The failure of the wisdom of crowds

James Surowiecki’s The Wisdom of Crowds argues that across a large and diverse group, the average response will be better and smarter than individual experts. He illustrates this point with the jellybean answer. In a large room of people, few will get close to guessing the correct number of jellybeans in a jar. But the [...]

Ask questions

Simplifying somewhat, there are two main ways to respond to a research brief

Answer all issues raised point by point in a methodical and thorough way
Question the brief, outline the options and problems and offer a starting point for discussion

The former will be successful where the client knows the answers and outputs he or she wants [...]

Linkbaiting is a tactic, not a strategy

Will blogging eat itself?
While taking into the account the existential question of what a blog actually is, and the gamut of prose that it encapsulates, the trend for ever-increasing noise does seem apparent (this blog being but one example). From microblogging to reblogging via splogs and linkrolls, are we reducing ourselves to inanity repeated endlessly? [...]

Links automatically opening in new windows

Whenever I link to other pages or sites, I’ve specified that the link should open in a new tab or window. Ever since the advent of tabbed browsing, this is the way I have surfed the Internet and so it made sense to me.
However, my opinion has changed after reading the posts and comments over [...]

Mygazines and online magazine sharing

Everything is Miscellaneous points to Mygazines, a new website where people can upload and share their magazines.
My previous post was on piracy; would this venture come under the banner? Perhaps, though I’m not sure whether content owners would be as keen to pursue the owners in court (not yet, anyway)

Unlike music or films, magazines have [...]

BigChampagne and measuring piracy

Photo by http://www.flickr.com/photos/sharynmorrow/
Through this Economist article on Internet piracy, I came across the company BigChampagne. Among the data they compile are statistics on p2p downloads.
I can’t fathom from their website how exactly they measure this activity (I presume they crunch IP addresses of seeders and leechers), but it is certainly an area work monitoring. I [...]

Public accepting of advertising supporting free online video

New data from Ipsos MediaCT in the United States shows that the public are largely accepting of the ad-supported online video model.

Over four in five online video users think that it is reasonable to include advertising on full length TV programmes. To me, this is expected but what I did find surprising is that almost two thirds [...]

Observations from New York

1. With the notable exception of the staff at Century 21, everyone (whom I met in Manhattan, anyway) is really nice
2. With the ability to run air conditioned subway trains 24 hours a day, you’d think it wouldn’t be so difficult to have electronic boards telling you how long it would be before the next [...]

Vacation time

Photo by http://www.flickr.com/photos/stuckincustoms/
Macy’s 4th July Fireworks; Mets vs. Giants; shopping til I drop; Circle Line Tour; Guggenheim; Rockefeller; Lady Liberty; Hot dogs; bagels; cocktails; jet-lag.
I’ll be back in a few weeks.
sk

Links – 3rd July 2008

This will be the last link update for a couple of weeks
Blog-related
Happiness as your business model – presentation and analysis (Experience Curve)
Top 10 TED talks (Boing Boing)
Noah Brier’s Brand Tags has been adapted for the UK
The Marketing Society’s 50 golden brands microsite
Excellent business quotes (Junta42)
Appraising Forrester (Technobabble 2.0)
ESPN’s 360 model (Mediapost) and the move to [...]