Williams College Online Community

Text of President Falk's email to all alums follows:

Dear Alumni,

I am saddened and upset to inform you that a disturbing incident of racist hate speech occurred on campus over the weekend. The details are in the email below, which was sent last night to the campus community from several members of senior administration.

You'll see in the message that as a result of the incident, we've decided to cancel all classes and athletic practices today and gather together as a community on Chapin Lawn at 11 a.m. Today will be an important day for us to unite to begin to heal from this terrible act and reaffirm that such harmful behavior has no place at Williams--or anywhere. 

Sincerely,

Adam Falk

All-campus email follows "below the fold:"

Dear Mr. McLaughery:

I have followed with considerable interest your recent argument at Amherst that the Amherst football team would not tolerate the policy of having the varsity soccer team featured at the weekly pep-rallies,  even in a subordinate role to the football team.  I must admit that I find your arguments highly amusing;  just about as amusing as I found your rating within “the Top Thirty Teams in the Nation” way back in early October.   I wrote an article at the time pointing out just what a “BONER” I thought this rating was.  Since that time,  your rather unimpressive performances against Rochester, Bowdoin,  Coast Guard, Wesleyan,  Tufts,  and Trinity have more than established me as an infallible prognosticator on this particular issue.  Therefore,  I felt that perhaps a little opinion on your recent stand against the soccer team at Amherst might be in order.  I might add that I feel just as sure on this one as I did early last October.

NOTE:  This is the first of two articles of general interest which pose questions of both educational process and current events.   The Eph Log will be reworking its Williams-related news feed mechanism,  altering formats and seeking beta participants in the next weeks.

Princeton Professor Daniel Kahneman has a piece "Don’t Blink! The Hazards of Confidence" in the recent NYT.  While I'm sure many Williams Professors have already read and thought about it,   it is worth reading for its reflection on the human (and academic tendency) to overestimate the value of our own knowledge and belief.  The piece is also rather long and unstructured-- it dives into an extended consideration of financial markets,  anecdotal but lacking summary points or principles.

Kahneman's largest point is that humans often overvalue their own conclusions and judgments,  and ignore this even when confronted with direct evidence.  He begins with his youthful experiences as a psychologist for the Israeli Army,  supposedly giving methodical predictions of which officer candidates were likely to suceed as leaders in the future.  

His conclusions are almost bleak:

...watching the candidates go through... tests, we had to summarize our impressions... with a grade and determine who would be eligible for officer training... Some of the men looked like strong leaders, others seemed like wimps or arrogant fools, others mediocre but not hopeless. [Often...] we were completely confident in our evaluations and believed that what we saw pointed directly to the future. The soldier who took over when the group was in trouble and led the team over the wall was a leader...

NOTE:  We're taking an approximately week-long break from focusing on Williams News (of which there is more than will fit our current format),  to review Eph(b)log history and focus on online community and its problems;  as well as do a bit of evaluation and planning.

The following is another example of "negativity" or "negative comments" online,  --

Two days ago,  the New York Times published an article on Krista Branch's music and its relationship to the Tea Party,  "Song Adopted by Cain’s Campaign Also Aims to Be a Tea Party Anthem".  (The characterization may be inaccurate of Branch's intent).

Branch's production firm,  Sound Mind Productions,  had placed a video of one her recent songs,  "Lead Me On,"  on YouTube on 22nd August.  Before the NYT article,  the video had about 3,000 views and 10 comments,  mostly positive. 

By yesterday evening,  the YouTube page had just under 6,500 views and had garnered another 25 comments.  Almost all of the comments were entirely negative,  either criticising Branch or attempting to engage in some form of criticism of Israel's current policies.  

By early this morning,  Sound Mind Productions had disabled comments on the YouTube page.

Immediately,  there is nothing profound to see here.  Sound Mind represents Branch.  As in my previous example from Sound Thang,  they...

Earlier today,  I received the following (somewhat disturing) email (full version available in extended post):

[Wine] WineHQ database compromise

Jeremy White jwhite at codeweavers.com  Tue Oct 11 14:13:23 CDT 2011

---

Hi,

I am sad to say that there was a compromise of the WineHQ database system.

