I think we're going to have a lot of smaller films to watch soon:

Wellspring's Guirgis is all for the change — but it's not without drawbacks, she maintains. "Fifty percent of the population under 25 wants to make a film," she said. "It's far more of an ambition than writing. "While it's good to make the means of creation more accessible, a lot of the material won't cut it."

Hacking NetFlix : The Age of Independent Films

A REMINDER THAT THIS IS A SURVEY OF 250 PEOPLE WHO AREN’T SMART ENOUGH TO LET THE ANSWERING MACHINE PICK-UP.

-Joan McCullough, East Shore Partners

The Big Picture: Quote of the Day: U of Mich (prelim)

So, is this scientific vindication of what your mother always used to tell you—that breakfast-eating is crucial to academic success?

Not exactly. There is an alternate—and perhaps more compelling—explanation for why breakfast-eaters do relatively well in school while breakfast-skippers may have a tough time: The skippers are also the ones whose bodies rebel against early-morning activity. Their circadian clocks are telling them that it's still nighttime, or they're plain exhausted and need the extra zzz's. Taken together, the scientific literature on breakfast and sleep suggests that making sure kids get enough shut-eye will probably do more for them than dragging them out of bed to eat their Wheaties. Yet the authors of the new review article—like most nutrition researchers—overlook the literature on sleep, which seems to exist in a separate, academic bubble. That's too bad, because differences in kids' sleep patterns may underlie the questions about cognition and academic performance—as well as health effects like obesity—that the breakfast club is most interested in answering.

Shooting Down the Breakfast Club - Why you shouldn't wake your kids up to eat their Wheaties. By Amanda Schaffer

Which brings us to the Touch Toy. Wood says that the project was prompted by the idea of exploring ways of communicating with each other than just texting or phoning.

The Touch Toy is a small, key-fob sized device that has some kind of input mechanism, and some kind of output, Ken Wood said. At the moment, the input mechanism is giving the toy a gentle squeeze, and the output is a vibration.

(You can see where we are going with this already, cant you?)

The Touch Toy relays the input to your phone, connecting via bluetooth. Your phone then sends an instruction to another phone, which relays the signal to that phone's touch toy. The second touch toy then vibrates. Or, as Wood put it: "I squeeze my touch toy, my wife's vibrates".

MS boffins use bluetooth for love bites | Channel Register

I really like reading Expeditors' SEC 8-K filings. It is a very
shareholder friendly company that uses the 8-K to answer all
questions, publically. Not only do you get a nice snapshot of a
very well run business -- that tends to reflect globalization
trends, to boot -- but you also get a great tone of voice.

Such as this Q&A, discussing their competition. Expeditors is
a shipping logistics company -- their customer wants to get their
inventory from place A to place B, and Expeditors buys the
capacity to do so. They pride themselves on being asset-free,
that is, they own no air or ocean freight vehicles themselves.

18. Are you seeing more intense competition from other supply chain solutions companies which own assets, particularly aircraft? Do they have a competitive advantage that Expeditors does not?

As to more intense competition, the answer is no. The sort of competition we are currently seeing has always been there. It's just another flavor of the dancing circus bear. The outfits may change, the routine gets upgraded and the music may be different, but at the end of the day, a dancing asset bear is still a bear in a tutu. Brown bear or grizzly, it is really just the same act. Popular in Europe, but still the same act. They may try to present an image of refinement costumed in a supply chain outfit with a flashy IT wig, but you are still just watching a bear dance. Some say it is just not natural.

With respect to competitive advantages, sure, being a bear no doubt has some competitive advantages, although we question whether improvisation or flexibility could be listed among them.

EDGAR | Expeditiors 8-K, May 31 2005

Surgeons, air traffic controllers, waitresses, and bus drivers—or anyone in a high-stress job—take in a steady flow of information that needs to be processed on the spot. But how much is too much? Cognitive scientists in Australia have concluded that humans can juggle four “chunks” of information at any given instant. After that, they become confused. Their next move is no more reasoned than flipping a coin.

Brains Study Brains - Discover Magazine - science news articles online technology magazine articles Brains Study Brains

From the Dept. of Most Encouraging Statistics: According to an Annenberg poll conducted this spring, about 40 percent of Americans consider Fox News talk show host Bill O'Reilly a "journalist" -- while only 30 percent of the people surveyed said they considered famed Washington Post reporter Bob Woodward to be one. (The poll was conducted from March 7 to May 2, before Mark Felt was revealed to be Deep Throat, but even if that news had boosted Woodward's number another 10 percent, would a tie between the two take us from astonishing to uplifting?)

Salon.com Politics

Microsoft’s Windows Mobile 5.0 is being touted as a potential “BlackBerry killer,” but major security shortcomings could derail widespread enterprise adoption, analysts warned Friday.

One of the things I've come to appreciate about my blackberry is that almost all of the odd limitations come down to their security model. Not only is the user interface surprisingly well optimized for its input means, but as long as you remember that their main customer is government and enterprise, so too is their security model.

This means I have to put up with crippled bluetooth, underfeatured USB, and no camera phone. But the security side of my head says "yes!"

Blackberry Cool � Gartner: Windows Mobile 5.0 Security Falls Short

Meador, who is head of operations at ClearContext, and Deva Hazarika, the chief executive officer, have been playing poker in lieu of collecting paychecks for the past year while working to get their three-person company off the ground. After logging 50 or more hours a week at the office, each one spends another 10 to 15 hours, usually on weekends and evenings, at their favorite poker sites

High-stakes start-ups | CNET News.com

Blockbuster could learn something from this late-return policy

They did. Haven't you seen the End of Late Fees promotional material?

Membership rules apply for rentals. Rentals are due back at the date and time stated on the transaction receipt. There is no additional rental charge if a member keeps a rental item up to 7 days beyond the pre-paid rental period. After 7 days beyond the due date, Blockbuster will automatically convert the rental to a purchase on the 8th day and will charge the member the selling price for the item in effect at the time of the rental, minus the rental fee paid. Member then has 30 days to return the product and receive a credit for the selling price charged, less a $1.25 restocking fee.

however I am curious about what possible financial gain could result from putting $1 on your credit card to pay for them...don't the credit card companies charge ~5% of sales just to tap into their system? Shouldn't cash be encouraged?

It is worse than that. For most vendors, there is generally a per-transaction fee as well as some percent of sales. I have seen numbers like 0.35$ and 3%. Different merchants work out different fee structures, but I have seen numbers suggesting that credit card fees take up a good chunk of individual iTunes purchases. McDonalds probably has a very good deal -- recall that it was only very recently that the fast food vendors began accepting credit cards.

They want to use the credit card for the reasons of the late-fee charge; obviously, they have done a forecast by which the expected value of rental duration is greater than 1 day. Some reasonable number will result in purchases at $25, a significant premium over the cost of media. Membership terms tend to be the motivator by which rentals are returned. Using a credit card and this fee structure, they may lend without membership. The last thing McDonalds wants to do is extend credit to their customers; and the rental business wouldn't work if you had to give them a $25 cash deposit for every video.

Wired News: Order Your Big Mac and DVD to Go