A Search Engine That Relies on Humans - Bits Blog - NYTimes.com

"A report this week laying out a strategy for social search has been getting a good deal of attention in tech circles. The paper, “Anatomy of a Large Scale Social Search Engine,” was written by Damon Horowitz and Sepandar Kamvar of Aardvark, one of several companies working on creating social search engines. As of October 2009, Aardvark had about 90,000 users.

Social search aims to connect people with questions to people who can answer those questions. By contrast, regular Web searches take questions, break them into keywords, and then find Web sites that have the most relevance to these keywords. The idea has been floating around tech circles for years. Yahoo, among others, has tried to develop social search as a way to challenge Google."

one forty plus. - The One Week Digital Cleanse

"Mention to anyone with computer savvy that your laptop has somehow gotten slower over recent months and they’ll ask you the same thing: “have you defragmented your hard drive?” Defragmenting works by taking small slivers of information stored in various locations and consolidating them so that they’re in the same place on the drive and thus easier to access in larger chunks. Hard drive fragmentation is a great metaphor for - if not a literal manifestation of - what’s happened to our brains over years and years of processing small bursts of information. 2009 took fragmentation to a whole new level given the rise of Twitter and the social acceptance of texting people as a substitute to making phone calls."

Official Google Blog: Helping computers understand language

"Enabling computers to understand language remains one of the hardest problems in artificial intelligence. The goal of a search engine is to return the best results for your search, and understanding language is crucial to returning the best results. A key part of this is our system for understanding synonyms.

What is a synonym? An obvious example is that 'pictures' and 'photos' mean the same thing in most circumstances. If you search for [pictures developed with coffee] to see how to develop photographs using coffee grinds as a developing agent, Google must understand that even if a page says 'photos' and not 'pictures,' it's still relevant to the search. While even a small child can identify synonyms like pictures/photos, getting a computer program to understand synonyms is enormously difficult, and we're very proud of the system we've developed at Google."

BBC Horizon - How Long Is A Piece Of String?

• Part 2/6
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Grains of Sand Reveal Possible Fifth State of Matter | Wired Science | Wired.com

"“You walk on the beach, and the sand supports your weight. Pick up a handful, and it runs through your fingers, like a liquid. But you can’t walk on water,” said Jaeger. “In the top of an hourglass, sand is this strange solid. It’s at the verge of being a solid; it flows through the middle as something like a liquid, and then it’s a solid again,” he said."

The military history of ancient Israel - Google Books

The military history of ancient Israel - Google Books

Free Will and Ethics : The Frontal Cortex

"At the very least, free will is a useful illusion, leading us to be more prosocial and ethical. Because even if we are just 'a vast assembly of nerve cells and their associated molecules,' we're a vast assembly that feels like so much more. William James, as usual, said it best: 'My first act of free will shall be to believe in free will.'"

Queen - Bohemian Rhapsody

28 Rich Data Visualization Tools - InsideRIA

"We're currently working with a dozen different clients, all web application (re)designs. All of these clients have data rich applications and need equally rich data visualizations to help their end customers analyze data quickly and effectively.

What makes my job really interesting is that these clients are in different industries and are using different technologies. So we have pulled together a set of 28 tools for creating graphs, Gantt charts, diagrammers, calendars/schedulers, gauges, mapping, pivot tables, OLAP cubes, and sparklines, in Flash, Flex, Ajax or Silverlight."

The Futurist: The Probable –vs- The Possible

"Probability is a funny thing. It looks objective and scientific, it crunches a large volume of numbers, but in reality it is quite fuzzy and subjective. If we look closely at a scientific forecast, then usually an honest one will establish two things – a forecast range and the degree of certainty that is expressed within that range. For example, the Bank of England publishes its economic forecasts that inform the decisions about setting the levels of interest rates. These are quite instructive because they have a range of predictive possibility (the Bank of England calls it a ‘fan’ because it looks like a fan graphically) and a probability of outcome."

2009 Legacy? Privacy As The New Scarcity | Snowcrashing

"According to new figures released by the Interactive Advertising Bureau and PricewaterhouseCoopers, U.S. online ad spending in the third quarter was down 5.4% from the same period a year ago.

Is the economic downturn the only culprit? It might. But it is also a testament to the failure of online advertising to deliver innovation, which leaves the web powerhouses scrambling to find effective ways to monetize their traffic.

