Fun with Google Trends

I am in LOVE with Google trends... so cool.

The Hillary v. Barack throwdown...

Are we going into a recession??

Why voting on Feb 5 matters

At least in New York City, it isn't winner take all. Plus Obama could win NYC and all of the delegates, since there are 8M people that live here.

Story at the Sun.

Like they say in Chicago - vote early, vote often.

Will one of our soon-to-be-married friends have this experience?

I pray not (being a guy and all)!

Cool bridges

Continuing my fascination with architecture, here is a list and pics of 18 cool bridges.

My favorite stat from last week

Well, other than Obama kicking ass...

Was this. Proving (if maybe just for once) that sex (or sexy people) might not sell.

Buy Indian...

It is official - if I want to support the motherland, I should buy a Jag or Land Rover.

Gotta say - that beats buying a Mahindra. :)

My iPod (and iPhone) makes me sane

I always knew there was a reason that I spent all that money on those cool little devices... much cheaper than therapy.

As David Bull says in the article:

The iPod allows people to control their environment, more so than any other technology. In a world where we have little sense of control over our everyday lives, it can be very satisfying to control how you interact with your environment. You have a playlist that you listen to while you're out walking around New York ... certain songs that remind you of the city. But the real sound of New York is shut off. You're controlling what your image of the city is. We are fine-tuning the relationship between our own feelings and environment.

There's a paradox between the cosmopolitan nature of a city and the iPod, which signifies something else. As users become more locked into their increasingly subjective pleasure, they ... (are remaking the) world in their own image. It's the idea that, "I don't want to hear loud people; I want to be left alone," and the iPod allows that. The paradox is, cosmopolitism resides in the person's iPod. It's often the most amazing array of music from around the world; the rich mix of songs around the world contrasting with the chilly nature of the city.... Where does diversity go? In our pocket.

This is how I survive the Subway and all the crazy people.

Apple is trying to surround me

First, they seduce me with their products. Then they open a HUGE store less than a block away from work. Now, they are opening one in the UWS.

How will I escape... and more importantly, how will Nina keep me from buying even more Apple stuff?

Me likey

Seeing as how Nina and I are going for less expensive gifts for each other post "First Wedding Anniversary" - this big poster makes me feel all warm and fuzzy.

Because I love skyscrapers & because I studied architecture in college (and used to scribble skyscraper designs in all my book margins).


I swear I am not compensating for anything. My lovely wife - I have given you the best gift idea ever (and shared it with the world).

What if YOU seceded and no one cared?

Seriously... like, what is the second biggest source of oil in Latin American behind Venezuela had like a third of it's land mass decide to declare sovereignty.

Also, what is none of the press in the Free World seemed to give a damn?

This is pretty funny. That's my short and sweet post for the weekend.



Indians on Facebook. Great.

Not to mention Penn Masala. Brilliant.

Any takers?

Nina and I are going to several weddings in 2008 (4 or 5 I think), so I hope one of them decides to do this:

glumbert - Best wedding first dance ever

Rob/Sarah?

If only Nina and I had thought of this... Damn!

Shoot me

...if I ever sound, act, behave like this.



Really.

I am building a theme I think...

Politicians are dumb. Maybe that's not news to everyone, but I keep finding confirmatory evidence. Since I am lazy - here is a much more well-thought out response to the "open letter" by Danny Sullivan. As he says:

You want to have hearings? Take a look at that. But this waste of time exercise over Google-DoubleClick? Approve the deal, and let's move on.

It is challenging when politicians can't accurately represent what companies like Google and DoubleClick actually do yet feel the need to comment on it and make mis-representations in order to urge action.

The Real Issue with Social Security

In further proof that most people have absolutely no idea what they are talking about... I give you Social Security. The discussion around this government program strikes me as similar to the discussion that surrounded "global warming". Here is an excerpt from Paul Krugman's article in the NY Times:

But the “everyone” who knows that Social Security is doomed doesn’t include anyone who actually understands the numbers. In fact, the whole Beltway obsession with the fiscal burden of an aging population is misguided.

As Peter Orszag, the director of the Congressional Budget Office, put it in a recent article co-authored with senior analyst Philip Ellis: “The long-term fiscal condition of the United States has been largely misdiagnosed. Despite all the attention paid to demographic challenges, such as the coming retirement of the baby-boom generation, our country’s financial health will in fact be determined primarily by the growth rate of per capita health care costs.”

The real reasons are shrouded in half-truths and convenient lies by politicians who don't know otherwise and are too stupid to think for themselves.

Silver lining from tsunami for one town?

