Just Work: The Gig Economy, Platform Capitalism and the Battle for Worker Rights

 

A comic by Tom Humberstone about gig workers and the need to organise, with loads of local Edinburgh flavour.

Reverse Engineering the source code of the BioNTech/Pfizer SARS-CoV-2 Vaccine

Entrepreneur and software developer Bert Hubert explains the structure of the vaccine, with plentiful analogies to computing. There are some amazing hacks in there! Thanks to Lennart Augustsson for the pointer.

Welcome! In this post, we’ll be taking a character-by-character look at the source code of the BioNTech/Pfizer SARS-CoV-2 mRNA vaccine.

Now, these words may be somewhat jarring - the vaccine is a liquid that gets injected in your arm. How can we talk about source code?

This is a good question, so let’s start off with a small part of the very source code of the BioNTech/Pfizer vaccine, also known as BNT162b2, also known as Tozinameran also known as Comirnaty.

The Tempest

In many ways, Covid 19 has expanded rather than contracted our cultural opportunities. Today, Wanda and I saw an interactive online live abridged production of The Tempest, from Creation Theatre. It was great! We were lucky to get one of the extra places they added due to demand. They are likely to put on additional shows, keep an eye out. Spotted via The Guardian.

Root causes

Trevor Sumner delivers an incisive analysis of the root causes of the Ethiopian airlines crash. Many call it a software failure, but he looks at a trail of issues: economic problem, airframe problem, aerodynamic problem, systems engineering problem, sensor problem, maintenance practices problem, pilot training problem, pilot expertise problem, and back to economic problem.

(Thanks to Robin Sloan for highlighting Sumner's post in his weekly newsletter, Year of the Meteor.)

Brexit implies Techxit?

In the wake of the EU referendum, there appears to be considerable information about its consequences that many might wish to have seen before the vote. Some of this concerns the negative impact of Brexit on technology firms. Among others, the BBC has a summary.

I was particularly struck by one comment in the story, made by start-up mentor Theo Priestley (pictured above),.

And Mr Priestley thinks that in the event of a Scottish independence referendum that leads to reunification with the EU, it's possible some start-ups could move north of the border, perhaps to rekindle "Silicon Glen" - a 1980s attempt to compete in the semiconductor industry.