Kickstarter

The Kickstarter Handbook: Real-Life Success Stories of Artists, Inventors, and Entrepreneurs
by Steinberg, Don
Published 14 Aug 2012

People who are hip about all things Kickstarter occasionally refer to a campaign as, simply, “a Kickstarter.” A person who launches a campaign may also be called “a Kickstarter.” So, yeah, a Kickstarter can launch a Kickstarter on Kickstarter. Hey, it’s a flexible word, and the author and publisher of this book don’t have to pay a royalty every time we use it, so there you go. Most of the rest of the stuff that happens on Kickstarter can be described using normal, everyday English, and we don’t anticipate any confusion. So what are you waiting for? Let’s get this dance party started. As one Kickstarter campaign creator might say: there’s no time like the Present. IT’S EASY TO HEAR THE TALES of Kickstarter hauls so gargantuan that your eyes light up like silver dollars while the cash-register sound from Pink Floyd’s song “Money” plays in your head.

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Born as a so-crazy-it-just-might-work notion, Kickstarter was quickly becoming a breeding ground to nurture more such outlandish ideas. But even then, Kickstarter had barely shifted into second gear. By 2011, Publishers Weekly magazine calculated that Kickstarter had become the No. 3 publisher of indie graphic novels in the United States, in terms of the number of book projects it funded. The 2012 Sundance Film Festival, a major showcase for independent films, featured seventeen movies that had received Kickstarter funding, amounting to 10 percent of the festival’s lineup. Early in 2012, Kickstarter announced that it expected to fund creative projects to the tune of $150 million for the year, a slightly larger sum than the 2012 fiscal year budget for the National Endowment for the Arts.

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It gets a little squishy, though. Plenty of companies have been born because Kickstarter funding helped them produce their first gadget, or game, or clock, or smooth stones that control the temperature of your cup of coffee (this last was a real Kickstarter, called Coffee Joulies). “The idea of a creative project is a made-up one. It’s kind of a fuzzy line,” Kickstarter cofounder Yancey Strickler has acknowledged. The brass at Kickstarter feels that even if what you’re really doing is starting a company, and the product in your campaign is its genesis, Kickstarter wants the campaign to be about the product, not the company.

This Could Be Our Future: A Manifesto for a More Generous World
by Yancey Strickler
Published 29 Oct 2019

Many Kickstarter projects underwent a similar transition from new and unproven idea to mainstream acceptance. The tabletop game Cards Against Humanity started as a Kickstarter project backed by several hundred people. So did Oculus Rift, which was a prototype in a garage when its Kickstarter launched. Pebble invented smartwatches with its string of Kickstarter projects. Hundreds of restaurants, movie theaters, galleries, and other public spaces are open today thanks to their backers and the platform. All these projects began as ideas just like Kickstarter itself. During Kickstarter’s first year, I reviewed nearly every project when it launched.

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We said publicly that we’d never sell the company or take it public. We would do what was best for Kickstarter’s mission, not use it to do what was best for us. Unlike Silicon Valley companies burning through piles of cash, we stayed small and lived within our means. Kickstarter began operating profitably in its fourteenth month in business. A bit more than one hundred people work out of Kickstarter’s office, an old pencil factory in Brooklyn that the company bought years ago. Kickstarter doesn’t even have a landlord. It was this same independent spirit that led Kickstarter to become a public benefit corporation (PBC). A PBC is a for-profit company that’s legally committed to balancing shareholder interests with producing a positive benefit for society.

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The Creative Independent has no advertising, charges nothing for its content, and has a full-time staff. Kickstarter pays for all of it. And yet there’s no Kickstarter logo anywhere. Kickstarter is listed in the site’s footer as its publisher, but otherwise derives no direct benefit. So why do it? Because The Creative Independent is a value-creating project according to the commitments in Kickstarter’s PBC charter. The site supports the creative community, provides resources and educational material for creative people, and elevates the work of artists and creators. These are values that Kickstarter is committed to growing, and The Creative Independent supports with distinction.

Makers at Work: Folks Reinventing the World One Object or Idea at a Time
by Steven Osborn
Published 17 Sep 2013

Osborn: I just have one more question about Kickstarter. I mean, everybody and their dog is launching Kickstarter projects it seems, and I just want to know about your experiences with it and maybe any hiccups you had or challenges dealing with the Kickstarter model. It sounds like you’re thinking about doing it again already, so I’m guessing you had a pretty good experience. Is there anything you can say there or any advice you have for anybody considering using Kickstarter? Kettenburg: Yes. So we had a couple of bumps in the road with Kickstarter directly, actually. Kickstarter pulled our project when it was around the $200,000 mark.

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So the first time that we did a firmware update was a bit exciting. Osborn: Tell me a bit about how you guys launched on Kickstarter—what the Kickstarter experience was like. How did you make the decision to do Kickstarter? You guys are still the most successful Kickstarter campaign, but I think you’re also a really early hardware device on Kickstarter. Like you said, it’s kind of gotten to the point where hardware start-ups are a sexy thing to do now, but you started well before that. Migicovsky: We decided to go on Kickstarter mainly because we were unable to raise money from standard, more typical investment sources. We joined a program called Y Combinator, which is an incubator in Silicon Valley.

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Osborn: You launched the Form I on Kickstarter. It had a lot of success there. I know there are a lot of makers right now interested in Kickstarter. It is possible to test the feasibility of something, the commercial viability of something right out the gate, without having to ship it first and take a huge risk or liability up front. I was wondering if you had any advice about Kickstarter or had any interesting experiences with them, or anything you could share? Linder: As you know, our Kickstarter experience was pretty amazing. Above all, it was pretty humbling because what Kickstarter does—it is this amplifier for early adopters, for lack of a better description—and sorry it’s a little bit clichéd, but it’s true.

Future Perfect: The Case for Progress in a Networked Age
by Steven Johnson
Published 14 Jul 2012

Yet there is nothing in Kickstarter’s DNA that says it has to be a for-profit company. We could easily decide as a society that the $200 million Kickstarter is disbursing is not nearly enough to support the kind of creative innovation we need in our culture. At which point, the government could create its own Kickstarter and promote it via its own channels, or it could use taxpayer dollars as matching grants to amplify the effect of each Kickstarter donation. This, in a nutshell, is the difference between a libertarian and a peer-progressive approach. The libertarian looks at Kickstarter and says, “Great, now we can do away with the NEA.”

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But Krupnick was facing this dilemma in 2010, which meant that he had another option: a website named Kickstarter. Founded in April 2009 by Perry Chen, Charles Adler, and Yancey Strickler, Kickstarter is perhaps the most successful of a new generation of “crowdfunding” sites that organize financial support for creative or charitable causes through distributed networks of small donors. On Kickstarter, artists upload short descriptions of their projects: a book of poetry that’s only half completed, a song cycle that has yet to be recorded, a script for a short film that needs a crew to get produced. Kickstarter’s founders defined “creative” quite broadly: technological creativity is welcome, as are innovations in such fields as food or design.

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To a traditional economist, there’s something baffling about the lack of an “upside” in the Kickstarter donation. By strict utilitarian standards, the vast majority of Kickstarter donors are wildly overpaying for the product. No music video—however long, however large the typeface they use to thank donors personally in the credits—is worth a hundred dollars, particularly a music video by an unknown director that hasn’t, technically, been made yet. So why does the contribution get made? The return on the Kickstarter investment can’t be measured by the conventional yardstick of utilitarian economic theory.

Blood, Sweat, and Pixels: The Triumphant, Turbulent Stories Behind How Video Games Are Made
by Jason Schreier
Published 4 Sep 2017

Double Fine had found a fourth option: Kickstarter, a “crowdfunding” website that had launched in 2009. Using this website, creators could pitch directly to their fans: You give us money; we’ll give you something cool. During Kickstarter’s first couple of years, users of the site were hobbyists, hoping to earn a few thousand dollars to shoot short films or build neat folding tables. In 2011, however, the projects started getting bigger, and in February 2012, Double Fine launched a Kickstarter for a point-and-click adventure game called the Double Fine Adventure.* It shattered every record. Previous Kickstarters had been lucky to break six figures; Double Fine raised $1 million in twenty-four hours.

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Then Josh Sawyer and Adam Brennecke came to Urquhart with an ultimatum: they wanted to launch a Kickstarter. They preferred to do it with Obsidian, but if Urquhart continued to stonewall, they’d quit, start their own company, and do it themselves. To sweeten the pot, Sawyer added that he’d be happy to keep working on pitches for publishers, as long as someone at the company started planning a Kickstarter. It helped that other Obsidian veterans had also expressed a great deal of interest in crowdfunding, including Chris Avellone, who had been publicly praising Kickstarter for months, even going as far as to poll Obsidian fans about what kind of project they’d want to help fund.* Urquhart relented, and within the next few days, Adam Brennecke was locking himself alone in an office, trying to come up with the perfect Kickstarter.

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What you’d have found instead was dozens of people mashing F5 on their keyboards, watching the Project Eternity Kickstarter raise hundreds of dollars per minute. In the afternoon, realizing that they weren’t going to get much work done, Feargus Urquhart took a group of staff and went to Dave & Buster’s across the street, where they ordered a round of beers and proceeded to stare silently at their phones, refreshing Kickstarter. By the end of the day they’d hit $700,000. The next few weeks were a whirlwind of fundraising, updates, and interviews. Project Eternity raised its original goal of $1.1 million a day after the Kickstarter went live, but Urquhart and his crew weren’t content settling for the minimum—they wanted to raise as much as possible.

The History of the Future: Oculus, Facebook, and the Revolution That Swept Virtual Reality
by Blake J. Harris
Published 19 Feb 2019

All of the hardest stuff (Optics, display panels, and interface hardware) is done, right now I am working on how it actually fits together, and figuring out the best way to make a head mount . . . The goal is to start a Kickstarter project on June 1st that will end on July 1st, shipping afterwards as soon as possible. I won’t make a penny of profit off this project, the goal is to pay for the costs of parts, manufacturing, shipping, and credit card/Kickstarter fees with about $10 left over for a celebratory pizza and beer. I need help, though . . .” After listing a few of the things he needed help with (a logo, ideas for the Kickstarter video, etc.), Luckey published the post on MTBS3D. He felt hopeful—hopeful that this might be “the kind of thing that jumpstarts a bigger VR community.”

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“I saw you tweeted about Ouya,” Iribe said. “The reaction to their Kickstarter . . . I mean, it’s just . . . crazy.” Bleszinski couldn’t help but nod in agreement. There was just no other valid reaction. It was crazy.6,7 Ouya’s Kickstarter campaign went live on the morning of July 10. In just eight hours, on the heels of over eight thousand backers, the campaign surpassed its fund-raising goal of $950,000.8 Even crazier: Ouya would end up raising $8,596,474 (from 63,416 backers) by the end of its thirty-day run.9 Iribe knew it was unrealistic to envision Oculus’s Kickstarter campaign achieving that same kind of runaway success.

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Iribe texted Antonov late at night on August 4. “Dillon’s resigning from Autodesk on Monday and joining Oculus!” “You don’t think it’s a bit early?” Antonov replied. “What will he be doing a month from now, when the Kickstarter is over and we don’t yet have SDK & Kits to give out? I guess organizing forums and Korean community?” “Localizing Kickstarter, press release, first press event, etc.,” Iribe said. “We need Korean devs buying Kickstarter kits.” “Well that is obvious . . . just to me it sounds like part a part time job until kits actually ship. Right now we are in a hype-spin marketing wave; but then we’ll need to buckle down and actually get it all ready . . .

Makers
by Chris Anderson
Published 1 Oct 2012

Underground VC Kickstarter solves three huge problems for entrepreneurs. First, it simply moves revenues forward in time, to right when they’re needed. One of the reasons startups traditionally have to raise money at the start is to pay for product development, tooling, purchasing components, and manufacturing, all of which they’ll presumably get back later when they sell the products. But if they can turn those sales into presales, which is essentially what Kickstarter does, they’ll have the money when they need it and won’t have to raise venture capital or take out a loan. Second, Kickstarter turns customers into a community.

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But the degrees of separation they connect are the real magic, reflecting latent knowledge about people’s desires that can be identified only by the combination of the people they know and ideas that are compelling enough to pass along (what social scientists call memetic). How did you come to hear of your first Kickstarter project (assuming you have)? Was it a friend who thought you might be interested? The feed of someone whom you follow on social media? Coverage in the news in some area you follow? The point is that you probably didn’t go to Kickstarter looking for it. It found you. And if you responded, you were the right target audience even though nobody might have been able to guess that beforehand. So Kickstarter is not just money-raising, it’s market research. It surfaces demand that could often not be found any other way.

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In short, a few Maker-style entrepreneurs had outdesigned, out-marketed, and outpriced one of the biggest electronics companies in the world. And then, thanks to Kickstarter, they got ready to out-sell Sony, too. The Pebble team set a Kickstarter target of $100,000. It reached that in just two hours (I was one of those early backers). And then it kept on going. By the end of the first day, it had passed $1 million. By the end of the first week, it had broken the previous Kickstarter record of $3.34 million. After a little more than three weeks, Pebble had already passed $10 million in backing and had pre-sold 85,000 watches.

Creative Intelligence: Harnessing the Power to Create, Connect, and Inspire
by Bruce Nussbaum
Published 5 Mar 2013

The experience is not a simple transaction like buying a work of art at a gallery or an album off iTunes. It’s deeper and richer. The first Kickstarter projects raised $1,000, $5,000, even $25,000. But the audience for participating in the creative process proved both larger and more willing to invest than the founders had imagined. Between its launch in 2009 and October 2012, successful Kickstarter projects raised a total of $316 million, mostly for art and music. If Kickstarter continues to grow at this rate, it will soon rival the National Endowment for the Arts, which had an operating budget of $146 million for 2012. But Kickstarter doesn’t finance just art and music. A campaign for new watches based on the iPod nano music player (you snap it into a special wrist band) raised nearly $1 million; the resulting products, TikTok and LunaTik, sold tens of thousands for their designer, Scott Wilson, at his company Minimal in Chicago.

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Charles Adler presentation in the author’s Parsons course Design at the Edge, spring 2012; Carlye Adler, “How Kickstarter Became a Lab for Daring Prototypes and Ingenious Products, Wired, March 18, 2011, accessed September 11, 2012, http://www.wired.com/magazine/2011/03/ ff_kickstarter/2/. 86 All transactions are handled: Yancey Strickler, “Amazon Payments and US-Only” Kickstarter Blog post, October 3, 2009, http://www.kickstarter.com/blog/amazon-payments-and-us-only, accessed September 11, 2012. 86 On one level Chen, Strickler: Charles Adler: personal interviews with the author. Charles Adler presentation in the author’s Parsons course Design at the Edge, spring 2012. 87 The first Kickstarter projects: Ibid. 87 Between its launch in 2009 and October 2012: http://www.kickstarter.com/help/stats, accessed October 4, 2012. 87 which had an operating budget: http://www.arts.gov/about/budget/ appropriationshistory.html, accessed October 19, 2012. 87 A campaign for new watches: “Transform Your iPod Nano into the World’s Coolest Multi-Touch Watches with TikTok + LunaTik by Scott Wilson and MINIMAL,” Kickstarter campaign site, http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/ 1104350651/tiktok-lunatik-multi-touch-watch-kits. 87 San Francisco–based studio raised: “Doublefine Adventure,” Kickstarter campaign page, accessed September 11, 2012, http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/doublefine/ double-fine-adventure?

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Charles Adler presentation in the author’s Parsons course Design at the Edge, spring 2012. 87 The first Kickstarter projects: Ibid. 87 Between its launch in 2009 and October 2012: http://www.kickstarter.com/help/stats, accessed October 4, 2012. 87 which had an operating budget: http://www.arts.gov/about/budget/ appropriationshistory.html, accessed October 19, 2012. 87 A campaign for new watches: “Transform Your iPod Nano into the World’s Coolest Multi-Touch Watches with TikTok + LunaTik by Scott Wilson and MINIMAL,” Kickstarter campaign site, http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/ 1104350651/tiktok-lunatik-multi-touch-watch-kits. 87 San Francisco–based studio raised: “Doublefine Adventure,” Kickstarter campaign page, accessed September 11, 2012, http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/doublefine/ double-fine-adventure?ref=live. 88 JOBS Act, new legislation: Mark Landler, “Obama Signs Bill to Promote Start-Up Investments,” New York Times, April 5, 2012, accessed September 11, 2012, hhtp://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/06/us/politics/obama-signs-bill-to-ease-investing-in-start-ups.html; Ryan Caldbeck, “How the JOBS Act Could Change Startup Investing Forever,” TechCrunch, March 16, 2012, accessed September 11, 2012, http://techcrunch.com/2012/03/16/ crowdfundingstartups/. 88 We all hold a number: I am deeply indebted to my wife, Leslie M.

New Power: How Power Works in Our Hyperconnected World--And How to Make It Work for You
by Jeremy Heimans and Henry Timms
Published 2 Apr 2018

“I’m thrilled that you’re writing”: Yochai Benkler, discussion with authors, December 2, 2016. “What’s interesting is that if you teach”: Ibid. “Benkler’s dream”: Benkler, “Carr-Benkler Wager Revisited.” “Kickstarter is not a store”: Strickler, Chen, and Adler, “Kickstarter Is Not a Store.” “public benefit corporation”: Yancey Strickler, Perry Chen, and Charles Adler, “Kickstarter Is Now a Benefit Corporation,” Kickstarter (blog), September 21, 2015. www.kickstarter.com. Kickstarter’s charter boldly: “Charter,” July 2017. www.kickstarter.com. “We told people”: Perry Chen, discussion with authors, March 10, 2017. A study at the University of Pennsylvania: University of Pennsylvania Wharton School of Business, “Wharton Crowdfunding Study,” July 2017. www.crowdfunding.wharton.upenn.edu.

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Kickstarter’s charter boldly, and in plain English, paints a picture of a very different kind of new power behemoth: • Kickstarter will care for the health of its ecosystem and integrity of its systems. • Kickstarter will never sell user data to third parties. It will zealously defend the privacy rights and personal data of the people who use its service, including in its dealings with government entities… • Kickstarter will not cover every possible future contingency, or claim rights and powers just because it can or because doing so is industry standard. • Kickstarter will not lobby or campaign for public policies unless they align with its mission and values, regardless of possible economic benefits to the company

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Amazon: Different Ideas of What Is ‘Handmade,’ ” Forbes, October 10, 2015. Their network allows anyone: Meetup, July 2017. www.meetup.com. So now Meetup’s primary business model: Meetup, “Organizer Subscription Pricing,” July 2017. www.meetup.com. “Kickstarter is not a store”: Yancey Strickler, Perry Chen, and Charles Adler, “Kickstarter Is Not a Store,” The Kickstarter (blog), September 20, 2012. www.kickstarter.com. In fact, the celebrated venture capital firm: Alyson Shontell, “Why Legendary Investor Fred Wilson Didn’t Invest in Airbnb When It Was Just a Tiny Startup,” Business Insider, March 21, 2014. “When we rate each other”: Tom Slee, “The Shape of Airbnb’s Business (II),” Tom Slee (blog), June 9, 2014. www.tomslee.net.

Platform Scale: How an Emerging Business Model Helps Startups Build Large Empires With Minimum Investment
by Sangeet Paul Choudary
Published 14 Sep 2015

Encouraging producers to spread their creation at the point of production drives growth for many content platforms. Some platforms like Instagram, Kickstarter and SurveyMonkey actively encourage this as part of the user workflow. 3.The spread of the unit helps to complete an incomplete interaction. An unanswered question on Quora is a spreadable unit demanding social feedback in the form of an answer. A fresh survey on SurveyMonkey needs responses. A Kickstarter project is a bid to potential funders to come over to Kickstarter and fund the project. While not necessarily a requirement for all spreadable units, the incompleteness of the interaction creates an active call to action for the recipient, prompting them to act.

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Agoda allows only users who have already booked and stayed at hotels through them to rate those particular hotels. This prevents users from entering false reviews, a problem that is often associated with TripAdvisor. Agoda’s social curation system is designed to manage curation rights. KICK-STARTING SOCIAL CURATION SYSTEMS Social curation doesn’t kick-start on its own. Many social curation systems are built on editorial curation efforts. Platforms like Quora and Medium have succeeded in building highly effective social curation systems by starting editorially and building a culture of quality on the platform. The creation of culture is especially important when sampling judgment is subjective.

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This strategy works when the following design considerations are satisfied by the platform: 1.The platform offers a compelling organic incentive for producers to bring consumers onto the platform. 2.The ‘off-platform’ influence and following of the average individual producer is significant enough to attract a large number of consumers to the platform. 3.The platform allows producers to interact with their followers (consumers) in a much more efficient way than currently allowed by alternative channels. TOOLS TO HARVEST FOLLOWERS One of the most common manifestations of this strategy is seen in the launch of platforms like Kickstarter and Udemy. These platforms allow producers to ‘harvest’ their existing connections and followers on other networks like email, social networks, and blogs. Kickstarter allows project creators to raise funding from their connections and followers. Skillshare allows teachers to teach a course to their followers (and subsequently others). These ‘follower harvesting’ use cases offer compelling incentives for producers to bring in their following.

Money, Real Quick: The Story of M-PESA
by Tonny K. Omwansa , Nicholas P. Sullivan and The Guardian
Published 28 Feb 2012

The smaller, more portable, manually-operated Hip Pump, which alternates pull- and push-pumping, costs about $40. Since it entered the Kenyan market in 1998, KickStart has sold over 64,500 pumps (and over 178,500 worldwide). KickStart’s surveys, conducted two months and 18 months after purchase, document a dramatic impact. Purchasing households experience an average 1100% rise in farm income— from $100/yr. to $1100/yr.—and a 200-300% rise in HHI income, in the first year of pump ownership. KickStart has faced two main impediments in selling its pumps. One is a lack of finance; the second is lack of access to a water source. Most smallholder farmers who lack access to a stream or pond can reach water by digging a 5- to 60-foot well.