What we know at this point that someone was able to obtain unauthorized access to the phpmyadmin utility.  We do not exactly how they
 obtained access; ...

We do not believe the attackers obtained any other form of access to the system.

On the one hand, we saw no evidence of harm to any database. We saw no evidence of any attempt to change the database ...

Unfortunately, the attackers were able to download the full login database for both the appdb and bugzilla.  This means that they
 have all of those emails, as well as the passwords.  The passwords are stored encrypted, but with enough effort and depending on the
 quality of the password, they can be cracked.

This, I'm afraid, is a serious threat; it means that anyone who uses the same email / password on other systems is now vulnerable to
 a malicious attacker using that information to access their account. ...

This is again another reminder to never use a common username / password pair.  This web site provides further advice as well:
http://asiknews.wordpress.com/2011/03/02/best-practice-password-management-for-internet-web-sites/

I am very sad to have to report this.  We have so many challenges in our world today that this is a particularly painful form of salt
for our wounds.

However, I think it is urgent for everyone to know...

Please note:  the Williams Record has a new home:

www.TheWilliamsRecord.com
Glad to see them back!  Unfortunately, they're still using WordPress,  unlike my friends at the Vanderbilt Hustler.  C'mon guys! Step up!!!  (<-- said with a smile).

Players Should Be Proactive!

MassLive's High School Sports section offers advice to parents on Athletics' Recruiting:

"No connection between newspaper[s] and athletes being recruited for college"

            We got another one last week – a mom of a high school athlete calling to tell the sports department we had something wrong in the paper and if we could fix it because her son was trying to get recruited for college. ...

[P]lease high school parents, you need to know something: your child being recruited to play sports in college has nothing ... to do with what’s in the newspaper. There’s no connection.

            Don’t believe me? OK, let’s ask a college coach.  ...

            LaBranche:     “College coaches only truly recruit players that they or a trusted staff member has evaluated in person,” LaBranche said. “The recruiting of that player is based entirely on an evaluation of current skills,...

From the New York Times:

Colleen Rogers Gerrity and Alexander Hannafey Hogan, both fourth-year medical students, are to be married Sunday at the Thompson Memorial Chapel at Williams College in Williamstown, Mass. The Rev. Christopher J. Devron, a Roman Catholic priest, is to perform the ceremony.

The couple, both 26, met at Williams, from which they graduated.

Ms. Gerrity will keep her name. She is studying at the University of Vermont College of Medicine in Burlington. She is a daughter of Ann Clarke Gerrity and Dr. Michael L. Gerrity of Williamstown. The bride’s father, a pediatrician, is a partner in Northern Berkshire Pediatrics, a group practice in North Adams, Mass. Her mother is a ceramic artist.
Mr. Hogan is studying at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine in Manhattan. He is a son of Leslie M. Hannafey and Stephen Hogan of Brooklyn Heights. The bridegroom’s mother retired as a managing director in Manhattan for corporate finance at the investment banking unit of Prudential. She was until May the president of the Heights Casino, a tennis and squash club in Brooklyn. His father is a partner in Yeskoo Hogan & Tamlyn, a Manhattan law firm.

Best of wishes to Colleen and Hogan!

Seeking Alpha reports:

Seeded by legendary investor Julian Robertson, Chase Coleman is only 35 years old and a graduate of Williams College. His fund Tiger Global Management returned 71% after fees in 2007. Tiger Global's Chase Coleman is one of the more successful 'tiger cubs'. Coleman's Tiger Global has nearly $5 Billion under management and achieved an average 21% return per year since 2001. Coleman mainly invests in technology companies.
Below we compiled a list of stocks that Coleman has been holding since the beginning of this year. These are Coleman’s holdings with at least $100 Million at the end of June. Chase Coleman is one of the best technology investors around. He made billions from his investments in Facebook. He also invested early in LinkedIn (LNKD). His investments in publicly traded companies also performed spectacularly. Here are his best technology stock picks for the long term:
 
Apple Inc. ... Viacom Inc. ... Amazon.com, Inc. ... MasterCard Worldwide ... Priceline.com ... Visa Inc. ... MakeMyTrip.com ...
(Full rundown in extended post.)

Hmm.  How much of Apple's revenues are due to iPhone sales alone?