An open letter to Phil S. Baran
(Spotify users, cue this before reading further)

Dear Phil,

On behalf of all mankind: Would you please slow down? We mortals have no chance to keep up with you. It is not funny anymore. We need a break.

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I use LinkedIn a lot. I like LinkedIn. In my current position, I collaborate with many people across the world, and I think LinkedIn is a great interface for networking; connecting and keeping in touch with colleagues. Until just a couple of days ago.

Listen. I am not against paying for a good service. […]

The problem I have with the Stille coupling is that it always works. How do you like the sound of that? When Suzuki, Kumada, Negishi fail one after the other with certain troublesome substrates, Stille always comes to the rescue. Yields may vary, yields do vary, but there is always […]

I have added several new links during the past few week, to useful chemistry tools and to other fantastic blogs. Rather than to go into details, I recommend you explore them yourself. Look to the right!

I am always on the lookout for more, so if you think there is a resource, tool, page, […]

As coupling partners in Suzuki type reactions, plain arylboronic acids and esters belong in the past, together with a few other things (Figure 1).

Figure 1. Outdated occurrences: Dinosaurs, mullets, SCART cables, wasp waists and phenylboronic acids; requiescat in pace

So much progress in the […]

iPhone, iPad, Android and Blackberry users (and many more) – I have finally gotten around to make this site more browser-friendly on mobile devices. Check it out and tell me if you like what you see!

The page should automatically detect whether you are using a smartphone or not, and switch to the […]

Allow me to be a complete idiot and (selectively) quote myself. Back in the days, I did thesis work on organic semiconductors. Yeah, we came up with some nice syntheses and stuff like that, but to be honest, at the end of the day we did not have much to show the world. So we […]

Introduction
I have a couple of questions for You, my dear readers. Some things I have always wanted to know. You are enlightened and I demand straight answers, if you happen to sit on first-hand information.

Background
In 1671, the English naturalist John Ray was the first person to describe the isolation […]

Encyclopedia Dramatica once referred to 4chan.org as “the asshole of the Internets”, which in my humble opinion is pretty dead right. Allow me to paraphrase:

Nomenclature is the asshole of organic chemistry

Remember where you heard it first, and quote me if you want, but before you do anything else, go ahead […]