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Assorted links
1. Michael Lewis on Warren Buffett. And Lewis's forthcoming book on the crash.
2. The worst Mexican restaurant on earth?
3. Did fairy tales originate in print?
4. He wants to launch a paper plane in space.
5. The waning interest in WolframAlpha.
Posted by Tyler Cowen on May 19, 2009 at 02:40 PM in Web/Tech | Permalink
Comments
Wolfram Alpha is something I'll use occasionally. But I can learn far more on wikipedia. I use wikipedia daily, and google for small calculations even, so what can WA do that I can't do in those other less formal ways? It's almost a week since the season finale, and it still can't tell me what lies beneath the shadow of the statue for goodness sake. I like that it can integrate a function, but so what?
Posted by: anon at May 19, 2009 3:43:37 PM
You know what would be awesome on Wolfram Alpha, btw? A sidebar telling me what the last five searches have been. Then I could actually learn something, because as it is, I can't figure out how to make it answer any questions I have.
Posted by: anon at May 19, 2009 3:45:40 PM
I confess to being slightly amused that we're relying on Google to tell us that people aren't interested in Wolfram Alpha.
Posted by: John Thacker at May 19, 2009 3:46:45 PM
The mexican restaurant story is odd. It does sound like a bad restaurant (my experience is that even decent, let alone good, Mexican food is very hard to find in Europe, though there was, for a while, a pretty decent place in Moscow.) But who the hell cares if you can order in Spanish? Why bother or care? To get upset about it is really dumb.
Posted by: Matt at May 19, 2009 4:39:06 PM
Matt:
True, I think Tyler himself would point out that all those Mexicans who make French food in the US probably can't speak French.
Posted by: Michael at May 19, 2009 4:41:35 PM
Agree with Matt on the Mexican story. And why would you seek out Mexican food in Germany, anyway? Why would Americans (I can't quite tell if the bloggers are in fact, but it seems a reasonable guess), who can have great Mexican food in their home country almost anywhere, seek it out in Europe, esp. when good German restaurants are in lot shorter supply here in the States? Seems there'd be greater utility in going with German while in Germany.
Posted by: JackTrade at May 19, 2009 4:47:39 PM
I'm with the group here. Why would an American get upset because a waitress in a Mexican (so called) restaurant in Germany can't speak Spanish? Why on earth should she? You're privileged enough that she speaks English. Imagine how pretentious and obnoxious the waitress probably thought these people were. Imagine you were working in a pizza joint in Columbus, OH and a German couple start ordering in (bad) Italian and then getting frustrated with you because you don't understand (and you happen to speak decent German). How would you feel?
Posted by: vanya at May 19, 2009 5:06:18 PM
I have never eaten in a Mexican restaurant in Europe, and doubt I ever shall.
My wife has told me of a restaurant in Moscow in the old days that was called
the Hanoi. However, it only served bad Russian food, not a single thing even
remotely Vietnamese. When she complained, they gave her some very bizarre song
and dance that might have been interpreted as amounting to political sympathy or
whatever, although it was clear from decorations and so on that they were at
least posing as a Vietnamese restaurant to some extent.
As for the US, in the first year my wife was here we were in Columbus, Wisconsin
and saw a restaurant named, "Pizza Chez Fritz." We did not try to eat there.
Posted by: Barkley Rosser at May 19, 2009 5:19:14 PM
It's true that Mexican food in Germany is really quite a bizarre pastiche. But yes, the sense of entitlement that the author brings is surely a greater source of human suffering than any shortcomings the food might have had...
Posted by: bbartlog at May 19, 2009 5:21:22 PM
Is it the same chili's as in the US? That one doesn't even pretend to be a Mexican, just a vaguely Southwestern-tinged TGIFridays.
Posted by: josh at May 19, 2009 5:29:13 PM
I confess that I didn't, and don't, understand the hype over WA. It's just AskJeeves with a new suit of clothes. Nobody ever explained why it would succeed where AskJeeves, answers.com, etc. couldn't.
And about Chilli's in Germany...the place sounds hideously bad but, first, why would you expect decent Mexican food in Germany? Every Mexican restaurant I've ever been to is clearly owned and operated by (relatively) recent Mexican immigrants. How many of those can there be in Germany? And second, why does it matter whether the waitress can speak Spanish or not?
Posted by: Bob Montgomery at May 19, 2009 5:34:19 PM
I wonder how that guy would react if he sees a black waiter in an italian restaurant ...
