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eli knaap @knaaptime.com · 16/07/2026

its an interesting empirical question and i'd actually have a weak prior its wrong. Its true most people dont understand urban systems are metropolitan in scale. But the ~25% pop FHFA defines as rural are not really drive-till-you-qualify people, i dont think www.fhfa.gov/blog/insight...

fhfa.gov

Who Lives in Rural America? | FHFA

In this blog post, we share insights into the demographics and housing characteristics of rural America. Through our analysis of the Census Bureau’s American Community Survey (ACS), we find that, on a...

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Mark Copelovitch @mcopelov.bsky.social · 28/05/2026

This is the destruction of federal funding for scientific research & universities as we know it. A total, comprehensive politicization of the process & an end run around Congress.

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Paul Goldsmith-Pinkham @paulgp.com · 17/04/2026

Finally updated the search engine behind econlit-db to Meilisearch. Everything should be quite fast now -- under a second or two. Let me know if you have any bugs. paulgp.com/econlit-pipe...

paulgp.com

Economics Literature Search

Full-text search across 15,000+ papers from top economics journals and NBER working papers. Track how empirical methods have evolved over time.

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eli knaap @knaaptime.com · 15/04/2026

*stares blankly in Regional Science* here's Luc and Dan, a mere forty years ago, discussing the inferential issues in spatial regression, which were already very well-known at the time

Do Spatial effects really matter in regression analysis? By Luc Anselin and Daniel Griffith, Papers in Regional Science 1988

The effects of spatial dependence in the error term are the same as for any nonspherical disturbance variance matrix. The regression coefficients will remain unbiased using OLS, but significance tests and measures of fit may be misleading. This result is due to the biased estimation of error variance, / test significance levels, and R2?.

C O N C L U D I N G R E M A R K S O n e o f t h e m a i n o b j e c t i v e s o f t h i s p a p e r w a s t o i l l u s t r a t e t h a l i g n o r i n g s p a t i a l c f l e c t s i n a p p l i e d r e g r e s s i o n a n a l y s i s m a y l e a d t o s e r i o u s e r r o r s i n t h e I n t e r p r e t a t i o n o f f a m i l i a r r e g r e s s i o n d i a g n o s t i c s a n d m i s s p e c i f i c a t i o n t e s t s . ‘ C h e r e s u l t s o f t h e s i m p l e n u m c r i c a l e x p e r i m e n t s r e p o r t e d o n i n t h i s p a p e r c l e a r l y d e m o n s t r a t e t h a t s p a t i a l c t l e c t s r e a l l y d o m u t t e r i n r e g r e s s i o n a n a l y s i s . A t t h t s p o i n t i n t i m e , a c o n s i d e r a b l e b o d y o f l i t e r a t u r e i s a v a i l a b l e t h a t d e s c r i b e s t e c h n i q u e s f o r h a n d l i n g s p a t i a l e f f e c t s i n a p p l i e d r e g r e s s i o n a n a l y s i s . H o w e v e r , t h e r e a p p c u r t o b e s e v e r a l m a j o r o b s t a c l e s h i n d e r i n g a m o r e e f f e c t i v e d i s s e m i n a t i o n o f t h e s e m e t h o d s t o t h e p r a c t i c e o f r e g i o n a l s c i e n c e a n d g e o g r a p h y , W e f e c l t h a t i n o r d e r t o a c h i e v e a n e f f e c t i v e a n d t h o r o u g h d i s s e m i n a t i o n a n u m b e r o f i m p o r t a n t r e s e a r c h i s s u e s n e e d t o b e a d d r e s s e d . A m o n g t h e s e w e b e l i e v e t h e f o l l o w i n g f i v e a r e m o s t c r u c i a l : ( 1 ) a m o r e e f f e c t i v e t e s t i n g f o r t h e P r e s e n c e o f s p a t i a l e l l e c t s i n ’ r e g r e s s i o n r e s i d u a l s , e i t h e r i n i s o l a t i o n o r i n c o m b i n a t i o n w i t h o t h e r s o u r c e s o f m i s s p e c i f i c …

