Links I Liked

Disarming (if unintentional) honesty: Oil company advertising has changed a bit since 1962 (not sure about their practice though)

The Jeevan Bindi, which doubles as an iodine patch and could save millions of lives  [h/t Nisha Agrawal]

Global obesity: 2.1 billion people are overweight or obese. It causes 5% of all deaths and costs $2 trillion a year. 60% of all obese people live in developing countries. Still think it isn’t a development issue?

Two brilliant, grim backgrounders on Middle East meltdowns:

On Yemen, Helen Lackner argues that Saleh not the Houthis has the guns, and the country is starting to look like 1980s Lebanon

And some powerful, if depressing reporting from inside Baghdad on the state of the Iraqi conflict, [h/t Jon Lee Anderson]

12 years on from this Donald Rumsfeld memo and the hubris is still breathtaking

Which countries are good/bad at turning econ growth into social progress? The 2015 Social Progress Index

How do poor people understand corruption? Differently from anti-corruption wonks, according to this Interesting survey from Papua New Guinea

Why Indians’ son preference leads to them being shorter than Africans. [h/t Chris Blattman].

Please take two minutes to watch this totally extraordinary April Fools Video Prank in Math Class. Gloriously nerdy