They say the world is flat, but anyone who has tried to buy a train ticket in India, a SIM card in Nigeria, or a decent bagel outside New York quickly learns the planet is actually shaped like a single, gargantuan Monopoly board—complete with the same four railroads, the same two utilities, and the same…
ASML: The Tiny Dutch Firm Holding the World Hostage—One Nanometer at a Time By Hans van der Kloot, Senior Correspondent, The Hague Veldhoven, Netherlands—If you squint hard enough at a map of Europe, you’ll find ASML’s headquarters wedged between a cow pasture and an IKEA. From this pastoral setting, the company quietly decides whether your…
In the grand bazaar of twenty-first-century capitalism, where every human impulse is priced, packaged, and resold at a 400-percent markup, Ticketmaster stands as a cathedral of exquisite disappointment. From São Paulo to Seoul, Dublin to Dubai, the same ritual unfolds: credit-card numbers are tendered like votive offerings, CAPTCHA boxes are genuflected before, and, in the…
