10 ways to think about these «peace negotiations»

This is David, your decidedly human web crawler, and you're reading the Weekly Filet. As every Friday, I try to help you to make sense of what’s happening, and imagine what could be. It's great to have you.

1. Peace or Partition?

If you are not at the table then you are on the menu. If you read only one thing to try and make sense of what's going on with the Ukraine «peace negotiations» between the USA and Russia, make it this one by Timothy Snyder. He offers ten aspects to pay attention to, and three possible explanations of what's happening – the best case being that the Americans involved are just stunningly incompetent.

Peace or Partition?

Russians and Americans speak about Ukraine, without Ukrainians

Thinking about...Timothy Snyder

2. Defense Against Dishonest Charts

There are myriad ways in which data visualisations can be used deceptively. We're not talking about made-up numbers here, but charts that are technically correct, but terribly misleading. This is an excellent interactive guide that lets you explore design choices that can tell wrong stories with real data. You'll come away better equipped to spotting such charts in the wild.

Defense Against Dishonest Charts

This is a guide to protect ourselves and to preserve what is good about turning data into visual things.

FlowingData

3. Is Innovation Slowing Down?

From the Financial Times' Economics Show, a very interesting conversation on a) whether humanity's capability for innovating is slowing down, b) why that could be and c) how we could reliably measure it. It starts a bit slow in the first minutes, but unlike innovation, it picks up the pace as time goes on.

Is innovation slowing down? With Matt Clancy - The Economics Show

The Economics Show with Soumaya Keynes is a new weekly podcast from the Financial Times packed full of smart, digestible analysis and incisive conversation. Soumaya Keynes digs deep into the hottest topics in economics along with a cast of FT colleagues and special guests. Come for the big ideas, stay for the nerdery.Soumaya Keynes is an economics columnist for the Financial Times. Prior to joining the FT she worked at The Economist for eight years as a staff writer, where as well as covering trade, the US economy and the UK economy she co-hosted the Money Talks podcast. She also co-founded the Trade Talks podcast. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Pocket CastsPocket Casts

4. There’s a Term for What Trump and Musk Are Doing

Slate used to have this occasional series «How the U.S. media would cover XYZ if it happened in another country...». The blunt tone and direct language was brilliantly revealing. Now is the time to be blunt and direct about what's happening in the US – without satire. How about this: regime change. A clarifying piece by Anne Applebaum

There’s a Term for What Trump and Musk Are Doing

How regime change happens in America

The AtlanticAnne Applebaum

5. Beautiful, boring, and without soul

«A gardener is not someone who grows flowers but one who cultivates the soil.» Reflections on building meaningful products.

DOC • Beautiful, boring, and without soul

Steyn Viljoen

What else?

Instant-gratification links that make you go wow! or aha! the moment you click.