How a big US bank laundered billions from Mexico’s murderous drug gangs

How a big US bank laundered billions from Mexico’s murderous drug gangs
As the violence spread, billions of dollars of cartel cash began to seep into the global financial system. But a special investigation by the Observer reveals how the increasingly frantic warnings of one London whistleblower were ignored. A soldier guards marijuana that is being incinerated in Tijuana,...
April 11th, 2011 | Social Insight | Read More

Gold Farming: Virtual Slavery?

Gold Farming: Virtual Slavery?
It was an hour before midnight, three hours into the night shift with nine more to go. At his workstation in a small, fluorescent-lighted office space in Nanjing, China, Li Qiwen sat shirtless and chain-smoking, gazing purposefully at the online computer game in front of him. The screen showed a lightly...
March 28th, 2011 | Social Insight | Read More

Hackerville: How a Remote Town in Romania Has Become Cybercrime Central

Hackerville: How a Remote Town in Romania Has Become Cybercrime Central
Three hours outside Bucharest, Romanian National Road 7 begins a gentle ascent into the foothills of the Transylvanian Alps. Meadowlands give way to crumbling houses with chickens in the front yard, laundry flapping on clotheslines. But you know you’ve arrived in the town of Râmnicu Vâlcea when...
February 14th, 2011 | Social Insight | Read More

WikiLeaks cables: Bangladeshi ‘death squad’ trained by UK government

WikiLeaks cables: Bangladeshi ‘death squad’ trained by UK government
Rapid Action Battalion, accused of hundreds of extra-judicial killings, received training from UK officers, cables reveal The British government has been training a Bangladeshi paramilitary force condemned by human rights organisations as a “government death squad”, leaked US embassy cables...
December 22nd, 2010 | Social Insight | Read More

A Police Chief with a Difference

A Police Chief with a Difference
Kiran Bedi has a surprising resume. Before becoming Director General of the Indian Police Service, she managed one of the country’s toughest prisons — and used a new focus on prevention and education to turn it into a center of learning and meditation. Before she retired in 2007, Kiran...
December 16th, 2010 | Social Insight | Read More

Wikileaks’ aim to defeat “Authoritarian Conspiracy”

Wikileaks’ aim to defeat “Authoritarian Conspiracy”
The following is an interesting analysis (by ‘zunguzungu’) of a text by Wikileaks leader Julian Assange, probably written around 2006. See the paper: State and Terrorist Conspiracies For additional analysis, see here. By Michel Bauwens for the P2P Foundation Analysis: (nearly quoted in full) “Most...
December 14th, 2010 | Social Insight | Read More

Was the poisoning of a French town in 1951 an LSD trial?

Was the poisoning of a French town in 1951 an LSD trial?
On August 16th 1951 a number of people in the quiet southern French town of Pont St.Esprit began to fall ill. Stomach pains were soon followed by violent and often terrifying hallucinations. Local hospitals were soon overwhelmed and more than thirty people were taken to asylums in nearby towns. It was...
August 25th, 2010 | Social Insight | Read More

Monkey Economicus?

Monkey Economicus?
Laurie Santos looks for the roots of human irrationality by watching the way our primate relatives make decisions. A clever series of experiments in “monkeynomics” shows that some of the silly choices we make, monkeys make too. Laurie Santos studies primate psychology and monkeynomics —...
August 4th, 2010 | Social Insight | Read More

A Ladies’ Man and Shameless

A Ladies’ Man and Shameless
Das ewig weibliche zieht uns hinan. The eternally feminine leads us forward. – Goethe He who binds himself to a joy does the winged life destroy, But he who kisses the joy as it flies lives in Eternity’s sunrise. – William Blake Only connect. – E. M. Forster I‘m finally...
July 13th, 2010 | Social Insight | Read More

Noam Chomsky and Latin America

Noam Chomsky and Latin America
Noam Chomsky speaks about the future and predicts difficult situations for China and India. On the other hand he analyzes the appearance of progressiveness in Latin America as very important. For the first time in 500 years, LA is moving towards a degree of independence and a kind of integration and...
June 7th, 2010 | Social Insight | Read More