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| Current Topic: Technology |
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Trust and Reputation Building in e-Commerce |
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| Topic: Technology |
10:51 pm EDT, Aug 14, 2002 |
Abstract: Transactions on online markets require a great deal of trust among anonymous trading partners. To mitigate some of the risks involved in anonymous transactions, several online market sites have implemented reputation management mechanisms that differ in structure and probably functionality. In a series of experiments, this study examines the impact of two simple reputation management mechanisms on the evolution of trust and trustworthiness in a repeated trust game among strangers. Follow the link "RC22533.pdf" to access the full text in PDF. Trust and Reputation Building in e-Commerce |
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Blog's the word at MSNBC.com |
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| Topic: Technology |
8:46 am EDT, Aug 3, 2002 |
MSNBC will introduce a new Web logs section by the end of August, a move that will allow it more editorial control over the opinionated ramblings of its former online discussion boards. "Web logs create a different kind of community. Like-minded people come together to talk about things ..." This is interesting. MSNBC says that trading group discussion boards for personal web logs will simplify their editorial lives and bring an end to flame wars, apparently because people who disagree won't be able to find each other. Blog's the word at MSNBC.com |
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The Seven Myths of Knowledge Management |
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| Topic: Technology |
11:02 pm EDT, Jul 27, 2002 |
If you look at how companies approach knowledge management, you can see that the problem is in the execution. Companies commonly make catastrophic mistakes ... Realize you don't have to solve every information problem on the first day. Start small, demonstrate successes and develop evangelists for your efforts. One caveat: You need to think big even as you start small. Focus as much on the value and reliability of the information as on how the information is stored. [A firm] built a way for people to query each other -- people no longer just looked up information but could find the scientists who generated the information and ask a precise question. Employees were delighted. They made better decisions, and in less time. In the end, knowledge management isn't about maintaining a pristine database. It's about fostering an environment in which people can ask questions ... an open system that encourages building relationships through communities and creating opportunities for personal interaction, across cubicles and across oceans. The Seven Myths of Knowledge Management |
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Not Just Closing a Divide, but Leaping It |
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| Topic: Technology |
12:55 pm EDT, Jul 20, 2002 |
Mitchel Resnick, of the MIT Media Lab: "Access is not enough. Access is just a starting point." "It's not about playing games, but about making your own games. It's not about surfing the Web, but it's about making your own Web pages. It's not just about downloading MP3 music files, but doing your own music composition." "We want to see young people literally taking their own ideas and creating." One of the biggest draws is the digital studio, a glass-enclosed back room equipped with a synthesizer, microphones and a CD-burning computer loaded with software to create and edit music. During recording sessions, the glass trembles with booming bass notes and synthesized percussion. At first, anyone could drop in and use the studio, "but so many people were going back there that it got to the point where we had to put in some limits." "There were other places kids could go and get access to computers ... But it wasn't satisfying the need that we saw that was out there for kids to express themselves, to create something, to have a sense that they could bring about change with the technology." The future of intellectual property is under construction at the Computer Clubhouse. What does it mean for your business model? Not Just Closing a Divide, but Leaping It |
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Blast From the Past | Baseball, Radio, and TV |
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| Topic: Technology |
1:03 pm EDT, Jul 14, 2002 |
This new radio craze is already crimping attendance. ... And next we will have the whole works shot to pieces because instead of mere sound, the radio will be producing in every home that has a [set] the picture of the play. ... Then what will become of baseball? Nobody will actually see Ruth and Sisler in action except the bored operators of the wireless picture-producing machine. ... The magnates won't have to worry about taking care of their crowds, their concrete grand stands will be torn down and the business of baseball will be collecting a fee for supplying the action that is reproduced on the parlor wall instead of counting the gate. -- The Sporting News, April 27, 1922 In another era, technology and entertainment collide in a public display of creative destruction. Could the music industry learn a thing or two from the history of baseball? Blast From the Past | Baseball, Radio, and TV |
