Tonycurzonprice's Favorite Links on google from Diigo

O'Brien: 'Stoopid'? Technology has changed how we think. (SiliconValley.com)

Tue, 22 Jul 2008 06:39:31 -0000

Comment on Carr

Highlights and Sticky Notes:

But Carr does come around to an essential question: Does what we lose outweigh the new insights or thinking that we gain? Would anyone argue that whatever society lost with the introduction of the printing press was far exceeded by the progress it enabled in areas like medicine and science?

Carr cops to being a bit of a worrywart about new technologies. I tend to lean toward the optimistic side.

The changes we're experiencing through our use of technology can feel disorienting at times. But if we're lucky, they'll lead us into a new era of thinking and progress in the same way Gutenberg's press did all those years ago.

Tags: epistemology google guttenberg

Posted by: tonycurzonprice

Rough Type: Nicholas Carr's Blog: Net brain syndrome

Sun, 20 Jul 2008 15:31:37 -0000

Highlights and Sticky Notes:

Net brain syndrome

Tags: montpelerin google

Posted by: tonycurzonprice

Human vs. Machine: The Great Challenge of Our Time

Sun, 06 Jan 2008 18:07:15 -0000

I've written quite a bit about "bionic software," the idea that one of the distinguishing characteristics of Web 2.0 is that its applications are a new hybrid of man and machine, driven by algorithmic interpretation of aggregated human activity. Recent turmoil in financial markets show us just how such systems can run amok.

Figuring out the right balance of man and machine is one of the great challenges of our time. We're increasingly building complex systems that involve both, but in what proportion?

Bill Janeway will be talking at the conference with Rick Bookstaber, author of A Demon of Our Own Design. Bookstaber was the head of risk management for Morgan Stanley, and now runs a hedge fund. He argues that the very techniques originally developed to manage risk via computational means have actually increased risk. He asks whether we can put the genie back in the bottle, and whether we can afford not to.

Incidentally, this same issue is playing itself out in the world of Web 2.0 itself, with new search engines, from Jason Calacanis' mahalo to Jimmy Wales' Wikia Search making the argument that a purely algorithmic approach is fundamentally flawed. In response to yesterday's announcement of Wikia Search, Cory Doctorow wrote, in a BoingBoing editorial entitled Wiki-inspired "transparent" search engine:

We have a notion that the traditional search engine algorithm is "neutral" -- that it lacks an editorial bias and simply works to fulfill some mathematical destiny, embodying some Platonic ideal of "relevance." Compare this to an "inorganic" paid search result of the sort that Altavista used to sell.

But ranking algorithms are editorial: they embody the biases, hopes, beliefs and hypotheses of the programmers who write and design them.

Mahalo is placing a bet on human intervention in search results; Wikia Search on the power of making its ranking algorithms open and transparent (a la open source software). But both are trying to re-draw the boundary between human and machine.

Tags: economics google manipulation montpelerin

Posted by: tonycurzonprice

Trading for their own account

Sat, 29 Dec 2007 19:52:13 -0000

Google's announcement of Knol shows that they understand some of their key business drivers very well; With as much as 5% of the search result links for popular terms going to Wikipedia pages, a solution to capturing some of that traffic in an environment that Google can control and display ads on makes good business sense....

[But] Knol shares with Google Book Search the problem of being both indexed by Google and hosted by Google. This presents inherent conflicts in the ranking of content, as well as disincentives for content creators to control the environment in which their content is published. This necessarily disadvantages competing search engines, but more importantly eliminates the ability for content creators to innovate in the area of content presentation or enhancement.

Highlights and Sticky Notes:

You get a period of innovation and openness for a while, till the winners start taking more value than they create.

In technology, this has traditionally been about bundling; When Microsoft included disk compression in their operating system, or Apple bundled widgets, the primary victims of that bundling were the independent software developers. But by bundling source materials with the tools used to discover (Google) or consume (Kindle) them, it isn't just other search engines or ebooks that suffer; It's everyone trying to participate in the marketplace of ideas.

Ultimately, I think we see this pattern in the economic development of every innovation. When a new technology is introduced, there's a lot of green-field opportunity, and so much value is being created that there's no need to capture it all. But as the technology matures, the winners need to capture more of the total value being created. They gradually crowd out suppliers as well as competitors.

Tags: google montpelerin

Posted by: tonycurzonprice

Google AJAX Search API - Sign Up

Sat, 07 Jul 2007 10:26:38 -0000

Highlights and Sticky Notes:

Thanks for Signing up for a Google AJAX Search API key!

Your key is:

ABQIAAAA2wK19K8m2uw5YM7vpcooRxR6DZuPdJCVsrNFcL8uoiXjCWqd6BSjsogTPqVyDcQYbExHeLKLYpb9Rg

This key is good for all URLs in this directory:

http://opendemocracy.net/

Tags: google

Posted by: tonycurzonprice

Is Google Too Powerful?

Wed, 11 Apr 2007 12:01:18 -0000

Highlights and Sticky Notes:

Is Google Too Powerful?
As the Web giant tears through media, software, and telecom, rivals fear its growing influence. Now they're fighting back

Tags: google market-power

Posted by: tonycurzonprice

The Library of Babel

Thu, 29 Mar 2007 15:30:52 -0000

Highlights and Sticky Notes:

When it was proclaimed that the Library contained all books, the first impression was one of extravagant happiness. All men felt themselves to be the masters of an intact and secret treasure. There was no personal or world problem whose eloquent solution did not exist in some hexagon. The universe was justified, the universe suddenly usurped the unlimited dimensions of hope.

Tags: borges google search

Posted by: tonycurzonprice

Edge: TURING'S CATHEDRAL by George Dyson

Wed, 07 Mar 2007 06:59:47 -0000

Highlights and Sticky Notes:

What is Google doing at the Frankfurt Book Fair? And why has a consortium of publishers filed a lawsuit against them? On the other hand, why do the "digerati" love Google Print and Google Print Library?

Tags: ai google

Posted by: tonycurzonprice