voluntaryXchange

Word Tip # 9

Just a note to let you know that my Word Tip # 9, posted about a month ago, just saved me about 10 minutes of mindless work deleting semi-colons and hitting enter.

Technorati Tags: word,tip,replace,line,break,paragraph

Your Future: Recreating Events in 3D

Two memes to combine here.

1. Sameer Agarwal, a computer scientist at the University of Washington can produce 3D visual reconstructions of cities based on the thousands of freely available two dimensional JPEG files available on the internet.
2. I’ve been going through my late father’s photos and slides. You know the drill: decades old scenes filled with people you don’t know. My wife is doing her late mother’s 8 mm movies too.

Here’s a prediction. In a few years you’ll be able to input a bunch of photos, slides, or films - of that picnic from 1957, or birthday party from 1974 - into software that will be able to produce a 3D simulation of the event that you can “fly” through, rotate, and so on.

Via New Scientist.

Technorati Tags: 3D,photo,rome,venice,dubrovnik,simulation

Word Tip # 13: Selecting Text

Selecting text is a pain …

Here’s a trick: click in the left margin to select text instead of on the text itself.

• One click gets you a line,
• Two a paragraph, and
• Three the whole document.

Technorati Tags: word,select,text,tip

Sunk Cost Strategy for Managerial Economics

Sinking costs to stifle potential future competition is something hard to motivate for students.

Holman Jenkins had a good example in his column last week about net neutrality; where this is the current strategy:

The greatest fear of Microsoft, Amazon, eBay and Yahoo is having to plumb their deep pockets and offer competing payments to broadband carriers to speed their bits to consumers. They much prefer spending their money to sprinkle server farms around the globe, assuring fast, reliable access for their customers in a way that no newcomer can easily replicate.

All of those server farms are sunk costs that show their commitment to the current “non-neutral” netiture, and which then serve to dissuade new entrants. Obviously, they also help to lock those firms into a preference for that netiture as well.

Technorati Tags: server,farm,net,neutrality,managerial economics

Quote About the Obama Administration’s Attitude Toward Business

From Holman Jenkins:

The new administration seemingly won't let companies fail, and won't let them succeed either.

This is more of an opinion, but it’s an interesting idea to keep around:

… That companies are inclined to snuggle up mainly to share losses and preserve capacity in a downturn or to curb the free-riding of powerful customers. When profits are available, on the other hand, they quickly go back to competing to maximize their respective shares rather than colluding to limit their individual upsides.

Technorati Tags: quote,obama,holman,jenkins,companies,fail,succeed

WTF?

From The Guardian:

… Obama had turned down no fewer than five requests from Downing Street to hold a bilateral meeting at the United Nations in New York or at the G20 summit …

Can you say hissy fit?

Technorati Tags: obama,gordon,brown,g20,un

If Jimmy Carter Didn’t Exist, Would We Have to Invent Him?

Taranto:

… Jimmy Carter's continuing presence on the national scene is a helpful reminder of how much progress America has made in just the past few decades.

Technorati Tags: jimmy,carter,taranto,quote

The Madoff “Victims” Revisited

Federal prosecutors announced:

… A review of most accounts held by Bernard L. Madoff’s customers when he was arrested shows that about half of the customers had not lost money because they withdrew more money than they originally invested.

Here at voluntaryXchange, this finding was anticipated 7 months ago, where I also noted that these people are committing a crime if they don’t pay the money back.

The New York Times sugar coats this though. The quote above was drawn from an article that headlined “Review Says No Net Loss for Some In Scheme”.

OMFG

• No net loss is a euphemism for profit!
• Some is not usually interpreted as “about half”!

All of these people partnered in a criminal enterprise, and yet:

Prosecutors made the revelation as they told a judge in court papers that there was no need to order restitution …

Further, in any Ponzi scheme, the chances of profiting are higher when you get in earlier. Now … go out and look at all the “victims lists” you’ve seen published. Go ahead … here’s one, and another, and there’s even a mashup map.

Not one of these sources – which include rather detailed information including names, how much was “lost”, and sometimes even juicy personal details – lists when these people started investing with Madoff. This is a critical piece of information that is probably easier to get than some of the other ones, and it is unreported.

Technorati Tags: madoff,victims,ponzi,scheme,profit,loss,criminal

Apple Isn’t Malware-Immune

The new release of iTunes that all of us installed has a security flaw – on Mac and Windows.

Go download the new one (9.0.1).

Technorati Tags: apple,itunes,malware

The Scold

… Just like your teenage kids, aren’t acting in a way that they should act.”

This is an attitude unbecoming of cabinet secretary, but this puritan is who we’re stuck with under Obama.

Technorati Tags: chu,energy,secretary