Umalu

18 ms·

121.
Why are the letters "z" and "x" so popular in drug names?(neurocritic.blogspot.com)
25 points by Umalu 16y ago|16 comments
122.
by Umalu 16y ago
Two things are interesting in this story. One is that this guy is doing extraordinarily well, much better than the vast majority of traditionally published writers. He is, indeed, an outlier. The other interesting thing about this is how mu
123.
by Umalu 16y ago
This is correct. Once a company has to go to the trouble of producing quarterly and annual financial reports and filing them with the SEC and making them available to the world, most companies conclude they might as well do a real IPO and g
124.
by Umalu 16y ago
Traditionally there are three reasons to go public: (1) need capital, (2) founders or VCs need to cash out, or (3) have 500+ stockholders. Reason (3) has driven some otherwise cash rich companies with somewhat patient VC money to go public,
125.
by Umalu 16y ago
This analysis seems right to me. MSFT's annual cash flow from operations is in the $24 billion+ range. MSFT has $44 billion of cash in the bank. What is MSFT going to do with all that cash? Watch Google slowly eat its business? I'm surprise
126.
by Umalu 16y ago
This is a thoughtful review of Kevin Kelly's "What Technology Wants." The book itself is very thought-provoking, so much so that I haven't stopped thinking about it since reading it a month or so ago. The criticisms in this review are certa
127.
by Umalu 16y ago
But how much would it cost Tazo to upgrade their landing page to be merely mediocre-but-usable? I would think that for a company of Tazo's size and success, the cost of doing this would be trivial.
128.
by Umalu 16y ago
When the government hands out cash to the poor, it's a "handout" that creates a "culture of dependency." When the government hands out cash to the banks, it's a "bail-out" that creates a "sound financial system." Right.
129.
by Umalu 16y ago
These are sales numbers for one of the author's books (4 copies sold!), not sales numbers for Google Books as a whole. Still, an interesting point about Google's deeper selection than Amazon making Google the more natural virtual card catal
130.
by Umalu 16y ago
Positional thinking carries a risk. We can look down and feel better, but there is always someone above who will make us feel worse.
131.
by Umalu 16y ago
I thought the site itself was the advice, in a "don't do this" kind of way.
132.
by Umalu 16y ago
Interesting history of the suit. But while the article sees a future for the suit, to me the suit is history. Suits once denoted upper class, and sumptuary laws prevented lower classes from looking upper. Now suits denote lower middle manag
133.
by Umalu 16y ago
Interesting if somewhat unfocused think-piece. What struck me is how forward-looking we were in 1956; Tomorrowland's vision of a future in space looked so clear back then. What would we put in Tomorrowland today?
134.
by Umalu 16y ago
The person interviewed in this article seems to say they are not strangled by data: "The role of data in design at Google gets exaggerated. People forget that design at Google is just as often faith-based as data-driven." So while that may
135.
by Umalu 16y ago
The article answers this question by explaining that the billboard is part of a Facebook tie-in deal to promote Facebook Places in connection with the upcoming New Years in Times Square event.
136.
2011 Will Be the Year Android Explodes (in a good way)(tech.fortune.cnn.com)
8 points by Umalu 16y ago|0 comments
137.
by Umalu 16y ago
Key statement in Tilson's analysis: "the stock is priced for perfection." He is not saying Netflix is a bad business, he is just saying that its current price is so rich it has to continue to do extremely well to justify that rich price, an
138.
by Umalu 16y ago
Steve Eisman, who was featured in Michael Lewis's "The Big Short" as one of the few who foresaw the housing bubble, recently gave a presentation titled "For Profit Education: Subprime Goes to College." Worth flipping through: http://www.sc
139.
by Umalu 16y ago
It is rare to see a truly performance-based employment system at a company because, as this post (and the comments) show, in order to execute well you have to continuously cull the low performers from the herd. This creates a culture of fea
140.
by Umalu 16y ago
Edward Tufte says this is "Probably the best statistical graphic ever drawn." It is discussed in Tufte's Visual Display of Quantitative Information and he even sells a poster of it: http://www.edwardtufte.com/tufte/posters .
141.
In praise of scientific error(scientificamerican.com)
2 points by Umalu 16y ago|0 comments
142.
by Umalu 16y ago
But I thought Microsoft was already dead ;-) http://www.paulgraham.com/microsoft.html
143.
by Umalu 16y ago
I get suspicious when articles talk in terms of "the Chinese" and "the Americans" and "the Germans." That is painting with such a broad brush. You know you are not the same as everyone else in your country, but it is so easy to fall back on
144.
by Umalu 16y ago
You can read Leonard Read's masterful 1958 essay on the miracle of something as humble as a pencil ("I, Pencil") here: http://www.econlib.org/library/Essays/rdPncl1.html
145.
by Umalu 16y ago
It is common for people on the outside to think everyone on the inside is the same. This article makes the very helpful point that it is not enough to be a "lawyer." You must get a "lawyer who understands startups." Otherwise it's like an i
146.
by Umalu 16y ago
Kind of sobering to realize that in 1996 I was building duplo doll houses with my daughter while Larry and Sergey and were building a duplo server housing that grew into a $190 billion company. I had always heard that the Google logo's colo
147.
by Umalu 16y ago
These are good (albeit mostly intuitive) reference checking tips. What amazes is me is how rarely anyone bothers to check references. I've been listed as a reference many times, but estimate I've been called much less than 10% of the time.
148.
by Umalu 16y ago
Over last 5 years, Apple's net income increased 7x, growing from $2 billion to $14 billion. Over this same period, Microsoft grew its net income only 1.5x, from $13 billion to $19 billion. While it is amazing that Apple is almost worth $300
149.
by Umalu 16y ago
At least shoppers with bar code scanners are still visiting stores. What should really be striking fear and terror into the hearts of retailers are shoppers who never set foot in stores anymore, people who, like me, order everything online.
150.
by Umalu 16y ago
How? With 23,000 employees you can staff up a lot of internal projects. And with $30 billion in cash you can afford to acquire a lot of external projects. Why? I think Google has a different philosophy than Apple. Where Apple seems like a d

More ›