Hi all -

Sorry for the dropout - pushing to get some stuff done around here.

Here’s a really, really interesting arcticle from Yahoo :
Wikipedia, the encyclopedia that relies on volunteers to pen nearly 4 million articles, is about as accurate in covering scientific topics as Encyclopedia Britannica, the journal Nature wrote in an online article published Wednesday.
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The finding, based on a side-by-side comparison of articles covering a broad swath of the scientific spectrum, comes as Wikipedia faces criticism over the accuracy of some of its entries.

Two weeks ago prominent journalist John Seigenthaler, the former publisher of the Tennessean newspaper and founding editorial director of USA Today, revealed that a Wikipedia entry that ran for four months had incorrectly named him as a longtime suspect in the assassinations of president John F. Kennedy and his brother Robert.

Such errors appear to be the exception rather than the rule, Nature said in Wednesday’s article, which the scientific journal said was the first to use peer review to compare Wikipedia to Britannica. Based on 42 articles reviewed by experts, the average scientific entry in Wikipedia contained four errors or omissions, while Britannica had three.

This is really important, because it says that community efforts can stand aside commercial efforts, and be of equivalent quality. Of course, this is what Ernie is going to depend on.

Posted by Thomas Howe @ 11:27 am | Filed Under Lead Stories | 1 Comment

Well, I had the most interesting morning with Joe Batista, the “chief creatologist” of Hewlett Packard. A quick bio :

Joseph (Joe) Batista, Director & Chief Creatologist at Hewlett Packard (HP) Corporation, is responsible for building new business realties leveraging HP’s portfolio of assets, and driving new growth, strategy and implementation agendas that deliver real business results.

As you might know, I’m a former chairman of the Cape Cod Technology Council, which sort of sounds like “President of the Orleans Kiwanis”. In a way, it is, but with a twist. Tons of successful Boston area executives and engineers have houses down here on the Cape, Nantucket or Martha’s Vineyard, and they all have a vested interest in seeing high tech on the Cape flourish. So, we tend to have excellent speakers come to our breakfasts. As an example, we had the director of NASA’s Institute for Advanced Concepts (NIAC), who has a house here, speak to us about all the neat 10 to 40 year projects that NASA is working on, including anti-matter drives and hopper bots. And yes, it does sound like Star Trek. That’s because the producers of Star Trek make regular visits to NIAC for TV show fodder. Yes, anti-matter drives are a real project, ableit nascent, at NASA. Cool, huh? But, I digress.

Joe was speaking to us about the new economy, where the real asset is ideas. As part of this, he spoke about commoditization, and used as real world examples Clorox and coffee beans. Now, here’s an excellent take away based on coffee beans. It doesn’t take a creatologist to relate this to today’s world of telephony:

Commodity == coffee beans, 1-2 cents per pound
Product == Maxwell house coffee, $1.25 per pound
Service == Dunkin Donuts Coffee, $1.25 per cup
Experience == Starbucks Coffee, $2-$5 per cup

I’ll leave you with a quote from Pulp Fiction :

                                 BUDDY                     How ’bout you, Peggy Sue?

                                MIA                     I’ll have the Durwood Kirby burger                     — bloody — and a five-dollar                     shake.

                                BUDDY                     How d’ya want that shake, Martin                     and Lewis, or Amos and Andy?

                                MIA                     Martin and Lewis.

                                VINCENT                     Did you just order a five-dollar                     shake?

                                MIA                     Sure did.

                                VINCENT                     A shake?  Milk and ice cream?

                                MIA                     Uh-huh.

                                VINCENT                     It costs five dollars?

                                BUDDY                     Yep.

                                VINCENT                     You don’t put bourbon in it or                     anything?

                                BUDDY                     Nope.

                                VINCENT                     Just checking.

Later…                            VINCENT                     Can I have a sip of that?  I’d like                     to know what a five-dollar shake                     tastes like.

                                MIA                     Be my guest.

      She slides the shake over to him.

                                MIA                     You can use my straw, I don’t have                     kooties.

      Vincent smiles.

                                VINCENT                     Yeah, but maybe I do.

                                MIA                     Kooties I can handle.

      He takes a sip.

                                VINCENT                    Goddamn!  That’s a pretty fuckin’                    good milk shake.

                                MIA                    Told ya.

                                VINCENT                    I don’t know if it’s worth five                    dollars, but it’s pretty fuckin’                    good.

      He slides the shake back.

Posted by Thomas Howe @ 11:21 am | Filed Under Lead Stories | Leave a Comment

Ok - this has nothing to do with anything, but this was SO funny, it made me fall off my chair. Anyone who’s ever been an engineer has a story like this one, but this is so over the top, I just had to share….

Posted by Thomas Howe @ 2:36 pm | Filed Under Lead Stories | Leave a Comment