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Archive for July, 2009

Real Options and the Baseball Trade Deadline

Posted in Sports, tagged , , , , , , , , on July 29, 2009| 7 Comments »

In a couple of days, the baseball trade deadline on July 31 will pass.   Both local teams here in the San Francisco Bay Area have interesting decisions to make or already have made important trade decisions:

  • The San Francisco Giants finished last season with one of the worst offenses in baseball and didn’t make a significant offensive upgrade during the offseason.  While there were several moves available to them in the offseason, one option that is often cited by the local media revolves around Adam Dunn.  Dunn, an outfielder who finished last season with the Arizona Diamondbacks after spending the previous 7+ years with my beloved Cincinnati Reds (I grew up in nearby Dayton, Ohio), is a feast or famine slugger who could have given the Giants an offensive presence that they lacked.   (more…)

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Proof of the Power of the Internet- The JK Wedding Entrance Video

Posted in Entertainment, Internet, tagged , , , , , on July 26, 2009| 3 Comments »

The current viral sensation sweeping the web is the fun wedding entrance dance into a church in St. Paul, Minnesota.    Titled J&K Wedding Entrance Dance, within a week, it has 7 million views, visits for the wedding party to the Today Show and Good Morning America; and even a recreation of the dance on the Today Show. (more…)

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National Health Care Spending Levels: A Global Comparison

Posted in Public Policy, tagged , , , , , , , on July 23, 2009| 3 Comments »

This month, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) released a comprehensive health data report, comparing health care statistics across OECD countries.   Their website and study can be found here and an excel file with a sampling of their data is also available.     With the recent flurry around the Obama administration’s health care proposals, it feels like a good time to look at some of the more interesting data sets to me:

  • Healthcare Spending as a % of GDP
  • Doctor Consultations, Number per Capita
  • Hospital Beds per 1000 Population (more…)

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PC Profit Pools in the era of Netbooks

Posted in Internet, Technology, tagged , , , , , , , , on July 13, 2009| 4 Comments »

Recently, there has been lots of coverage and discussion about netbooks.  Netbooks have been flying off the shelves, along with iPhones- perhaps the only consumer computing or communications device that is actually selling well.   It seems that everyone in the carrier, software, computer, and internet space is excited about netbooks.  But at a price point of less than $300, can everyone really be happy and make money?   Here are some recent news stories from a few of the major players.

Google- Google announced this week plans for a Google Chrome based Operating System to be targeted to Netbooks.   This is on top of previous plans to have Google Android based Netbooks available, a few of which are already available (Skytone (China based company) Alpha-680 Google Android Netbook).   Clearly, Google is targeting netbooks from multiple angles and ultimately wants to get more users on the Internet using non-Microsoft based devices and software to eventually view and click on Google based advertisements. (more…)

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Is the Facebook news feed a motivator or a demotivator?

Posted in Internet, Technology, tagged , , on July 7, 2009| Leave a Comment »

The Facebook news feed has become an essential component of many people’s daily online activities—a key element to the social media experience.   Through the news feed, people now know more about their friends and co-workers lives than ever before.  For example, many people may have only really known about a colleague before Facebook through their professional persona and superficially about some of their hobbies.  Now, through Facebook, they may see that they travel often to exotic places, or have children with numerous after-school activities, or participate in impressive feats like marathons or triathlons.  Or on the flip side, they may find out that these colleagues’ lives outside of work look and feel remarkably like their own.   In either case, Facebook has created more awareness of the details of the lives of many of the people in one’s professional and personal network. (more…)

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Electronic and Erasable Paper- evolving technologies

Posted in Environment, Technology, tagged , , , , , , on July 3, 2009| 1 Comment »

When thinking about ways to reduce the usage of traditional paper beyond simply changing usage patterns, some of the technologies that can contribute to that goal include electronic paper, erasable paper, erasable ink, and alternative resource (besides tree) paper.  There have been exciting developments in each of these technologies, but want to focus on two technologies: electronic paper and erasable paper.

Electronic Paper

Electronic paper (e-paper) is a display technology that is designed to have an appearance of ordinary ink on paper.  Electronic paper reflects light like ordinary paper and is capable of holding text and images indefinitely without drawing electricity, while allowing the image to be changed later.   (more…)

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