Back from Barcamp Boston
This weekend I had a chance to attend BarCamp Boston (4). As usual it was fun and interesting and I had a chance to hang out and talk with a bunch ...
Blog Posts
All my blog posts and articles
Page 82 of 142 (2823 total posts)
April 2009
Weapons of civic mass destruction
I am struck by how broken our political process is. I’m not the first nor the last to make this observation, How did we get here and what are the underlying reasons? Here’s one way I have started to look at it: we have perfected the science of persuasion to such a point that it is **now destroying u...
Read more →The torture discussion back in 2001
Recently of course, because of the ‘torture memos’, the topic is all over the papers and cable ‘news’ programs. It’s brought back to mind a discussion that was raging hot and heavy, starting back in 2001, about the idea of allowing the issuance of ‘Torture Warrants‘. [Alan Dershowitz](http://en...
Read more →Great proposal re: http://data.gov from Sunlight Foundation
Check out this post [Re...
Inside the Shot Heard ‘Round the World
Did you wonder how those snipers were able to shoot those pirates when both groups were on boats on the open sea? Check out this post Inside the Shot Heard ‘Round the World: > ""These guys can put three rounds onto the head of a quarter at that range," Allen told me. " (from: from Defense Tech)
[GEEKY] How DataRSS might work
Editors Note (that’s me, Pito): I’ve decided to change the name of this thing to “Decentralized Data Discovery – DDD” because I learned from more than one person that calling it Data RSS was misleading and confusing. I need to go back and update the papers and blog posts. I’ve just finished writ...
Read more →An excellent paper about Curaçao Politics
This is probably not high on your radar, but if you have interest in the island of Curaçao you may have heard about the big referendum issue that is being hotly debated these days. I won’t even try to capture the sides of the argument, rather I want to refer you to this outstanding paper written by ...
Read more →Has Paula gotten Smarter?
I’ve been an American Idol fan for a while now, in fact from the very start. I’ve been commenting to the TV Set that Paula is seeming much smarter, incisive and interesting this year than in the past.[I see I am not the only one to notice 🙂](http://www.boston.com/ae/tv/articles/2009/04/07/judging_p...
Read more →If you think stronger regulation is a good answer, heed Buffett
Check out this post If you think stronger regulation is a good answer, heed Buffett: > “Warren Buffett gave a three-hour interview in August. Here’s an interesting [bit from the transcript](http://www.clusterstock.com/2...
Read more →Great paper about Harri Hursti’s demonstration of ballot scanner security concerns
I recently saw the movie Hacking Democracy. It’s absolutely fascinating and basic background for anyone interested in election reform. In it you learn about some of the heroes of election reform, including Harri Hursti ...
Read more →Paul Simon’s Graceland Album: the back story
Ethan Zuckerman writes a great piece about how Paul Simon’s Graceland album came to be, with some of the historical context, backstory and being a xenophile. A great read: > “At its best, Graceland sounds like Simon is encountering forces to large for him to understand or control. He’s riding on top...
Read more →Maybe I hate my iPhone
This is from today’s New York Times Magazine. I didn’t know Virginia Heffernan was funny! > “Actually, the iPhone probably sips, like a lipsticky girl with a vodka drink. It usual...
Read more →Meeting24.tv Keeps Online Meetings Simple
Check out this post Meeting24.tv Keeps Online Meetings Simple: > "Like Utagoe Live 100, meeting24.tv also has a similar minimalistic feel to it, which is supposed to make it easy for anyone to use – even those with little web experience. The service is based on the assumption that other online meeting solutions such as TokBox (which we covered three times), Cisco’s Webex, Polycom or Skype are just too complex. " (from: from TechCrunch) I tried it, at least by myself. It seems to work but I am not sure that I am getting the most performance out of my Logitech webcam. Pretty cool.
Bizspeak
Who cares about equities traders leaving Morgan Stanley. Not me, but check out this post Top Equities Trader Leaves Morgan Stanley: > "We’re convinced that no one would actually use the "sp...
Read more →NBC’s Boston affiliate isn’t going to show Leno’s new show
Check out this post NBC’s Boston affiliate isn’t going to show Leno’s new show: > "WHDH, the NBC affiliate in Boston (I’m watching it right now) says that they’re not going to show Leno’s new 10PM show. Starting in September, the station is going to show local news at 10PM instead!" (from: from TV Squad) This is pretty interesting. I was wondering how the world could give up the 10:00pm time slot, each and every day on NBC. So ‘our’ station is choosing to opt out. Didn’t realize this was even possible!
March 2009
How easy is it to cheat?
I’ve gotten very interested in Election Reform lately, and I’ve delved into how the overall voting system works, technically but also politically and procedurally. There are so many simple and not so simple ways in which election results can be manipulated that it makes my head spin. I was at FooCa...
Read more →Funny: Nasa’s “Colbert Room”
Thousands of lectures from top scholars – this looks GOOD!
I spent 5 minutes perusing this site, and it looks really good. Wow, makes me want to be back in college. Now if only had time (and discipline?) to actually watch some of these lectures, that would be wonderful! Academic Earth – Thousands of video lectures from the world’s top scholars 
Even Paul Krugman has to wait for the cable guy
Check out this post Incommunicado, probably: > "I’m working at home today, waiting for the Fios guy. Which means that I’m probably going to drop off the face of the earth for much of today." (from: from Paul Krugman) 🙂
“Society doesn’t need newspapers. What we need is journalism”
Clay Shirkey writes an article called “Newspapers and Thinking the Unthinkable”. I thought this was an excellent discussion about a topic I’ve written, with much less insight, in th...
Read more →