Sunday, February 29, 2004
The Future of Intelligence
Future Hi - Celebrating the Rebirth of Psychedelic Futurism: "The future of intelligence then, is more sensory experience... more complex and enriching than anything we can possibly imagine right now."
Saturday, February 28, 2004
The Tipping Blog
Microcontent News, a Corante.com Microblog: "Somehow I had lucked into the mythical 'Tipping Point' described by author Malcolm Gladwell: 'that moment in an epidemic when a virus reaches critical mass'. If the link to my article was the virus, then the method of transmission was the humble weblog."
Wednesday, February 25, 2004
The Complete Guide to Googlemania!
Wired 12.03: "They named their new search engine Google, for the biggest number they could imagine. But it wasn't big enough. Today Google's a library, an almanac, a settler of bets. It's a parlor game, a dating service, a shopping mall. It's a Microsoft rival. It's a verb. At more than 200 million requests a day, it is, by far, the world's biggest search engine. And now, on the eve of a very public stock offering, it's cast as savior, a harbinger of rebirth in the Valley. How can it be so many things? It's Goooooooooogle."
Researchers Successfully Force Evolutionary Leap
ScienceDaily News Release: "Engineers and scientists at The University of Texas at Austin and the University of Michigan have forced an unprecedented evolutionary leap in E. coli bacteria, and findings from their study could have ramifications on protein production for the biotechnology industry."
Tuesday, February 24, 2004
Empathy is a Hardwired Feeling
Brain Waves: Empathy is a Hardwired Feeling: "Human survival depends on the ability to function effectively within a social context. Central to successful social interaction is the ability to understand others intentions and beliefs. This capacity to represent mental states is referred to as 'theory of mind' or the ability to 'mentalize'. Empathy, by contrast, broadly refers to being able to understand what others feel, be it an emotion or a sensory state. Accordingly, empathic experience enables us to understand what it feels like when someone else experiences sadness or happiness, and also pain, touch, or tickling."
Sunday, February 22, 2004
William Gibson interview
Philadelphia Inquirer | 02/17/2004: "I always assumed that social-science fiction - anything set on Earth in a not-too-distant future - is just a mutant version of the present. But the easiest hook to hang on me was that I was a futurist. I had always maintained that I was squinting at the present in a certain way... The art form I loved as a kid had gone completely flat. I realized no one had tried to write a science-fiction novel as if Lou Reed and David Bowie were writing it."
Scientists See How Placebo Effect Eases Pain
Science & Technology at Scientific American.com: "The concept of a placebo effect, by which patients get better from the mere illusion of treatment, has intrigued scientists since it was first proposed in 1955. Since then debate has centered on whether it truly exists and, if it does, how it works. Findings published today in the journal Science offer fresh evidence in support of the existence of a placebo effect, and suggest how a brain influenced by this effect changes its response to pain.
"The results support the hypothesis that the placebo effect does not interfere with the body’s ability to sense pain, but instead affects how the brain modulates its interpretation of the body’s signals."
"The results support the hypothesis that the placebo effect does not interfere with the body’s ability to sense pain, but instead affects how the brain modulates its interpretation of the body’s signals."
Monday, February 16, 2004
Behind the Six Degrees of SARS
Wired News: "'You take account of the fact that you don't have contact with everyone, but rather certain people,' said Mark Newman, a professor of physics and complex systems at the University of Michigan, who pioneered the application of network effects to epidemics. 'Then you can make predictions about how the disease would spread or about how you could deploy vaccine programs or treatment programs to try to prevent its spreading.'"
Detecting Patterns in Complex Social Networks
Smart Mobs: "So-called social networking is very popular these days, as show the proliferation of services like Friendster, Orkut and dozens of others. But do the companies behind these services have any idea of what is hidden inside their complicated networks? When these networks reach a size of millions of users, it's not an easy task. A researcher at the University of Michigan is trying to help, with a new method for uncovering patterns in complicated networks, from football conferences to food webs."
The Semantic Web
Scientific American: "The Semantic Web will bring structure to the meaningful content of Web pages, creating an environment where software agents roaming from page to page can readily carry out sophisticated tasks for users."
Saturday, February 14, 2004
Echo is Feedback
Ross Mayfield's Weblog: "It will be interesting to watch how deliberation in smaller groups can be augmented by Vote Links to accelerate new emergent patterns, as well as how the A-list uses them as new listening tools."
