Month: July 2003

The shelf life of booksWe talked before about the importance of shelf life, indicating that one of the key issues for most companies involves extending the shelf life of its products. In the crazy book industry, where a few chains (Borders, Barnes & Noble, Wal-Mart) hold a powerful oligopsony, even the biggest publishers have little power… Continue reading oligopsony

Sears discards credit division Citigroup bought the credit card operations of Sears for $3.4 billion. That's another step in the roll-up of the credit industry. The idea is that Sears can now concentrate on its core business, rather than financial services. But the problem is that Sears is threatened in its core businesses. In apparel… Continue reading credit card operations

David Galbraith groks it. This just in from David Galbraith…..  One small step for Technorati.. Something interesting is happening in the world of online identities. The end goal is clear – a distributed, decentralized identity system where people have control over their own identity online – a people's 'Passport' or what Marc Canter envisages as… Continue reading David Galbraith groks it

Help isbn.nu!. “I'm not a library scientist, nor do I play one on the Web. However, I do run isbn.nu, and have lots of ideas about how people conceive of books: not as ISBNs nor as editions (usually) but as works that have various instanciations. Most recently, I've been able to add a limited form… Continue reading Help isbn.nu!

It Was the Best of Winning Entries, It Was the Worst of Winning Entries. Bulwer-Lytton Contest Results “The annual Bulwer-Lytton contest recognizes and awards the very worst opening sentences found in novels. The 2003 results are in (2002 results, 2001 results) and the winning entry begins “They had but one last remaining night together, so… Continue reading It Was the Best of Winning Entries, It Was the Worst of Winning Entries

Laszlo caught my eye today. Folks over on the .NET Weblogs were talking about Laszlo's launch. Looks awesome.  [The Scobleizer Weblog]

AppleMatters interview. AppleMatters interviews Zeldman about why he likes Macs, how he uses them in his studio, and recursive icon bug in the OS X Finder. [Jeffrey Zeldman Presents: The Daily Report]

Paul Resnick on Reputation. Online reputation mechanisms are large-scale online word-of-mouth communities in which individuals share opinions on a wide range of topics, including companies, products, services, and even world events (Dellarocas, 2003). Best known so far as a technology for building trust and fostering cooperation in online trading communities, such as eBay, these mechanisms… Continue reading Paul Resnick on Reputation

First Impression. “If it's not fun, don't do it. Time to get another job.” –Alan Webber, Founding Editor, Fast Company  [Fast Company]

An announcement about RSS. As noted on Scripting News today, the RSS 2.0 copyright has been transferred to Harvard, the spec has been placed under a Creative Commmons license, and an advisory board — initially Dave Winer, Brent Simmons, and me — has been formed. … [Jon's Radio]