Hey City Zen!

The year ends with tons of media attention, a bit of media whoring, really: The Independent, Time, Publico, GizModo, The National Post, Men's Fitness, Mother Jones, ArsTechnica, The Sun, Drive with Yasmeen Khan (at 17:30) (audio of interview), etc.

What is important is that it refers to a paper I'm really proud of. First, because it was a great collaboration that started with Joana Sá at Gulbenkian, who had the idea to look at the birth peaks problem. Then it involved Johan Bollen, a long time partner in crime, and Ian Wood, one my students who has been a real pleasure to work with. I am very proud with our demonstration that Data Science, Computational Social Science, and Complexity research can be used to obtain surprising results and invalidate previous hypotheses. In other words, Data Science that does not simply validate our pre-existing biases and accepted wisdom, but demonstrates new explanations. In this case, we found that online interest in sex rises at Christmas and other cultural celebrations, with more births nine months later, in what is the first global analysis of human birth-rate cycles. Another bonus was that to reach our results, we developed a novel spectral methodology for sentiment analysis on social media. To make things even better, it is fun Science dealing with the Sweetest Taboo, as all the media attention shows and Sade knew all along: Everyday is Christmas, and every night is New Years eve.

Labels: #Christmas, #Complexity, #DataScience, #Sade, #Sex

2017 was a great year for music, which tends to happen when the politics sucks! Here the is the best City Zen of the year (which I may update until the end of the year). Albums, Tracks, Remixes/Edits, and Box Set.

Top 25 Albums of 2017

There are definitely 3 Top albums that are just excellent from beginning to end:

LCD Soundsystem - American Dream
London Grammar - Truth is a Beautiful Thing 
The XX - I See You

The other 22 alphabetically:

!!! - Shake the Shudder 
Marc Almond - Shadows and Reflections 
Arcade Fire - Everything Now
Ana Bacalhau - Nome Próprio 
Capicua, Emicida, Rael, Valete - Língua Franca
Dave Dapper - Emotional Freedom Technique
Fujiya & Miyagi - Fujiya & Miyagi
The Gift - Altar 
João Gil - Por... 
Goldie - The Journey Man
HMB - +
Kendrik Lamar - Damn. 
Lana Del Rey - Lust for Life
Lorde - Melodrama
Moullinex - Hypersex
The National - Sleep Well Beast 
Polo & Pan - Caravelle
PZ - Império Auto-Mano
The Sparks - Hippopotamus
Thundercat - Drunk 
Kamasi Washington - Harmony of Difference
Wednesday Campanella - Superman

Top 100 Tracks of 2017

Top 25 Remixes and Edits of 2017

Labels: #2017, #Music

The recent resignation of Al Fanken brought to mind Malcom X's discussion of American democracy as hypocrisy. Thank you Maureen Dowd for shedding light on this most recent Democratic party great hypocrisy. As if Clinton Inc. did not know that Weinstein was as rapist (even Jane Fonda knew!), as if they believed the women who accused Bill Clinton.

The accusations against Al Franken pale in comparison to those against Weinstein and Clinton---if they are even real. Yet, all the Democratic party senators who are now so outraged with Franken, including Gillibrand, were holding hands with Bill Clinton in the 2016 convention and in their own campaign events---as if the women who accused him never existed---and taking money from Weinstein. All of them, plus Gloria Steinem, Madeleine Albright and Hillary Clinton, should now apologize to Clinton's accusers for not believing their recollections---those women are still there waiting for that recognition, and there is, after all "a special place in hell for women who don't help each other".

Democratic party leaders should apologize that the most well known feminist in the land, as well as the first woman nominated for the presidency by the Democratic party, fat-, age- and slut-shamed rather than believed those women, as now they so sanctimoniously shout we should do in the Franken case. They should also explain better how they did not know about Weinstein. This has nothing to do with excusing X because Y is worse, but about simple fairness and decency, rather than hypocrisy and shamelessness of mythical proportions.

My guess is that Franken is the sacrificial clown so that the Democratic party doesn't deal with the bigger offenders and its collective guilt on the topic. Franken's actions should certainly be investigated and taken where they should. But the idea that the party is doing this because of a watershed moment against sexual assault is a joke. I will believe that when all those apologies start coming out. As Maureen Dowd says, "that's no way to be the party that protects women."

Labels: #hipocrisy, #politics