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These crops yield low financial returns and are primarily stored to feed the household. Early adopters of KickStart pumps, as with any technology, were better educated and more financially secure, and thus less risk averse. For many farmers, $40 or $105 is an unimaginable expenditure; for others, it seems possible and certainly desirable given the quick returns on investment, but difficult to come up with the money. So KickStart has leveraged M-PESA to design and develop a mobile layaway service: Tone Kwa Tone Pata Pump (Swahili for “Drop by Drop Gets the Pump”). Years ago, KickStart noticed that informal cash layaway was occurring, as many local agricultural retailers who had good relationships with farmers would set up layaway programs.

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Tone Kwa Tone Pata Pump (Drop by Drop Gets the Pump): Mobile Layaway A similar product, in that it sets a target and enforces illiquidity until the target is reached, comes from a product manufacturer. KickStart is an NGO whose mission is to identify profitable business opportunities open to thousands of very poor people; then design, manufacture and mass market simple moneymaking tools that unlock these business opportunities. KickStart’s best-selling product is a metal, pedal-powered pump aptly named the Super MoneyMaker, which allows a single smallholder farmer ******ebook converter DEMO Watermarks******* working with a partner to irrigate up to two acres in eight hours—a 16-fold increase in efficiency over manual irrigation methods.

Without Their Permission: How the 21st Century Will Be Made, Not Managed
by Alexis Ohanian
Published 30 Sep 2013

My low-cost staple was hummus. The Armenian way. 6. Note to Mark: If you’re reading this, it’d better not count as billable time. 7. That would be the aforementioned Kiko.com, undone by Gmail’s web calendar. 8. http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/597507018/pebble-e-paper-watch-for-iphone-and-android 9. http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2012/04/pebble-smartwatch-breaks-kickstarter-record-in-five-days/ 10. http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1610300135/brooklyns-cool-colonie-restaurant-coming-soon-to-b?ref=search 11. Yoda, in Star Wars: Episode V—The Empire Strikes Back (1980). There’s a good chance, based on my reader demographic, that you may not know this movie very well.

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A friend and fellow startup dude, Chris Dixon, describes the extreme version of this by saying, “The next big thing will start out looking like a toy.”3 One example of this would be Kickstarter. Their first project, Drawing for Dollars, surpassed its humble twenty-dollar goal by raising thirty-five dollars, which came from three backers who bought artwork from an artist in Long Island City.4 Less than three years later, a team using the same platform raised ten million dollars in preorders for a futuristic watch called Pebble.5 The idea of a group of people pitching in to make something come to fruition is hardly novel, but the way the Kickstarter team leveraged the Internet to pitch to millions of people simultaneously (as opposed to a coterie of traditional investors) certainly was.

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Granted, these watches look awesome, and the “dream team” they’d assembled was a bright group of Canadians from the University of Waterloo, but even founder Eric Migicovsky was surprised when the campaign raised more than ten million dollars from about sixty-eight thousand people worldwide ($10,266,845, to be exact).8 They actually capped preorder requests in order to satisfy expectations, but not before nearly every publication that covers tech or gadgets gushed about their unprecedented Kickstarter campaign. I know this team well, not only because I was there in the room for their Y Combinator interview but also because I ended up managing the team that does their social media. That started just after their monumental launch on Kickstarter, which shattered all previous fund-raising records for the site—in five days.9 We watched a global consumer frenzy grow around this product after investors had responded so lukewarmly (remember, even other founders can be wrong).

Bold: How to Go Big, Create Wealth and Impact the World
by Peter H. Diamandis and Steven Kotler
Published 3 Feb 2015

Census Bureau.” 3 Devin Thorpe, “Why Crowdfunding Will Explode in 2013,” Forbes, October 15, 2012, http://www.forbes.com/sites/devinthorpe/2012/10/15/get-ready-here-it-comes-crowdfunding-will-explode-in-2013/. 4 Victoria Silchenko, “Why Crowdfunding Is The Next Big Thing: Let’s Talk Numbers,” Huffington Post, October 22, 2012, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/victoria-silchenko/why-crowdfunding-is-the-n_b_1990230.html. 5 Laurie Kulikowski, “How Equity Crowdfunding Can Swell to a $300 Billion Industry,” The Street, January 14, 2013, http://www.thestreet.com/story/11811196/1/how-equity-crowdfunding-can-swell-to-a-300-billion-industry.html. 6 “Floating Pool Project Is Fully Funded And New Yorkers Everywhere Should Celebrate,” Huffington Post, July 12, 2013, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/07/12/floating-pool-project-is-fully-funded_n_3587814.html. 7 AI with Joshua Klein, 2013. 8 Dan Leone, “Planetary Resources Raises $1.5M for Crowdfunded Space Telescope,” Space.com, July 14, 2013, http://www.space.com/21953-planetary-resources-crowdfunded-space-telescope.html. 9 For a good breakdown of these rules, please see http://www.cfira.org. 10 AI with Chance Barnett, 2013. 11 This information sits on a banner across the top of their landing page: https://www.crowdfunder.com, our numbers were gathered in June 2014. 12 See http://blog.angel.co/post/59121578519/wow-uber. 13 Tomio Geron, “AngelList, With SecondMarket, Opens Deals to Small Investors for as Little as $1K,” Forbes, December 19, 2012, http://www.forbes.com/sites/tomiogeron/2012/12/19/angellist-with-secondmarket-opens-deals-to-small-investors-for-as-little-as-1k/. 14 John McDermott, “Pebble ‘Smartwatch’ Funding Soars on Kickstarter,” Inc., April 20, 2012, http://www.inc.com/john-mcdermott/pebble-smartwatch-funding-sets-kickstarter-record.html. 15 Dara Kerr, “World’s first public space telescope gets Kickstarter goal,” CNET, July 1, 2013, http://www.cnet.com/news/worlds-first-public-space-telescope-gets-kickstarter-goal/. 16 McDermott, “Pebble ‘Smartwatch’ Funding Soars on Kickstarter.” 17 See https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/let-s-build-a-goddamn-tesla-museum--5. 18 Kerr, “World’s first public space telescope gets Kickstarter goal.” 19 Cade Metz, “Facebook Buys VR Startup Oculus for $2 Billion,” Wired, March 25, 2014, http://www.wired.com/2014/03/facebook-acquires-oculus/. 20 All Indiegogo stats come from AIs with founders Danae Ringelmann and Slava Rubin, conducted in 2013. 21 Ibid. 22 Ibid. 23 AI with Eric Migicovsky, 2013. 24 See www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/a/abrahamlin109275.html. 25 Eric Gilbert and Tanushree Mitra, “The Language that Gets People to Give: Phrases that Predict Success on Kickstarter,” CSCW’14, February 15, 2014, http://comp.social.gatech.edu/papers/cscw14.crowdfunding.mitra.pdf. 26 AI with Ringelmann and Rubin, 2013. 27 AI with Migicovsky. 28 AI with Ringelmann and Rubin. 29 AI with Migicovsky.

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PART THREE: THE BOLD CROWD Chapter Seven: Crowdsourcing: Marketplace of the Rising Billion 1 Netcraft Web Server Survey, Netcraft, Accessed June 2014, http://news.netcraft.com/archives/category/web-server-survey/. 2 AI with Jake Nickell and Jacob DeHart. 3 Jeff Howe, “The Rise of Crowdfunding,” Wired, 2006, http://archive.wired.com/wired/archive/14.06/crowds_pr.html. 4 Rob Hof, “Second Life’s First Millionaire,” Bloomberg Businessweek, November 26, 2006, http://www.businessweek.com/the_thread/techbeat/archives/2006/11/second_lifes_fi.html. 5 Jeff Howe, “Crowdsourcing: A Definition,” Crowdsourcing, http://crowdsourcing.typepad.com/cs/2006/06/crowdsourcing_a.html. 6 “Statistics,” Kiva, http://www.kiva.org/about/stats. 7 Rob Walker, “The Trivialities and Transcendence of Kickstarter,” New York Times, August 5, 2011, http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/07/magazine/the-trivialities-and-transcendence-of-kickstarter.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0. 8 “Stats,” Kickstarter, https://www.kickstarter.com/help/stats. 9 Doug Gross, “Google boss: Entire world will be online by 2020,” CNN, April 15, 2013, http://www.cnn.com/2013/04/15/tech/web/eric-schmidt-internet/. 10 “Global entertainment and media outlook 2013–2017,” PricewaterhouseCoopers, 2013, https://www.pwc.com/gx/en/global-entertainment-media-outlook/. 11 Freelancer Case Study based on a series of AIs. 12 Quoted from AI: Matt Barrie. 13 Tongal Case Study based on a series of AIs with James DeJulio. 14 reCAPTCHA and Duolingo Case Study based on a series of AIs with Luis von Ahn. 15 During the completion of this book, a Bay Area startup called Vicarious wrote an AI program able to solve (i.e., read) CAPTCHAs with an accuracy of 90 percent.

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By 2013 that number had jumped to $526,460,675 in loans from 1,047,653 Kiva lenders while maintaining a 98.96 percent repayment rate.6 This was also the same time when crowdfunding sites like Indiegogo and Kickstarter came into being, giving birth to a new way to raise money for creative projects. Want to make a movie? Cut a new CD? Design a new kind of watch? Just put a video up on either of these sites and ask the crowd for the money. It didn’t take long before theNew York Times started calling Kickstarter “the people’s NEA [National Endowment for the Arts],” and well, they weren’t kidding.7 In 2010, the site raised over $27 million and funded 3,910 projects.

Ctrl Alt Delete: Reboot Your Business. Reboot Your Life. Your Future Depends on It.
by Mitch Joel
Published 20 May 2013

Does this truly have an effect on business? Consider this last piece of data from the Kickstarter world: In February 2012, Yancey Strickler (one of Kickstarter’s co-founders) said in an interview with Talking Points Memo that Kickstarter was on course to disburse over $150 million to its various projects in 2012. To put this into perspective, the National Endowment for the Arts had a fiscal 2012 budget of $146 million. On top of that, several Kickstarter projects have topped $1 million in funding from backers. As Kickstarter’s popularity continues to grow and inspires new and exciting entrepreneurs, we’re starting to see that businesses that create powerful direct relationships based on value can achieve staggering financial results.

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Without knowing if there would be a market for Pen Type-A and not having the resources to turn this design concept into any semblance of a serious business model, they turned to one of the hottest online destinations, Kickstarter, to get a feel for the potential market. If you don’t know about Kickstarter, well, now’s the time for you to find out: Kickstarter is a simple crowdfunding platform that allows individuals to post their creative projects (everything from music and film to technology and journalism) and to start an online threshold-pledge system for the funding of the project. It is, without question, the most interesting thing happening online right now. In short: If you can’t get a movie deal, you can post your project to Kickstarter, define the budget, and invite anybody and everybody who thinks it’s a good idea to become a backer.

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Many people have great ideas that can be explained in simple three-minute online videos, but very few people have the skills to then execute the ideas successfully. Kickstarter has reduced the mountain between ideation and execution into the proverbial molehill. Now, by posting their ideas with a clear financial structure on Kickstarter, businesses can find out—in short order—if there really is a market for their wares. Kickstarter is a New York startup that was founded in April 2009. According to Wikipedia, the company has raised more than $275 million for more than sixty-five thousand projects since it got started. Even more impressive, Kickstarter has a project success rate of close to 45 percent. (Success is defined by whether the project met or surpassed the threshold set by the project organizers or creators.)

The Revenge of Analog: Real Things and Why They Matter
by David Sax
Published 8 Nov 2016

By far the most disruptive and powerful technological tool behind the revenge of tabletop games has been Kickstarter. Since the crowdfunding service began in 2009, it has quickly become the de facto launchpad for tens of thousands of board and card games, large and small. At any given time there are roughly two hundred new tabletop game projects raising money on Kickstarter, and roughly half reach their fund-raising goal. Tabletop games are one of the most popular projects on Kickstarter, in terms of both dollars raised and the success of fund-raising campaigns. Kickstarter does not regularly break down its statistics for the games category (which includes both video and tabletop games), but in 2013 the company told the New York Times that tabletop game projects raised $52.1 million that year, compared to $45.3 million for video games.

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Kickstarter does not regularly break down its statistics for the games category (which includes both video and tabletop games), but in 2013 the company told the New York Times that tabletop game projects raised $52.1 million that year, compared to $45.3 million for video games. Kickstarter has done more to fuel the creation of games than anyone since Milton Bradley. Almost every single designer I spoke with for this book had launched games on Kickstarter. There are certainly runaway successes, such as the silly card game Exploding Kittens, which raised over $8 million in a matter of days, but most projects raise a few thousand dollars to pay for a game’s production. Some games start out small on Kickstarter, and eventually grow huge. One of the first to do this was Cards Against Humanity.

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Over the next few years, they worked to develop the game, and took early prototypes to board game industry trade shows, including Germany’s massive Essen Spiel, where they learned about Kickstarter. When they launched their Kickstarter campaign in late May 2015, the goal was to raise €29,000 to fund Deal: American Dream. I met Vernaza with just six days left, and only €20,000 raised. “No one tells you how much Kickstarter is a ride,” he said, as he unrolled a prototype board for the game and set up the cards. “It’s really a ride.” Deal: American Dream sets competing criminal networks against each other in the drug-producing and -consuming markets of the Americas.

The Mesh: Why the Future of Business Is Sharing
by Lisa Gansky
Published 14 Oct 2010

If you do, they’ll love you for it. And think you’re cool, too. CASE STUDY: Kickstarter In April 2009, a new way to fund creative ideas and projects made a splash on the Internet. Designers, filmmakers, journalists, inventors, artists, and other creatives flocked to Kickstarter, a platform for soliciting small yet consequential monetary contributions from donors. Kickstarter is powered by a unique funding method that is not about personal investing: project creators maintain 100 percent ownership of their intellectual property. Starting a project on Kickstarter is free, but currently projects are posted by invitation only, and must be based in the United States.

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Even if the funding goal is surpassed, projects can accept pledges until the funding deadline arrives. Kickstarter applies a fee of 5 percent to the amount raised. The caveat: if a funding goal isn’t achieved, all pledges are canceled, and no money changes hands. As donors and artists bring their own social networks to the site, the potential for donors to find new interesting projects, and for artists to reach more donors, naturally builds. Perry reports that Kickstarter is increasing the number of projects and the volume of its transactions at a rate of about 20 percent a month. Kickstarter has momentum, a growing following, angel investors, and a big idea—perfect ingredients for success in the Mesh.

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—DENISE CARUSO, former New York Times technology columnist; senior research scholar, Carnegie Mellon University “Gansky lucidly describes how a new generation of companies make their community’s passion, intelligence, and resources a core part of the business itself. Kickstarter is honored to be included as part of this new movement.” —PERRY CHEN, cofounder and CEO, Kickstarter “At ThredUP, we fully embrace what Gansky calls the Mesh and are rapidly growing our service, community base, brand, and ecosystem around a new business model dedicated to extending the life of kids’ clothing and making parents very happy!” —JAMES REINHART, cofounder and CEO, ThredUp “Crushpad is a true Mesh business.

Open for Business Harnessing the Power of Platform Ecosystems
by Lauren Turner Claire , Laure Claire Reillier and Benoit Reillier
Published 14 Oct 2017

The future of platforms 215 10 See, for example, Bloomberg article dated 2 May 2016 on universal basic income: www.bloombergview.com/articles/2016-05-02/a-basic-income-should-be-the-nextbig-thing. 11 www.theverge.com/2014/9/30/6874353/reddit-50-million-funding-give-users-10percent-stock-equity and www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/2moyiz/serious_ how_should_reddit_inc_distribute_a/. 12 21 September 2015, Kickstarter blog, www.kickstarter.com/blog/kickstarter-is-now-abenefit-corporation?ref=charter. 13 Kickstarter fulfilment report, www.kickstarter.com/fulfillment. 14 At the time of writing, the Singapore Autonomous Vehicle Initiative (SAVI) is running live trials of autonomous cars. 15 Moore’s law states that computer processing power doubles every two years. 16 Sharetribe promises to have your platform business running in a few minutes without the need for a developer . . . give it a go at www.sharetribe.com/. 17 J.

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This could enable the emergence of more flexible platform-based organizations, where value and equity are shared in a simple and effective way with their contributing participants and the wider ecosystem. A few sharing economy platforms have recently taken a stance to address the profit conundrum. Benefit Corporations include Etsy, Juno, and Kickstarter, which reincorporated as a benefit corporation in 2015.12 Kickstarter’s mission is driven first by how well they bring creative projects to life before The future of platforms 211 the size of their profits. Kickstarter measures project success rates (typically only 9% of projects fail to deliver results)13 as a key driver of added value. It is also very possible that more open, decentralized platforms, with shared governance models, as advocated by many within the sharing economy movement, are able to scale and offer successful alternatives not controlled by large corporations.

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(commercial organization), Kiva (not-for-profit organization), Kickstarter (public-benefit corporation), Reddit (community). Sides: the distinct and diverse groups of customers or entities being connected by the platform. For two-sided platforms, they are typically segmented into two groups: one on the supply side (often called producers) and the other on the demand side (often called users or consumers). They are jointly called ‘platform participants’. • Producers: individuals, communities, businesses or entities delivering value created on and/or through the platform. For example, eBay sellers, Kiva borrowers, Kickstarter creators, Reddit content contributors.

WTF?: What's the Future and Why It's Up to Us
by Tim O'Reilly
Published 9 Oct 2017

But it Should Be,” Money Talking, WNYC, January 16, 2015, http://www.wnyc.org/story/failure-not-an-option-but-it-should-be/. 286 Three had no investment at all from VCs: Bryce Roberts, “Helluva Lifestyle Business You Got There,” Medium, January 31, 2017, https://medium.com/strong-words/helluva-lifestyle-business-you-got-there-e1ebd3104a95. 286 which he called indie.vc: Bryce Roberts, “We Invest in Real Businesses,” indie.vc, retrieved April 3, 2017, http://www.indie.vc. 287 tens of millions in distribution: Jason Fried, “Jason Fried on Valuations, Basecamp, and Why He’s No Longer Poking the World in the Eye,” interview with Mixergy, April 4, 2016, https://mixergy.com/interviews/basecamp-with-jason-fried/. 287 “if growth is not immediate and meteoric”: Marc Hedlund, “Indie.vc, and focus,” Skyliner (blog), December 14, 2016, https://blog.skyliner.io/indie-vc-and-focus-8e833d8680d4. 289 “faster than any company in Silicon Valley”: Hank Green, “Introducing the Internet Creators Guild,” June 15, 2016, https://medium.com/internet-creators-guild/introducing-the-internet-creators-guild-e0db6867e0c3. 290 at the Vatican in November 2016: Fortune +Time Global Forum 2016, “The 21st Century Challenge: Forging a New Social Compact,” Rome and Vatican City, December 2–3, 2016, http://www.fortuneconferences.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/Fortune-Time-Global-Forum-2016-Working-Group-Solutions. pdf. 290 by $165 billion: Google, Economic Im-pact, United States 2015, retrieved Dec-ember 12, 2016, https://economicimpact. google.com/#/. 290 more than 60% of their traffic came from search: Nathan Safran, “Organic Search Is Actually Responsible for 64% of Your Web Traffic (Thought Experiment),” July 10, 2014, https://www.conductor.com/blog/2014/07/organic-search-actually-responsible-64-web-traffic/. 291 commissioned a report: Yancey Strickler, “Kickstarter’s Impact on the Creative Economy,” The Kickstarter Blog, July 28, 2016, https://www.kickstarter.com/blog/kickstarters-impact-on-the-creative-economy. 291 have gone on to great success: Amy Feldman, “Ten of the Most Successful Companies Built on Kickstarter,” Forbes, April 14, 2016, https://www.forbes.com/sites/amyfeldman/2016/04/14/ten-of-the-most-successful-companies-built-on-kickstarter/#4dec455f69e8. 292 register as a public benefit corporation: Yancey Strickler, Perry Chen, and Charles Adler, “Kickstarter Is Now a Benefit Corporation,” The Kickstarter Blog, September 21, 2015, https://www.kick starter.com/blog/kickstarter-is-now-a-benefit-corporation. 292 regular cash distributions to their shareholders: Joshua Brustein, “Kickstarter Just Did Something Tech Startups Never Do: It Paid a Dividend,” Bloomberg, June 17, 2016, https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-06-17/kickstarter-just-did-something-tech-startups-never-do-it-paid-a-dividend. 292 shareholder value primacy has no legal basis: Lynn Stout, The Shareholder Value Myth (San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler, 2012). 292 argues otherwise: Leo E.

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One project, Oculus, was later sold to Facebook for $2 billion, of which Kickstarter received nothing. (Unfortunately, neither did any of the project’s backers. It would have set a great precedent if, having won big, the Oculus founders had treated their initial backers as if they had been investors, letting them in on some of the windfall.) While the absolute numbers are far smaller than those for Google, Kickstarter’s ratio of value captured to value created is far better. Since Kickstarter charges a fee of only 5%, that means the company’s total lifetime revenues were roughly $250 million, a tiny fraction of the value created. Because Kickstarter is a private company, and Yancey Strickler, its cofounder and CEO, made clear that he has no plans for the company to sell or go public, it’s impossible to estimate what Kickstarter would be worth if it were to do so.