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eli knaap @knaaptime.com · 15/04/2026

on the one hand, it's dope to see spatial analysis win Econometrica's best paper (!) on the other, it's so deeply troubling that this statement is news to economists in 2026

excerpt from the paper's conclusion:

Applied researchers are well aware of the pitfalls of conducting inference with persistent time series data. Variables are routinely tested for extreme time series persistence
using unit root or related tests, and are often differenced to avoid spurious regression
effects.
This paper demonstrates that inference with highly persistent spatial data is equally
fraught: HAC or clustered standard errors fail in the presence of strong spatial correlation, leading to spurious significance between independent spatial variables. We have
provided tools to detect such strong spatial persistence, akin to time series unit root and
stationarity tests.
We have also suggested ways of restoring valid regression inference by suitably transforming the spatial variables, combined with spatial HAR corrections to accommodate
any residual weak correlations. The theory here is much less complete, however.

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Adam Serwer @adamserwer.bsky.social · 09/04/2026

Wrote about how Hegseth’s effort to resegregate the upper ranks of the US military ties into the larger MAGA project to restore hierarchies of race and gender: www.theatlantic.com/ideas/2026/0...

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Don Moynihan @donmoyn.bsky.social · 09/04/2026

"To put it bluntly, an X post today receives less than 3% of the views a single tweet delivered seven years ago." If you think it is necessary to be on Twitter to communicate your fact-based worldview, the reality is that worldview is being smothered.

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Jerry Chen @jcsalterego.bsky.social · 06/03/2025

starting to think podcasts are the problem

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Dan Garisto @dangaristo.bsky.social · 03/04/2026

BREAKING: In response to huge cuts in Trump's budget request, NSF is shuttering its SBE directorate. Staff will be transferred to other parts of the agency and "grants that align with Administration priorities" will be maintained. That & more w/ @maxkozlov.bsky.social & @edwrdchen.bsky.social

nature.com

Massive budget cuts for US science proposed again by Trump administration

Budget proposal would also curb federal payments for scientific publishing.

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Eileen Clancy 🧿 @clancyny.bsky.social · 02/02/2026

Notepad++ "Chinese-linked cyberespionage group with a long history hijacked the update process for the popular code editing platform Notepad++ to deliver a custom backdoor and other malware."

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eli knaap @knaaptime.com · 29/01/2026

if foot traffic flows into a place like downtown LA looked something like this before the ICE raids, then, say, like this afterward... well, there will be economic consequences, on top of everything else socialecology.uci.edu/news/oc-busi...

a racial dot density map of the LA regions. Colored lines of varying widths show the level of flow from different communities (before the June ICE raids)

a racial dot density map of the LA regions. Colored lines of varying widths show the level of flow from different communities (after the June ICE raids). There are substantially fewer lines and smaller widths indicating fewer people traveling downtown from a smaller set of origins. Many of the reduced flows come from predominantly nonwhite communities, suggesting a chilling effect across the diverse region

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eli knaap @knaaptime.com · 20/06/2025

DID NO ONE SEE WATCHMEN???? bsky.app/profile/scot... it. um. won 11 emmys and explores the inherent racism underlying masked law enforcement

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Jeff Rueter @jeffrueter.bsky.social · 25/01/2026

Kare 11 local news just read, in full, this statement from Michael and Susan Pretti, the parents of Alex Pretti. "Please get the truth out about our son."

Statement from Michael and Susan Pretti
Parents of Alex Jeffrey Pretti

“We are heartbroken but also very angry.

Alex was a kindhearted soul who cared deeply for his family and friends and also the American veterans whom he cared for as an ICU nurse at the Minneapolis VA hospital. Alex wanted to make a difference in this world. Unfortunately, he will not be with us to see his impact.

