News from the North

I blog about developing-world technology at The Walrus , Canada's answer to The New Yorker , and science fiction at tor.com , the world's preeminent site for "science fiction, fantasy and related subjects." An index of my work at both: World Fast Forward at The Walrus : Inaugural introduction . Colombia's Mobile Revolution - Banking with your phone is a bigger deal than you might think. Better Dying Through Chemistry - How to ruin entire nations and destroy untold millions of lives. The Donkey And The Ninja - No donkeys were harmed in the making of this post. But I cannot say the same about ninjas. A Man, A Plan, A Canal - How to run and ruin megaprojects. There's Gold In Them There Trees - How do you patent indigenous knowledge? Big Brother Is Watching Them. OK? - In which I reflect on having been mugged at gunpoint. One Laptop Per Child: What Went Wrong - Its fundamental problems are twofold: 1. It was a bad idea to begin with. 2. The XO laptop is a ...

Atom and RSS feeds are available. I write about lots of things - you'll find a rant about what's wrong with Africa , an essay on computer security , a contemplation of the joys of being punched in the face and an idiosyncratic guide to Los Angeles - but for the most part, this is a travel blog. I've spent a good chunk of the last decade wandering around the planet, and this is where I write about what I've seen. In 1997 I mounted an Asian Invasion : both style and content of my writeup are dated, but the pictures are pretty. Then, in 1998, I spent six months travelling across Africa: I never wrote this up properly (unless you count my first published novel ) but I did keep a travel journal and took photographs . In autumn 2000 I returned to Asia, visited Delhi, Veranasi, and the Taj Mahal , trekked around Nepal's Annapurna Circuit , rafted the mighty Sun Kosi river, and explored the not-so-Black-Hole of Calcutta , and then took up scuba diving in Thailand . In...