Loose cannons

Cruelty

"[Abdurrahman Wahid's] advisers have taken to placing a vibrating mobile phone in his pocket so they can call and wake him during meetings." — The Washington Post on the Indonesian president's habit of falling asleep when he is bored.

Moral markets

"You really can moralise the marketplace ... These people really don't want bad publicity." — UNESCO official Lyndel Prott, being optimistic about efforts to stop art dealers from handling artifacts stolen from the Third World.

Joy

"Let's face it, part of the joy of being a boss is walking around the office and seeing people work for you." — AT&T corporation spokesperson Burke Stinson explaining why information technology has not made office work obsolete.

Success

"Germany is facing the possibility that we will develop real slums ... it is completely new for us. In some ways, capitalism was too successful." — Hinrich Lehmann-Grube, former mayor of the East German city of Leipzig, quoted in the Washington Post.

From GLW issue 441