as described in the FT by Richard Milne and his interviews with the CEO Peter Loscher.
• Ross Clark in The Times points out We can feed the world: look at all the space, mentioning the huge areas of Russia which have gone fallow. Ardent readers of Maximizing Progress know I've spotlighted the promise of African agriculture as well.
• Two compelling Special Reports in the FT this past week, including Leading Businesswomen in the Arab World and a Survey of Nigeria. Today's NYTimes has a piece by Graham Bowley, however, pointing out that One Reason Gas is Emptying Your Wallet: Nigeria, spotlighting the impact of local strife on global markets.
• Two compelling local MIT-spinoff companies featured in the Boston Globe this week: Mok Oh and Jim Schoonmaker's EveryScape covered by Hiawatha Bray in Take a Peek this past Tuesday, and Rutledge Ellis-Behnke and Steve Kelly's Arch Therapeutics spotlighted by Scott Kirsner in New Ally on the Operating Table in his Innovation Economy column today.
• Just after I wrote about Extraordinary Forgiveness among POWs, I read Irene Sege's Globe story about the really remarkable Kai Leigh Harriott who forgave the man who shot and paralyzed her five years ago. The philosophically sage 8 year-old Kai says "clinging to anger would darken her life."
  
• Several other stories about children: USA Today's Nanci Hellmich interviews Susan Linn, asking is Make-believe vital to kids? You better believe it... Niola Woolcock in The Times writes Teach children how to be tough, not just happy, says academic. On the other hand, in socialist egalitarian Sweden Party poopers tell schoolboy: You must invite your enemies to your birthday party, write Markus Oscarsson and Roger Boyes in The Times. The BBC also weighs in on this Birthday party snub. Thankfully, Dean Nelson in today's Sunday Times spotlights the extraordinary Babur Ali in Hello, class, I'm the 16-year-old head. Babur's been running his own school for younger kids in West Bengal since he was 11, inspired by the persistent questioning from poorer pupils who couldn't afford the education he was getting.
  
• Various developments in Boston: Michelle Hillman in the BBJ writes about the potential doubling of capacity of Boston Common Garage, a great example of an underpark hiding ugly parked cars underground. Kris Frieswick in today's Globe Magazine writes about MIT-alum Kairos Shen, the Shaper of Things to Come as Boston's Chief City Planner. And Stephanie Ebbert asks in today's Sunday Globe Is tide starting to turn along the waterfront? writing about the South Boston Waterfront. And in Boston Magazine, Rachel Levitt illustrates The City That Might Have Been, all about bold building projects that stalled (but still provoke!-)
• Interesting Green City stories generally: USA Today's Charisse Jones writes that in DC City bike plans on training wheels: Public rentals or loans are part of mass movement to save gas, planet (See local Boston developments in my blog post on Work Bikes). Indeed, Emily Wax in the Washington Post writes that Fuel Prices Boost Cause of S. Asia's Maligned Rickshaw. And in rich countries, Peter Goodman writes in the NYTimes that Fuel Prices Shift Math for Life in Far Suburbs. Finally, the idiocy of commuting for hours amidst gridlock and gas fumes is properly priced and -- surprise, surprise -- economic incentives inspire people to both use bikes or mass-transit and/or to shift to living in the inner-city (or in any case, nearer to work).
• Isabel Kershner writes in the NYTimes from the West Bank that Cameras Emerge as a Tool In a Conflict Over Land. Using a handheld video camera, Muna Nawajaa, a Palestinian woman, recently captured irrefutable proof of vicious Jewish illegal settlers assaulting harmless local Arab shepherds. Cameras provided, btw, by B'Tselem, an Israeli human rights group.