I do not throw around the ‘hero’ term lightly. However, his last thought and act was to protect a woman. The sickening lies told about our son by the administration are reprehensible and disgusting. Alex is clearly not holding a gun when attacked by Trump’s murdering and cowardly ICE thugs. He had his phone in his right hand and his empty left hand is raised above his head while trying to protect the woman ICE just pushed down, all while being pepper sprayed.

Please get the truth out about our son. He was a good man. Thank you.

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Jens von Bergmann @jensvb.bsky.social · 23/01/2026

Global datasets are really cool. Lots of fun to be had, I used this for looking at city evolution over time, sprawl, building heights, … Just really cool when one can do that globally with the click of a button. E.g.:

doodles.mountainmath.ca

Density timelines – Mountain Doodles

Global city density patterns across time.

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eli knaap @knaaptime.com · 23/01/2026

dot density maps arent my favorite, but they can be really rich ways of looking at multigroup segregation. If you know the area a bit, you dont even need a legend to recognize what these categories represent. One thing i havent seen before is a combo of dot density with dasymetric mapping

proportional dot density map showing racial segregation in greater los angeles

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Emily Badger @emmbadger.bsky.social · 09/01/2026

A long-awaited update of federal employment data shows crippling staff reductions in some federal agencies and offices: www.nytimes.com/interactive/...

nytimes.com

220,000 Fewer Workers: How Trump’s Cuts Affected Every Federal Agency (Gift Article)

New data offers the first clear view of the impact of the buyouts and firings.

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Kyle Barron @kylebarron.dev · 07/01/2026

Announcing deck.gl-raster: 𝐟𝐮𝐥𝐥𝐲 𝐜𝐥𝐢𝐞𝐧𝐭-𝐬𝐢𝐝𝐞 𝐂𝐎𝐆 𝐫𝐞𝐧𝐝𝐞𝐫𝐢𝐧𝐠. No server required. 1.3 𝐠𝐢𝐠𝐚𝐛𝐲𝐭𝐞 COG, streamed directly into the browser: developmentseed.org/deck.gl-rast... - GPU-accelerated raster reprojection - GPU image processing for colormaps, nodata values - Efficient use of COG overviews

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eli knaap @knaaptime.com · 09/01/2026

news from PySAL world: we have a new package in the ecosystem(!) As of today, `gwlearn` is available in package managers. It provides a suite of tools for geographically weighted machine learning using a sklearn API. pysal.org/gwlearn/v0.1... great work by lead author @martinfleischmann.net

pysal.org

gwlearn

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eli knaap @knaaptime.com · 07/01/2026

another sweet port from Kyle! A touch of background on the original, for those interested: knaaptime.com/urban_analys...

knaaptime.com

33 Spatial Optimization – Urban Analysis & Spatial Science

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Kyle Walker @kylewalker.bsky.social · 27/12/2025

My favorite #Python package to use is spopt, a library for spatial optimization. It helps you with: 📊 Facility location planning; 📊 Sales territory design; 📊 Maximizing market share; And much more! Check it out here: pysal.org/spopt/

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Timnit Gebru @timnitgebru.blacksky.app · 22/12/2025

Is logistic regression "AI"? What about convex optimization? Is LLM AI? What about an image recognition system built without using "feature learning" techniques but done through "feature engineering"?

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eli knaap @knaaptime.com · 21/12/2025

furthermore, i dont care how this game turns out, or how many caleb williams apoligistst there are, malik is a better qb

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eli knaap @knaaptime.com · 21/12/2025

tom. it's not called the windy city because of the weather.

