December 2009
67 posts
Israel's Airports →
With all the talk about airport security going on, I keep thinking back to my trip to Israel a few years back. They don’t make you take your shoes off or worry about liquids. What they do instead is interview each and every passenger with seemingly benign questions. It quickly becomes apparent that they don’t really care where you went to nursery school, but instead are interested in...
“If you’re not in the know, the Nexus One is the fabled Google Phone now come to...”
– Nexus One rooted - Hack a Day
“JetBlue made its first flight in 2000, and quickly grew from start-up to major...”
– Wow, that’s crazy .. JetBlue is only ten years old.
Top aviation stories of the decade: JetBlue launches, Southwest soars - Flights: Airfare, flight tracker, delays, miles tracker & airport news - Today in the Sky - USATODAY.com
Best New Blogs of 09 →
Continuing the year-end festivities, here are my top new blogs of 2009. I’m defining “new” here by whether the site was in my reading repertoire before this year. Anyway, here they are in no…
“The butthead who won that insane “get paid $100K to live on an island and blog...”
– ‘Best Job’ Winner Stung By Venomous Jellyfish: Links, Pics, Videos, and News
Top 10 of 09 →
Inspired by Alan Wolk (who was inspired by BBH Labs), here are my top ten posts of the year (at least by number of pageviews):
Why Did Tropicana Redesign?: Yet another voice in the debate on…
The Google Mafia →
Was reading this article about Google’s move into local search and how it’s peaked regulator’s interest and one quote in particular jumped out:
“This is not in the ‘don’t be evil’ bucket,” said one industry source, who like most asked not to be named for fear of repercussions for publicly criticizing Google. “They’re giving preferential...
Palin's Media Manipulation →
A very interesting Palin insight by way of The Washington Independent (by way of Ezra Klein). Anyway, the author, David Weigel, argues that Sarah Palin has created an amazing situation for herself, one in which the media reports her press releases as if they’re fact:
I think what Palin’s doing here is incredibly savvy. She knows that anything that goes out under her name will be...
“Readers and news reports say Verizon has pushed out a smartphone update that has...”
– As someone said in the comments, “Not nice to touch other peoples’ stuff without permission, Verizon.”
Verizon Reportedly Forces Smartphone Users To Exclusively Search Via Bing - The Consumerist
Immigration in America →
The Economist has a very good (and fairly long) piece on immigration in the United States. It’s quite interesting to read something positive about America for a change, though the article ends with a strong warning that the country must be careful to keep the borders open.
I especially liked this retort to the argument that today’s immigrants (especially Hispanics) are not...
The Web is Dumb →
There’s an excellent decade wrap-up article over at The Awl about the hunt for lonelygirl15, an even Richard Rushfield describes as “the finest hour of post-modern journalism.” Particularly good are his lessons from the event, including:
The wisdom of the web is a bunch of hooey: The lonelygirl research teams drew professionals from every discipline and field of study known to...
“But the age of online video is still far off: the average American watches just...”
– Are these numbers right? They seem sort of crazy.
FT.com / Lex / Technology, media & telecoms - Internet TV
“Basically, he’s spewed 4,000 words to say that “open” is always good and always...”
– Daring Fireball Linked List: Google’s ‘Meaning of Open’
“It’s been so long since it last happened that most people will have forgotten,...”
– Not sure I agree, but it’s a reasonable theory.
Netscape, Yelp, and the Tech IPO Boom of 2010
Teaching Kids Code →
Fred Wilson points to a piece in The Times about teaching kids computer science.
The article doesn’t necessarily point out anything we don’t know, though I found this nugget interesting: “Not enough young people are embracing computing — often because they are leery of being branded nerds.” (There is no evidence to support that fact in the article.)
As I’ve...
“Hybrid careers like Dr. Halamka’s that combine computing with other fields will...”
– New Programs Aim to Lure Young Into Digital Jobs - NYTimes.com
What We Learned This Weekend: 'Avatar' Edition →
bunch:
People like 3D Warrior Smurfs, but only about half as much as they like lusty teenage vampires and werewolves. For those of you keeping score at home:
Avatar - Weekend 1: $73,000,000
New Moon - Weekend 1: $142,839,137
Designing for the Future →
Brand New’s wrap-up of the best and worst logos of 2009 is a good read. Their choice for worst logo of the year is Bing, which I can’t say I disagree with. It just sort of looks slapped together, which was probably the point to make it feel a little more cuddly like Google. Also interesting was going back and looking at the comments on the original MSN redesign post Brand New did,...
“The amount of fun you’re having at a party is inversely proportional to the...”
– Behold Kincaid’s Law. My Law.
Anonymized →
Somebody has sued Netflix, claiming that their release of “anonymized” data as part of the Netflix prize allowed her to be identified. What’s particularly interesting is how it went down:
just weeks after the contest began, two University of Texas researchers — Arvind Narayanan and Vitaly Shmatikov — identified several NetFlix users by comparing their...
Ghostly's Favorite Albums of the Decade →
Ghostly is awesome on so many levels. This is exactly the sort of thing record labels should do. Pretty much everything they do is exactly the sort of thing record labels should do.
(via cjn)
Choose One →
I read Too Big to Fail because of this Financial Times review that called it the best account of a “tumultuous financial collapse or scandal” since Barbarians at the Gate. Needless to say that’s what I’m reading now and it’s excellent.
All of that is a long way of introducing an interesting quote I read in the book last night about why one stock can be overvalued...
“It seems to me that the right approach is to think as you act, to learn while...”
– Blending skills in new ways. | From The Head Of Zeus Jones
Gift Card Stimulus? →
rc3.org points to this quote in defense of gift cards:
So why not just give the boy cash? Surely cash would allow an even more efficient allocation of resources? But cash is inferior, I think, because cash, like it or not, carries with it some assumption of responsibility. You don’t want to waste your cash frivolously, or you might feel compelled to save it for some greater goal. You might...
“The North Face Apparel Corp. is suing parody company called The South Butt and...”
– The article continues, “The South Butt’s attorney, Albert Watkins, says the company was started by 18-year-old Jimmy Winkelmann to help pay for college. It puts out products with the tag line ‘Never Stop Relaxing,’ a parody of The North Face line, ‘Never Stop...
“The most effective advertisements of all are those with little or no rational...”
– Talent imitates, genius steals: No Rational Content
WatchThis is pretty awesome. We helped GE mock up a futuristic sleigh for Santa based on technology they’re developing.
A new sleigh for Santa…courtesy of GE technology at From Edison’s Desk - GE Global Research Blog
“Animals have been submitted as applicants in suspected diploma mills in several...”
– This is a list of those animals: List of animals with fraudulent diplomas
“Free Wi-Fi in McDonald’s starts next month! Soon the only exercise we will...”
– Goodbye Awl Offices. Ha.
“The cumulative devaluation of the Zimbabwe dollar was such that a stack of...”
– The enormity of Zimbabwe’s inflation
50 Rebuttals →
New Scientist’s Short Sharp Science blog offers a 50-point rebuttal to an article from a UK newspaper with 100 reasons why climate change is natural. My favorite response may be the slightly bitchy answer to the very first point, “There is ‘no real scientific proof’ that the current warming is caused by the rise of greenhouse gases from man’s activity.” To which...
“The International Air Transport Association revised its financial outlook...”
– Well that’s not good, is it?
IATA estimates $5.6 billion in loss for airlines worldwide in 2010 - Flights: Airfare, flight tracker, delays, miles tracker & airport news - Today in the Sky - USATODAY.com
“Surely Tiger’s decision to outsouce sexual services to a range of...”
– Why on earth has Accenture ditched Tiger Woods?