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Because Kickstarter is a private company, and Yancey Strickler, its cofounder and CEO, made clear that he has no plans for the company to sell or go public, it’s impossible to estimate what Kickstarter would be worth if it were to do so. But Kickstarter is in the game for the long haul, committed to creating value for its participants rather than extracting it. Kickstarter has gone so far as to register as a public benefit corporation, a designation that places a legal requirement on the company to consider its impact on society and not just on shareholders. Kickstarter’s founders told their venture capital investors from the start that they have no plan to exit, and have instead put in place a mechanism for making regular cash distributions to their shareholders, just like Basecamp and the indie.vc companies.

The End of Big: How the Internet Makes David the New Goliath
by Nicco Mele
Published 14 Apr 2013

Among the over 26,000 projects successfully funded on Kickstarter since its inception in 2008, a third have been music albums, another third film or video, and about a tenth writing and publishing projects.20 Not one of these projects needed a big studio, big record label, or big publisher to back them.21 Approximately one-tenth of the films premiering at Sundance Film Festival in 2012 were at least partially funded on Kickstarter, leading David Carr to remark in the New York Times that “at Sundance Kickstarter resembled a movie studio, but without the egos.”22 And Kickstarter is just one of several crowd-sourced funding sites. Others include Indiegogo.com, focused on funding indie films, and PledgeMusic.com, for musicians. After the Great Unknowns’ second album, Andy went back to academia. Kickstarter had given them enough funding to make another album but not enough to cover the marketing and touring expenses the band would accrue when promoting the album professionally.

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The book is available for purchase at http://www.bulldozingtheway.com/. 16. https://buy.louisck.net/news/a-statement-from-louis-c-k 17. https://buy.louisck.net/purchase/live-at-the-beacon-theater 18. http://www.gq.com/entertainment/tv/blogs/the-stream/2012/03/aziz-ansari-dangerously-delicious-standup-online.html 19. http://bigthink.com/ideas/42326 20. Kickstarter statistics are constantly updated at http://www.kickstarter.com/help/stats. 21. http://www.kickstarter.com/blog/10000-successful-projects 22. http://mediadecoder.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/01/30/at-sundance-kickstarter-resembled-a-movie-studio-but-without-the-egos/ 23. http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/22/magazine/22madmen-t.html 24. Levine, Free Ride, 141. 25. http://www.slate.com/articles/business/moneybox/2012/02/i_paid_4_million_for_this_.html 26. http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/164/major-league-baseball-advanced-media-bam 27.

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In a June 2012 interview, he said, “our first album didn’t sell enough to attract any labels, but we wanted to make another album.” So the band went to a site called Kickstarter, which enables artists to crowd source funding for their ventures. The band raised $8,612 from 149 backers, a sum that would let the group get together and professionally record and release an album. It’s a perfect story about the End of Big: a small band with a small audience that creates music without any of the normal channels for production, distribution, marketing or monetization. “Kickstarter helped us have it both ways, in a sense: we could do a serious album, somewhat harboring the hope that it would arouse a lot of interest and lead to great new opportunities, but keep up other jobs.

To Save Everything, Click Here: The Folly of Technological Solutionism
by Evgeny Morozov
Published 15 Nov 2013

Take just one example: Johnson thinks that a site like Kickstarter offers a much better model of funding arts than, say, the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA); in fact, he thinks it’s just a matter of time before Kickstarter overtakes the NEA. “The question with Kickstarter, given its growth rate, is not whether it could rival the NEA in its support of the creative arts. The new question is whether it will grow to be ten times the size of the NEA.” Elsewhere in the book, Johnson writes that he doesn’t want to scrap the NEA, only to make it work more like Kickstarter; what’s most interesting about his argument, however, is that he doesn’t spell out why the NEA should become like Kickstarter and what makes the latter’s model superior.

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Elsewhere in the book, Johnson writes that he doesn’t want to scrap the NEA, only to make it work more like Kickstarter; what’s most interesting about his argument, however, is that he doesn’t spell out why the NEA should become like Kickstarter and what makes the latter’s model superior. Perhaps, Johnson simply doesn’t have to, as his audience can anticipate the argument that is implied: the Kickstarter approach is simply better because it comes from “the Internet.” This odd and shortsighted claim focuses on the mechanics of the platform rather than on the substance of what institutions like the NEA actually do. Kickstarter works as follows: creators—they can be start-ups that want to build a cool app or new gadget or artists who want to make a music video—post their fund-raising appeals on the site; if and when enough people chip in, the creators get the money to embark on their project.

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Now, this is a very different model from the top-down hierarchical model of the NEA, in which a bunch of artsy bureaucrats make all the decisions as to what art to fund. But the fact that Kickstarter offers a more efficient platform for some projects to raise more money more effectively—bypassing the bureaucrats and increasing participation—does not mean it will yield better, more innovative art or support art that, in our age of cat videos, might seem old-fashioned and unnecessary. Sites like Kickstarter tend to favor populist projects, which may or may not be good for the arts overall. The same logic applies to other governmental and quasi-governmental institutions as well: if the National Endowment for Democracy worked like Kickstarter, it would have to spend all its money on funding projects like the highly viral Kony 2012 campaign, which, all things considered, may only be of secondary importance to both democracy promotion and US foreign policy as a whole.

Full Stack Web Development With Backbone.js
by Patrick Mulder
Published 18 Jun 2014

The Bigger Picture. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 Before You Get Started Backbonify Your Stack Using npm Local Backbone.js Backbone.js via Content Delivery Networks Modules, Packages, and Servers CommonJS Modules Beyond index.html Browserify Combining Express.js and Stitch When Things Go Wrong Conclusion 1 2 2 4 5 6 8 9 10 13 15 16 2. Kick-Starting Application Development. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17 Creating a Wireframe Decoupling State from the UI Models and Collections Views Backbone.js and MVC Preparing a Click Dummy Basic HTML and Style Building a Data Layer Basic Events Conclusion 18 19 21 22 22 24 24 26 31 34 3.

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The widely popular RequireJS and Java‐ Script AMD module format will be discussed later in the book. For the next chapters, we’ll stay in the web browser. You will learn about the basic abstractions that Backbone.js provides, and we will discuss Munich Cinema, the main example application of the book. 16 | Chapter 1: The Bigger Picture CHAPTER 2 Kick-Starting Application Development Don’t make me think is mentioned by Steve Krug as the most important principle in designing user interfaces. When you browse a list of movies, for example, it is nice to initially see just the film posters and for the movie details to be visible only upon request. In a web browser, the user experience of browsing movies results involves processing events that result from input devices such as a mouse or keyboard.

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The movies are the most important entities on the website, so we want to preserve the context to quickly switch from one movie to another. Therefore, we want to combine a list view of the movies with details views. There also needs to be an easy way to navigate back and forth between the movies. 18 | Chapter 2: Kick-Starting Application Development During our conversation with the designer, we decided that patrons like Mary would be interested to interact with Munich Cinema as follows: • It would be useful for them to be able to filter and search movies (e.g., by the same director or in the same genre) so that they can decide which movie to go see.

Who Owns the Future?
by Jaron Lanier
Published 6 May 2013

Keith has been a celebrated musical instrument designer for years, and he had an idea for a new kind of digital musical device called the QuNeo. Instead of going the usual route of pitching investors, he used Kickstarter to pitch his future customers directly. They loved the idea, and his QuNeo controller became one of Kickstarter’s fine early success stories. Hordes of customers lined up and prepaid for a device that didn’t exist yet, turning into pseudo-investors and customers at the same time. Kickstarter as a tool for funding product development isn’t perfect. It would be even better if it supported the creation of risk pools for multiple projects, and an insurance or risk management system for customers.

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But it’s the sort of strategy a Siren Server must resort to in order to retain an arm’s-length, risk-free state of being. Here is the question and answer about the policy from the Kickstarter website: How will Kickstarter know whether something is a simulation or rendering [ . . . instead of a photograph of a physical prototype]? We may not know. We do only a quick review to make sure a project meets our guidelines. I would like to see Kickstarter grow to be larger than Amazon, since it embodies a more fundamental mechanism of overall economic growth. Instead of just driving prices down, it turns consumers into a priori funders of innovation.

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That’s not to say there’s no role for startups that are compatible with humanistic computing ideals. Kickstarter is an example brought up earlier. Maybe a startup can introduce a new template for personal activity that can evolve to have the key benefits of a job even though it isn’t called a job. Kickstarter, Etsy, ancient eBay, and similar efforts are legitimate baby steps in that direction. (For that matter, so was Second Life, the now-somewhat-stale virtual world service in which people created, bought, and sold virtual stuff.) Such efforts are in harmony with the principles of humanistic computing. Even if Kickstarter becomes superhuge, however, even big like an Apple, it probably wouldn’t become big enough to compensate for the jobs to be lost to self-driving vehicles and automated manufacturing and resource extraction.

The New Kingmakers
by Stephen O'Grady
Published 14 Mar 2013

For developers that don’t wish to surrender any control, Kickstarter represents yet another funding option. Founded in 2008, Kickstarter is a crowd source funding platform that had attracted $175 million in contributions as of April 2012. The model is simple: for a commission of 5% on each project—and a few additional percentage points due Amazon for usage of their payments network—Kickstarter provides artists, filmmakers, developers, and others with a direct line to potential individual investors. Unlike traditional venture capital, however, Kickstarter claims no ownership stake in funded projects—all rights are retained by the project owners.

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Unlike traditional venture capital, however, Kickstarter claims no ownership stake in funded projects—all rights are retained by the project owners. Though Kickstarter is by no means focused strictly on developers, they have been among the most impressive beneficiaries. Of the top projects by funds raised, the first three are video games. In March 2012, Double Fine Adventure set the record for Kickstarter projects, attracting $3.3 million in crowd-sourced financing. Number two on the list, Wasteland 2, raised just under $3 million, with third place Shadowrun Returns receiving $1.8 million. The Kickstarter model is less established than even seed-stage venture dollars, but it shows every sign of being a powerful funding option for developers moving forward.

The Great Wave: The Era of Radical Disruption and the Rise of the Outsider
by Michiko Kakutani
Published 20 Feb 2024

GO TO NOTE REFERENCE IN TEXT “arts organization for the post-gatekeeper era”: Rob Walker, “The Trivialities and Transcendence of Kickstarter,” The New York Times Magazine, Aug. 5, 2011, nytimes.com/​2011/​08/​07/​magazine/​the-trivialities-and-transcendence-of-kickstarter.html. GO TO NOTE REFERENCE IN TEXT Kickstarter was launched in 2009: Kickstarter, kickstarter.com/​about. GO TO NOTE REFERENCE IN TEXT “two sides of complete silence”: “Silent Meditation,” Kickstarter, kickstarter.com/​projects/​silentmeditation/​silent-meditation-on-vinyl. GO TO NOTE REFERENCE IN TEXT Oculus Rift: Max Chafkin, “Why Facebook’s $2 Billion Bet on Oculus Rift Might One Day Connect Everyone on Earth,” Vanity Fair, Sept. 8, 2015, vanityfair.com/​news/​2015/​09/​oculus-rift-mark-zuckerberg-cover-story-palmer-luckey; Jenna Wortham, “Creator of a Virtual Reality Sensation,” The New York Times, Mar. 26, 2014, nytimes.com/​2014/​03/​27/​technology/​creator-of-a-virtual-reality-sensation.html; Taylor Clark, “How Palmer Luckey Created Oculus Rift,” Smithsonian Magazine, Nov. 2014, smithsonianmag.com/​innovation/​how-palmer-luckey-created-oculus-rift-180953049/.

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Meanwhile, filmmakers, performance artists, and inventors who couldn’t get venture capital for their projects turned to crowdfunding platforms like Kickstarter, which The New York Times called “the people’s N.E.A.,” an “arts organization for the post-gatekeeper era.” Kickstarter was launched in 2009, and by the end of 2022 it had been used by some twenty-two million people to pledge more than $7 billion to more than 200,000 projects including more than a dozen award-winning films shown at the Sundance, Tribeca, and SXSW festivals. Projects that won backers on Kickstarter ranged from small, whimsical endeavors (like Silent Meditation, a limited run of translucent vinyl LPs that featured “two sides of complete silence”), to hugely ambitious undertakings like Oculus Rift, a virtual reality headset designed by a young college dropout named Palmer Luckey who built a prototype in his parents’ garage, raised $2.4 million on Kickstarter in 2012, and two years later sold the company to Facebook for $2 billion.

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General Services Administration, About CitizenScience.gov, citizenscience.gov/​about/​#; Citizen Science, Scientific American, scientificamerican.com/​citizen-science/. GO TO NOTE REFERENCE IN TEXT As businesses have increasingly come: Luc Rinaldi, “A Kickstarter Approach to Science,” Maclean’s, Aug. 11, 2015, macleans.ca/​economy/​business/​a-kickstarter-approach-to-science/; About Us, Wazoku, wazoku.com/about-us/; What Challenge Will You Solve Today?, Wazoku, wazoku.com/​challenges/. GO TO NOTE REFERENCE IN TEXT “The more they teach you”: “Innovation Through Co-creation: Engaging Customers and Other Stakeholders,” Mack Center for Technological Innovation, Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania, Nov. 18, 2011, mackinstitute.wharton.upenn.edu/​wp-content/​uploads/​2012/​12/​Innovation-through-Co-Creation_Full-Conference-Summary.pdf.

The Sharing Economy: The End of Employment and the Rise of Crowd-Based Capitalism
by Arun Sundararajan
Published 12 May 2016

Between 2009 and 2015, close to nine million people pledged close to $2 billion for hundreds of thousands of projects on Kickstarter, and the word has entered the lexicon of popular culture. Every day, hundreds of people decide they are going to “Kickstart” their projects. What’s in it for the funders? Part of it is the pure joy of seeing a cool idea receive the funding it needs to get off the ground. Part of it has to do with getting early access to cool new things. However, even if the project is a commercial venture, investing in a Kickstarter gives you no ownership stake. I spoke to Kickstarter’s founder and CEO Yancey Strickler about this in spring 2014, and at the time he asserted that he had no intention of taking the platform into the “capital for equity” realm.

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In fact, late in 2015, the company reaffirmed its position by becoming a benefit corporation, renewing its longstanding commitment to supporting the arts and culture, and articulating other values and commitments it intended to live by.43 If one looks at the composition of projects funded on Kickstarter, some of the “gift” motivations become clearer. A large percentage of Kickstarter projects are those that would have traditionally been funded by a foundation or a wealthy local business looking to support the arts, or through a charity walk, or by a group of friends. As Brian Meece, the founder and CEO of Kickstarter competitor RocketHub told me in 2013, crowdfunding is a social event, and a successful project is one that is curated in the same way you would a good party. In many ways, thus, the psychology of funding projects on Kickstarter is much more social than commercial.

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The platform ensures that the well-heeled OneFineStay guests will enjoy all the amenities they might expect from a high-end hotel, including cleaning, fresh linens (on a daily basis if needed) and 24/7 guest services. In other words, while the space may be supplied by crowd, the hospitality is not provided by the homeowners but rather by the platform itself. Funding: Kickstarter, Kiva, Funding Circle, AngelList The peer-to-peer financing arena provides additional examples along the gift-market spectrum. The quintessential crowdfunding platform Kickstarter, for example, provides a way for people to fund a wide variety of projects, be it a new film or performance, the development of a new app, or a new product. A typical sequence of funding works like this. First, creative entrepreneurs launch their project with a funding goal.

Peers Inc: How People and Platforms Are Inventing the Collaborative Economy and Reinventing Capitalism
by Robin Chase
Published 14 May 2015

Trade School, “About,” http://tradeschool.coop/about. 7. Ibid. 8. Kickstarter, “Stats,” www.kickstarter.com/help/stats. 9. Accenture, “The ‘Greater’ Wealth Transfer: Capitalizing on the Intergenerational Shift in Wealth,” 2012, www.accenture.com/us-en/Pages/insight-capitalizing-intergenerational-shift-wealth-capital-markets-summary.aspx. 10. Adrianne Jeffries, “If You Back a Kickstarter Project That Sells for $2 Billion, Do You Deserve to Get Rich?” TheVerge.com, March 28, 2014, www.theverge.com/2014/3/28/5557120/what-if-oculus-rift-kickstarter-backers-had-gotten-equity. 11. Greg Belote, “What If Oculus Crowdfunded for Equity?

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We’ll follow Caroline Woolard, a Brooklyn-based artist and organizer who founded the Trade School, a platform for participation in which anyone in the New York community could sign up to teach a one-session class, which was offered free to anyone who showed up to attend. She successfully raised money using Kickstarter several times. Kickstarter and Indiegogo (among others) let people contribute money to projects of all kinds without taking any equity. Instead of equity, donors are given a range of thank-you gifts depending on how much they’ve contributed. In 2010, Caroline co-founded a community experiment in a small storefront in Brooklyn, where people took classes in exchange for barter.

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In exchange for instruction, teachers received everything from running shoes to mixed CDs, from letters to a stranger to cheddar cheese.”6 A year later, the Trade School decided to turn to Kickstarter again to raise $9,000 to repeat the experiment for a longer period of time and to pay for some materials and a staff coordinator. Successful for a second time, the idea attracted attention from cities around the world. Trade Schools were opening in Oakland, Singapore, London, New Delhi, Sherbrooke, Jamaica, Purchase, Guadalajara, Cardiff, San Francisco, Bangkok, Paris, San Francisco, New Haven, and Milan, and all of them were seeking advice and support of the original group in Brooklyn. So the team turned back to Kickstarter to raise $10,000 to reimburse the freelance engineers and designers building an open-source Web platform that would make the lives of volunteers in all those cities much easier.7 Since 2009 Kickstarter has funneled nearly $1.4 billion to more than 70,000 projects, which are usually small, one-of-a-kind efforts.8 It’s great for pilots or small projects, but not enough to get a platform through the controlled kernel phase.

The Data Detective: Ten Easy Rules to Make Sense of Statistics
by Tim Harford
Published 2 Feb 2021

Two brothers in Syracuse, New York, even launched a Kickstarter campaign in the hope of being paid $400 to film themselves terrifying their neighbors at Halloween. These disparate campaigns have one thing in common: they received precisely zero support. Not one of these people was able to persuade strangers, friends, or even their own families to kick in so much as a cent. My inspiration and source for these tales of Kickstarter failure is Silvio Lorusso, an artist and designer based in Venice. Lorusso’s website, Kickended.com, searched Kickstarter for all the projects that have received absolutely no funding.

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I have never read a media report or blog post about the attempts of the young and ambitious band Stereotypical Daydream to raise $8,000 on Kickstarter to record an album. (“Our band has tried many different ways of saving money to record a legitimate album in a professional studio. Unfortunately, we still have not saved enough.”) It probably will not surprise you to hear that the Stereotypical Daydream Kickstarter campaign brought them zero dollars closer to their goal. On the other hand, I’ve heard quite a lot about the Pebble watch, the Coolest cooler, and even that potato salad. If I didn’t know better, I might form unrealistic expectations about what running a Kickstarter campaign might achieve. This isn’t just about Kickstarter, of course.

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* * * — Surely there is no easier way to raise some cash than through Kickstarter? The crowdfunding website enjoyed a breakthrough moment in 2012 when the Pebble, an early smartwatch, raised over $10 million. In 2014, a project to make a picnic cooler raised an extraordinary $13 million. Admittedly, the Coolest cooler was the Swiss Army knife of cool boxes. It has a built-in USB charger, cocktail blender, and speakers, attracting a thundering herd of backers. The Pebble smartwatch had its revenge in 2015, as a fresh campaign raised more than $20 million for a new and better watch. In some ways, though, Zack “Danger” Brown’s Kickstarter achievement was more impressive than any of these.

To Sell Is Human: The Surprising Truth About Moving Others
by Daniel H. Pink
Published 1 Dec 2012

Robert Atkinson, “It’s the Digital Economy, Stupid,” Fast Company, January 8, 2009. 9. Carl Franzen, “Kickstarter Expects to Provide More Funding to the Arts Than NEA,” Talking Points Memo, February 24, 2012, available at http://idealab.talkingpointsmemo.com/2012/02/kickstarter-expects-to-provide-more-funding-to-the-arts-than-nea.php; Carl Franzen, “NEA Weighs In on Kickstarter Funding Debate,” Talking Points Memo, February 27, 2012, available at http://idealab.talkingpointsmemo.com/2012/02/the-nea-responds-to-kickstarter-funding-debate.php. That said, Kickstarter has a high failure rate. Roughly half the projects that seek funding don’t succeed in reaching their target.

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Some three-quarters of a million Americans now say that eBay serves as their primary or secondary source of income.8 Meanwhile, many entrepreneurs find fund-raising easier thanks to Kickstarter, which allows them to post the basics of their creative projects—films, music, visual art, fashion—and try to sell their ideas to funders. Since Kickstarter launched in 2009, 1.8 million people have funded twenty thousand projects with more than $200 million. In just three years, Kickstarter surpassed the U.S. National Endowment for the Arts as the largest backer of arts projects in the United States.9 While the Web has enabled more micro-entrepreneurs to flourish, its overall impact might soon seem quaint compared with the smartphone.

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Roughly half the projects that seek funding don’t succeed in reaching their target. See Samantha Murphy, “About 41% of Kickstarter Projects Fail,” Mashable Tech, June 12, 2012, available at http://mashable.com/2012/06/12/kickstarter-failures/. 10. Comments at Wired Business Conference, New York City, May 1, 2012. 11. Michael Mandel, “Where the Jobs Are: The App Economy,” TechNet white paper, February 7, 2012, available at http://www.technet.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/TechNet-App-Economy-Jobs-Study.pdf. 12. Michael DeGusta, “Are Smart Phones Spreading Faster Than Any Technology in Human History?” Technology Review, May 9, 2012. 13.

