Linkfest 2022-12-16: Cap-a-pie

S. M. Stirling, using the method of good “hard” science fiction, instructed his readers in the use and value of plate mail in several books.

Apenwarr: Systems design explains the world: volume 1

A stellar exposition of systems design in the context of programming.

With Both Hands: The Cold Equations

Systems engineering powered American success in WWII and the Cold War. Well, that and sigint.

Bits About Money: The Optimal Amount of Fraud is Non-Zero

This principle also applies to quality system design. Much of modern industry in many sectors use quality system principles to ensure work is done according to standards, but all quality systems tend toward greater and greater complexity in attempting to drive error rates to zero. This is a mistake. The optimal amount of mistakes is not zero.

The Obelisk: Let Us Now Praise the New Literature

Weird fiction is hard to market in the modern world with its restrictive genre labels. Don’t miss the true gems being written even now that defy genre labels.

A thread listing anime mostly unknown to me.

Scott Locklin: Battleships: a ridiculous but awesome idea

Without using the word, Scott Locklin argues that battleships are the supreme embodiment of the Faustian tendency in Western culture.

The Long View: The Twilight of Democracy

Unlike the secretive NSA, sometimes it seems that everyone who retires from the CIA gets a book deal along with their pension. This book review is now nineteen years old, but it seems pertinent to understanding how the Deep State works. The Deep State might seem like a re-tread of Eisenhower's Military-Industrial Complex, but it is both broader and subtler than that. It is more like Cecil Rhode's Round Table groups for the present day, a broad network of like-minded individuals who have responsibility and influence in their own right, largely because of their intelligence and accomplishments, who collaborate informally.