Posted by: Hei Lun Chan at May 19, 2009 5:38:45 PM
Note that you get different trend results if you check for wolframalpha instead.
Posted by: Anon at May 19, 2009 5:49:30 PM
Ah, but if the black waiter spoke Italian, or better yet, Chinese, it would
be OK.
Posted by: Barkley Rosser at May 19, 2009 5:50:08 PM
Was interest in Wolphram Alpha waning when you made this post? Because as I look at it now, it's on a continuing upswing. Although I suppose it's possible that's *because* you linked about it...
Posted by: Glen Raphael at May 19, 2009 9:38:22 PM
via Slashdot,
http://tech.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=09/05/19/1846258
we learn from Groklaw that WolframAlpha's terms of use are very different than Google's:
"If you make results from Wolfram|Alpha available to anyone else, or incorporate those results into your own documents or presentations, you must include attribution indicating that the results and/or the presentation of the results came from Wolfram|Alpha. Some Wolfram|Alpha results include copyright statements or attributions linking the results to us or to third-party data providers, and you may not remove or obscure those attributions or copyright statements. Whenever possible, such attribution should take the form of a link to Wolfram|Alpha, either to the front page of the website or, better yet, to the specific query that generated the results you used. (This is also the most useful form of attribution for your readers, and they will appreciate your using links whenever possible.)
"A list of suggested citation styles and icons is available [here.]
"Failure to properly attribute results from Wolfram|Alpha is not only a violation of these terms, but may also constitute academic plagiarism or a violation of copyright law. Attribution is something we expect you to give us in exchange for us having provided you with a high-quality free service.
"The specific images, such as plots, typeset formulas, and tables, as well as the general page layouts, are all copyrighted by Wolfram|Alpha at the time Wolfram|Alpha generates them. A great deal of scholarship and innovation is included in the results generated and displayed by Wolfram|Alpha, including the presentations, collections, and juxtapositions of data, and the choices involved in formulating and composing mathematical results; these are also protected by copyright.
"You may use any results, including copyrighted results, from Wolfram|Alpha for personal use and in academic or non-commercial publications, provided you comply with these terms.
"If you want to use copyrighted results returned by Wolfram|Alpha in a commercial or for-profit publication we will usually be happy to grant you a low- or no-cost license to do so. To request a commercial-use license, go to this form and provide the input for which you want to use the corresponding output along with information concerning the nature of your proposed use. Your request will be reviewed and answered as quickly as practical."
http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20090518204959409
Posted by: Lee A. Arnold at May 19, 2009 9:47:01 PM
Mexican food in Europe = automatic epic fail.
Posted by: Andy at May 19, 2009 9:54:47 PM
excellent mexican food in madrid. Not so much the rest of spain.
Posted by: charlie at May 19, 2009 10:32:26 PM
I think I'd like Warren Buffet. He has good taste in food.
Posted by: TGGP at May 20, 2009 12:10:15 AM
I like Wolfram alpha mostly because it can graph historical p/e's which i haven't really found anywhere else
Posted by: assman at May 20, 2009 2:07:16 AM
The comments on European Mex cooking are an appropriate complement to all those Parisian food and travel guides (often written by Americans) that have lots of asides about how difficult it is to get *decent* (oohh those crude Americans!) French cheese or real prosciutto on this side of the pond. I had a recent conversation with a European transplant who said American food isn't that cheap because if you must have *real* mozarella or *real* jamon serrano then you have to spend a fortune. So this is a good reminder of the importance of relative and comparative advantage.
Posted by: korvak at May 20, 2009 2:27:36 AM
I'll bet there's no shortage of good turkish restaurants in Germany.
Posted by: BillWallace at May 20, 2009 3:04:37 AM
I'd like to note that not all Mexican food in Europe is a fail. Anyway ever been to Wahaca in London?
http://www.wahaca.co.uk/
It owns most of the places I've been in the Southeastern US. By far.
Posted by: Matt at May 20, 2009 4:42:30 AM
Nice post on Mexican food. Perfect parody: Two fat ass Americans, first time traveling to Europe go to a Mexican restaurant in provincial Germany. They get upset about lack of cultural awareness of the restaurant, waiter, etc. No Spanish, broken English. I would loved to have seen that.
Posted by: student at May 20, 2009 6:25:38 AM
The interest in WolframAlpha actually seems to be increasing, according to that link.
Posted by: Roger at May 20, 2009 10:19:52 AM