The Inevitable: Understanding the 12 Technological Forces That Will Shape Our Future
by Kevin Kelly
Published 6 Jun 2016

Korean pop dance video “Gangnam Style”: Officialpsy, “Psy—Gangnam Style M/V,” YouTube, July 15, 2012, accessed August 19, 2015, https://goo.gl/LoetL. 9 million fans to fund 88,000 projects: “Stats,” Kickstarter, accessed June 25, 2015. raise more than $34 billion each year: “Global Crowdfunding Market to Reach $34.4B in 2015, Predicts Massolution’s 2015 CF Industry Report,” Crowdsourcing.org, April 7, 2015. about 20,000 people who raised: “The Year in Kickstarter 2013,” Kickstarter, January 9, 2014. unless the total amount is raised: “Creator Handbook: Funding,” Kickstarter, accessed July 31, 2015. highest grossing Kickstarter campaign: Pebble Time is currently the most funded Kickstarter, with $20,338,986 to date. “Most Funded,” Kickstarter, accessed August 18, 2015. 40 percent of all projects succeed: “Stats: Projects and Dollars Success Rate,” Kickstarter, accessed July 31, 2015.

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The technology of sharing enables the power of one fan who is willing to prepay an artist or author to be aggregated (with little effort) together with hundreds of other fans into a significant pool of money. The most renowned crowdfunder is Kickstarter, which in the seven years since it was launched has enabled 9 million fans to fund 88,000 projects. Kickstarter is one of about 450 crowdfunding platforms worldwide; others, such as Indiegogo, are almost as prolific. Altogether, crowdfunding platforms raise more than $34 billion each year for projects that would not have been funded in any other way. In 2013, I was one of about 20,000 people who raised money from fans on Kickstarter. A few friends and I created a full-color graphic novel—or what used to be called a comic book for grown-ups.

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A few friends and I created a full-color graphic novel—or what used to be called a comic book for grown-ups. We calculated we needed $40,000 to pay writers and artists to create and print the second volume of our story, called The Silver Cord. So we went onto Kickstarter and made a short video pitch for what we wanted the money for. Kickstarter runs an ingenious escrow service so that the full grant (in our case $40,000) is not handed over to the creators until and unless the total amount is raised. If the drive is even a dollar short at the end of 30 days, the money is returned immediately to the funders and the fund-raisers (us) get nothing. This protects the fans, since an insufficiently funded project is doomed to fail; it also employs the classic network economics of turning your fans into your chief marketers, since once they contribute they become motivated to make sure you reach your goal by recruiting their friends to your campaign.

Tools of Titans: The Tactics, Routines, and Habits of Billionaires, Icons, and World-Class Performers
by Timothy Ferriss
Published 6 Dec 2016

Here are just a few of the non-obvious keys we learned. Find the MED for Kickstarter Traffic If you want to raise a lot of money on Kickstarter, you need to drive a lot of traffic to your project. And you want that traffic to be comprised of prospective backers of your project. Applying the concept of MED (“minimum effective dose” from The 4-Hour Body), we knew we needed to discover and focus on the best traffic sources. My friend Clay Hebert is a Kickstarter expert. One of the things he taught me is a simple trick using bit.ly tracking. Bit.ly is a link shortening service used by millions of people . . . and Kickstarter. If you add a + to the end of any bit.ly URL, you can see stats related to that link.

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Based on this data, we decided to focus all of our attention on just two goals: Getting coverage on the right blogs Activating our networks to create buzz on Facebook, Twitter, and email We knew that if we did this, we would be listed in Kickstarter’s Popular Projects sections, which is how you get people who are browsing Kickstarter to check out and back your project. Find Relevant Bloggers Using Google Images Start by looking at who covered Kickstarter projects similar to yours. You can do this by using a simple Google Images hack. If you drag and drop any image file into the search bar at images.google.com, you’ll be shown every website that has ever posted that image. Pretty cool, huh? Here’s the process your VA will use: Find 10 Kickstarter projects similar to yours, and for each, do the following:Right-click and save-to-desktop 2 to 3 images.

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Some platforms require “all-or-nothing” funding goals; others permit partial funding; some raise money for completed projects; some, like Patreon, fund ongoing projects. Patreon supporters might fund a monthly magazine, or a video series, or an artist’s salary. The most famous and largest crowdfunder is Kickstarter, which has raised $2.5 billion for more than 100,000 projects. The average number of supporters for a successful Kickstarter project is 241 funders—far less than 1,000. That means if you have 1,000 true fans, you can do a crowdfunding campaign, because by definition a true fan will become a Kickstarter funder. (Although the success of your campaign is dependent on what you ask of your fans). The truth is that cultivating 1,000 true fans is time-consuming, sometimes nerve-wracking, and not for everyone.

Growth Hacker Marketing: A Primer on the Future of PR, Marketing, and Advertising
by Ryan Holiday
Published 2 Sep 2013

We all find ourselves in the same position: needing to do more with less and finding, increasingly, that the old strategies no longer generate results. So in this book, I am going to take you through a new cycle, a much more fluid and iterative process. A growth hacker doesn’t see marketing as something one does, but rather as something one builds into the product itself. The product is then kick-started, shared, and optimized (with these steps repeated multiple times) on its way to massive and rapid growth. The chapters of this book follow that structure. But first, let’s make a clean break between the old and the new. What Is Growth Hacking? The end goal of every growth hacker is to build a self-perpetuating marketing machine that reaches millions by itself.

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They are the inventors, operators, and mechanics of their own self-sustaining and self-propagating growth machine that can take a start-up from nothing to something. But don’t worry, I’m not going to belabor definitions in this book. What’s important is we’re all trying to grow our business, launch our website, sell tickets for our event, or fund our Kickstarter project. And the way we do it, today, is fundamentally different from how it used to be done. Instead of launching products with multimillion-dollar marketing budgets, the growth hackers we will follow in this book began their work at start-ups with little to no resources. Forced to innovate and motivated to try new things, growth hackers like these have built some of these companies into billion-dollar brands.

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With the collapse or crumbling of some of the behemoth companies and the rapid rise of start-ups, apps, and websites, marketing will need to get smaller—it will need to change its priorities. When you get right down to it, the real skill for marketers today isn’t going to be helping some big boring company grow 1 percent a year but to create a totally new brand from nothing using next to no resources. Whether that’s a Kickstarter project you’re trying to fund or a new app, the thinking is the same: how do you get, maintain, and multiply attention in a scalable and efficient way? Thankfully, growth hacking isn’t some proprietary technical process shrouded in secrecy. In fact, it has grown and developed in the course of very public conversations.

Throwing Rocks at the Google Bus: How Growth Became the Enemy of Prosperity
by Douglas Rushkoff
Published 1 Mar 2016

Interview with Scott Heiferman, conducted by e-mail, September 2014. 53. Sarah Lacy, “Pando in 2014: Looking Back on an Exhausting, Transformational Year,” pando.com, December 25, 2014. 54. Max Chafkin, “True to Its Roots: Why Kickstarter Won’t Sell,” fastcompany.com, March 18, 2013. 55. “Kickstarter Is a Benefit Corporation,” kickstarter.com, September 21, 2015. 56. J. D. Alois, “Neil Young’s Pono Music Is Now Equity Crowdfunding Following $6.2 Million Kickstarter Hit,” crowdfundinsider.com, August 13, 2014. 57. Mike Masnick, “Larry Lessig Launches Crowdfunded SuperPAC to Try to End SuperPACs,” techdirt.com, May 1, 2014. 58. Jeremy Parish, “How Star Citizen Became the Most Successful Crowd Funded Game of All Time,” wdc.com, January 13, 2015. 59.

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“In the Internet industry, you’re basically a custodian of your own idea for maybe three to five years and then you’re supposed to sell. That’s insanity,”54 Kickstarter cofounder Perry Chen told Fast Company when he was trying to explain his platform’s approach to venture funding. He and Yancey Strickler started the now-famous crowdfunding site with $10 million in 2009 but made investors agree up front never to sell their shares. “We hope that we can return some of these funds to shareholders through some kind of profit sharing or dividend,” Chen explained, “and that’s it.” Six years later, in 2015, Strickler still enjoyed enough authority over the direction of the company to turn Kickstarter into a benefit corporation.55 None of his shareholders objected.

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He’s offering his investors something that’s anathema to conventional thinking: a way of participating in living commerce, a sustainable mission, and a continual flow of dividends. It treats money less like ice than like water. Besides, if the Kickstarter platform works as planned, there will be a whole lot less need for venture capital at all. Kickstarter, and other crowdfunding sites such as IndieGogo and Quirky, seek to democratize fund-raising. They give small businesses and independent creators a way to bypass investment by instead seeking funding in advance from their future customers. It’s how a musician like Amanda Palmer funds her tours and albums, Neil Young funded development of his high-fidelity digital music device Pono,56 and Lawrence Lessig funded his super PAC, Mayday.57 Individuals have raised a few hundred dollars to produce products from coloring books to news articles.

Collaborative Futures
by Mike Linksvayer , Michael Mandiberg and Mushon Zer-Aviv
Published 24 Aug 2010

There was a total breakdown in communication, trust, transparency, etc <www.maryrobine ekowal.com/journal/my-very-bad-experience-with-fundablecom/> <boingboing.net/2009/08/22/fundable-rips-off-hu.html>. Kickstarter Kickstarter.com has taken up this concept of crowdfunding with what seems to be significant initial success. The premise is simple: an individual defines a project that needs funding, defines rewards for different levels of contribution, and sets a funding goal. If that pledges meet the funding goal, the money is collected from pledgers, distributed to the project creator, who uses the funding to make the project. If the project does not reach the funding goal by the deadline, no money is transferred. Most projects aim for between $2,000 and $10,000. Kickstarter pledges are not donations, as most of the contributions are associated with tangible rewards, nor are they a form of micro-venture capital, as funders retain no equity in the funded project.

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At the end of their first year, they gave out a number of awards including the project with the most contributors, the project that raised the most money, and the project that reached their goal the fastest, but the award that might be most telling is for the “Most Prolific Backer”: 93 “Jonas Landin, Kickstarter ’s Most Prolific Backer, has pledged to an amazing 56 projects. What motivates him? “It feels really nice to be able to partially fund some one who has an idea they want to realize.” <blog.kickstarter.com/post/318287579/the-kickstarter-awards-by-the-numbers> One curious conundrum arose when Diaspora sought only to raise $10,000 to develop an open source social networking platform ended their campaign with $200,642. <www.kickstarter.com/projects/196017994/diaspora-thepersonally-controlled-do-it-all-distr> Their fundraiser came at the same time as a wave of Facebook privacy roll-backs, perfectly matching the simmering discontent with Facebook to their privacy focused project.

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Kickstarter pledges are not donations, as most of the contributions are associated with tangible rewards, nor are they a form of micro-venture capital, as funders retain no equity in the funded project. While crowdfunding need not limited in topic, Kickstarter is focused almost exclusively on funding creative and community focused projects. Part of their goal is to create a lively community of makers who support each other. At the end of their first year, they gave out a number of awards including the project with the most contributors, the project that raised the most money, and the project that reached their goal the fastest, but the award that might be most telling is for the “Most Prolific Backer”: 93 “Jonas Landin, Kickstarter ’s Most Prolific Backer, has pledged to an amazing 56 projects.

Roads and Bridges
by Nadia Eghbal

Musicians make a name for themselves through YouTube or Soundcloud instead of big record labels. Creative people fund their ideas through crowdfunding platforms like Kickstarter or Patreon. Similarly, these infrastructure projects sprang from passionate, creative developers who thought I could do this better, collaborating to build and release code to the world. The difference is that millions of people rely on this code to lead functional daily lives. Because code is less charismatic than a hit YouTube video or Kickstarter campaign, there is little public awareness of and appreciation for this work. As a result, there is not nearly enough institutional suppo rt for the output that sparked an information revolution.

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There are two major sources of funding at the moment: software companies and other developers. Crowdfunding Some development work gets funded through crowdfunding campaigns, such as Kickstarter or Indiegogo. Bountysource, the aforementioned open source bounty website, also has a platform called Salt, dedicated to crowdfunding open source projects. Andrew Godwin, a London-based Django core developer, successfully raised £17,952 (roughly $25,000) from 507 backers on Kickstarter to fund database work for Django. The project was fully funded in less than four hours. Of his decision to raise funds for an open source project, Godwin wrote: A lot of open source code gets done for free.

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At the other end of the lifecycle, some projects are meant to decline as other, better solutions take their place. Digital infrastructure is distributed across hundreds of projects, large and small, built by individuals, groups and companies; it would be a behemoth task to catalog them all. It's hard to find funding...for the average developer (me) some of them are totally out of reach. [Kickstarter] only works if you either go viral or hire someone to do all of the marketing/design/promotions….Turning a project into a business is great too, but...these are all things that take away from development (which is the part I like to focus on). If I wanted to get a grant, I wouldn't even know where to start.[149] - Kyle Kemp, freelance developer and open source contributor Institutional efforts to support digital infrastructure There are some institutional efforts to collectively organize and help support open source projects.

Digital Bank: Strategies for Launching or Becoming a Digital Bank
by Chris Skinner
Published 27 Aug 2013

Crowdfunding differs from social lending in that it is investing for returns in new business start-ups and, like crowdsourcing, it pools the money of the masses into a nice venture fund to get things started. Much of the focus of crowdfunding has been around Kickstarter, the American leader in this space. Kickstarter provides a platform for funding by pre-selling your idea, rather than providing equity in the business. For example, you have a conceptual music idea, and you pre-sell the idea through Kickstarter with the hope of getting enough monies to fund the implementation of the idea (unlike other sites where you get an equity stake in the business). Kickstarter kicked off in business in April 2009 and, three years later, had seeded $200 million in funds across 50,000 projects.

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Most of these projects are related to entertainment and the arts (about sixty percent of all projects), although some are technology and related fields. For example, in their most recent success, Kickstarter generated $10 million in funding for a new venture called Pebble. Pebble is a smartwatch that will connect to a smartphone. According to the Wall Street Journal, it raised more than $1 million in its first day on Kickstarter (April 17 2012) based upon an offer to pledge $115 to pre-order the watch. By mid-May 2012, Pebble had achieved its goal of raising $10.27 million. The funds were gained from 68,929 people, making it the most crowdfunded start-up ever in dollar terms at that time.

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In addition, social media is creating new business models, some of which have already been mentioned such as SmartyPig. In this section, we look at some of these new financial service models and, in each section, pick a leader to focus upon in depth. There are many new financial service operations emerging using social media covering Capital Markets (Etoro, Stocktwits, etc), Corporate Banking (Funding Circle, Kickstarter, Market Invoice, Platform Black, The Receivables Exchange, etc), Retail Banking (Zopa, Moven, Simple, Bitcoin, etc), Payments (Currency Cloud, Square, mPowa, etc) and Insurance (Friendsurance). These sites are all newly launched in the past decade and are firmly based upon proven social models of finance.

No Ordinary Disruption: The Four Global Forces Breaking All the Trends
by Richard Dobbs and James Manyika
Published 12 May 2015

Jeremy Grant, “Temasek’s dealmaking reflects big bets on rise of the consumer,” Financial Times (London), April 14, 2014, www.ft.com/cms/s/0/79d9824e-bb9a-11e3-8d4a-00144feabdc0.html#axzz36evevz5a. 62. www.kiva.org/about. 63. “Stats,” Kickstarter, www.kickstarter.com/help/stats?Ref=footer. 64. Rob Thomas, “The Veronica Mars movie project,” Kickstarter, March 13, 2013, et seq., www.kickstarter.com/projects/559914737/the-veronica-mars-movie-project. 65. “Alibaba sells loan arm to Alipay parent in pre-IPO change,” Bloomberg News, August 12, 2014, www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-08-12/alibaba-sells-loan-arm-to-alipay-parent-in-pre-ipo-change.html. 66.

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These are often of particular interest for smaller companies that do not have access to more traditional capital sources such as public markets and bank loans. Peer-to-peer lending and fund-raising platforms such as Kiva and Kickstarter know no national borders. Kiva, a web-based platform that allows users to lend money to people around the world, has reached over 1.2 million lenders, intermediating more than $600 million in loans.62 Since its founding in 2009, Kickstarter, a crowd-sourcing platform for creative projects—from movie documentaries to board games—has coordinated $1.3 billion in pledges from more than 6.9 million people.63 Among the notable projects funded on Kickstarter was the Veronica Mars movie, a sequel to the television show, which raised $5.7 million from more than ninety thousand “backers.”64 Alipay, the payment processing company launched in China by e-commerce giant Alibaba, has a unit that provides financing to small businesses.65 Exploit New Commercial Opportunities Companies with access to privileged sources of capital will have a clear competitive advantage.

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C=251324&p=irol-newsarticle&ID=1769548. 50. Amy Dockser Marcus and Christopher Weaver, “Heart gadgets test privacy-law limits,” Wall Street Journal, November 28, 2012, http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052970203937004578078820874744076. 51. Kiva website: www.kiva.org/about. 52. Kickstarter website: www.kickstarter.com/help/stats?ref=footer. 53. Martin Hirt and Paul Willmott, “Strategic principles for competing in the digital age,” McKinsey Quarterly, May 2014. 54. Amit Chowdhry, “WhatsApp hits 500 million users,” Forbes.com, April 22, 2014, www.forbes.com/sites/amitchowdhry/2014/04/22/whatsapp-hits-500-million-users. 55.

A Short Ride in the Jungle
by Antonia Bolingbroke-Kent
Published 6 Apr 2014

Hopping with pain and fury I apologised, dragged her up and stamped on the kick-start. Nothing. Silence. Not even a pop. More than ten tries later it was clear there was no convincing her. Panther was going nowhere. Since it was getting dark and there was no traffic, I was going to have to drag her off the road and find somewhere to sling my hammock. But with a wall of mountain on one side and a steep drop on the other, there was nowhere to go. I walked back to Panther determinedly. 'Right girl, you're going to start this time, OK!' I said out loud. I gave the kick-start an extra hard kick and she choked into life.

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I was far more likely to encounter mental demons than I was any man-eating big cats. As I stood up to leave at the end of the evening, George walked over to the bike to wish me goodbye. 'You're a brave girl,' he said. 'Good luck.' 'I'm not brave!' I retorted. 'I haven't done it yet. Tell me that when I've finished.' And with that I kick-started my bike and rode off into the Hanoi night. CHAPTER 3 GOING SOLO I awoke as the first glimmer of dawn broke through the hotel curtains. Vietnam rises early and already the street outside was humming with the noise of mopeds and the clatter of opening shutters. It was almost too much to comprehend that in a few hours I'd be zipping up my panniers, turning into the traffic and heading south.

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His intentions were clear as gin. Amused and revolted in equal measure, I looked him in the eye and said in my clearest English, 'Look mate! Firstly I have a boyfriend, secondly I'm not that cheap and thirdly you are definitely not my type.' I'm sure he got the gist. Without hesitation I stamped the kick-start, gave him a wave and wheeled off leaving him standing there, still waving the crisp 500,000 dong note. Agreeing to lunchtime offers of a quickie from a stranger wasn't part of my 'Yes' rule. At Dong Loc, Vietnam is almost at its thinnest. Fifteen miles to the east is the ocean, forty miles westwards the impenetrable jungles of Laos.

Science...For Her!
by Megan Amram
Published 4 Nov 2014

It’s not easy to finagle, especially since America has been hemorrhaging money in the twenty-first century. That’s why the United States has turned to the crowd-sourcing fund-raising site Kickstarter to fill in the cracks! * * * National Debt by the United States Government * * * ABOUT THIS PROJECT: Hi you guys! Joe Biden and the rest of the gang here! :) We’re looking for some awesome people to help us Kickstart our dream project of having a functioning federal government! That’s where you come in: all we’re asking for is a little help. And twenty trillion dollars. As you may know, we (the United States government) are a little strapped for cash.

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• Astrobiology • Carbon Dating • E-mail • Shakespearean Spam • E-male! • Which Dating Site Is Right for You? • This Spring’s Cutest Calling Cards to Leave on Your Serial Killer Victims! • Sexual Assault . . . and Pepper! . . . Spray! • Fun Ways to Freeze Your Eggs! • What I Imagine Porn Looks Like • Economic Technology • Kickstarter: Eliminate the National Debt Project • Electronic Music Women in Science “Trading Dungeons”: How to Spruce Up Your Basement Dungeon • Women in Science • How to Tell if You’re Upset Because You’re PMS-ing or Because You’re Caught in a Basement Dungeon • Hot or Not?! • Famous Women Scientists . . .

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As the kids say, “LOL!” (Laugh On Line!) We may be the ones responsible for “this economy” in the first place but still. Uncle Sam may have gotten us into this mess, but WE WANT YOU . . . to GET US OUT! There is little if any funding available for small-to-midsize debt-based projects such as this. Through Kickstarter, with your support, the country that you live in can remain a free sovereign nation instead of having to sell Ohio to China, ’cause then Ohio would probably start speaking Chinese, and that’s FUCKED UP. A LITTLE BACKGROUND: For those of you who don’t know, the USA is the best! Originally from England, the United States government has been a major world power since it was founded in 1776.

Coders: The Making of a New Tribe and the Remaking of the World
by Clive Thompson
Published 26 Mar 2019

To capture the excitement of the moment, Schafer’s company streamed footage from their office, showing the staff as they followed the increasing Kickstarter pledges. In a cycle of hype, that made fans more excited—so they kept on loading and reloading Schafer’s Kickstarter page. Everyone wanted to see the instant the campaign tipped over from $999,999 to $1,000,000. And that, as it turns out, was a problem for Kickstarter’s existing design. “They’re all streaming it, saying ‘let’s all celebrate this moment, this is Kickstarter history,’” Ivy says. But he hadn’t yet optimized Kickstarter to deal with such crushing amounts of activity. His development team was pretty small; they’d been focused on all sorts of other design challenges.

