Links 23/12/15

Politics:

The Cairo Review with an in-depth report on how ISIS uses targeted brutality and violence. 

The Atlantic about the future of driverless cars, the companies competing in the new market and the challenges they are facing:

Whereas railways seemed to shrink the space between departure and destination, driverless cars promise to create new windows of time for people who would otherwise be stuck staring at another car’s bumper in traffic. Municipalities could, theoretically, order fleets of self-driving cars and turn old parking lots into tree-filled parks, reducing the need for and eliminating the cost of individual car ownership.

The potential implications for people who can’t drive themselves—due to disability, age, fatigue, drunkenness, or other factors—are huge. And as driverless cars outnumber human-driven ones, and begin communicating with each other and smart traffic signals, there’s potential to eradicate traffic jams. “You’re going to see the emergence of a new mobility ecosystem,” Burns said. “It’s not a question of whether. The real questions are who, how, and when."

The Atlantic: The High-Stakes Race to Rid the World of Human Drivers, December 1, 2015

Wired on the tech giants that won 2015. 

Brookings on how the future of American manufacturing depends on automation. 

Pop Culture: 

Here's XLR8R's top downloads of the year. 

Sleater-Kinney played five shows in a row in New York and here are some pictures, and I will get to see them twice next year because I have the best life partner in the world. And Hazlitt interviews Carrie Brownstein.