Inside the App Economy

Great article from Businessweek discussing the future of the App craze for businesses.

Internet Set for Change with Non-English Addresses

“The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, or ICANN — the non-profit group that oversees domain names — is holding a meeting this week in Seoul. Domain names are the monikers behind every Web site, e-mail address and Twitter post, such as “.com” and other suffixes.

“One of the key issues to be taken up by ICANN’s board at this week’s gathering is whether to allow for the first time entire Internet addresses to be in scripts that are not based on Latin letters. That could potentially open up the Web to more people around the world as addresses could be in characters as diverse as Arabic, Korean, Japanese, Greek, Hindi and Cyrillic — in which Russian is written.”

Makes me think about the overwhelming amount of information that can and will be shared over the Internet. Also reminds me of the importance of quality in data and information, because so much of what is out there is just noise.

The Song Decoders at Pandora

Pandora, an Internet radio service, is convinced that by pouring information through a computer into an algorithm, it can guide you, the listener, to music that you like. The premise is that your favorite songs can be stripped to parts and reverse-engineered.

What’s interesting to me is that our future is headed towards more and more data being applied to subjects which previously were considered “artistic.” Check out the New York Times article here.

Connecticut to Scrutinize Food Labels

That “Smart Choice” cereal you buy for your children may not be so smart after all. The Connecticut attorney general said that he was investigating a national labeling campaign that promotes products like Froot Loops and mayonnaise as nutritionally smart choices. Fascinating article from the New York Times.

Libraries and Readers Wade Into Digital Lending

As young people become used to reading everything online, public libraries across the country are expanding collections of books that reside on servers rather than shelves. Interesting article from the New York Times.

Speech to the Community Indicators Consortium

I gave the speech below to the Community Indicators Consortium (CIC) today.  CIC is a terrific group committed to the neutral presentation of data for the benefit of community advancement.  For more information about CIC, see www.communityindicators.net.   I am a member of the CIC and if you have an interest in joining, please email me and I will put you in touch with someone in membership. 

The Economy Described by a Water Flow Machine

This is worth the read.  NYT article by Steve Strogatz.  Here’s an excerpt:

“Look at its plumbing diagram. It’s a network of dynamic feedback loops.  In this sense the Phillips machine foreshadowed one of the most central challenges in science today: the quest to decipher and control the complex, interconnected systems that pervade our lives.”

Guest Column: Like Water for Money – Olivia Judson Blog – NYTimes.com

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NYT Hires a Social Media Editor

More and more people are getting their news from filtering and alert mechanisms.  Why?  Because it’s easy and gets you to things of relevance to you.  This is more evidence that news is what the reader chooses to be of relevance.  News is like food:  junk food and healthy food are all available.  It’s our choice what we consume.  Filters and alerts are ways of altering your diet of news.  Sick of reading your local paper?  Not hearing news about that key competitor?  Set up a google news alert or subscribe to the RSS feed for your favorite sports team or start following a publication on Twitter or Facebook.  Reminds me of the great line from Finding Forrester where the wise Sean Connery character, a reclusive writer, says to his mentee, who can’t believe he reads the National Enquirer, ”The Times is dinner, but the National Enquirer, that’s dessert.”   

Here’s a quote from the internal NYT email:  “the point is that an awful lot of people are finding our work not by coming to our homepage or looking at our newspaper but through alerts and recommendations from their friends and colleagues.” 

The New York Times Hires a Social Media Editor; Does It Need One?

From www.mashable.com.

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Why Are Affluent People Healthier?

No surprise here:  the rich are healthy because they can afford to be.  Now there is a study that proves this.  Why Are Affluent People Healthier? – The Atlantic Food Channel

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40 Useful and Creative Infographics

See these cool data visualizations, although in many cases there’s more sizzle than steak.  Always the challenge of presenting information is that the coolness of the graphics is not necessarily related to the usefulness of the data.  I’ve always believed that the data story is what’s most important, but failure to present in an interesting manner can doom your idea.  40 Useful and Creative Infographics.  Thanks Jessica Mullens for pointing this out.

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