Well, golllly, Martha, says here there's a county in California that's voted for the winning candidate for governor five times running! Must be a big deal, seems they can see everything coming. Glad the SJ Merc is checking on what they think of the recall. Worth 42 column inches and a page one lead below the fold!

Um, hold on here. Time for some remedial statistics.

Now, class, let's suppose the odds of voting with the winner each time are just even (likely less than the case). Let's also suppose the trials are independent, that is, picking the winner last time doesn't give you any better chance this time. Now, the odds of having picked the winner in five elections would be? Yes, Billy? Correct, that would be one in 32! Now for a bonus, since there are 58 counties in California, should we be surprised that one got it right? No? Gold star for you!

It's obvious that elementary statistics isn't a requirement for graduating from J-school. Nor, since picking the stories and where they run is the editor's perogative, does it seem to be a qualification for that job at the Merc. Since these are the folks who presume to recommend who can best balance our budget, how the economy is to be revived, and how to interpret venture capital results, I suggest you all set your credibility knob accordingly.
7:58:56 PM    

Rich Miller has an thoughtful post on RFID privacy issues. Two key points that I'd emphasize:

1. In spite of optimistic visions of coupling sensing and other elements with RFID, initially and for a long time to come they will be passive devices recording only UPC/UID combinations. As Rich points out, this is nothing more or less than a portable key into product and transaction databases. The privacy issue is controlling dissemination of customer information among those databases, a problem which transcends RFID, as controversies around direct marketing make clear.

2. The limitation on RFID deployment currently, and on the distopian visions of its future impact, is the same: cost. Both the tags and readers are non-trivial expenses in a retail and distribution foodchain that runs on thin margins. There's a lot more immediate payoff in optimizing that distribution chain, than in the speculative marketing benefits of tracking what sweater you're wearing when you wander into the mall. Even if there weren't privacy issues in that scenario, the implied installed base and capital expense of equipment means it's quite a ways off, even if there there were a provable return.

If you're looking for something to worry about, ponder instead the reported EU initiative to RFID tag all Euronotes. Given the 'markup' involved in printing and issuing paper money, this will be economic from day one. The implications are limited only by the imaginations of the Eurocrats.

If this is an area you'd like to follow, check here for a feed of relevant stories, though with limited interpretation.
4:45:00 PM    

In the wake of last week's post on the demise of 'big VR' came two relevant e-mails received over the long holiday weekend.

The first arrives from an investor in Russia, who has been involved in the rebirth of the Pachikov's pioneering VR firm Paragraph as Parallel Graphics. (Paragraph was absorbed by SGI, and then spun off again during one of its periodic downsizings.) Mr. Stobie reports they have "killed all those fanciful 3D projects from 3D chat environments to 3D virtual marketing rooms", and are now profitable "processing inputs from original 3D design to create 'light' fully-informed 3D models" for verticals specifically including aerospace. Ah, the joys of low cost Russian R&D!

Then arrives a notice that VR guru Jaron Lanier will be speaking at a BayCHI gathering, and he has helpfully sent ahead a list of the top 11 reasons VR is not commonplace. Read the whole thing, but here's my pick for insight:

10) Because there is still no clear sense of where VR fits into the time and space of our lives and workflows.  VR setups take up space.  Where would you put one?  When would you use it?  New interfaces usually colonize the time and space taken up by older ones.  That's why the first successful consumer computer designs initially looked like typewriters, even though I think everyone involved was vaguely embarrassed by the association.  Same with wireless devices in relation to phones.  What exactly is VR stepping into the shoes of?  It can't really step into reality, so, where? When?

And Jaron's summation?

Having said all this, please remember that considered as an industrial (rather than consumer) technology, VR has been a great success. You can't buy a car that wasn't designed in VR, or fill it with gas that was found without the aid of VR.

1:45:08 PM