November 2010
9 posts
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Sunday Funnies: How To Become The Most Popular...
Alex Blagg dishes out his not-so-secret formula:
1. Read EVERY Tweet. If you let even one Tweet slip through the cracks, you could miss the secret of the whole universe.
2. Keep track of everyone you retweet because they owe you a favor now.
3. Check to see if your email address book contacts are on Twitter. If they’re not, harass them unmercifully until they sign up and follow you.
...
October 2010
21 posts
2 tags
WatchYesterday Mike Arrington posted an article on TechCrunch dubbed “It’s Kinda Rough For MySpace Over on Quora”:
A simple question on Quora yields some fascinating comments: “Is MySpace likely to recover?”
Google VP Corporate Development David Lawee left a brief and sarcastic “Is this a real question?” response. Which is noteworthy because Google is a major advertising partner to...
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How is the Fed's zero rate policy increasing the... →
An excellent question was asked on Quora just the other day: How is the Fed’s zero rate policy increasing the price of risky assets?
Even better than the question is the answer that Alex Robson provides us with:
The problem in artificially holding the interest rate at zero is that it has the following domino effect on the market:
It artificially increases the supply of money by making it...
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Sony's strategy for the PlayStation Phone →
MG Siegler writes:
Sony’s new strategy:
Step 1: Take generic-looking Android phone.
Step 2: Tack-on a Sony controller.
Step 3: Create yet another Android app store.
Step 4: Pray.
I couldn’t agree more…
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Did Digg game its own system to benefit publisher... →
Well this is interesting.
A mysterious @LtGenPanda writes:
Digg recently published a blog post titled “Digg’s Algorithmic Mystery Tour” on October, 15th. While a Digg blog post is a normal thing, a post about the algorithm was very surprising to me. Why did Digg, which never bothers to blog about very visible changes, numerous bugs and issues, decided to blog about its secret “algorithm”? They...
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UberCab Ordered to Cease and Desist →
Over the weekend UberCab, a startup determined to disrupt the current taxi industry, was ordered by the city of San Francisco to cease and desist all operations:
UberCab Inc. has been issued a cease and desist order from the SF Metro Transit Authority & the Public Utilities Commission of California. While we are looking into the issues raised, we believe that the service we offer is in...
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Marketing Part 2: It's All In The (Descriptive)... →
Check out the link above on “17 Mutable Suggestions For Naming A Startup.” I especially like number 2:
2. Hint At What You Do: You have two paths to go when picking a startup name. You can pick a name that is “synthetic” and made-up (example: Wufoo or Quora) or you can use somthing that is somewhat descriptive of what you do (example: Backupify or KISSmetrics). I lean a bit towards...
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What the hell is kreezo.com? →
Some startups are destined to fail.
It doesn’t matter how good your idea is. If you haven’t figured out a way to share just how good your idea is you will never succeed.
So with that I ask: what the hell is kreezo.com?
The idea behind kreezo.com may be great, but I can’t seem to figure out what that idea is. They have failed to properly market themselves to potential users.
...
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GrubHub Nails Customer Retention
Last night I went to order some dinner off of the food delivery search engine GrubHub.
I was blown away by a UX feature that they utilize. Here it is:
I was asked to login in order to complete my order. Not sure of whether or not I had created a GrubHub account in the past I inputed an email/password combination that I commonly use.
Poof!
GrubHub alerts me that no password is associated with...
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Thoughts on Instagr.am and Bestc.am
Visual social networking is going to be the next big thing:
Use of the service is exploding, just like:
Forget updating your friends in 140 characters or less. Forget sharing with them where you are at. Instead, why not share an image of the event itself?
That’s right, a picture. Up-and-coming services Instagr.am and Bestc.am allow users to do just that.
Everyone is saying that Quora...
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Why did Google shut down GOOG-411?
From Daniel Feygin on Quora:
GOOG-411 was never a product. It was a mechanism through which users trained Google’s speech recognition, which was itself destined to become a feature of other applications. With Android’s increasing use of speech recognition, Google must now believe that they are beyond the point where additional training through GOOG-411 is necessary.
Sounds...
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WatchKatharine Seelye from the New York Times:
The Gavin Power Plant burns 25,000 tons of coal a day and is located adjacent to the former town of Cheshire, Ohio. Cheshire was plagued by pollution from the power plant and the power plant was plagued by complaints and legal actions (threatened and actual), not only from townspeople but also from regulatory authorities. The owner of the plant had...
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Why do construction projects almost always go over...
(Cross-posted from my Posterous)
On the surface the question seems simple enough: why do construction projects almost always go over budget?
Let’s turn to Quora for a simple answer:
Because owners almost always choose the lowest bidder as their contractor. That lowest bidder will likely try to turn a profit in the change orders, forcing the project “over budget.”
If an owner...
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WatchAccording to TechCrunch, “Google has a secret fleet of automated Toyota Priuses.”
Google says it gathered the best engineers from the DARPA Challenges (an autonomous vehicle race that the government puts on) to work on this project.
Very smart. As always, Google went for the cream of the crop.
They also note that these cars never drive around unmanned in the interest of safety.
...
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Yet Another Domain Name Extortion Scam →
From Marco.org:
I got this email last week:
Subject: About Internet Intellectual Property Issue
Dear CEO,
We are a leading internet solutions organization in Asia, and we have something urgent to confirm with you. Yesterday we received a formal application from a company called ” Varmer Investment Co., Ltd “. They were trying to apply for ” instapaper ” as Brand Name and following Domain...
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“The economy is stuck in neutral so stepping on the [quantitative easing] gas...”
– Wise words from Mike Shedlock, investment advisor at SitkaPacific Capital.
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WatchMedia polarization between the right and left has created a vacuum in the middle for political pundits to fill.
John Avlon, in a post titled ”The Comedian Political Takeover,” argues that comedians are now the driving factor behind political debate.
As we saw last week, comedian Stephen Colbert is well-entrenched in the political realm.
In the above video we see comedian John...
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