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But if suddenly thousands or millions of people start pounding away on your server? In that situation, unoptimized code can be ruinous. That’s what Lance Ivy found out when Kickstarter got popular. In 2012, three years after it was launched, Kickstarter started to get its first “million-dollar” campaigns. Among the first was a campaign by veteran video-game designer Tim Schafer to create Broken Age, his latest title. Schafer initially wanted to raise $400,000, a huge sum for Kickstarter at the time. But Schafer’s fan base rallied around the cause, and within 24 hours they had come close to raising a full $1 million. To capture the excitement of the moment, Schafer’s company streamed footage from their office, showing the staff as they followed the increasing Kickstarter pledges.

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With so many people eagerly pounding away on the same page, they were inadvertently staging a “denial of service attack,” a flood of traffic that brings a server to a halt. “We went down,” Ivy says. “We went down multiple times.” Nobody minded, thank God. On the contrary, back in those days “breaking Kickstarter” was considered to be a mark of pride, a proof of your campaign’s viral success. But Ivy knew fans wouldn’t always be so forgiving, and that meant optimizing Kickstarter so it wouldn’t burn through so many resources when a campaign heated up. One key trick: They wrote code that auto-updated a campaign’s pledge amount in real time, so that rabid fans could sit and watch it tick upward without constantly refreshing the page.

People Powered: How Communities Can Supercharge Your Business, Brand, and Teams
by Jono Bacon
Published 12 Nov 2019

“Firefox Crop Circle,” FirefoxCropCircle.com, accessed November 30, 2018, https://firefoxcropcircle.com/circle/; “SpreadFirefox,” Mozilla Firefox, November 2013, https://blog.mozilla.org/press/files/2013/11/nytimes-firefox-final.pdf. 25. “Pebble Time—Awesome Smartwatch, No Compromises,” Kickstarter, accessed November 25, 2018, https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/getpebble/pebble-time-awesome-smartwatch-no-compromises/description; “Exploding Kittens,” Kickstarter, accessed November 25, 2018, https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/elanlee/exploding-kittens/description. 26. Haydn Taylor, “Minecraft Exceeds 90m Monthly Active Users,” Games Industry, October 2, 2018, https://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2018-10-02-minecraft-exceeds-90-million-monthly-active-users. 27.

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Kate Clark, “Joseph Gordon-Levitt’s Artist Collaboration Platform HitRecord Raises $6.4m,” TechCrunch, January 31, 2019, https://techcrunch.com/2019/01/31/joseph-gordon-levitts-artist-collaboration-platform-hitrecord-raises-6-4m/. 15. “Star Citizen by Cloud Imperium Games Corporation,” Kickstarter, accessed November 1, 2018, https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/cig/star-citizen; P. Ariyasinghe, “Star Citizen Hits $150 Million in Crowd Funding,” Neowin, May 20, 2017, https://www.neowin.net/news/star-citizen-hits-150-million-in-crowd-funding/. 16. Lizette Chapman and Eric Newcomer, “Software Maker Docker Is Raising Funding at $1.3 Billion Valuation,” Bloomberg, August 9, 2017, https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-08-09/docker-is-said-to-be-raising-funding-at-1-3-billion-valuation. 17.

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HITRECORD doesn’t just provide a rewarding way to make art with others, but everyone whose contribution is included in a final funded HITRECORD production is compensated (to date, nearly $3 million has been paid to the community).14 The value was clear. New businesses often see particularly interesting value in community. As an example, Star Citizen, a popular multiplayer space combat game used Kickstarter to raise $500,000 to build their game and have subsequently raised $150,000,000 in crowd-funded donations and have built a community of 1.8 million players.15 Other companies have used community growth as an opportunity to build market relevance, such as the cloud infrastructure company, Docker, who started out life relatively unknown, but built a passionate community around its technology that helped them to subsequently become a staple in the technology infrastructure industry.

When the Money Runs Out: The End of Western Affluence
by Stephen D. King
Published 17 Jun 2013

Money can always be created and, if necessary, dropped from the sky out of helicopters or other suitable flying machines. It's increasingly clear, however, that no amount of policy stimulus has returned Western economic growth to the rates enjoyed by my generation in decades past. While most of the debate regarding our current economic challenges focuses on the best cyclical measures to kick-start economic growth, this book offers something different: an analysis of what happens if the recovery simply fails to materialize or is substantially weaker than those seen in the past. Its mixture of economics, politics and history is deliberate. Without an understanding of the political and historical context, economics on its own threatens to become increasingly irrelevant.

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Even as Japanese companies carry on repaying the debts built up in the 1980s, so the Japanese government year by year continues to add to public sector debt. Japan is caught in a trap. Private companies don't want to invest. An ageing population prefers not to spend. The resulting lack of demand inevitably puts pressure on government to spend more. Yet, too often, extra government spending, rather than kick-starting economic growth, has merely led to the construction of so-called ‘bridges to nowhere’, vanity projects that say more about the ‘pork barrel’ nature of political reality than about the strength or otherwise of the overall economy. One good example is the town of Hamada in Shimane prefecture. With a population of around 70,000 mostly elderly people, it benefits from the Hamada Marine Bridge – largely devoid of traffic – a university, a prison, an art museum for children, a ski resort and an aquarium, all of which represent gifts from current and future Japanese taxpayers.

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However, back in 2010, most forecasters – including the Office for Budget Responsibility, the independent fiscal watchdog – concluded that loose monetary policy alone would lead to a decent recovery in economic activity that, in turn, would allow room for some kind of fiscal contraction without too much collateral damage. It wasn't so much reckless fiscal austerity that threw the UK economy off course but, rather, the impotence of monetary policy. Von Mises would have regarded this attempt to kick-start Western economies through ever more desperate monetary measures as the failed pursuit of illusory, not real, prosperity – claims on future economic activity that might never materialize. Yet our societies have not been prepared to make the ‘real’ versus ‘illusory’ distinction. We think we've discovered the secrets of ever rising prosperity partly because we're terrified of the consequences should prosperity crumble in our hands.

Exponential Organizations: Why New Organizations Are Ten Times Better, Faster, and Cheaper Than Yours (And What to Do About It)
by Salim Ismail and Yuri van Geest
Published 17 Oct 2014

Seely Brown and Hagel call this “scalable learning,” and given the growth rates of ExOs, it is their only possible strategy. In the best cases, ExOs feature both—that is, ideas are developed bottom-up and get acceptance/ratification/support from the top. In the end, the best ideas win, regardless of who proposed them. In an effort to kick-start this kind of thinking, Adobe Systems recently launched the KickStart Innovation Workshop. Participating employees receive a red box containing a step-by-step startup guide and a pre-paid credit card with $1,000 in seed money, and are given forty-five days to experiment with and validate innovative ideas. Although they have access to coaching from some of the company’s top innovators, the rest is up to them.

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Tools such as UserVoice, Unbounce and Google AdWords can accomplish this. Crowdfunding is a growing trend to help fund ideas using the web to assemble very large numbers of comparatively small investors—thus not only raising capital, but also reflecting the interest of the market. Two well-known examples of crowdfunding companies are Kickstarter and Indiegogo. In 2012 there was an estimated $2.8 billion raised via crowdfunding campaigns. By 2015 that number is expected to climb to $15 billion. The World Bank predicts crowdfunding to grow to $93 billion by 2025. In addition to raising enormous amounts of money for causes and startups, such platforms are also democratizing access to working capital.

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The result has been an industry-wide transformation, allowing new entrants and hobbyists into the field, which has benefitted all players in the business, including Illumina. Though few industries have experienced such a stunning transformation as biotech, similar trends can also be seen in many other hardware arenas. Thus, while a basic 3D printer in 2007 cost nearly $40,000, the new Peachy Printer—recently funded on Kickstarter—is now available for just $100. And that’s only the start: Avi Reichental, CEO of market leader 3D Systems, sees no obstacles to bringing his company’s high-end 3D printers to market for just $399 within the next five years. Another example of this trend includes single-board computers for robotics and education, where the open sourced Raspberry Pi platform has proved transformative.

Design Is a Job
by Mike Monteiro
Published 5 Mar 2012

Approaching Pricing A few years ago I was fortunate enough to work with a company called Kickstart (not to be confused with Kickstarter, the excellent crowd-sourcing project funding service). Kickstart is an NGO (non-governmental organization) that designs and manufactures low-cost water pumps for use in impoverished agricultural areas of the world, mainly in Eastern Africa. They have an amazing track record of helping people lift themselves out of poverty by using these simple, easy-to-fix water pumps to irrigate crops. They create jobs. Here’s why I’m mentioning it: they don’t give away the pumps, like most NGOs would. They sell them. The Kickstart founders spent years working with NGOs who donated equipment and tools to those in need, only to return to the scene and find that the equipment had been scavenged for parts or was sitting unused and rusting away.

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The Kickstart founders spent years working with NGOs who donated equipment and tools to those in need, only to return to the scene and find that the equipment had been scavenged for parts or was sitting unused and rusting away. People didn’t value (or need) what they had been given. So Kickstart decided to sell their pumps, marketing them as the “Super MoneyMaker.” The results were impressive. Instead of free hand-outs, the Super MoneyMaker became an item the poorest people in the world would save up for. Only people who actually planned to use one would buy one. When you pay for something with your own money, you value it more than when you get it for free.

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See commencement fees developers 115 directing other designers 122 E Eames, Ray and Charles 9, 130 elevator pitches 15 enforcing contracts 55 engineers 116 establishing a feedback cycle 76, 80 ethical responsibilities 28 F feedback guidelines 78 firing people 127 G Gillum, Katie 87 Gruber, John 121 H Hall, Erika 2, 82, 110 I indemnity 54 information designers 113 intellectual property transfers 53 internal dysfunctions 62 invoice approval 92 K Kalman, Tibor 9, 130 Kickstart 33 kill fees. See termination fees L late payments 97 lawyers 47, 89, 98 leadership 124 Let’s Make Mistakes 87 Levine, Gabe 48 Licko, Zuzana 9, 130 lines of credits 98 lowballing 43 M maintaining relationships 16 marketers 118 market research 36 myth of the magical creative 6 N negative feedback 71 networking 15 O organizing client feedback 82 outbound client contacts 20 P Papanek, Victor 9, 130 payment milestones.

Company of One: Why Staying Small Is the Next Big Thing for Business
by Paul Jarvis
Published 1 Jan 2019

Launching and Iterating in Tiny Steps 168 predictability, accessibility: George Whitesides, “Towards a Science of Simplicity,” TED Talks, February 2010, https://www.ted.com/talks/george_whitesides_toward_a_science_of_simplicity. 170 the most-funded KickStarter project ever: “Pebble Time—Awesome Smartwatch, No Compromises,” Kickstarter, accessed October 9, 2017, https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/getpebble/pebble-time-awesome-smartwatch-no-compromises. 170( didn’t ensure Pebble’s long-term success): Lauren Goode, “Fitbit Bought Pebble for Much Less Than Originally Reported,” The Verge, February 22, 2017, https://www.theverge.com/2017/2/22/14703108/fitbit-bought-pebble-for-23-millionw. 171 best suited for consumer-facing products: Olav Sorenson, “Could Crowdfunding Reshape Entrepreneurship?”

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That’s why getting a working version of your product released as quickly as possible is important: your company needs to start generating cash flow and obtaining customer feedback. Andrew Mason founded Groupon as a basic website where he manually typed in deals and created PDFs to email to subscribers from Apple Mail. Pebble, a smartwatch, started with just a single explainer video and a Kickstarter campaign (no actual product, even) that raised more than $20 million to fund its development; Pebble was eventually sold to FitBit. Virgin started as a single Boeing 747 flying between Gatwick, England, and Newark, New Jersey. Once these startups were up and running, they were able to build from customer feedback and make positive changes.

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Not so with Gather, however: Jeff decided to test his idea for his new product by creating a crowdfunding campaign for it. This approach, he felt, would see how much his audience wanted Gather; if they did, they would raise the capital he needed to build it without the need to give up control to investors. And because he’d already spent a decade building an audience that was ravenous for his Ugmonk brand, Jeff’s Kickstarter campaign was able to generate over $430,000 (surpassing his original funding goal by 2,394 percent), garnering him more than enough to cover all the costs required to put Gather into production. Jeff was now able to ramp up production to an existing audience for this product, and he got funding directly from that audience instead of from outside investors who might not have completely shared his vision.

Reinventing Capitalism in the Age of Big Data
by Viktor Mayer-Schönberger and Thomas Ramge
Published 27 Feb 2018

The total market for peer-to-peer lending in China is estimated to have surpassed $100 billion in 2016. Kickstarter and its competitors, such as Indiegogo, offer a related service. Kickstarter alone has helped start-ups generate direct sales in excess of $3 billion, with one in three projects being successfully funded (and only about 15 percent of funded projects eventually failing). Recently, Kickstarter has teamed up with equity crowdfunding platform MicroVentures to offer backers a chance to buy equity in small businesses. What’s interesting is that Kickstarter built a platform for start-ups to go beyond a simple purchasing or funding transaction and offer comprehensive, rich, and continuous information to backers, quite a bit like an early data-rich market, so as to provide them with a lot of information in their decision-making and also keep them in the loop later.

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General Electric and Siemens are decentralizing: “The Multinational Company Is in Trouble,” Economist, January 28, 2017, http://www.economist.com/news/leaders/21715660-global-firms-are-surprisingly-vulnerable-attack-multinational-company-trouble. media giant Thomson Reuters aims to: Mary Johnson, “How to Kickstart Innovation at a Multinational Corporation,” Thomson Reuters blog, April 7, 2016, https://blogs.thomsonreuters.com/answerson/kickstart-innovation-multinational-corporation. recruit the talent their firms required: Eben Harrell, “The Solution to the Skills Gap Could Already Be Inside Your Company,” Harvard Business Review, September 27, 2016, https://hbr.org/2016/09/the-solution-to-the-skills-gap-could-already-be-inside-your-company.

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But we may understand this case also as a metaphor for the rise and eventual fall of money-based markets, and the success of information intermediaries over monetary ones. We suggest this may happen throughout the financial services sector as finance capitalism is replaced by data capitalism. Venture capitalist Albert Wenger, whose firm has funded many successful start-ups in the financial sector from Kickstarter to SigFig, likens the fate of traditional banks in the age of rich data to another image of a tempest threatening a ship—a “Spanish Galleon full of raided gold sinking in a storm.” It has access to all the capital but lacks the insight, based on information, to circumnavigate the perilous weather

The Zero Marginal Cost Society: The Internet of Things, the Collaborative Commons, and the Eclipse of Capitalism
by Jeremy Rifkin
Published 31 Mar 2014

David Bornstein, “Crowdfunding Clean Energy,” New York Times, March 6, 2013, http:// opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/03/06/crowd-funding-clean-energy/ (accessed March 6, 2013). 4. “Amazon Payment Fees,” Amazon, http://www.kickstarter.com/help/amazon (accessed June 11, 2013); “What Is Kickstarter?” Kickstarter, http://www.kickstarter.com/hello?ref=nav (accessed June 11, 2013). 5. “What Is Kickstarter?” 6. “Re-imagining US Solar Financing,” Bloomberg New Energy Finance (June 4, 2012) from David Bornstein, “Crowdfunding Clean Energy,” New York Times Opinion Pages, March 6, 2013, http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/03/06/crowd-funding-clean-energy/?

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Zopa, the U.K.’s first peer-to-peer lender, has processed loans of more than £414 million.2 Peer-to-peer social lenders brokered $1.8 billion in loans by the end of 2012, forcing the big banks to take notice.3 A more recent offshoot of peer-to-peer social lending is something called crowdfunding. Kickstarter, the leading crowdfunding enterprise, was launched in April 2009. Here’s how it works. Kickstarter goes around conventional investment vehicles and raises finance capital from the general public on the Internet. Originators of a project put their plan up on a site and pick a deadline by which the necessary funds have to be raised. If the goal is not reached by this deadline, no funds are collected. This provision ensures that the project has enough financing to at least make a go of the venture. The money pledged by donors is collected by Amazon payments. Kickstarter collects 5 percent of the funds raised and Amazon charges, on average, an additional 3 to 5 percent.4 Kickstarter, unlike traditional lenders, has no ownership in the ventures.

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Kickstarter collects 5 percent of the funds raised and Amazon charges, on average, an additional 3 to 5 percent.4 Kickstarter, unlike traditional lenders, has no ownership in the ventures. It’s merely a facilitator. By November 2013, Kickstarter had fostered 51,000 projects with a 44 percent success rate. The projects had raised more than $871 million. Kickstarter limits the project funding to 13 categories—art, dance, design, fashion, films and video, food, games, music, photography, publishing, technology, and theater.5 Various crowdfunding platforms offer different forms of compensation. Donors can either pledge funds as gifts or receive the comparable value of the funds extended to the borrower in the form of goods or services once the project is up and running, or provide funds as a straight loan with interest, or invest in the project in return for equal shares.

The Purpose Economy: How Your Desire for Impact, Personal Growth and Community Is Changing the World
by Aaron Hurst
Published 31 Aug 2013

While this worked as a controlled pilot project, the next step is to understand the commercial viability of offshore OMEGA systems for a variety of uses, including biofuels production, wastewater treatment, and carbon sequestration. 3. Kickstarter: Crowdsourced Investment Kickstarter, an online platform for crowdfunding independent creative projects, launched in 2009 using secure online fundraising platforms (itself a recent disruptive technology). The platform recognized and filled a gap for creative entrepreneurs, designers, and other freelancers wanting to maintain creative control over their projects. The founders like to highlight this process as being rooted in the time of Mozart or Mark Twain, who solicited money from their communities and gave that community one of their finished products. Even so, Kickstarter’s inventive use of technology to harness the power of the creative community has enabled a crowd-sourced $789 million for 53,672 different projects, and in the process, Kickstarter has become one of the most influential bright spots in and beyond the tech world. 4.

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Leaders of that economy, like HP and IBM, started with a foot still in manufacturing, creating hardware to store and manage information. Today, we see the early Purpose Economy stars anchored in Information Economy platforms; Facebook, which enables self-expression and community on a massive scale, is a great example. Kickstarter, which now provides more funding for the arts than the National Endowment for the Arts, is another. With the rise of the Information Economy, most companies eventually adopted information-driven systems and tools into their operations and products, such as GPS in cars and robotics in manufacturing.

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As so many of Amanda’s fans offered up their homes and food freely, she realized that people felt her music was helping them, and that they wanted to help her in return. After her fan volunteered to pay her for the free album he’d burned, she decided to make her music free and to open up to her community, asking them to support her directly. She launched a Kickstarter campaign to support the making of her next album, and it generated nearly $1.2 million in contributions from 25 thousand people—the same number that her record label had considered so shabby. Amanda’s story perfectly expresses how people are looking for more personal domain in their lives, which she has achieved.

Blockchain: Blueprint for a New Economy
by Melanie Swan
Published 22 Jan 2014

Overstock CEO Patrick Byrne and Counterparty created a new venture, Medici, announced in October 2014, to provide a decentralized stock market for equity securities in the blockchain model.42 Crowdfunding Another prime example of how financial services are being reinvented with blockchain-based decentralized models is crowdfunding. The idea is that peer-to-peer fundraising models such as Kickstarter can supplant the need for traditional venture capital funding for startups. Where previously a centralized service like Kickstarter or Indiegogo was needed to enable a crowdfunding campaign, crowdfunding platforms powered by blockchain technology remove the need for an intermediary third party. Blockchain-based crowdfunding platforms make it possible for startups to raise funds by creating their own digital currencies and selling “cryptographic shares” to early backers.

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A program or smart contract can be written that releases a payment when a specific value of a certain exchange good is triggered or when something transpires in the real world (e.g., a news event of some sort, or the winner of a sports match). Smart contracts could also be deployed in pledge systems like Kickstarter. Individuals make online pledges that are encoded in a blockchain, and if the entrepreneur’s fundraising goal is reached, only then will the Bitcoin funds be released from the investor wallets. No transaction is released until all funds are received. Further, the entrepreneur’s budget, spending, and burn rate could be tracked by the subsequent outflow transactions from the blockchain address that received the fundraising.

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Sample list of Dapps Project name and URL Activity Centralized equivalent OpenBazaar https://openbazaar.org/ Buy/sell items in local physical world Craigslist LaZooz http://lazooz.org/ Ridesharing, including Zooz, a proof-of-movement coin Uber Twister http://twister.net.co/ Social networking, peer-to-peer microblogging66 Twitter/Facebook Gems http://getgems.org/ Social networking, token-based social messaging Twitter/SMS Bitmessage https://bitmessage.org Secure messaging (individual or broadcast) SMS services Storj http://storj.io/ File storage Dropbox Swarm https://www.swarm.co/ Koinify https://koinify.com/ bitFlyer http://fundflyer.bitflyer.jp/ Cryptocurrency crowdfunding platforms Kickstarter, Indiegogo venture capital funding In a collaborative white paper, another group offers a stronger-form definition of a Dapp.67 In their view, the Dapp must have three features. First, the application must be completely open source, operate autonomously with no entity controlling the majority of its tokens, and its data and records of operation must be cryptographically stored in a public, decentralized blockchain.

