Book read: The National Debt by Martin Slater

Not the most promising of titles, I got this book on the strength of a couple of reviews and my passing interest in British economics.

It presents a "how we got to now" analysis of British history told through the national debt.  Each major historical moment is analyzed (typically wars or times of trouble) and the debt we built up is presented.

It is written really clearly and explains some technicalities very well.

Android article

Great article on how Google are closing sourcing strategic parts of Android to keep the competitive moat high:

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2018/07/googles-iron-grip-on-android-controlling-open-source-by-any-means-necessary/

Antartic Survey Ship

Video of launch here:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/uk-44834768/attenborough-launches-boaty-mcboatface-polar-ship

Filesystem article

Good article on file systems history:

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2008/03/past-present-future-file-systems/

Film: All Is Lost Directed by J C Chandor

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2017038/

Book read: Ready Player One by Ernest Cline

I watched the recent film and kept hearing that the book was great so I gave it a go - a very different story to the book, more detailed and more cultural references, a really good read:

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/9969571-ready-player-one

Cisco sell off beleagured SPVSS (aka NDS)

Finally it's happened Cisco's 4 years of mismanagement of the SPVSS business unit is at an end.

Permira are buying it back at a knock down price.

Here's the sanitized press release

https://investor.cisco.com/investor-relations/news-and-events/news/news-details/2018/Permira-Funds-to-Acquire-Ciscos-Service-Provider-Video-Software-Solutions-Business/default.aspx

And from one of the people who mis-managed and rode on the back of it:

https://blogs.cisco.com/news/service-provider-news

All sounds like a great plan that they always intended - but in reality a disastourous acquisition that destroyed the existing business...