"We continue this protocol until the future date (1 May 2010) at which time we upload our final version of the master document. For this final version, we include the URL of a web site where the .pdf documents of all of our past forecasts can be downloaded and independently checked for consistent MD5 and SHA-2 hashes. For convenience, we will include a summary of all of our forecasts in this final document."

"Suppose you are given a simple closed curve in the plane. (“Simple” means the curve does not intersect itself, “closed” means the curve ends at the same point where it begins.) Can you always find four points on the curve which form the vertices of a square?"

"What makes my job really interesting is that these clients are in different industries and are using different technologies. So we have pulled together a set of 28 tools for creating graphs, Gantt charts, diagrammers, calendars/schedulers, gauges, mapping, pivot tables, OLAP cubes, and sparklines, in Flash, Flex, Ajax or Silverlight."

"Up until World War I, the archetypal manufacturing CEO was production oriented—usually an engineer or inventor of some kind. Even as late as the 1930s, business school curriculums focused mostly on production. Khurana notes that many schools during this era had mini-factories on campus to train future managers."

"IndieVest Pictures evaluates vast numbers of packaged feature film projects and scripts developed by well-known filmmakers and industry professionals. Those projects that we believe are truly unique and compelling are selected for further development by IndieVest Pictures. Of these, only the very best are ultimately admitted into the Premiere Portfolio.

As an IndieVest Member, you’ll gain ‘first look’ access to the Premiere Portfolio, and be able to view all the independent feature films under development by IndieVest Pictures."

"It's not the CG that looks weird; if you shot an ordinary scene with the same 3d technique it would look boring and flat in 2d (indeed, the difficulty of emphasizing depth by adjusting focus on a consumer video camera is a big part of what makes it 'look like video'). So the primary reason Avatar is a Big Deal for Hollywood is that Cameron seems to have succeeded in developing a 3d photographic technique that is much more compelling and realistic than the standard fixed-angle 3d which has been used until now, which actually emphasizes the separation of the audience from the action. And in order to fully appreciate this…yes, you'll need to go to the theater."

"Email has become more like a habitat than an application. It is used for a wide range of tasks such as information management and for coordination and collaboration in organizations. Our research shows that email is the place in which a great deal of work is received and delegated and is a growing portal for access to online publications and information services. Indeed, users have been seen to co-opt email as a personal information management (PIM) tool. This follows from what we have found to be a common tendency of knowledge workers, which is to embed personal information management directly into their favorite workspaces. In this article, we explore further these new and unanticipated uses that are made of email, and suggest potential design ideas to support them better. We present the findings from four months of fieldwork conducted at three companies."

"There are important uses for financial products, even complicated ones, so I don't want to impugn innovation generally, but I also don't want to adopt the position that it was all useful – it clearly wasn't and stronger regulatory oversight is needed. As for the defense of financial models and innovation described above, the statement that innovation generally is the source of economic growth, therefore financial innovation must also be good, isn't much help. Similarly, if saying "models benefit many fields, such as airline safety, and not only financial markets" is the best defense of risk models available, that's telling."

"Although much comes in, there is still plenty for us to seek out and acquire. We are omnivorous in our appetite for material printed in the United States before 1877—if we don’t already have it, we want it, and even if we do have it, we might want another copy if it is slightly different or in better condition than the one we have. We also add secondary materials to the collections to support research here."

"The best way to approach auction type situations like this is often to simply list the maximum price you can afford. Your instance(s) will get run if and when the spot instance price reaches that price and you will regularly get charged less depending on what other users are bidding for their instances.

Though I don’t recommend trying to chase the spot instance price around, it is natural to be curious about what others have been paying and whether or not you might have a chance to get in with your bid."

"Spot Instances are a new way to purchase and consume Amazon EC2 Instances. They allow customers to bid on unused Amazon EC2 capacity and run those instances for as long as their bid exceeds the current Spot Price. The Spot Price changes periodically based on supply and demand, and customers whose bids meet or exceed it gain access to the available Spot Instances. Spot Instances are complementary to On-Demand Instances and Reserved Instances, providing another option for obtaining compute capacity."

"But health care is not zero-sum villainy. This post is not arguing that insurers are better than you think and providers worse. This post is arguing that nature of both groups is beside the point. They work within the market the government constructs. And both the market for insurance and the market for health care need reform. But we're comfortable reforming only the market for insurance, and so we are leaving half — or maybe more than half — the job undone."

QOTW: "There's a reason so many super-villains have graduate degrees."

"I can understand why a retailer would want to use my copyright as bait to lock in readers—but exactly how is this good for me? This is why I'm not selling digital downloads of the professional readings of With a Little Help. With so much friction and goofiness in the marketplace, I'd rather give the MP3s away under a Creative Commons license and solicit donations through PayPal. My listeners don't want DRM. They want to get their books with a minimum of hassle. But, for the record, I'd put my books in Audible and the iTunes Store in a hot second if only they'd sell them on the same terms that I'd be willing to buy them: no DRM and no license agreement except “don't violate copyright law.”"

"Protovis composes custom views of data with simple marks such as bars and dots. Unlike low-level graphics libraries that quickly become tedious for visualization, Protovis defines marks through dynamic properties that encode data, allowing inheritance, scales and layouts to simplify construction.
Protovis is free and open-source, provided under the BSD License. It uses JavaScript and SVG for web-native visualizations; no plugin required (though you will need a modern web browser)! Although programming experience is helpful, Protovis is mostly declarative and designed to be learned by example."

Grammatical Evolution Ruby Exploratory Toolkit

"Faro Measuring System's Laser ScanArm might bring back bad memories of the dentist, but in fact it's another 3D scanning solution–this one mounted to an articulated arm that not only helps you hold it steady, but records the scanner's position in space. Faro's Orlando Perez shoots and captures a mini Lady Liberty:…"

"This is the best and most amazing thing we saw at the conference that wasn't directed by James Cameron: Zebra Imaging boldly proclaims that they "produce the most innovative holographic products and technology in the world," and after an in-person demo, you walk away convinced. Words can't describe what you need to see with your eyes, so check it out (demonstrated by Zebra's Michael Klug):…"