Information Doesn't Want to Be Free: Laws for the Internet Age
by Cory Doctorow , Amanda Palmer and Neil Gaiman
Published 18 Nov 2014

San Franciscans are ranked eighty-seventh in global payers; below Oslo, ranked eighty-sixth, where the average payment is $58.” Humble isn’t the only innovative collector of donations. Kickstarter uses “crowdfunding” to raise money for creators—people solicit funds to complete a project, and make a pitch (text and video) explaining why donors should trust them to use the money wisely. Then they specify premiums and gifts to be given to exceptional donors—give ten dollars and I’ll send you a postcard with a custom sketch; a hundred dollars gets you a custom portrait; ten thousand dollars gets you an original comic book starring you and your friends. Kickstarter has also been used as an effective means of collecting preorders before a production run: Give me fifteen dollars, and I’ll send you a book.

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The event was meant to commemorate her twenty-eighth birthday, and she sought to raise $4,500 on Kickstarter from fans who got to watch her draw on a live video feed and received pieces of illustrated paper. She raised $25,805. In 2012, she sought $30,000 from her fans to rent a New York City storefront and paint nine giant paintings inspired by the Occupy Wall Street movement. Within a week, she had $55,000. By the time the project ended, she had $64,799 (including the $8,000 per painting she took in for the seven canvases she sold as part of the highest-level Kickstarter reward). Like many painters through history, Crabapple relies on patrons to pay her bills—but her patrons number in the thousands, and she needn’t worry about the caprice or high-handedness of a few fat cats as she paints her way into history. 2.6 Does This Mean You Should Ditch Your Investor and Go Indie?

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Two years ago, I conducted a crowdfunding campaign that raised over a million dollars in capital so that I could put out a record without a major label. People scratched their heads—why would this happen? How did she do it? The newspapers, the journalists, the bloggerati all weighed in. Was this the future of music? Was my Kickstarter “repeatable”? Am I a freak, an outlier, a strange charity case that an outlying public accidentally raised above the norm? Not from where I’m standing. There are many more of me—there already have been, and we are legion. It’s repeating as we speak. We are a new generation of artists, makers, supporters, and consumers who believe that the old system through which we exchanged content and money is dead.

Evil by Design: Interaction Design to Lead Us Into Temptation
by Chris Nodder
Published 4 Jun 2013

The Spore creature creator gave users a feeling of “owning” the character they developed before the full game was available. (spore.com/trial) Kickstarter’s whole business model could be described as making people feel ownership before they’ve bought a product, or indeed before it’s even been made. The idea is that you pledge money and become a backer of a proposed creative project. Obviously, if the project doesn’t meet its funding goals you aren’t billed. That means that if you want the product, it’s in your interest to persuade as many other people as you can that they too should get involved. With three hours to go, Double Fine had already easily become the highest financed Kickstarter project in the site’s history.

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With three hours to go, Double Fine had already easily become the highest financed Kickstarter project in the site’s history. The Double Fine project pushed all the right pre-ownership buttons. (kickstarter.com) One example of a successful Kickstarter project is Double Fine Adventure, a point-and-click computer game. At the time of funding, backers knew only that Tim Schafer, the project’s leader, had a history of producing engaging adventure games. No work had been done on a script, character development, or any other aspects of the game. Based on nothing more than reputation and a promise to include backers in regular updates as the game development process progressed, Tim met his funding goal of $400,000 in just eight hours.

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Based on nothing more than reputation and a promise to include backers in regular updates as the game development process progressed, Tim met his funding goal of $400,000 in just eight hours. Even he was surprised when funding topped the one million dollar mark within twenty-four hours. By the time the Kickstarter project closed, he had 87,142 backers for a total donation of more than $3.3 million. That left him 834 percent funded, and therefore he could add more characters and better technical effects, and release on more platforms and in more languages than he had ever intended. To increase the chances of success, most Kickstarter projects draw people in with escalating rewards for pledges at different levels of involvement. Double Fine Adventure promised a copy of the game to people pledging at the $15 level, with various stages including signed books and posters at $500 up to lunch and a tour of the offices at the $10,000 level.

Dual Transformation: How to Reposition Today's Business While Creating the Future
by Scott D. Anthony and Mark W. Johnson
Published 27 Mar 2017

In 2012, Globe CEO Ernest Cu backed a proposal from Minette Navarrete to create a separate investment vehicle called Kickstart Ventures, jointly owned by Singtel and the Ayala Corporation, the family-controlled conglomerate that constituted the other significant investor in Globe. One of Kickstart’s missions is to develop the entrepreneurial ecosystem in the Philippines, a country with a young, technologically savvy population. Between 2012 and 2015 Kickstart made twenty investments in early-stage companies in the Philippines. Impressed by the progress, in early 2015 Cu convinced his board to set aside $50 million to expand Kickstart’s investment activities. Increasingly, companies have decided that this kind of corporate venture capital is critical given the pace and scale of change in the global market.

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See also transformation B creating goals/boundaries for, 121–123 creating separate new engine for, 12 disruption as opportunity for, 47–50 fitness landscape and, 7–8 gap in, determining, 118–121, 213–214 portfolio management systems and, 80–82 rapid, as warning sign, 108–109 slowing revenue, as warning sign, 107 strategic opportunity areas and, 123–127 Guaranteach, 69 Gupta, Piyush, 151 Hait, William N., 17, 18, 19 Hall, Taddy, 38 The Haloid Photographic Company, 13 Hancock, Jake, 84 Hardless, Edgar, 143 Harvard Business School MBA program, 103, 110–113, 176 Hastings, Reed, 23, 32–36 decision making by, 93–95 education and, 69–70 HBO, 5, 35 HBX, 113 health care industry acquisitions in, 22–23 Aetna, 23, 87, 99–102 constrained market in, 59–61 illusory nonconsumption in, 62–63 Johnson and Johnson, 16–22 medical devices, 203–204 Medtronic, 72–73 Netflix and IBM in, 70 retailization of, 101 Healthy Family, 127 Healthy Heart for All, 73, 74 Hill, Andy, 131 Hill, Linda, 146 Hinckley, Gordon B., 41 Hoffman, Reid, 49 HOPE acronym, 65 Horowitz, Ben, 206 House of Cards, 35 House of Payne, 98 Houston, Drew, 151 the how, changing in transformation A, 36–45 Huffington, Arianna, 27 Huffington Post, 27, 28 Humana, 183 Hundred Flowers Campaign, 117 Hurley, Chad, 97 HyperText Markup Language (HTML), 3 IBM, 8, 54, 132 Watson, 70, 204 ibrutinib, 19 Icahn, Carl, 15 ideas, sharing, 149 identity crises, 168–173, 193–197 IDEO, 61 Imbruvica, 19 industry entrant activity, 104–105, 112 Innosight, 61, 77, 93 Innov8, 143–144 innovation business model, 40–42 in business models, 20 catalysts in, 104–105 creating safe spaces for, 143–145 in established companies, 71–72 for improving today and creating tomorrow, 55 incumbents’ failure in, 14–15 pace of disruptions and, 4–5 physical environment and, 148 predictability and, 137–139 sharing ideas and, 149 simplifying experiments and, 148–149 Innovation: The Attacker’s Advantage (Foster), 71 The Innovator’s Dilemma (Christensen), 14–15, 36, 71 The Innovator’s Extinction (Ulmer), 71–72 The Innovator’s Guide to Growth (Anthony, Johnson, Sinfield, and Altman), 62 Instagram, 48 Institute for Health Sciences, 204 Intel, 78–79 InterActive Corp, 49–50 interface management, 75, 80–87 arbitration in, 86–87 exchange teams in, 82–83 transfer pricing in, 85 internet browsers, 2–3, 47 media transformations from, 2–3 Intuit, 132–133 inverse mentors, 150–151 investment curiosity and funding of, 141 at Deseret, 30 estimating potential of existing, 119 at SingPost, 52–53 by venture capitalists, 103–104 iPhone, 4, 92–93, 104 iPod, 92–93 Israel, Simon, 53, 142 iTunes, 92–93 Janssen, Paul, 16 Janssen Pharmaceuticals, 16–22 business model innovation at, 42 postdisruption job to be done at, 39 Jarden Consumer Solutions (JCS), 130–131 Jasper, 143 Jassy, Andy, 53–54 Jensen, Michael, 177 job loss, 7 at Deseret, 30 at Media General, 157 Jobs, Steve, 4, 8 destruction by, 132 focus of, 116 influenced by Xerox, 13 Motorola and, 92–93 transformation journey of, 181–182 job to be done, 21 determining defensible postdisruption, 36–39 Johnson, Lyndon, 116 Johnson, Mark, 36, 53, 62, 109–110 Johnson & Johnson, 16–22, 177–178 Joyce, Jim, 64 Karim, Jawed, 97 Kay, Alan, 154 Kennedy, John F., 24, 115–116, 117, 132 Kickbox, 148–149 Kickstart Ventures, 143–144 Knewton, 56, 67 Knight, Wayne, 95 Knight Ridder, 97 Kodak, 1–2, 4, 11 Kodak Moments, 1–2 Koonin, Steve, 95 KPO, 51 KSL, 8, 9, 29, 68 Kuhn, Thomas, 68 Lafley, A.G., 124, 137 Lasseter, John, 4 Lazarus, Mark, 95 Lead and Disrupt (O’Reilly and Tushman), 53, 54 leaders and leadership commitment to transformation A implementation by, 43–45 conflict arbitration by, 86–87 conviction to persevere and, 24, 155–179 courage in decision making and, 91–113 on crises of commitment, 186–189 on crises of conflict, 189–193 curiosity in, 24, 135–154 discussion questions for, 210 in dual transformation, 23–24 exchange teams and, 83–84 exposing to new thinking, 145–147 focus and, 24, 115–133 greatest challenge facing current, 5, 11 hands-on involvement by, 44 in maintaining transformations, 162–163 mindsets for success in, 23–24 opportunity of disruption and, 11–12 overestimation of alignment by, 119 profiles of transformation, 182–186 purpose and, 176–178 understanding customer problems and the job to be done, 38–39 The Lean Startup (Ries), 65, 153 LeBlanc, Paul, 58 le Carré, John, 153 Lee, Christopher M., 67–68, 86–87 Lee Hsien Yang, 136 Lee Kuan Yew, 136 LegalZoom, 207 Lenovo, 92 Levitt, Ted, 37, 175 Lew, Allen, 144–145 Lim Ho Kee, 53 Linford, Jon, 84 LinkedIn, 49 Lin Media, 156 local maximums, 6 lunar module frame, 131–132 Lyft, 205 Lynch, Kevin, 32 Major League Baseball, 98–99 Manila Water, 117–128, 184–185 determining goals and boundaries at, 121–123 focus at, 142 growth gap determination at, 118–121 outcomes for, 127–128 strategic opportunity areas of, 123–127 Mao Zedong, 116–117 Marcial, Sharon, 127 margins, 122 “Marketing Myopia” (Levitt), 175 markets identifying constrained, 59–63 opened by disruptions, 5 Marriott, 8 Martin, George R.R., 5 Martin, Roger, 124, 140, 177 McClatchy, 97 McGrath, Rita, 65, 146 Meckling, William, 177 media companies founded after disruption in, 47–50 streaming, 33–36, 93–95 transformations in, 2–3 Media General, 155–157 Medicity, 183 Medtronic, 72–73, 74 Merck, 22 metrics, 42–43 microlenders, 73 Microsoft, 4, 49, 54 Mint, 132 mission statements, 177, 178 mobile phones, 3–5, 91–93 banking and, 151–152 shipping industry and, 202–203 Monte Carlo techniques, 98–99 moonshot, 24, 115–116, 131–132 Morton, Marshall, 155–156 motivation, 175–176 leaders on, 194 Motorola, 4–5, 92 M-PESA, 201 Mulally, Alan, 153–154 Mulcahy, Anne, 14, 86 multisystem operators (MSOs), 96, 98–99 Murdoch, Rupert, 97, 109 Myspace, 48, 97, 109 Narayen, Shantanu, 31–33 National Basketball Association, 98–99 National Science Foundation, 56 Navarrete, Minette, 143–144 Nestlé, 204 Netflix, 23, 97, 104 Amazon Web Services and, 54 business model innovation at, 40, 42, 146 business model of, 106 content creation at, 34–35 decision making at, 93–95, 102 early warning signs at, 108 metrics at, 43 postdisruption job to be done at, 39 transformation A at, 32–36 transformation B at, 69–70 transformation journey at, 181 net present value (NPV), 110 net promoter scores, 78 Netscape, 2–3, 47 News Corp, 48, 97 Newspaper Association of America, 3 newspapers.

Modern Monopolies: What It Takes to Dominate the 21st Century Economy
by Alex Moazed and Nicholas L. Johnson
Published 30 May 2016

In fact, most of today’s biggest IPOs and acquisitions are platforms, as are almost all of the most successful startups. The list includes Apple, Google, Microsoft, Facebook, Twitter, Amazon, eBay, Instagram, YouTube, Twitch, Snapchat, WhatsApp, Waze, Uber, Lyft, Handy, Airbnb, Pinterest, Square, Social Finance, Kickstarter, and more. (See Figure 1.4 for examples of platform startups and their latest valuations.) The growth of platforms isn’t isolated to the United States either; platform companies such as Alibaba, Tencent, Baidu, and Rakuten have taken over China and much of Asia. Figure 1.4. Platform companies and recent valuations, January 2016.

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—Fred Wilson, venture capitalist and founder of Union Square Ventures Fred Wilson, founder of Union Square Ventures (USV), is a renowned investor and venture capitalist. His firm has invested in many platform companies, including Twitter, Etsy, Lending Club, Tumblr, Foursquare, SoundCloud, and Kickstarter. To explain his company’s investment thesis, he has told what he called the “dentist office software story.” The story, “a modern day fable about defensibility in the software business,”1 begins with an entrepreneur who’s tired of having long waits at the dentist’s office. So, in typical entrepreneur fashion, this person decides to build management software for dentists’ offices.

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USV realized it did not want to invest in commodity software, so Wilson and his partners asked, “What will provide defensibility?” The answer: “Networks of users, transactions, or data,” Wilson explained. “That led us to social media, to Delicious, Tumblr, and Twitter. And marketplaces like Etsy, Lending Club, and Kickstarter.” One of USV’s partners, Albert Wenger, has created an alternative ending for this story. In his version, a dentist named Hoff Reidman “decides that he wants to network with other dentists.” He creates a site called Dentistry.com. He hustles to get initial traction, and the site takes off.

The Future Is Faster Than You Think: How Converging Technologies Are Transforming Business, Industries, and Our Lives
by Peter H. Diamandis and Steven Kotler
Published 28 Jan 2020

by 2015, a worldwide total of $34 billion: Ben Paynter, “How Will the Rise of Crowdfunding Reshape How We Give to Charity?” Fast Company, March 3, 2017, See: https://www.fastcompany.com/3068534/how-will-the-rise-of-crowdfunding-reshape-how-we-give-to-charity-2. Kickstarter: See: https://www.kickstarter.com/help/stats. Pebble Time: John McDermott, “Pebble ‘Smartwatch’ Funding Soars on Kickstarter,” Inc., April 20, 2012. See: https://www.inc.com/john-mcdermott/pebble-smartwatch-funding-sets-kickstarter-record.html. $300 billion: Massolution/Crowdsourcing.org, 2015 CF Crowdfunding Industry Report. See: http://reports.crowdsourcing.org/index.php?route=product/product&product_id=54.

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And while Marillion had to invent the entire back-end process that drove their campaign, today’s entrepreneurs can choose from any of the six hundred different crowdfunding platforms available in North America alone. Kickstarter, for example, one of the most popular reward-based platforms, has launched over 450,000 projects, with over $4.4 billion pledged to the site. It has also sped up the startup process considerably. The most successful Kickstarter campaign to date, a smart watch called Pebble Time, raised just over $20 million in little over a month—something that would have taken years to accomplish in Marillion’s day. And like many other digital platforms, crowdfunding is riding atop Moore’s Law and experiencing double-digit growth.

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For those unfamiliar, crowdfunding is pretty straightforward. The “crowd” in question refers to the billions of people currently online. The funding part means asking that crowd for money. Typically, a crowdfunder presents their product or service to the world, usually via a video posted to a dedicated site like Kickstarter, and asks for money in one of four forms: as a loan (technically peer-to-peer lending), as an equity investment, in exchange for a reward (e.g., a T-shirt), or as an advanced purchase of the proposed product or service. And it can add up to a lot of money. The very first crowdfunding project took place in 1997, when the British prog-rock band Marillion raised $60,000 through online donations to finance a US tour.

What's Mine Is Yours: How Collaborative Consumption Is Changing the Way We Live
by Rachel Botsman and Roo Rogers
Published 2 Jan 2010

In this sense, the nouveau riche, just like their counterparts in earlier Roman, Greek, and Egyptian civilizations, bought and consumed goods for self-advertisement as much as, if not more than, utility. What interests us the most is not the luxury status or elitist side of conspicuous consumption that Veblen referenced, but the excessive mass consumption binge kick-started in the 1920s that exploded in the mid-1950s. We refer to the endless acquisition of more stuff in ever greater amounts as “hyper-consumerism,” a force so strong that there are now more shopping malls than high schools in America.2 There is now more than sixteen square feet of shopping mall for every man, woman, and child in the United States.3 Our challenge is not the fundamental consumer principle in itself but the blurred line between necessity and convenience; the intoxicating addiction of defining so much of our lives through ownership; and the never-ending list of things we “have to have.”

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Pastor Jerry Falwell railed against video games, the Internet, and “godless” movies, and former vice president Dan Quayle’s and the media’s rant against Murphy Brown turned into a political circus. But today it is this generation of “valueless” children that is changing the world with sophisticated inventions such as Meraki (a low-cost Internet service for poor communities), new funding models such as Kickstarter (a “crowdfunding” model for creative projects), powerful online networks such as Meetup (an online platform that makes it easy for anyone with shared interests to organize local face-to-face groups), and community tools such as WordPress (an open-source blogging software). All these ventures were founded by entrepreneurs under thirty.

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Like Chris Hughes on Obama’s campaign, Gallop also knew she had to make her initiative fun and avoid the “yawn factor” by adding a healthy dose of what she refers to as “competitive collaboration.” She launched IfWeRanTheWorld.com early in 2010. It’s essentially a crowdsourcing project based on the similar principles of microfunding sites such as Kiva or Kickstarter. People are motivated to do big things by taking all easy steps, microactions that in Gallop’s words “can bring about great leaps.” When you arrive at the site, you are asked to complete the statement, “If I ran the world, I would___.” Gallop illustrates how it works with a simple example. “The blank would be filled with something like ‘plant a garden to feed the local homeless.’ ” On the IfWeRanTheWorld platform, the user and the community all help break down the goal into microactions that friends, family, neighbors, businesses, celebrities, or total strangers can all help complete.

Simple Rules: How to Thrive in a Complex World
by Donald Sull and Kathleen M. Eisenhardt
Published 20 Apr 2015

. [>] Indiegogo’s rules reflect: Kathy is grateful for the superb research help of Annie Case in comparing Indiegogo and Kickstarter. Christina Farr, “Indiegogo Founder Danae Ringelmann: ‘We Will Never Lose Sight of Our Vision to Democratize Finance,’” Venture Beat, February 21, 2014, http://venturebeat.com/2014/02/21/; Dan Schawbel, “Slava Rubin on How Indiegogo Has Created Jobs,” Forbes, October 4, 2012, http://www.forbes.com/sites/danschawbel/2012/10/04/; Jessica Hullinger, “Crowdfunding Clash: How Indiegogo Wants to Kick Kickstarter’s @$$,” Fiscal Times, May 30, 2014, http://thefiscaltimes.com/Articles/2014/05/30. [>] Parenting is another domain: Diane Sonntag, “10 Golden Rules of Positive Parenting,” accessed July 31, 2014, http://www.babyzone.com/kids/positive-parenting_222185; Alyssa S.

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Police officers use them to determine whether a suicide note is authentic. Even female hyenas apply them when deciding on a mate. Because these rules define the boundaries of inclusion or exclusion, they sometimes take the form of negative prohibitions, like the “thou shalt nots” of the Ten Commandments. Employees at Kickstarter, the crowdfunding website, for example, had rules to screen every potential project and reject those that did not fit one of its categories, like movies, art, or books. Although they live on the wrong side of the law, professional burglars, like judges, also rely on boundary rules. The choice of which house to enter is a high-stakes decision for burglars.

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The prior chapters describe how people initially learn rules—by using common approaches such as personal experience, applying analogies, and negotiating, and in a systematic way by identifying what moves the needles and where the bottlenecks lie. In contrast, this chapter focuses on how people and organizations can improve their initial rules, and accelerate their process for doing so. The hero of our first example, Shannon Turley, did not have the benefit of this book to kick-start his initial simple rules, but he has been remarkably successful at fine-tuning them. As an innovator in his profession, Shannon demonstrates how people can successfully refine and enhance their rules. CRAFTING BETTER SIMPLE RULES Shannon Turley was a not-so-talented athlete at Virginia Tech, class of 2000.

Digital Minimalism: Choosing a Focused Life in a Noisy World
by Cal Newport
Published 5 Feb 2019

“religion run by a biker gang”: Glassman has called CrossFit a “religion run by a biker gang” on many public occasions, e.g., Catherine Clifford, “How Turning CrossFit into a Religion Made Its Atheist Founder Greg Glassman Rich,” CNBC, October 11, 2016, https://www.cnbc.com/2016/10/11/how-turning-crossfit-into-a-religion-made-its-founder-atheist-greg-glassman-rich.html. The Mouse Book Club provides a good example: For more on the Mouse Book Club, see https://mousebookclub.com. “mobilizing literature”: “About,” Mouse Books Kickstarter campaign, https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/mousebooks/mouse-books. “Damn! . . . If this guy is billing out”: “Unlock Your Inner Mr. T—by Mastering Metal,” Mr. Money Mustache (blog), April 16, 2012, http://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2012/04/16/unlock-your-inner-mr-t-by-mastering-metal. “It was simply taken for granted”: Crawford, “Soulcraft.”