Friday, February 13, 2004
No Will to Keep Uru Live Alive
Wired News: "We're all trying to create these online worlds where the heart is a very complex social structure, where the value delivered is in the content created, the groups created and the social architectures created by the people inside the environment"
This is true! (Really...)
Fast Company Now: "A researcher at Cornell has found that people are more likely to lie while talking on the telephone than in email. Lies were told in 14 percent of emails, 21 percent of instant messages, 27 percent of face-to-face contact - and a whopping 37 percent of telephone calls."
'Digital Aristotle' Knowledge Recognition
The Seattle Times: "(P)rivate investment company, Vulcan, is announcing today that it is willing to bankroll three competing research teams from around the world for what it calls 'Project Halo,' a quest over the next 30 months to create a computerized tutor that's smart enough to pass college-level Advanced Placement (AP) tests in chemistry, biology and physics."
Wednesday, February 11, 2004
A Design Process Revealed
Stopdesign: For individuals who are neither designers nor artists, it may seem like those who are, use a lot of smoke and mirrors, magically whipping up each stunning creation. Artistic talent and creativity can certainly aid and enhance the final result, but design, in particular, generally follows a process. Each designer — or design group — develops a method for solving problems, then evolves that method over time. While no one person or group may view a problem from the same perspective, general similarities often appear in their approach."
Hot on the Trail of Hip
BW Online | January 26, 2004: "Vardi is inviting a group of 150 people to a boot camp in northern Israel this summer to find out what makes them tick. He thinks that afterward, people can use the info to tailor their products appropriately or invest money in the ideas of hip people."
Tuesday, February 10, 2004
Top Products, with context
An Experimental Study of Search in Global Social Networks
Science: "We report on a global social-search experiment in which more than 60,000 e-mail users attempted to reach one of 18 target persons in 13 countries by forwarding messages to acquaintances. We find that successful social search is conducted primarily through intermediate to weak strength ties, does not require highly connected 'hubs' to succeed, and, in contrast to unsuccessful social search, disproportionately relies on professional relationships. By accounting for the attrition of message chains, we estimate that social searches can reach their targets in a median of five to seven steps, depending on the separation of source and target, although small variations in chain lengths and participation rates generate large differences in target reachability. We conclude that although global social networks are, in principle, searchable, actual success depends sensitively on individual incentives. "
Monday, February 09, 2004
The Major Unsolved Problem in Biology
Scientific American: "(W)ondering, and meta-wondering, takes us to the heart of what geneticist-cum-neuroscientist Francis Crick (who would know) calls 'the major unsolved problem in biology'--explaining how billions of neurons swapping chemicals give rise to such subjective experiences as consciousness, self-awareness, and awareness that others are conscious and self-aware."
Friday, February 06, 2004
David Weinberger on the Value of the Unspoken
David Weinberger: "just stumbled across an 12-minute video talk I did for Vignette last spring on the value of ambiguity, messiness and the unspoken." It is definitely worth checking out...
Wednesday, February 04, 2004
Does Six Sigma Belong in Sixth Grade?
artkleiner.com: "Today, however, the bar has been raised. Assembly-line workers in
companies like Motorola need statistics (for their Six Sigma quality control approach), a 12th-grade reading level (for complex machine instructions and upgrades), a basic background in physics, a little programming, and possibly a foreign language (to communicate with their counterparts in, say, Brazil or Taiwan). Any high school graduate so well-educated, these days, is probably going on for an engineering degree, or else straight to a dot-com. In an era of what looks to be persistent shortages of skilled labor, schools are blamed, traumatized, and struggling to cope. Anything that reclaims more disadvantaged and uneducated youth for the economic mainstream represents a survival strategy for corporations that need more and more, not fewer and fewer, skilled workers."
companies like Motorola need statistics (for their Six Sigma quality control approach), a 12th-grade reading level (for complex machine instructions and upgrades), a basic background in physics, a little programming, and possibly a foreign language (to communicate with their counterparts in, say, Brazil or Taiwan). Any high school graduate so well-educated, these days, is probably going on for an engineering degree, or else straight to a dot-com. In an era of what looks to be persistent shortages of skilled labor, schools are blamed, traumatized, and struggling to cope. Anything that reclaims more disadvantaged and uneducated youth for the economic mainstream represents a survival strategy for corporations that need more and more, not fewer and fewer, skilled workers."
