More weekend links

1. Cuban dissident blogger (as in, living in Cuba) Yoani Sánchez describes the state of the Cuban real estate market, and discusses new rules that apparently legalize buying and selling houses, though she has her doubts that the government will allow the overt displays of inequality that would undoubtedly occur once the market is liberalized.

2. The NYT Magazine has a profile of a physicist who claims to have mastered the mathematics of the city. Hmm, where have I heard that before? He’s got some positive things to say about cities over suburbs and Joel Kotkin seems to disagree with him (always a plus in my book), but at the end of the day there’s something about him and his context-free pronouncement about “cities” writ large that really rubs me the wrong way.

3. A preservation vs. development story in the NYT about Seoul’s traditional “hanok” houses, with the chief preservationist being a white foreigner who doesn’t approve of interior redesigns or added basements or second stories. Something tells me he proably wouldn’t be a huge fan of my “development as preservation” theory.