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People are more eager than ever before to play Scrabble with neighbors, or trash-talk co-workers over poker, or line up in the Toronto cold for a table at Snakes & Lattes. The classic games that were popular in the pre-digital 1980s—Monopoly, Scrabble—remain popular sellers today, while the internet is fueling innovations in new game design (one of the most popular categories on Kickstarter is board games), leading to a renaissance in smarter, European-style strategy games—a movement best exemplified by the megahit Settlers of Catan, which has sold more than 22 million copies worldwide since it was first published in Germany in the mid-1990s. David Sax argues that this popularity is due in large part to the social experience of playing these games.

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These examples can seem to place high-quality leisure into an antagonistic relationship with newer technologies, but as I hinted above, the reality is more complicated. A closer look at the Mouse Book Club makes clear that its existence depends on multiple technological innovations. Printing books requires capital. The project’s co-founders, David Dewane and Brian Chappell, raised this money with an online Kickstarter campaign that attracted over $50,000 in funding from more than 1,000 backers. These backers found their way to this campaign in part because of bloggers like me who directed their online followings toward the project. Another key aspect of the Mouse Book Club model is helping readers understand and discuss the books they’re sent, enabling them to maximize the value they receive from their reading experience.

Frugal Innovation: How to Do Better With Less
by Jaideep Prabhu Navi Radjou
Published 15 Feb 2015

This doesn’t bother the 20-somethings; they just try to emulate Eric Migicovsky who, aged 27, launched Pebble, a start-up that makes smart watches which connect to phones and notify users about e-mails, text messages, incoming calls and social-media alerts. In early 2012, Migicovsky unveiled his project on Kickstarter, hoping to raise $100,000 in seed capital. Instead, he raised $10 million from over 68,000 backers, in just 4 weeks, making Pebble the largest crowdfunded project up to that point. Pebble has sold, mostly through its website, over 500,000 of its smart watches. To date, over 7 million individuals have pledged more than $1.3 billion to thousands of projects promoted on Kickstarter. Technologists and artists no longer need to rely on wealthy philanthropists such as Warren Buffett or Bill Gates for support; crowdfunding platforms allow even modest earners to invest.

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And in the sharing economy, firms such as Airbnb (sharing homes), RelayRides (sharing cars) and ParkatmyHouse (sharing parking spaces) are taking advantage of the internet and social media to enable ordinary people to monetise their idle household assets. Many of these disruptive digital ventures are being launched by millennials (popularly known as generation recession), who can raise capital on crowdfunding sites such as Kickstarter, KissKissBankBank and MedStartr. Digital disrupters are not all young bootstrap entrepreneurs. Technology heavyweights including Apple, Google, Cisco and IBM are investing heavily in driverless cars, smart grids, connected homes and consumer medical devices. A massive shakeout in the automotive, construction, energy, health-care and other mature industries seems imminent.

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A large number of open-source initiatives and crowdfunded projects are drastically bringing down the cost of 3D printers, making personalised manufacturing more affordable and accessible to more people. For instance, in May 2014, in an effort to make 3D printing accessible “to billions”, Autodesk, a design software provider, released Spark, an open-software platform that aims to make 3D printing simpler and more reliable. The same month, M3D, a start-up, raised a whopping $3.4 million on Kickstarter to produce a $300 super-easy-to-use 3D printer. One particularly impressive product of 3D printers is spare parts for fighter aircraft. In December 2013, BAE Systems, a British multinational defence and aerospace company, tested Tornado jets that had several 3D printed metal components in them.

The Production of Money: How to Break the Power of Banks
by Ann Pettifor
Published 27 Mar 2017

Savings as a consequence, not precondition of credit When young people leave school, obtain a job, and at the end of the month earn income, they wrongly assume that their newfound income is the result of work, or economic activity. This leads to the widespread assumption that money exists as a consequence of economic activity. In fact, with very rare exceptions, it is credit that, when issued by the bank and deposited as new money in a firm’s account, kick-starts activity. It was probably a bank overdraft that helped pay the wage she earned in that first job. Hopefully, her employment created additional economic activity (because, for example, she helped produce and sell widgets) which in turn generated income and savings needed to reduce the overdraft, repay the debt and afford her wage.

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A money-financed helicopter drop would require collaboration between the Treasury and the Bank of England. In keeping with its current operational independence, the process would begin with the BoE determining the size and timing of the helicopter drops.35 The People’s QE proposal is a type of programme in which the Bank of England would ‘… inject money into the UK economy that can kick-start economic activity in this country, reinvigorating government, local government, the private sector and household economies …’ To this end central bank money would be used to finance investment spending and lending. Primarily, central bank money would be used to finance the purchase of bonds issued by public sector institutions to directly finance government spending on infrastructure projects, or new money would be created to finance the lending of a green or public investment bank (as in Strategic QE and Green QE).36 Adair Turner’s Overt Monetary Financing (OMF) and Positive Money’s Sovereign Money Creation (SMC) both offer the option of distributing the newly created money directly to citizens, or using newly created central bank money to finance public investment spending.

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Rising unemployment led to lower wages and incomes, and this in turn weakened demand for a nation’s goods and services. As a result, prices fell further, leading to more bankruptcies and unemployment … and the downward cycle became almost unstoppable. Expanding the public money creation ‘belt’ in a period of economic emaciation such as that described above will not kick-start investment and employment, or generate new income. Indeed, the world already has too much money – in the form of debt – as monetary reform activists repeatedly remind us. One reason private banks are not lending into the economy is that potential clients are already too heavily indebted. Another is that potential clients are refusing to borrow because they, while heavily indebted, are fearful of economic conditions because few customers are ‘coming through the door’.

The $100 Startup: Reinvent the Way You Make a Living, Do What You Love, and Create a New Future
by Chris Guillebeau
Published 7 May 2012

It’s also the whole point: Since it’s so much easier to start a microbusiness, why do something different unless or until you know what you’re doing? Small is beautiful, and all things considered, small is often better. Unconventional Fundraising from Kickstarter to Car Loans What if you’ve thought it through and you do need to raise money somehow? Whenever possible, the best option is your own savings. You’ll be highly invested in the success of the project, and you won’t be in debt to anyone else. But if this isn’t possible, you can also consider “crowdraising” funds for your project through a service such as Kickstarter.com. Shannon Okey did this with a project to boost her craft publishing business. She asked for $5,000 and received $12,480 in twenty days thanks to a nice video and well-written copy.

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“They looked at me like I was a silly, silly woman who couldn’t possibly know anything about running a business,” she said. The rejection turned into an opportunity. Taking the project on Kickstarter generated both funds and widespread interest in the project. Nearly three hundred backers came through with donations ranging from $10 to $500, leaving the project fully funded with capital to spare. Oh, and Shannon was not one for going quietly. After she reached the $10,000 level in her Kickstarter campaign, she printed out the front page of the site, wrapped the page around a lollipop, and sent it off to the bank’s underwriters. “I think they got the message,” she says.

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An Offer You Can’t Refuse The step-by-step guide to creating a killer offer. 8. Launch! A trip to Hollywood from your living room or the corner coffee shop. 9. Hustling: The Gentle Art of Self-Promotion Advertising is like sex: Only losers pay for it. 10. Show Me the Money Unconventional fundraising from Kickstarter to unlikely car loans. PART III LEVERAGE AND NEXT STEPS 11. Moving On Up Tweaking your way to the bank: How small actions create big increases in income. 12. How to Franchise Yourself Instructions on cloning yourself for fun and profit. 13. Going Long Become as big as you want to be (and no bigger). 14.

The Misfit Economy: Lessons in Creativity From Pirates, Hackers, Gangsters and Other Informal Entrepreneurs
by Alexa Clay and Kyra Maya Phillips
Published 23 Jun 2015

Eric Rosenbaum is one of the creators of MaKey MaKey, an “invention kit” that makes it easy to turn ordinary household objects into video game controllers (turn bananas into piano keys, create a joystick out of a pencil drawing). Eric and his business partner, Jay Silver, used Kickstarter to raise funds for their project. With an initial goal of $25,000, Rosenbaum and Silver ended up raising $568,106. What makes this case study interesting is how two fringe cultures of innovation—the open-source culture and the shanzhai culture of pirated innovation—collide. Through a strange series of events, Rosenbaum and Silver discovered a clone of their idea, called DemoHour, on a Chinese Kickstarter site. And the MaKey MaKey founders didn’t like it. It wasn’t so much that the Chinese borrowed elements of their idea: MaKey MaKey is open-source, which means it is available for change and iteration.

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“But we shouldn’t be spending our public dollars and giving it away to international corporations,” they said. “We need to invest locally and in small businesses.” Rembert and Stuckert are focused on keeping the drumbeat of community hustle alive, making sure the town doesn’t slip back into dependency on big business. Their advice to others to kick-start community hustle? “You have to learn to be a catalyst and not a dictator. Having a charismatic personality certainly helps move things, but it’s less about one person. The biggest thing is learning how to get out of the way of things,” Stuckert told us. A lot of their process for engaging community has been about really asking people in town what they want Wilmington to become in the future.

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To all of the fellow writers at Prufrock Coffee and Café Oberholz who commiserated with us during shared episodes of writers’ block, as well as Asi Sharabi, who provided a desk to work from when it was needed. And finally, heartfelt and enormous gratitude must go to Fran Smith for her kind, wise, and compassionate guidance along the way. A big thank-you to our Kickstarter backers who helped get this project off the ground—without a committed grassroots financing campaign, we never would have made it this far. To Laura Gamse, our talented filmmaker, who traveled with us to India and China and whose father diligently emailed us misfit material throughout the journey.

The Future of Money: How the Digital Revolution Is Transforming Currencies and Finance
by Eswar S. Prasad
Published 27 Sep 2021

A small portion of the revenue comes from advertisements on the website and lenders’ payments for website clicks and calls. Some unique risks inherent to LendingTree’s model include a lack of geographic and lender diversity—about 20 percent of LendingTree’s business passes through two lenders. Crowdfunding Creativity For information on Kickstarter, see www.kickstarter.com. Statistics on project funding through Kickstarter are available at https://www.kickstarter.com/help/stats. The 8 percent fee for successful projects includes a payment processing fee of about 3 percent. Only about one-third of proposed projects are successful in reaching their funding targets. Interestingly, the areas in which project-funding success is at least 50 percent are related mostly to the performing arts—dance, music, and theater.

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They also often enjoy unique rewards offered by project creators, which could include a copy of what is being produced (a CD, a DVD, a gadget, et cetera) or an experience unique to the project, such as a backstage pass for a music event, some form of participation in the creative process, or a meal. Kickstarter charges a fee of about 8 percent on successful projects. Through May 2021, Kickstarter had crowdfunded more than 200,000 projects to the tune of nearly $6 billion. Ma Yun (better known as Jack Ma), founder of Alibaba Another US-based crowdfunding website, Indiegogo, allows people to solicit funds for an idea, charity, or start-up business. Since its founding in 2008 and through December 2020, the website has provided about $1 billion in funding from over 11 million contributions for more than 650,000 projects. As with Kickstarter, backers mainly enjoy the satisfaction of making it possible for enterprising or creative ideas to be transformed into reality.

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These sites allow for direct pitching of proposals to potential financiers but do not provide those financiers with equity stakes in the projects. One of the most prominent crowdfunding sites is Kickstarter, a US-based global crowdfunding platform launched in 2009. Anyone with creative ideas in approved areas can put their project proposal on the platform and set a funding goal. Funding on Kickstarter is all-or-nothing, which means no one is charged for a pledge toward a project unless it reaches its funding goal and is therefore deemed viable by the community. Backers are not investors, and their “return” is the satisfaction of seeing a project come to life.

Don't Make Me Think, Revisited: A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability
by Steve Krug
Published 1 Jan 2000

The temptation is to not want to use any space because (a) you can’t imagine that anybody doesn’t know what this site is, and (b) everyone’s clamoring to use the Home page space for other purposes. Take Kickstarter.com, for example. Because of their novel proposition, Kickstarter has a lot of ’splainin’ to do, so they wisely use a lot of Home page space to do it. Almost every element on the page helps explain or reinforce what the site is about. Kickstarter may not have a tagline (unless it’s “Bring creativity to life”) but they do put an admirable amount of effort into making sure people understand what they do and how it works. “What is Kickstarter?” is clearly the most prominent item in the primary navigation. ...but don’t use any more space than necessary.

The Age of Cryptocurrency: How Bitcoin and Digital Money Are Challenging the Global Economic Order
by Paul Vigna and Michael J. Casey
Published 27 Jan 2015

Allan Grant is a cofounder of hired.com: Billy Gallagher, “Hired Raises $15M in Series A at Valuation Around $60M,” TechCrunch, March 24, 2014, http://techcrunch.com/2014/03/24/hired-raises-15m-series-a/. Chris Cassano, a twenty-five-year-old from Florida: Chris Cassano, interviewed by Paul Vigna, June 12, 2014. He posted a description of it on Kickstarter: Chris Cassano, “Piper: A Hardware-Based Paper Wallet Printer and More,” Kickstarter, July 10, 2013, https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/299052466/piper-a-hardware-based-paper-wallet-printer-and-mo. “Money’s great, too”: Nathan Lands, interviewed by Paul Vigna, June 13, 2014. According to surveys conducted by news site CoinDesk: “State of Bitcoin Q2 2014 Report Reveals Expanding Bitcoin Economy,” CoinDesk, July 10, 2014, http://www.coindesk.com/state-of-bitcoin-q2-2014-report-expanding-bitcoin-economy/.

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It was the kind of on-a-lark thing only young people could do, and to his surprise, Beccy readily accepted the challenge. As if all that wasn’t challenging enough, the Craigs added another wrinkle: they would drive across the United States, fly to Europe, fly to Asia, and then fly back to Utah. They would pay for every stage of this round-the-world trip with bitcoin. They launched a Kickstarter project to fund the film, raised $72,000, bought themselves a little publicity, and hired a film crew. While it is reasonably feasible today, in 2015, to spend nothing but bitcoin for three months, this was mid-2013—just before a parade of well-known businesses announced they would accept bitcoin, as we’ll discuss in the next chapter.

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It didn’t take him long to create a prototype-dedicated printer based on a Raspberry Pi, a tiny, inexpensive motherboard that came with in-built security protections, which were necessary to avoid the problem of inadvertently registering your code on your hard drive whenever you communicated with a less well-protected printer. He posted a description of it on Kickstarter and immediately sold twenty-five. That netted him about $4,000. In September of 2013, he got a call from Kenna, inviting him out to 20Mission. The unusual deal was that Cassano could live and work at 20Mission in exchange for a small stake in his company; Kenna would essentially act as an angel investor for Cassano.

How to Fix Copyright
by William Patry
Published 3 Jan 2012

The collectives thus break with the traditional model of passive financial donors: members are expected to do their part in spreading culture by also performing. The Kickstarter project is another example of crowd-sourced funding of creators.41 Kickstarter is the world’s largest funding platform for creative projects in the world. Kickstarter helps artists, filmmakers, musicians, designers, writers, illustrators, explorers, curators, performers, and others to bring their projects to life. Kickstarter uses Amazon.com’s Flexible Payments Service so that individuals from around the world can pledge money to specific projects detailed on the site.

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Information about the collective may be found here: http://www. clarinetcoco.com/. The collective is part of a larger collective effort, the Fractured Atlas, which helps artists and arts organizations function more effectively as businesses by providing access to funding, healthcare, and education. See http://www.fracturedatlas.org/site/ about. 41. See www.kickstarter.com. 42. The European Union, for example, launched 2009 as a year of creativity and innovation. See http://create2009.europa.eu/. 43. This publisher is not Oxford University Press. 44. See Robert Caves, Creative Industries: Contracts Between Art and Commerce (2000, Harvard University Press). 45.

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(Beatles song) 16 Holmes, Oliver Wendell Jr. 19, 20 Hootie and the Blowfish 138 Hoover, Herbert 109 Horkheimer, Max 121 I Infopaq International A/S v. Danske Dagblades 213 iTunes 8 J Jagger. Mick 31 Jay-Z 98, 101–102, 178 Johnson, Mark 135 Johnson, Samuel 15 Jones, Alex 148 Justifications for copyright 8 K Kames, Lord 85 Karakunnel, Ben 261 Karp, Irwin 30 Kaspar clarinet mouthpieces 95 Keynes, John Maynard 90 Khan, Zorna 315 n. Kickstarter program 28 Kindle 9 321 Kretschmer, Martin 302 nn., 303 Kur, Annette 314 n. Kutiel, Ophir (“Kutiman”) 101 L Lady Gaga 9 Landes, William 103, 105 Lara Croft, Tomb Raider 22 Lennon, John 16, 95–96 Leval, Pierre 168, 196, 212 Litman, Jessica 299 nn. Little Nicky (terrible movie) 28 Lobbynomics 6 Lula da Silva 259 M Macaulay, Lord Thomas 70 Madison, James 131–132 Mallet, Sir Louis 85 Mamet, David 186 Manacles 91 Manet, Édouard 19 Marcellus, Robert 95 Marley, Bob 172 McCartney, Paul 16 Melos 30–31 Military bands 28 Mises, Ludwig von 39–40, 49 M&Ms 25 Model T cars 3 Monty Python 158 Moore, Joyce 8 Moore, Sam 8 Moses (Moshe Rabbeinu) 163 Mozart, Amadeus 15, 95, 100, 245 Mt.

AI Superpowers: China, Silicon Valley, and the New World Order
by Kai-Fu Lee
Published 14 Sep 2018

During China’s first internet boom of the late 1990s, Chinese companies looked to Silicon Valley for talent, funding, and even names for their infant startups. The country’s first search engine was the creation of Charles Zhang, a Chinese physicist with a Ph.D. from MIT. While in the United States Zhang had seen the early internet take off, and he wanted to kick-start that same process in his home country. Zhang used investments from his professors at MIT and returned to China, intent on building up the country’s core internet infrastructure. But after a meeting with Yahoo! founder Jerry Yang, Zhang switched his focus to creating a Chinese-language search engine and portal website.

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The year was 2010, and Guo was responsible for the influential Zhongguancun (“jong-gwan-soon”) technology zone in northwest Beijing, an area that had long branded itself as China’s answer to Silicon Valley but had not really lived up to the title. Zhongguancun was chock-full of electronics markets selling low-end smartphones and pirated software but offered few innovative startups. Guo wanted to change that. To kick-start that process, he came to see me at the offices of my newly founded company, Sinovation Ventures. After spending a decade representing the most powerful American technology companies in China, in the fall of 2009 I left Google China to establish Sinovation, an early-stage incubator and angel investment fund for Chinese startups.

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By giving robots the power of sight and the ability to move autonomously, AI will revolutionize manufacturing, putting third-world sweatshops stocked with armies of low-wage workers out of business. In doing so, it will cut away the bottom rungs on the ladder of economic development. It will deprive poor countries of the opportunity to kick-start economic growth through low-cost exports, the one proven route that has lifted countries like South Korea, China, and Singapore out of poverty. The large populations of young workers that once comprised the greatest advantage of poor countries will turn into a net liability, and a potentially destabilizing one.

Platform Revolution: How Networked Markets Are Transforming the Economy--And How to Make Them Work for You
by Sangeet Paul Choudary , Marshall W. van Alstyne and Geoffrey G. Parker
Published 27 Mar 2016

INDUSTRY EXAMPLES Agriculture John Deere, Intuit Fasal Communication and Networking LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, Tinder, Instagram, Snapchat, WeChat Consumer Goods Philips, McCormick Foods FlavorPrint Education Udemy, Skillshare, Coursera, edX, Duolingo Energy and Heavy Industry Nest, Tesla Powerwall, General Electric, EnerNOC Finance Bitcoin, Lending Club, Kickstarter Health Care Cohealo, SimplyInsured, Kaiser Permanente Gaming Xbox, Nintendo, PlayStation Labor and Professional Services Upwork, Fiverr, 99designs, Sittercity, LegalZoom Local Services Yelp, Foursquare, Groupon, Angie’s List Logistics and Delivery Munchery, Foodpanda, Haier Group Media Medium, Viki, YouTube, Wikipedia, Huffington Post, Kindle Publishing Operating Systems iOS, Android, MacOS, Microsoft Windows Retail Amazon, Alibaba, Walgreens, Burberry, Shopkick Transportation Uber, Waze, BlaBlaCar, GrabTaxi, Ola Cabs Travel Airbnb, TripAdvisor FIGURE 1.2.

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Thus, in virtually every case, the core interaction starts with the creation of a value unit by the producer. Here are a few examples. On a marketplace like eBay or Airbnb, the product/service listing information is the value unit that is created by a seller and then served to buyers based on their search query or past interests. On a platform like Kickstarter, the project details constitute the value unit that enables potential backers to make a decision whether to fund it. Videos on YouTube, tweets on Twitter, profiles of professionals on LinkedIn, and listings of available cars on Uber are all value units. In each case, users are provided with a basis for deciding whether or not they want to proceed to some further exchange.

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Create value units that will be relevant to at least one set of potential users. When these users are attracted to the platform, other sets of users who want to engage in interactions with them will follow. In many cases, the platform company takes the task of value creation upon itself by acting as the first producer. In addition to kickstarting the platform, this strategy allows the platform owner to define the kind and quality of value units they want to see on the platform, thereby encouraging a culture of high-quality contributions among subsequent producers.7 When Google launched its Android smartphone operating system to compete with Apple’s, it seeded the market by offering $5 million in prizes to developers who came up with the best apps in each of ten categories, including gaming, productivity, social networking, and entertainment.

