Feedback in the Gobi

[Martin Taylor 930318 10:00]

An interesting little item in today's paper about a social feedback
system.

Apparently there is a battalion of Chinese soldiers in the Gobi desert
whose only task is to keep the sand shovelled off a particular railway
line. The only purpose of the railway line is to supply these same
soldiers.

I leave it to others to draw obvious (or less obvious, perhaps) conclusions.

Martin