Archive for 1 April 2007
Super Top Secret Crazy Maps
| Peter Klein |
In the early days of World War II a map showing Hitler’s plans for dividing up South America after a German invasion began circulating in Washington. The map turned out to be a hoax created by British intelligence, part of a massive covert operation to persuade US officials to enter the war. (This is all documented in Thomas Mahl’s fascinating Desperate Deception: British Covert Operations in the United States, 1939-1944, one of the most interesting foreign-policy books no one has read.)
Now Strange Maps reveals a recently declassified Soviet memo from 1973 showing how the world would look without the North American continent, a result “which may happen as a result of correction of gravity field of the Earth by the A-241/BIS device.” A hoax, to be sure, but whose? I’m guessing the CIA or a US defense intelligence agency. Why waste time explaining bomber gaps and missile gaps to appropriations committee members when you can simply show them a map like this?
Update: The Brits are at it again, using a fake map showing a nonexistent Iran-Iraq maritime border to prove the HMS Cornwall was seized in Iraqi waters. Craig Murray reports here and here.
Breaking News
| Peter Klein |
Several important announcements for today, April 1:
Foss, Klein, Postrel Join Harvard Faculty
Nicolai, Steve, and I are pleased to announce that we have accepted chaired positions at Harvard University:
Cambridge, Mass., April 1, 2007 — World-renowned scholars Nicolai J. Foss, Peter G. Klein, and Steven R. Postrel will join the Harvard faculty as University Distinguished Professors and co-directors of the newly formed Long Tail Institute for the Global Economy. Says incoming President Drew Faust: “I am delighted that Professors Foss, Klein, and Postrel are joining our team. I have always admired Foss and Klein’s work on judgment-based entrepreneurship, and I enjoyed Postrel’s columns in the New York Times before he changed his name to ‘Steve.’ After reading their blog I knew they were the ones to lead Harvard into the global information age.”
Announcing Guest Bloggers Jeff Pfeffer and Bob Sutton
We’re delighted to welcome Stanford University professors Jeff Pfeffer and Bob Sutton as our newest guest bloggers. Sutton writes: “Jeff and I have recently come out of what we call our ‘Blue Period,’ characterized by moodiness and irritability toward toward economists. We now realize that economic analysis is vital to the proper understanding of organizations. What better way to flaunt our new perspective than by joining the outstanding bloggers at Organizations and Markets? We’ll also be working on our new book, Not Ready to Make Nice in the Workplace.” Welcome, Jeff and Bob!
Google Acquires O&M
This hit the news wires today:
Mountain View, April 1, 2007 — Google Corporation announced today it has acquired a majority stake in the weblog Organizations and Markets, a leading provider of news and information on organizations, strategy, entrepreneurship, and anti-postmodernism. Google CEO Larry Schmidt noted that Google is seeking to expand beyond the search-engine business. “Let’s face it, search is yesterday’s technology. There’s too much junk out there. Instead of using computers to sort our information with confusing page-ranking algorithms, the time has come to hire experts to tell us what the world is really like. The authors of Organizations and Markets are just the experts we’ve been looking for.” Google shares dropped 42% in heavy trading upon the announcement.
Here are some important April 1 stories from prior years.
Organizations and Markets 
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