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Local Search in Unstructured Networks [PDF] |
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| Topic: Technology |
11:38 pm EDT, Jun 27, 2002 |
Abstract: We discuss a number of message-passing algorithms that can be efficiently used to search through power-law networks. Most of these algorithms are meant to be improvements for peer-to-peer file sharing systems, and some may also shed some light on how unstructured social networks with certain topologies might function relatively efficiently with local information. Like the networks that they are designed for, these algorithms are completely decentralized, and they exploit the power-law link distribution in the node degree. We demonstrate that some of these search algorithms can work well on real Gnutella networks, scale sub-linearly with the number of nodes, and may help reduce the network search traffic that tends to cripple such networks. To appear in: 'Handbook of Graphs and Networks: From the Genome to the Internet', S. Bornholdt and H.G. Schuster (eds.), Wiley-VCH, Berlin, 2002. Local Search in Unstructured Networks [PDF] |
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TOOL: The Open Opinion Layer |
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| Topic: Technology |
9:31 pm EDT, Jun 26, 2002 |
In March 2001, I recommended an earlier revision of this paper to readers of the fadori mailing list, saying, "Interesting thoughts on reputation systems, collaborative filtering, content annotation for virtual communities, and more ..." The latest version of the paper, logged here, will appear in the upcoming July 2002 edition of First Monday. Going public? Abstract: Shared opinions drive society: what we read, how we vote, and where we shop are all heavily influenced by the choices of others. However, the cost in time and money to systematically share opinions remains high, while the actual performance history of opinion generators is often not tracked. This article explores the development of a distributed open opinion layer, which is given the generic name of TOOL. Similar to the evolution of IP as an underlying layer for many computational tasks, we suggest that all open opinion layers can conceptually be merged into a single underlying TOOL layer that will become a common substrate upon which many scientific, commercial, and social activities will be based. Valuation decisions are ubiquitous in human interaction and thought itself. Incorporating information valuation into a computational layer will be as significant a step forward as our current communication and information retrieval layers. TOOL: The Open Opinion Layer |
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Making the Nation Safer: The Role of Science and Technology in Countering Terrorism [PDF] |
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| Topic: Technology |
6:42 am EDT, Jun 25, 2002 |
The United States needs to move to protect nuclear plants and the power grid against future attacks and may need to reorganize the way government agencies work together. "The community can make a critical contribution to protecting the nation. Our report gives the government a blueprint." "We now face a much more sophisticated threat." ... The power grid is vulnerable. "We could also lose a large part of the electrical distribution, electrical transmission system. In a worst-case scenario you would get a cascading failure," causing regional outages lasting weeks or months. ... Another glaring need is for trusted spokespeople to be put into place. The Office of Homeland Security should establish a new security institute made up of experts who could spot shortcomings in critical systems around the country and find ways to reduce or eliminate those problems. This effort should include "red teaming" exercises ... Seven urgent priorities: bioweapons treatments, vaccines; strengthening the power grid; using IT to detect, prevent cyber-attacks; emergency response communications; attack-resistant buildings; sensor and surveillance systems; air filtration and decontamination. Making the Nation Safer: The Role of Science and Technology in Countering Terrorism [PDF] |
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Seeing and Tuning Social Networks | O'Reilly Network |
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| Topic: Technology |
5:28 pm EDT, Jun 15, 2002 |
"New forms of social software are one of the most hopeful green shoots erupting from a still-bleak technology landscape. "The excitement is coming back." Seeing and Tuning Social Networks | O'Reilly Network |
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KPNQwest's network dropping data |
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| Topic: Technology |
5:59 am EDT, Jun 14, 2002 |
An Internet performance-monitoring company says KPNQwest's fiber-optic network has been losing track of the data it delivers at "alarming rates" since Friday. Since early Friday, KPNQwest's networks have been losing an average of 4 percent to 5 percent of all data. KPNQwest's network dropping data |
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