Fascinating TED talk on our “addiction to experts”
The thesis is that we are “addicted to experts” and when listening to experts, some research shows we basically stop thinking. Instead, we should continue to think for ourselves and…
“Study: Social media users shy away from opinions”
Study: Social media users shy away from opinions | Technology | KATU.com – Portland News, Sports, Traffic Weather and Breaking News – Portland, Oregon. Study suggests people post what they…
Why on-the-job training has mostly vanished
Is On-the-Job Training Still Worth It for Companies? – Businessweek. The relationship between employers and employees is such that jobs are rarely long lasting anymore. As a result, employers do…
US GAO’s full report on HealthCare.gov management failures
Here is the full report: Ineffective Planning and Oversight Practices Underscore the Need for Improved Contract Management (PDF) I do not have time to read it just now but look…
McDonald’s installs 7,000 self-order entry systems in Europe
As the cost of labor increases, investing in fixed cost capital improvements like robotics and self order systems becomes an easy decision for those hiring low skilled work forces: McDonald’s…
Cover Oregon software failed due to “ideological blindness” to the organization and management failures
Cover Oregon ran Oregon’s failed online health insurance market; it never enrolled a private individual and is being abandoned in a shift to the Federal HealthCare.gov web service. The system…
Scratch – Imagine, Program, Share
Historically, programming could be described as labor intensive, time consuming, error prone – and delivering projects late with defects and incomplete features. The failed Cover Oregon health exchange project suggests…
Teaching 1st year programming using MIT App Inventor
Good news and bad news: Reflections on Using AppInventor to Teach First-year Programming | blog@CACM | Communications of the ACM. MIT App Inventor is a graphical programming system that runs…
Did Newsweek really find Bitcoin inventor Satoshi Nakamoto?
UPDATE: Newsweek’s reporting was wrong: “There was a false unmasking by Newsweek in 2014″ Newsweek has posted a cover story by Leah McGrath Goodman, claiming to have located the inventor…
Developing Android apps using App Inventor 2
Front Page | Explore MIT App Inventor. App Inventor is perhaps the fastest and easiest way to develop custom Android applications. App Inventor uses a graphical programming model in a…
Product reviews versus Service reviews
I recently read through many reviews of cameras and looked at very well done Youtube video reviews of various cameras. Many of these reviews were done by “experts” and others…
90% of Obamacare private insurance plan purchases were by people who were already insured
A survey of 4,562 plan purchasers by McKinsey & Co found that 11 percent had no insurance and 89% were switching from an existing plan (presumably due to being eligible…
The challenge of health information data normalization
Different facilities and doctors use different terminology to describe the same things which makes the exchange of patient data difficult: Until the data is normalized, the true potential of HIEs…
Google Merchant Accounts: How do you change your business address?
Update: Multiple updates, below. Today (November 11) I received a reply from Google that says in order to change my address, I have to set up a new merchant account…
Why does Android’s Google Maps need access to your personal contacts list?
Google has updated the Maps app for Android. The update says the app now requires access to your contacts list. Why? To share with their business partner, the NSA? Who…