When the U.S. Department of Justice proved victorious in its historic antitrust suit against AT&T, breaking up what had been the world’s largest corporation in 1984, the feds promised a report every three years to document changes in telecommunications. The first was due in 1987.
But in 1986, with only a year to the deadline, the DOJ was stuck: no team in the U.S. government had the expertise to understand the complexity of this enormous, changing marketplace. A slew of consulting firms was there for hire, but they had all worked for AT&T. So the DOJ gave up on the experts and hired one man who had never studied the communications sector.
Peter Huber had no conflicts and started from scratch. The Geodesic Network: 1987 Report on Competition in the Telephone Industry, later cited widely as “the massive Huber report,” became a runaway bestseller for the Government Printing Office. The report brilliantly detailed how technologies of freedom were primed to crush old monopolies with disruptions at the network’s “edge”—personal computers, software, devices—if policymakers would lean back. The 450-page, data-dense thesis was delivered to the DOJ in 11 months; weeks early, as that was all the time Huber needed to go from zero to the world’s leading authority on perhaps the most complicated public policy issue yet invented.
rePost:Shigeru Miyamoto Wants to Create a Kinder World | The New Yorker
I want to bring us back to the Willy Wonka comparison. In “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory,” Wonka sets a competition with the secret aim of finding someone who has what it takes to replace him. I’m not suggesting that you’re looking for a replacement. But Nintendo existed long before you or I were born and will, I’m sure, exist long after both you and I are gone. What quality do you think Nintendo needs to protect in order to keep being Nintendo?
As the company has gained new competitors over the years, it’s given us an opportunity to think deeply about what makes Nintendo Nintendo. [President] Shuntaro Furukawa is currently in his forties, and [general manager] Shinya Takahashi is in his fifties; we are moving toward a position that will insure the spirit of Nintendo is passed down successfully. I am not concerned about that anymore. Now I’m focussing on the need to continue to find new experiences. This has always been what interested and excited me about the medium: not perfecting the old but discovering the new.
Source: Shigeru Miyamoto Wants to Create a Kinder World | The New Yorker
rePost:Donald Trump’s Legacy of Lies – The Atlantic
The second event came on November 3. For months Trump had tried frantically to destroy Americans’ trust in the election—the essence of the democratic system, the one lever of power that belongs undeniably to the people. His effort consisted of nonstop lies about the fraudulence of mail-in ballots. But the ballots flooded into election offices, and people lined up before dawn on the first day of early voting, and some of them waited 10 hours to vote, and by the end of Election Day, despite the soaring threat
Tyler Cowen's three laws – Marginal REVOLUTION
Tyler Cowen’s three lawsby Tyler Cowen on April 15, 2015 at 9:55 am in Economics, Law, Philosophy | Permalink
Many of you have been asking for a canonical statement of what I sometimes refer to as Cowen’s Laws. Here goes:
1. Cowen’s First Law: There is something wrong with everything (by which I mean there are few decisive or knockdown articles or arguments, and furthermore until you have found the major flaws in an argument, you do not understand it).
2. Cowen’s Second Law: There is a literature on everything.
3. Cowen’s Third Law: All propositions about real interest rates are wrong.
I coined those some time ago, when teaching macroeconomics, yet I remain amazed how often I see blog posts which violate all three laws within the span of a few paragraphs.There is of course a common thread to all three laws, namely you should not have too much confidence in your own judgment.
rePost:Tyler Cowen's 12 rules for life – Marginal REVOLUTION
Tyler Cowen’s 12 rules for lifeby Tyler Cowen on January 24, 2018 at 12:55 am in Education, Philosophy, Sports, Uncategorized | Permalink
After reading Jordan Peterson’s 12 rules, a few people asked me what my list would look like. I would stress that what follows is not a universal or eternally valid account, but rather a few ideas that strike me in the here and now, perhaps as the result of recent conversations. I suspect the same is true for everyone’s rules lists, so please keep this in perspective.
Here goes:
1. Assume your temperament will always be somewhat childish and impatient, and set your rules accordingly, knowing that you cannot abide by rules for rules sake. Hope to leverage your impatience toward your longer-run advantage.
2. Study the symbolic systems of art, music, literature. and religion, if only to help yourself better understand alternative points of view in political and intellectual discourse. Don’t just spend time with the creations you like right away. Avoid “devalue and dismiss.”
