A first! Got a spam today of the classic chainletter type (send $5 to the first name on this list . . .) — using Paypal rather than snail-mail.

Bon mot from Objectionable Content:

I have a somewhat detailed refutation of this notion, but if you’re pressed for time, here’s the abridged version: oh, come on now.

A misquoted economist remarks:

. . . (“I’m reading right off Fox news!” gets my vote as worst argument from authority ever).

It was a treat to see Eugene Volokh quoted in The Economist — to his own surprise.

The poet Tom Digby asks (on his own list):

Didn’t bards of old live largely on tips and free meals and such, rather than from some giant corporation pushing packaged “product”? Might the Internet move us back toward that model?

How do these PayPal tip jars work, anyway?

Popshot, a new punk rock magazine, scolds naïve anti-capitalists for getting the wrong end of the stick.

(Found in Aaron Krowne’s blog of which I was not previously aware; he was on my list of sites to look at because of mathematical material.)

Research Shows Just How Much People Hate A Winner. This is scary: pointless envy is stronger than economists expected. (Full paper)

Some of my libertarian dogma may need rebuilding.