Building a Vision of Design Success
Boxes and Arrows: "Redesigns are as often crucibles of group anguish as they are opportunities for invention and rebirth... A redesign has some built-in advantages over everyday maintenance; the most useful being focus. And focus is the loam that allows a shared vision to grow...
In a redesign, a vision can be the difference between a clear, cohesive design and a hodgepodge of various stakeholders’ urges. In the worst case, it can produce a work so inferior to the original that months are lost when the work is scrapped. Or it’s launched and customers flee in droves."
In a redesign, a vision can be the difference between a clear, cohesive design and a hodgepodge of various stakeholders’ urges. In the worst case, it can produce a work so inferior to the original that months are lost when the work is scrapped. Or it’s launched and customers flee in droves."
Brian Alger on Learing and Teachable Skills
Seblogging:: "Some well-crafted learning experiences can be a complete distraction and a waste of attention. Worse, they can deceive people into believing people that there is value to be had at the end of the road when there is not. When a critical mass of people realize that the intended value is absent, the experts search for a new spin."
Tuesday, February 03, 2004
Search Engine Relationship Chart
The Search Engine Relationship Chart is definitley worth checking out (including the downloadable PDF version).
Multi-dimensional mapping
Boing Boing: A Directory of Wonderful Things: "The Dynamap is a low-tech way of superimposing differnt logical and geographical networks over one another. "
Monday, February 02, 2004
Mesh Forum
Shannon Clark has started Mesh Forum, a new blog and database that "should list both academic papers, abstracts, and 'mass media' articles, including blog posts/online writings... This should start probably with the 'mass market' books such as Tipping Point, Six Degrees, Linked, Sync, Nexus etc. Eventually probably should have Mesh Forum reviews, links to other reviews/discussions, and links to related websites/author's sites... (and) links to Bloggers covering Theory of Networks or related topics." Too bad the RSS feed doesn't seem to work and that it is neary impossible to cut and paste quotes into blogThis! or any other text editor.
John Seely Brown on Social Software
socialSoftwareWeblog: John Seely Brown, former director of the Xerox Palo Alto Research Center, "points to the rapid development of what he calls 'social software' like instant messaging, Weblogs, wikis (multi-user Weblogs) and peer-to-peer tools - all of which make it easier for workers to communicate and collaborate online, almost instantaneously. The combined result, Mr. Brown said, is information technology that can amplify social interaction and enhance workers’ understanding of what is happening around them. The benefit, he added, could be to increase their ability to 'collectively improvise and innovate.' That is a key to productivity and peak performance."
Sunday, February 01, 2004
Social Software for Geniuses (Who Don't Want To Weed Through Thousands of Pages of Crap)
To understand the practical applications of social software, you need to remember three numbers: 3, 6, 10:
- 3 - There are three primary zones of social interaction: the outer zone of "structureless exploration" (characterized by valuing similarities through sharing information and ideas, discussion and meeting new people), the inner zone (characterized by valuing differences where people with specialized skills collaborate to carry out specific plans) and the barrier of member selection between the inner and outer zones. Moving from the outer zone to the inner zone without considering selection is often disastrous. All the more reason for exploring...
- 6 - As in "six degrees of separation" where the focus is on reputation and social capital. The six degrees concept was originally proposed by Stanley Millgram in the late 1950's and since confirmed by Duncan Watts and company. While it is true than any two people are connected by six degrees or less (a friend of a friend of a friend of a friend of a friend of a friend), social capital dramatically drops off after two degrees. In the words of Watts, "You can ask a friend of a friend for a favor, but that's about it." Of course, some people have more friends than others, which leads us to...
- 10 percent of the American population calls the shots for the other 90% according to RoperASW executives Jon Berry and Ed Keller, authors of The influentials. Sturgeons's Law states that "90% of everything is crap." While I am not comfortable mapping this law onto human beings, my research of posting patterns in internet discussion groups follows a similar pattern: 90% of all posts are written by 10% of all posters, 90% of all posts receive one response or less, 90% of all replies are of the "me too" (cool! great idea) variety, etc.
The Creativity Machine
STLtoday - News - Science & Medicine: "Thaler built another neural network and trained it to recognize the structure of diamonds and some other super-hard materials. He also built a second network to monitor the first one's activities. Then he tickled a few of the network's connections, and something began to happen. The tickling, akin to a shot of adrenaline or an electrical jolt in the brain, produced noise. In this sense, noise is not sound, but random activity. And the noise triggered changes in the network... The result was new ideas."