3. When the price goes up, buy less. Try to understand what the price really is, however, and good luck with that.
4. Marry well.
5. Organize at least some significant portion of your knowledge of the world in terms of place, whether by country, region, or city. If you do that, virtually every person will be interesting to you, if only because almost everyone has some valuable knowledge of particular places.
6. When shooting the basketball, give it more arc than you think is necessary. Consistently.
7. Learn how to learn from those who offend you.
8. Cultivate mentors, and be willing to serve as mentors to others. This never loses its importance.
9. I don’t know.
10. Heed Cowen’s Three Laws.
11. Do not heed Cowen’s Three Laws.
12. Every now and then read or reread Erasmus, Montaigne, Homer, Shakespeare, or Joyce’s Ulysses, so that you do not take any rules too seriously. The human condition seems to defeat our attempts to order it.
Source: Tyler Cowen’s 12 rules for life – Marginal REVOLUTION
Home – Ethos, Pathos, and Logos, the Modes of Persuasion ‒ Explanation and Examples
In order to persuade your audience, proper of Ethos, Pathos and Logos is necessary.
Source: Home – Ethos, Pathos, and Logos, the Modes of Persuasion ‒ Explanation and Examples
The Myth of Drug Expiration Dates
us. What if the system is destroying drugs that are technically “expired” but could still be safely used? In his lab, Gerona ran tests on the decades-old drugs, including some now defunct brands such as the diet pills Obocell (once pitched to doctors with a portly figurine called “Mr. Obocell”) and Bamadex. Overall, the bottles contained 14 different compounds, including antihistamines, pain relievers and stimulants. All the drugs tested were in their original sealed containers. The findings surprised bo
James Meek · Somerdale to Skarbimierz · LRB 20 April 2017
The moves to Bournville, Haxby Road and Somerdale weren’t mere efficiency and tech upgrades. In its poster announcing the naming contest Fry’s says of the site: ‘there is ample room, not only for factories, wharves and sidings, but also for playing fields, bathing pools and sports grounds.’ The Cadbury, Fry and Rowntree families were successful capitalist industrialists, but they were also Quakers, bound to care for the welfare of their employees. In the high Victorian age it was still possible to see a pot
Source: James Meek · Somerdale to Skarbimierz · LRB 20 April 2017
FastStats – Leading Causes of Death
Number of deaths for leading causes of death
- Heart disease: 614,348
- Cancer: 591,699
- Chronic lower respiratory diseases: 147,101
- Accidents (unintentional injuries): 136,053
- Stroke (cerebrovascular diseases): 133,103
- Alzheimer’s disease: 93,541
- Diabetes: 76,488
- Influenza and pneumonia: 55,227
- Nephritis, nephrotic syndrome, and nephrosis: 48,146
- Intentional self-harm (suicide): 42,773
Musings 20170527 : Pure Genius
Been binging on the not renewed 13 episode season 1 and done TV series Pure Genius.
I have been binging a lot when I’m home and working because it helps regulate my ADHD tendencies. Uping the distractions allow me to focus more, strange as that may sound.
Pure genius is about a Silicon Valley billionaire who goes in to the medical field by funding a fully free hospital, research lab, tech startup, all rolled up into one bunker hill.
That is only half of what inspired this musings. The other half being a sense of clarity that we are non ethical. Please note I didn’t say unethical. We are more of non ethical because or probably because of how hard it has been in the past as my friend Ireneo Salazar likes to point out every man for himself, every thing he can get.
In a past musings post I theorized that because we are a country in the edges a country in dire poverty and extreme inequality that we are the perfect place fpr disruption. Innovation happens in the edges and we are definitely there.
In Pure Genius the FDA is always a consideration in moving the science forward. I’ve read enough abstracts and executive summaries to agree. The FDA in trying to stop people from dying may be killing more people by slowing down progress in lifesaving or life improving technology. In Pure Genius in almost every episode there is the ghost of FDA bans/approvals/exceptions in the background.
We have shown a surprising lack of ethics, morals and whatnot why don’t we go full blast in what the US FDA’s dangerous non human ready drug/device/treatment trials.
I have to be honest I don’t think that the figures may make sense. That is the issue with a mere 100 Million population. I really suspect the FDA thing is best done by large population countries like India and China. There is actually excitement and fear in the back of myind that they’ve cured all these diseases in china because of looser regulations.
Where are all the rogue researchers. Rogue not in the cheating the data sense but rather the don’t fucking care what the FDA says rogue.
Hay where are my artificial lungs, my artificial liver, artificial kidneys, etc.
PS: I am still irked about the hearing aid thing.