This Yahoo article talks about a bunch of ruins that were exposed according to fisherman in Mahabalipuram when the water receeded before the tsunami hit.

Of course the locals are calling it the Indian Atlantis, but others aren't so sure. Either way, there are tourists coming now, and ultimately that might be the best thing that area needs right now.

If they can dye the river green one day a year...

(click on the image above for a bigger version)

Took most of the week to get to - but here is the picture out of my apartment window for my first St. Paddy's Day celebration in Chicago. This is actually from the day after (in the morning), since by the time I left for the bar crawl the green hadn't gotten this far down the river yet. In actuality, the color right after the dye it is almost radioactive green.

So you can see a bunch of the buildings and my view (which I have never gotten around to showing folks). The big constuction zone right below is the new Trump building that is going up (Bill Ransic, anyone?). So by next year I am sure there will be a 92 story building blocking part of that view.

Explain to me why this would work?

This blog makes a lazyweb request to create a fake "ad clicker and visitor" that would somehow make advertisers revolt and stop using the Pop-Up, thereby quickening its demise?

Umm... what? I am all about getting rid of pop-ups/pop-unders, but there are a few problems with this plan.

First of all, most of the pop-ups and pop-unders are purhased on a CPM basis. So a click on the ad doesn't cost anything nor would most advertisers really care - and assumably they don't track it.

Second, even for all the extra traffic headed to the advertiser, it is certainly bandwidth (which has costs), but I find it hard to believe that any extension in Firefox, even if installed by default in Firefox, would make that big a dent. Firefox is at most 5% of the market (if that). Of course, having the application hit the website 1,000, or 1 million times might be a different story, but I doubt that the script could do that without getting noticed.

The reason pop-ups/pop-unders exist still in the world are for the following reasons:

1. It is a cheap way to purchase advertising and a standard format.
2. It is a LOT of money for publishers. It is not an easy revenue line item to wean yourself off of once you have been using it on your site. A site like Google that never had them doesn't have this issue.
3. They deliver traffic - maybe not the most qualified or convertable, but they deliver enough (even if the 90% crud stat is right).

If you could figure out a way for publishers to replace the revenue they receive from pop-unders/pop-ups, most if not all would jump at the opportunity to get rid of them. They dislike them as much as the next guy but they like making their revenue for the quarter more.

How about a lazyweb request for some suggestions on ways a generic publisher could replace the money they get from pop-ups with another incremental revenue source? That would be interesting to hear about from the blogosphere.

Recipe for Funding Success

Even though it starts off with the requisite "I hate PowerPoint" diatribe, this post actually has a pretty in-depth outline for what to present to a VC (and in my mind, a bank, angels, and other funding sources). In some ways it is just an outline for a business plan, but at least it presents the information in a question format, which I think is nice for the end-user. Just so I don't give all the thunder away, here are the topics - click over to see the juicy details (and BTW, the blog is a pretty good read to boot):

1) WHAT IS YOUR VISION?
2) WHAT IS YOUR MARKET OPPORTUNITY AND HOW BIG IS IT?
3) DESCRIBE YOUR PRODUCT/SERVICE
4) WHO IS YOUR CUSTOMER?
5) WHAT IS YOUR VALUE PROPOSITION?
6) HOW ARE YOU SELLING?
7) HOW DO YOU ACQUIRE CUSTOMERS?
8) WHO IS YOUR MANAGEMENT TEAM?
9) WHAT IS YOUR REVENUE MODEL?
10) WHAT STAGE OF DEVELOPMENT ARE YOU AT?
11) WHAT ARE YOUR PLANS FOR FUND RAISING?
12) WHO IS YOUR COMPETITION?
13) WHAT PARTNERSHIPS DO YOU HAVE?
14) HOW DO YOU FIT WITH THE PROSPECTIVE INVESTOR?
15) OTHER

Saw this off of Boing Boing

Will I defect?

Seems strange to talk about this on a newly created Blogger site, but all the talk about Yahoo 360 is making me wonder if that might be the better place to blog? Assuming that anyone with a Yahoo ID can post/join, etc. setting up a community blog with my MBA-mates would make a whole lot more sense there - since we already have a Yahoo Group going.

The recommendations and social-network type of features are especially intriguing and something I thought that the other social networks should have stressed more in their ramp up to get the requisite network effect. Like Charlene mentions in her post, if all your friends and family are already there - and importantly signed up - then blogging is an easy extension. Trying to convince my parents or girlfriend or school-mates to sign up at a completely different site, since Blogger doesn't equal Google for most folks, is a hard sell.

I am eagerly waiting to see if Yahoo 360 lives up to my expectations...

UPDATE: There are screenshots out now.