So what happens when all Beacon-like models fail? If Mohammed won’t come to the mountain, the mountain must come to Mohammed. Wave your Online Privacy Good-Bye."

Social Media Today | Social Media Policies of 113 Organizations

"With companies searching for and developing standards for social media usage, many of them have come up with social media policies of their own.

I’ve found that reviewing the policies of other companies is a worthwhile way to gauge how a company uses social media and their goals with social media. These also serve as case studies for ideas of the type of information that is included in a social media policy.

Following is a list of organizations and their respective social media guidelines. This is a list compiled by Chris Boudreaux at his Social Media Governance web site."

The Social Grid | Leveraging the Power of the Web and Focusing on Development Simplicity | Tony Hey | Corporate Vice President of Technical Computing

The Social Grid: A social grid built around the web?

Clarity of Intention: The first tenet of enlightenment - Andrewcohen.org

"Clarity of intention is simple, but its implications are radical and profound beyond measure. If you want to be free more than anything else, you don’t have to depend on higher states; you don’t have to wait for God to save you; you don’t have to hope for grace to descend. In a truly courageous soul, this tenet will forge a strength and independence of spirit that in and of itself is liberation. Clarity of intention is the foundation of the enlightened life and the key to the evolution of consciousness itself, because it places your freedom entirely in your own hands."

Twitterville Notebook: Sodexo's Arie Ball - Global Neighbourhoods

In short, there’s a LOT happening on Twitter in terms of job searching and recruiting. This probably accelerate because these are tough economic times. There are surely more jobs being sought, than offered. But there clearly are some jobs out there and you can find them pretty easily on Twitter.

This is no surprise to Sodexo, the North American leader in managing food services and facilities. If you ever experienced the cuisine in a hospital, senior citizen center, college, medical or military facility, then you have probably eaten one of the 10 million meals they serve each day at 6000 locations in the Canada, the US and Mexico.

Sodexo, employs 120,000 people, but the big news is the company is in hire mode. In addition to plans to hire 1800 recent college grads, the company intends to add on over 5000 managers, professionals, and executives this year. These include General Managers, Chefs, Facilities Engineers, Environmental Services Managers, Dietitians, District Managers, vice presidents, and roles in Finance, HR, IS&T, Communications, Supply Management and more.
And despite these troubled times, their business is growing and they are hiring. What brings it to this blog is that Sodexo, a company that has been named as one of the best places to work, is using Twitter as an executive recruiting tool.

Content Farms: Why Media, Blogs & Google Should Be Worried

"The bottom line is that the quality of content produced by these 'content farms' is dubious, which has an impact on both publishers and readers.

Last week I analyzed the way wikiHow produces its content - its users do all of the writing and editing for free, via a Wikipedia-like platform. There was evidence that wikiHow's model is producing better content than its Demand Media counterpart for how-to articles, eHow. More worrying though is that Demand Media is producing thousands of these types of articles a day.

So is the Web becoming awash with low-quality content produced by content farms like Demand Media, Answers.com and now AOL? Yes it is.

From my analysis of Demand Media and similar sites, such content is very generic and lacks depth. While I wouldn't go as far as wikiHow founder Jack Herrick and say that it "lacks soul," it certainly lacks passion and often also lacks knowledge of the topic at hand. Arrington's analogy with fast food is apt - it is content produced quickly and made to order."

Material Damage, Collateral That Is at Amitai Givertz’s Recruitomatic Blog

"Rogue recruiter and sausage salesman David Perry was nice enough to include me as one of the co-authors in his recently published, run-away best-seller, Guerrilla Marketing for Job Seekers 2.0. Yowzer!

If you’re lucky enough you might still pick up a copy on Amazon.com. If you’re really, really lucky you won’t need to.

The chapter I wrote is entitled Guerrilla Googling and the Job Hunters’ Dashboard.

George Formby - When I'm cleaning windows

Which "End" of Social Media Are You On? - Jay Deragon

Objection! Florida Bans Judges From "Friending" Lawyers on All Social-Networking Sites | Fast Company

"In one of the craziest proclamations I've ever read, the Florida Judicial Ethics Advisory Committee has banned judges from 'friending' lawyers on social-networking sites. The reason? It 'reasonably conveys to others the impression that these lawyer 'friends' are in a special position to influence the judge.'

