Catching up with technology
Tuesday, October 14, 2008 at 2:23AM TECHNOLOGY QUARTERLY: 1) "The meek shall inherit the web: Computing: In future, most new internet users will be in developing countries and will use mobile phones. Expect a wave of innovation," 2) "Gas, gas, quick boys: Chemical sensors: A new nanodevice able to detect low concentrations of chemical agents could help to thwart terrorist gas attacks," and 3) "Following the crowd: The internet: The idea of 'crowdsourcing," or asking crowds of internet users for ideas, is being tried out in some unusual quarters," The Economist, 6 September 2008.
Three ideas I've been waiting on. Decent descriptions found here.
1) Forget one-laptop-per-child, because it's all about mobile phones. Even my kids know that one.
2) The coming ubiquitous sensing environment.
3) Asking the crowd for inputs. Remember my "55th State" article for Esquire? Well, you all helped write that one. In many ways, a slew of readers were all research assistants on Great Powers, which is why I thanked so many in the acknowledgments.
Reader Comments (2)
http://caps.fool.com
You rate any stock you want and "bet" that it will outperform or underperform the S&P over some period of time. The Fool then aggregates everyone's picks. Guess what happens? The top 5 star picks outperform, the 1 star stocks underperform. Seems trivial until you realize that Wall St spends gajillions of dollars trying to figure out the same thing in advance.
On your trips to Tennessee, you really ought to look up UT law professor Glenn Reynolds, the author of "An Army of Davids" which deals with this very subject. I really think that the two of you would have a lot to talk about.