The Berliner Philharmoniker has its New Year’s Eve Concert celebrating the transition of the years on 31 December. The problem with new year’s concerts is that usually they are roamed with cliché repertoire and often, dizzy post-alchoholic audience. Like, it’s good be festive, but stuffing the entire program with encore pieces is self-degrading in some way. The Berliner Philharmoniker stands sliiighly more serious—the orchestra presents a carefully selected program every year, featuring a beautiful blend of their leading composers, distinguished guests and of course, the remarkable musicians. ...

The Wiener Philharmonic’s New Year Concert is undoubtedly popular. Though most concerts’ selling mechanism is first-come-first-served, Weiner Philharmonic runs a lottery to distribute the tickets: Due to extremely high demand, tickets for the three traditional end of year concerts of the Vienna Philharmonic are drawn by lot exclusively on the Vienna Philharmonic website. In this way, music lovers from all over the world have an equal chance to purchase these highly desired tickets. Between February 1 and 28, 2025, applications will be accepted to take part in the drawing for tickets to the end of year concerts 2025/26. ...

The Wiener Philharmonic’s new year concert IS one of the world’s most famous classical concerts—correct me if I’m wrong, the only rival that stands is the Berlin Wall Concert, in 1989 when Leonard Bernstein conducting German National Opera, played Beethoven Symphony No.9 (Ode to Freedom, or Joy?). It’s special because The program every year largely remains the same, consisting a lot of waltz and polkas composed by the Stauß family. The concert was first performed in 1939 conducted by Clemens Krauss, who is also the discoverer of Stauß’s mastery. Since 1987, the musicians made the decision to select a different conductor every year: Herbert von Karajan (1987), Seiji Ozawa (2002), Andris Nelsons (2020) etc.—almost like a Nobel Prize for classical music composers. The television broadcast is augmented by ballet performances in selected pieces. Interestingly, tickets are allocated to overflow demand via lottery: ...

January is the busiest month full of deadlines—application (review), conference and grant submission, etc. Meanwhile, all the top classical groups release their New Year Concert recordings during this time. For some relax and motivation during workouts, let me share a series of 2025 New Year Concerts in the following days.

The Chinese (almost-)monopoly search engine Baidu is famed for its innovative approach to low-quality search results and extensive ads. While Google limits itself to a mere four ads per query, Baidu sometimes offers up to seven for hot keywords like “cosmetic surgery. Moreover, Baidu ensures its “sponsored” tags are so understated they’re easily neglected, while relegating organic results to a cramped corner of mediocrity. But here’s the pièce de résistance: you can enjoy ad-free, high-quality search results on Baidu simply by invoking the safeword “李彦宏”—the name of Baidu’s CEO. It has been loudly whispered that, Baidu has an unwritten rule to shield their leader’s eminent visage from association with anything negative. For example, search “Intense Pulse Light” (a cosmetic surgery) on Baidu with and without the safeword, and behold two parallel universes: ...

Or two dancers?

Notes of listens to the two-part series by Freakonomics: Can Academic Fraud Be Stopped? (Update) Episode website. Why Is There So Much Fraud in Academia? (Update) Episode website. The podcast focused on discussing academic misconduct particularly in the field of social psychology. It looked at the prevalence of fraudulent behavior, the whistle blower “Data Colada” by three professors and anonymous helpers, the fragile academic system that builds on trust and self-discipline that is vulnerable to incentives and cheating behavior. ...

I recently came across two interesting podcasts that I plan to summarize and comment on. Today has been busy so let me mark them here: Can Academic Fraud Be Stopped? (Update). Jan 1 2025, Freakonomics. Link. Voting Mechanisms. Aug 31 2020, Data Skeptics. Link. Also updated in the procrastination bulletin :D

The old saying goes “而或长烟一空，皓月千里，浮光跃金，静影沉璧” (GPT translates) The vast mist disperses, unveiling a radiant moon that spans the heavens. Golden ripples dance upon the lake, while the still reflections sink like jade into the depths. A serene dusk lingers, cradling both the boundless beauty of nature and the quiet mind. Jan. 5, 2025. Hangzhou, West Lake. Jan. 5, 2025. Hangzhou, West Lake. ...

The paper Test-Optimal Admissions by Dessein, Alex Frankel, and Navin Kartik has lingered on my desktop—and the Procrastination Bulletin—for over a year now. It’s time to give it the attention it deserves. ABSTRACT (from the authors) | Many U.S. colleges now use test-optional admissions. A frequent claim is that by not seeing standardized test scores, a college can admit a student body it prefers, say with more diversity. But how can observing less information improve decisions? This paper proposes that test-optional policies are a response to social pressure on admission decisions. We model a college that bears disutility when it makes admission decisions that “society” dislikes. Going test optional allows the college to reduce its “disagreement cost”. We analyze how missing scores are imputed and the consequences for the college, students, and society. (arXiv here) ...