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eli knaap @knaaptime.com · 21/12/2025

seen this floating around all day, with exactly this thought every time. If you're prepared to spend a 7th of this much, you have not spent enough time in the midwest. the Home Alone house has been valued under 3M until 2024 and its *in the chicago metro* www.zillow.com/homedetails/...

zillow.com

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eli knaap @knaaptime.com · 20/12/2025

among the many distinctions in *geospatial analysis*, it seems like physical geographers use "AI" in the 'traditional' sense of, like, deep nets applied to imagery data. whereas human geographers use it in the LLM sense of, like 'please vibecode my work for me because i asked so nicely'

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eli knaap @knaaptime.com · 19/12/2025

ima let you guys finish, but i live down the street from a frazier farms

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eli knaap @knaaptime.com · 19/12/2025

it's kinda wild that the virtual line judge is basically never used to check first downs in the nfl (as of yet), but like every single offside call in the premier league is assessed with VAR (football/football)

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eli knaap @knaaptime.com · 13/12/2025

TIL i learned colab comes with pysal 25.7 preinstalled. and, thats cool.

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eli knaap @knaaptime.com · 13/12/2025

unrelated, im working on a proper 'big data' project with data much larger than memory (so requires lazy/distributed compute) and i guess im the only one on the internet who really dislikes the polars api. maybe just because its unfamiliar but i find it really cumbersome

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eli knaap @knaaptime.com · 13/12/2025

was reading through the pandas3 release notes the other day and noticed they added support for [bodo](docs.bodo.ai/quick_start/...) as an engine in `apply` (already i was unaware you can use numba as an engine) ive never heard of bodo but it seems *awesome*? it's, like, jit and parallel at once?

github.com

GitHub - bodo-ai/Bodo: High Performance Data Processing in Python

High Performance Data Processing in Python. Contribute to bodo-ai/Bodo development by creating an account on GitHub.

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nilay patel @reckless.bsky.social · 08/12/2025

PACKERS WIN THERE IS HOPE FOR AMERICA

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eli knaap @knaaptime.com · 08/12/2025

caleb sucks! the bears are trash! 😝😝😝😝😝

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Dawn Dacquisto @dawndacquisto.bsky.social · 08/12/2025

I would love to see Parsons sack a ref

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eli knaap @knaaptime.com · 08/12/2025

we just not gonna call micah getting held on every play?

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eli knaap @knaaptime.com · 07/12/2025

dont let the commentators lie to you. caleb sucks. the bears are trash. and everyone in the nfc is deeply embarrassed chicago has a number one seed these are facts

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eli knaap @knaaptime.com · 04/12/2025

man. @andrew.heiss.phd is [an open source] legend. I'm putting together quarto websites for my winter courses and following his examples is just impossibly useful. Down to the way he parameterizes using variables so content is reusable (i've also used his hikmah manuscript templates for ages)

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andy vs. @im-all-id.me · 26/11/2025

In lieu of thanksgiving I suggest holding a sort of family court convicting your most annoying relatives of various offenses

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eli knaap @knaaptime.com · 26/11/2025

no one, ever: i cant spell economics, but i've had a bank account most of my life. Let me tell you how finance *Actually Works* _fucking everyone_, at all times: i have zero training in urban studies but I stepped foot in a house once. I am the world's foremost expert on housing and development

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JW Mason @jwmason.bsky.social · 25/11/2025

My third point is that the large rise in Black unemployment over the past few months is a reminder that aggregate demand has important distributional consequences. Strong labor markets disproportionately help less privileged workers, weaker labor markets disproportionately hurt them.

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Dave Levitan @davelevitan.bsky.social · 25/11/2025

Google at its peak was basically the best information retrieval system in human history and they and every competitor decided going from there to “you didn’t want answers you wanted half-assed auto-complete 80%-wrong hallucinations” in a few years was the right idea

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eli knaap @knaaptime.com · 22/11/2025

sometimes you have to call `plt.show()` to make quarto understand a figure is a figure 🤷‍♂️

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Claus Wilke @clauswilke.com · 19/11/2025

This seems important. Current AI models can't read graphs. They "see" what they expect to see, even if the data shows something else.

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