Ashby Jones, of the The Wall Street Journal's Legal Blog, raises the obvious point: When he first signed up for Facebook, back in the fall of 2007, 'friending' someone was akin to confirming a pre-existing friendship--an act that would justify the Committee's opinion. But since then, he writes, 'it's taken on a different meaning. I've friended friends, friends of friends, acquaintances, work colleagues, people who claim to know me, people from my past I barely remember, and people who probably requested my 'friendship' completely by mistake or through some sort of elaborate spam ruse that I'm not smart enough to figure out.' In other words, modern-day 'friending' rarely connotes actual friendship, especially on more professional social networks, such as LinkedIn and Twitter. (Several Committee members shared this belief, but were overruled.)"

Anarchism and Orthodox Judaism - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

"While there is no organized Orthodox Jewish anarchist movement, various anarchistic ideas are common in the works of many Kabbalists and Hasidic teachers. Since the antiquity, some Jewish mystical groups were based on anti-authoritarian or radically communal principles, somewhat similar to the Christian Quakers, Dukhobors and other similar movements. Some secular Jewish anarchists, such as Abba Gordin and Erich Fromm, had noticed remarkable similarity between anarchism and many Kabbalistic ideas, especially in their Hasidic interpretation. Martin Buber, a deeply religious philosopher, although not an Orthodox Jew, had frequently referred to the Hasidic tradition.

Some Jewish anarchists of the 20th century had explicitly combined contemporary radical thought with traditional Judaism, insisting, that Judaism calls for abolishment of the state, private property and class exploitation. These Orthodox Jewish anarchists observed the Halacha and had almost nothing in common with lifestyle anarchism, but they advocated the social system of communist anarchism or anarcho-syndicalism."

Innovation in Turbulent Times - HBR.org

"Too few businesses have creative, right-brain types in leadership positions. That leaves innovation especially vulnerable to unwise cost cutting during hard times. Decisions about slashing versus retaining projects are made by analytic, left-brain leaders unsuited to evaluating innovation portfolios."

Intel Wants Brain Implants in Its Customers' Heads by 2020 | Popular Science

"If the idea of turning consumers into true cyborgs sounds creepy, don't tell Intel researchers. Intel's Pittsburgh lab aims to develop brain implants that can control all sorts of gadgets directly via brain waves by 2020.

The scientists anticipate that consumers will adapt quickly to the idea, and indeed crave the freedom of not requiring a keyboard, mouse, or remote control for surfing the Web or changing channels. They also predict that people will tire of multi-touch devices such as our precious iPhones, Android smart phones and even Microsoft's wacky Surface Table.

Turning brain waves into real-world tech action still requires some heavy decoding of brain activity. The Intel team has already made use of fMRI brain scans to match brain patterns with similar thoughts across many test subjects."

Hat tip: Michael Marlatt

The Social Media Guru

Too funny...



Hat tip: Michael Marlatt

Reverse Engineering Google's Innovation Machine - HBR.org

"Even among internet companies, Google stands out as an enterprise designed with the explicit goal of succeeding at rapid, profuse innovation. Much of what the company does is rooted in its legendary IT infrastructure, but technology and strategy at Google are inseparable and mutually permeable—making it hard to say whether technology is the DNA of its strategy or the other way around. Whichever it is, Iyer and Davenport, of Babson College, believe Google may well be the internet-era heir to such companies as General Electric and IBM as an exemplar of management practice."

LinkedIn...To What?

Hat tip: Amybeth Hale

FRONTLINE: editors' notes: frontline / world: your digital trash? | PBS

"A team of graduate journalism students at the University of British Columbia sleuthed this story, tracking for months America's electronic waste and where it's ending up."

Social Media Revolution | Socialnomics

Social Media Revolution: Is social media a fad?

Or is it the biggest shift since the Industrial Revolution? This video details out social media facts and figures that are hard to ignore. This video is produced by the author of Socialnomics.

Guess How Many Tweets Fly Across Twitter Each Day | Brian Solis - PR 2.0

"1 million, 5 million, 10 million…?

If you guessed 10 million, you weren’t even half right.

According to new data from Pingdom, Twitter users are averaging 27.3 million tweets per day with an annual run rate of 10 billion tweets. Just last month, Caroline McCarthy of CNET reported that the 5 billionth tweet posted."