The System: Who Owns the Internet, and How It Owns Us
by James Ball
Published 19 Aug 2020

Part Two THE MONEY 4 The Money Men IF YOU WERE going to imagine an office designed to host some of the internet’s hottest start-ups, betaworks’s1 New York studio would be almost exactly what you’d picture. We’re in New York’s fashionable Meatpacking District, surrounded by designer shops, restaurants and bars, and just yards from the Hudson River. As you walk into the building you’re greeted with a wall of some of the biggest successes of the crowdfunding site Kickstarter, in which betaworks invested. There is a prototype Oculus Rift VR headset ($2.4 million raised), Hickies no-tie shoelaces ($580,000 raised), the Light Phone, an ultra-minimalist mobile phone ($415,000), and Sammy Screamer, a mobile alarm to ‘keep an eye on your stuff’ ($90,840), all on show as I visit.

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It has invested in Twitter, in part through two companies who were eventually bought out by Twitter,2 Tumblr, and a number of other companies that make up the social internet. These have included bit.ly, the URL shortener (more important when web addresses counted towards your Twitter character limit) and analytics tool, and Giphy, the online gif repository now built into a number of social media tools. In addition to its Kickstarter investment, betaworks also backed the blogging network Medium (founded by Twitter co-founder Evan Williams) and the podcasting company Gimlet Media (now owned by Spotify).3 It’s also funded numerous analytics companies used by social media businesses and content creators, and even built the hit iPhone and Android games Dots and Two Dots, before spinning those out as a separate company.4 The way betaworks operates is by investing in companies when they’re still very small – sometimes taking them into their studios when they might still only have a handful of people (often the co-founders) working for them, and haven’t raised any money yet.

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Wenger came to the VC game in a very similar way to Borthwick: he was president of del.icio.us, a service to share bookmarked websites (and so a precursor to Twitter and similar services), and then an angel investor in craft site Etsy and the social network Tumblr.13 USV currently invests in Soundcloud, Kickstarter, Stripe (a payments service), Foursquare and duolingo. It has exited investments including Twitter, Tumblr, Etsy and Zynga (maker of Farmville).14 But Wenger’s ability to spot what was coming, he tells me from the corner office of USV’s nineteenth-storey offices in Manhattan, just yards from the Flatiron Building, pre-dated most of the internet boom by a long way.

Origin Story: A Big History of Everything
by David Christian
Published 21 May 2018

The universe, he once wrote, was “the Sensorium of a Being incorporeal, living, and intelligent.”1 Early in the twentieth century, Einstein was so sure the universe was unchanging (at large scales) that he added a special constant to his theory of relativity to make it predict a stable universe. Is the idea of an eternal or unchanging universe satisfying? Not really, particularly if you have to smuggle in a creator to kick-start the process, as in “In the beginning there was nothing, then God made …” The logical glitch is obvious, though it has taken some sophisticated minds a long time to see it clearly. At the age of eighteen, Bertrand Russell gave up on the idea of a creator god after reading the following passage in the autobiography of John Stuart Mill: “My father taught me that the question, ‘Who made me?’

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There were gradients of light, temperature, and density, down which free energy flowed, like water over a waterfall. Each star poured energy into the cold spaces around it, generating flows of heat, light, and chemical energy that could be used to build new forms of complexity in nearby regions. Those are the flows of free energy that allow life to flourish here on planet Earth. Gravity had kick-started the transformation of matter into stars by fusing protons despite the barrier created by their positive charges. This is a pattern we will see over and over again. It’s a bit like the cup of coffee that helps you get going in the morning. Chemists refer to this initial shot of energy as activation energy; it’s the energy of a lit match that starts a conflagration.

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For the first time since plate tectonics had created the single supercontinent of Pangaea, two hundred and fifty million years ago, genes, organisms, information, and diseases could flow within a single worldwide system. The world historian Alfred Crosby described this ecological revolution as the “Columbian Exchange,” and he showed that globalization would transform the biosphere as much as it transformed human history.3 In The Communist Manifesto, Marx and Engels argued that these changes kick-started modern capitalism. The discovery of America, the rounding of the Cape, opened up fresh ground for the rising bourgeoisie. The East-Indian and Chinese markets, the colonization of America, trade with the colonies, the increase in the means of exchange and in commodities generally, gave to commerce, to navigation, to industry, an impulse never before known, and thereby, to the revolutionary element in the tottering feudal society, a rapid development.

Radical Technologies: The Design of Everyday Life
by Adam Greenfield
Published 29 May 2017

“Distributed Ledger Technology: Beyond blockchain,” 2016, p. 41, gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/492972/gs-16-1-distributed-ledger-technology.pdf. 8.Michael Del Castillo, “Prenup Built in Ethereum Smart Contract Rethinks Marriage Obligations,” CoinDesk, June 1, 2016. 9.Chrystia Freeland, “When Labor Is Flexible, And Paid Less,” International Herald-Tribune, June 28, 2013. 10.Stafford Beer, “What Is Cybernetics?”, Kybernetes, Volume 31, Issue 2, 2002. 11.Kickstarter exacts a 5 percent commission on successfully funded projects, kickstarter.com/help/faq/kickstarter+basics. 12.Graham Rapier, “Yellen Reportedly Urges Central Banks to Study Blockchain, Bitcoin,” American Banker, June 6, 2016; see also Nathaniel Popper, “Central Banks Consider Bitcoin’s Technology, if Not Bitcoin,” New York Times, October 11, 2016. 13.Pete Rizzo, “Bank of Canada Demos Blockchain-Based Digital Dollar,” CoinDesk, June 16, 2016. 14.See, e.g., a proposal for London’s budget to be executed via blockchain.

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The great cyberneticist Stafford Beer taught us that the “purpose of a system is what it does,” and if smart contracts work not to protect but to undermine working people, we must conclude that on some level this is what they are for.10 Nor are workers the only ones who might find the rug pulled out from under them in a world of smart contracts. Think of Kickstarter, for example. The crowdfunding site asks sponsors to pledge a sum of money toward a project (i.e. it is a box that contains value), and disburses that sum to the project originators only if the aggregate amount amassed in this way exceeds a preset threshold (and that box unlocks when certain conditions have been met). Kickstarter takes a cut for providing the platform on which pledges are aggregated and then paid out. But a well-designed smart contract framework would handle that whole process on a peer-to-peer basis, and do it for a relative pittance of Ether—a few pennies, against a few percentage points.11 A world of functioning smart contracts, then, holds existential peril for those intermediary enterprises like Kickstarter whose whole business model can effectively be boiled down to a single conditional statement.

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But a well-designed smart contract framework would handle that whole process on a peer-to-peer basis, and do it for a relative pittance of Ether—a few pennies, against a few percentage points.11 A world of functioning smart contracts, then, holds existential peril for those intermediary enterprises like Kickstarter whose whole business model can effectively be boiled down to a single conditional statement. The complexity of the challenges we face spirals upward when smart contracts are applied to the physical world, via the intercession of networked objects. Some developers understand the blockchain not primarily as an end in its own right, but as an enabling payment and security infrastructure for capturing the value from situations and settings there’s no efficient way to monetize at present—something capable of “fractionalizing” industries, “liquifying” markets, and siphoning from the world that fraction of gain that has to date remained beyond the reach of the so-called sharing economy.

The Open Revolution: New Rules for a New World
by Rufus Pollock
Published 29 May 2018

User-choice (the “Kickstarter” or “X-Factor” model) – say 10% – would allow some active consumer-choice in the allocation of funding to particular artists, projects or even general policies (supporting blues artists, for instance). Artists would propose projects, such as an album or new song, with a budget. Citizens would each be allocated “voting dollars” with which they could support such projects (with unused dollars being allocated proportionally). This would give the public some control over up-front funding, and has similarities to crowdfunding schemes such as Kickstarter or audience-voting on shows such as X-Factor.

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For, ultimately, it is only by our collective, political action that we can effect the large-scale reforms we need. To find out more about what we can do to make an Open world and how you can get involved, visit: https://openrevolution.net/make-it-happen * * * Wikipedia is a hugely impressive voluntary effort, but it was kick-started commercially and it too has benefited from state spending: its content is largely collected from information already published elsewhere, much of it produced in state-supported academia (or in commercial contexts such as journalism). One way or another, a good deal of the Open material available to us today has been supported by governments and business.↩ Coda: The Original Copyfight Fifteen hundred years ago, in 6th-century Ireland, a dispute over the copying of a book led to a pitched battle.

Copenhagen Like a Local
by DK

With its clean, monochrome interior and gingham-cushion-clad outdoor benches, this spot serves as a photo op for creatives and bloggers alike. Here, they clutch cups of coffee, brewed with beans from Aarhus-based roastery La Cabra. Try it! BECOME A BARISTA The Coffee Collective, a sustainable coffee empire, runs courses to help you kick-start your barista career or simply master the art of brewing an aromatic cup of black gold at home (www.coffeecollective.dk). Drink | Coffee Shops Liked by the locals “The speciality coffee scene in Copenhagen is driven by many small, innovative actors, each bringing their own approach to the table, but generally sharing a passion for lighter roasts and aromatic blends.”

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g Top Theatres g Contents Google Map WAREHOUSE9 Map 2; Halmtorvet 11A, Vesterbro; ///order.headache.just; www.warehouse9.dk There are no genres – or boundaries – at this cross-disciplinary creative space. In fact, the only thing that Warehouse9’s burlesque performances, poetry readings and film screenings have in common is that they present and promote LGBTQ+ perspectives. For many Vesterbroers the annual (and unmissable) Queer Xmas Cabaret show kick-starts their festive season. g Top Theatres g Contents Google Map BÅDTEATRET Map 4; Nyhavn 16Z, Indre By; ///mule.blasted.zooms; www.baadteatret.dk There’s something very Copenhagen about watching experimental theatre aboard a boat moored in Nyhavn. Expect satire, re-interpreted works gone wonky and surprises left, right and centre in this playful world of puppet shows, cabarets and poetry readings.

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g ARTS & CULTURE g Contents Public Art Westend BaNanna Park Prinsessegade Freetown Christiania Bolsjefabrikken The Great story of the little people and the giant trolls Fødder Mødes The Genetically Modified Little Mermaid g Public Art g Contents Google Map WESTEND Map 2; Vesterbrogade 65–78, Vesterbro; ///modest.transmit.eating In 1901, this section of Vesterbrogade was intended to house sex workers, but two years later prostitution was made illegal. Instead, theatre folk moved in and kick-started Westend’s legacy of creative expression. Local artists bomb the street’s arched entrance on a weekly basis, creating an ever-changing art gallery that perfectly captures the rebellious nature of modern street art and Copenhagen itself. g Public Art g Contents Google Map BANANNA PARK Map 3; Nannasgade 4, Nørrebro; ///legend.soils.submits; www.kobenhavnergron.dk What was once the toxic soil beneath an old oil refinery now grows green, and locals flock to BaNanna Park for picnics, football games and the climbing wall.

The Internet Is Not the Answer
by Andrew Keen
Published 5 Jan 2015

In May 2014, the Google engineer and libertarian activist Justine Tunney, who in 2013 tried to fund a private militia on Kickstarter,58 came up with the idea of replacing food stamps with Soylent, a “food product” that claims to “provide maximum nutrition with minimum effort.” “Give poor people @soylent so they can be healthy and productive. If you’re on food stamps, maybe you’re unhealthy and need to eat better,” Tunney tweeted, without bothering to check first with people on food stamps to see if they wanted to eat what the technology critic J. R. Hennessy calls “tasteless nutrition sludge.”59 No matter. In a month, Tunney had raised $1 million on Kickstarter for a repellent social experiment that brings to mind Soylent Green, the 1974 dystopian movie about a world in which the dominant food product was made of human remains.

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As Peter Goodman, the former global editor of the Huffington Post, wrote to Arianna Huffington before very publicly quitting his job in March 2014, “there is a widespread sense on the team that the HuffPost is no longer fully committed to original reporting; that in a system governed largely by metrics, deep reporting and quality writing weigh in as a lack of productivity.”26 What Goodman calls “original reporting” has, according to the media reporter Joe Pompeo, been replaced by a Buzzfeed-like focus on social and mobile platforms where “people love sharing stories about health and meditation and exercise and sleep.”27 “The unfortunate fact is that online journalism can’t survive without a wealthy benefactor,”28 mourns the GigaOm columnist Mathew Ingram. And I’m afraid the same is increasingly becoming true of many unprofitable bookstores, too, which are desperately relying on crowdfunding sites like Indiegogo or Kickstarter to raise money from benefactors.29 And, of course, there is no lack of rich benefactors from Silicon Valley who are buying up the very old media that their revolution has destroyed. The poachers are now the gamekeepers. There is Mark Zuckerberg’s Harvard roommate, Chris Hughes, a cofounder of Facebook, who bought the venerable New Republic magazine in 2012.

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To put this into perspective, in 2009 all the content on the World Wide Web was estimated to have added up to about half a zettabyte of data.20 But, rather than infinite, the possibilities of most of the new electronic hardware at CES 2014 were really all the same. They were all devices greedy for the collection of networked data. These devices, some of which were being crowdfunded by networks like Indiegogo and Kickstarter, were designed to connect our dots—to know our movements, our taste, our physical fitness, our driving skills, our facial characteristics, above all where we’ve been, where we are, and where we are going. Wearable technology—what the Intel CEO Brian Krzanich in his keynote speech at the show called a “broad ecosystem of wearables”—dominated CES 2014.

Cryptoassets: The Innovative Investor's Guide to Bitcoin and Beyond: The Innovative Investor's Guide to Bitcoin and Beyond
by Chris Burniske and Jack Tatar
Published 19 Oct 2017

What grew out of the inability of entrepreneurs of small or obscure projects to gain access to the more traditional methods of raising capital was a new method for connecting them to all levels of investors. Crowdfunding sites such as Kickstarter, Indiegogo, and others positioned themselves online as a way for connecting entrepreneurs and investors. In exchange for investors pledging money, the project or company promised to return the fruits of its labor, depending on the amount a specific investor pledged. Recognizing that this platform was a fertile ground for scams, the sites implemented policies and procedures to protect investors. For instance, Kickstarter maintains investor funds in escrow until a project is funded to a sufficiently high level.

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If not enough people invest, then funding stops and investors get their money back. Many projects have been funded by investors who simply wanted to see it become a reality, while others funded projects to receive the product. To get a feel for what Kickstarter can provide to investors interested in the bitcoin and blockchain space, simply type those terms into the search box on the Kickstarter site.8 Opportunities for investing in documentaries, books, games, and application development can be found. Fund a documentary on Bitcoin, for example, and on completion investors receive a DVD of that documentary. One of the most compelling aspects of crowdfunding was that it not only allowed dreamers to build their product or business, it allowed investors of all levels to participate in seeing these dreams come true.

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As markets mature over time, there is more regulation on what information asset issuers must provide and by whom that information must be verified and audited. With cryptoassets, however, these standards are not yet in place. To get an idea of what havoc misleading asset issuers can create, we’ll examine an example from early equities markets. About 80 years after Tulipmania, in the early 1700s, the first international bull market came to rise.16 Kick-started by infamous entities such as John Law’s Mississippi Company in France and John Blunt’s South Sea Company in Britain, the equity markets were whipped into a buying frenzy fueled largely by duplicity. Both the Mississippi Company and South Sea Company had convoluted structures and were heavily marketed as pursuits to establish a presence and exploit trade in the burgeoning Americas, even though they had only marginal success in doing so.

Custodians of the Internet: Platforms, Content Moderation, and the Hidden Decisions That Shape Social Media
by Tarleton Gillespie
Published 25 Jun 2018

Here is a representative but not exhaustive list of the social media platforms I think about, and that will be central to my concern in this book: social network sites like Facebook, LinkedIn, Google+, Hi5, Ning, NextDoor, and Foursquare; blogging and microblogging providers like Twitter, Tumblr, Blogger, Wordpress, and Livejournal; photo- and image-sharing sites like Instagram, Flickr, Pinterest, Photobucket, DeviantArt, and Snapchat; video-sharing sites like YouTube, Vimeo, and Dailymotion; discussion, opinion, and gossip tools like Reddit, Digg, Secret, and Whisper; dating and hookup apps like OK Cupid, Tinder, and Grindr; collaborative knowledge tools like Wikipedia, Ask, and Quora; app stores like iTunes and Google Play; live broadcasting apps like Facebook Live and Periscope.62 To those I would add a second set that, while they do not neatly fit the definition of platform, grapple with many of the same challenges of content moderation in platformlike ways: recommendation and rating sites like Yelp and TripAdvisor; exchange platforms that help share goods, services, funds, or labor, like Etsy, Kickstarter, Craigslist, Airbnb, and Uber; video game worlds like League of Legends, Second Life, and Minecraft; search engines like Google, Bing, and Yahoo. At this point I should define the term that I have already relied on a great deal. Platform is a slippery term, in part because its meaning has changed over time, in part because it equates things that nevertheless differ in important and sometimes striking ways, and in part because it gets deployed strategically, by both stakeholders and critics.63 As a shorthand, “platform” too easily equates a site with the company that offers it, it implies that social media companies act with one mind, and it downplays the people involved.

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As one Facebook manager fretted, “If you exist to make the world more ‘open and connected’ and you’re a content-sharing platform, the critical question to answer is why you’d ever delete anything, right? Because deleting things makes things less open, on its face.”4 This ambivalence haunts the edges of these guidelines, particularly between the statement of principles that begin the document and the specific rules that follow. Some minimize their intervention. Ning demurs, “We tidy up.” Kickstarter downplays, “We don’t curate projects based on taste. Instead, we do a quick check to make sure they meet these guidelines.”5 Of course, these disclaimers are cast into doubt somewhat by the lengthy lists of rules that follow. In other cases, the push and pull between intervening and not is even more clear: just as an example, after promising not to be “big brother” about reviewing user content (while retaining the right to do so when necessary), Delicious states, “We are also not your mother, but we do want you to be careful crossing the Internet.”

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Slightly more permissive sites do not specify nudity, and by their silence implicitly allow it, but prohibit the “sexually explicit” or pornographic—leaving it to the user and the moderator to decide what counts as explicit. LinkedIn warns that “it is not okay to share obscene images or pornography on LinkedIn’s service.” The guidelines for Last.fm, Kickstarter, and Pinterest are similar. And a few platforms are more permissive still: Blogger, Tumblr, and Flickr allow explicit content and pornography. Especially for the more permissive platforms, anxieties around sexual content are evident. After allowing sexual content, Blogger immediately and vociferously prohibits “non-consensual or illegal sexual content . . . rape, incest, bestiality, or necrophilia . . . child sexual abuse imagery . . . pedophilia.”

Hacking Politics: How Geeks, Progressives, the Tea Party, Gamers, Anarchists and Suits Teamed Up to Defeat SOPA and Save the Internet
by David Moon , Patrick Ruffini , David Segal , Aaron Swartz , Lawrence Lessig , Cory Doctorow , Zoe Lofgren , Jamie Laurie , Ron Paul , Mike Masnick , Kim Dotcom , Tiffiniy Cheng , Alexis Ohanian , Nicole Powers and Josh Levy
Published 30 Apr 2013

Nobody wants to stick their neck out on their own, without an understanding that other lenders are likely to start lending, and that consumers are likely to consume. Just as the prisoners would optimize their respective outcomes were they able to confer and act in a binding unison by which they agreed to stay mum, so too would our economy be best off if all of the economic actors agreed that they’d spend together, and kick-start a real recovery. That’s another way of looking at some of the effects of deficit spending: a form of enforceable collective action, decided upon through the deliberation of our (somewhat) democratic governmental institutions. This is not to say that our government’s actions are determined in an altruistic fashion with the public welfare as decision makers’ highest end—quite frequently the opposite, in fact.

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The defeat of SOPA was a true victory. But for those of us (un?)lucky enough to work as professional recording artists, the question that still looms is, how, or perhaps even if, we should be trying to make a living on our art. Do we forego labels and CD sales completely and take a leap of faith on Kickstarter? Do we have the kind of fan base that will support that? Is there a cloud-based model that is fair to artists? To be honest, though I consider myself both an activist and a musician, I actually find myself surprisingly UNinterested in learning the ins and outs of the music industry itself; both the one that is dying, and the new one that is being born.

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Please email David Segal at David@DemandProgress.org if you want to receive direct updates as action pages and tools go live This Saturday, more than seventy representatives from leading tech companies and advocacy groups from across the political spectrum participated in a meeting to coordinate action against the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA). The meeting, which included leaders from Tumblr, Foursquare, Etsy, Kickstarter and reddit was remarkable for the array of participating organizations and its focus on how to mobilize to inspire millions of Americans to take action to tell Congress that this bill is deeply flawed. Representative Zoe Lofgren opened the meeting with an overview of the current state of the legislation, emphasizing the need for Americans to call their representatives EARLY THIS WEEK to voice their strong discontent with the bill: It is slated for a vote in the House Judiciary Committee on THURSDAY.

Super Pumped: The Battle for Uber
by Mike Isaac
Published 2 Sep 2019

He knew he was opening up a new way of computing, built for mobility, and would need his pocket computers to do just as many things as his desktop Macintosh computers were able to do. He would eventually call it the App Store. Doerr knew opportunity when it was in front of him. He tried to seize it. “Steve, I see what you’re doing. I see it. I want to be a part of this,” he said. “I want to put together a fund to kickstart this thing.” Doerr was falling back on his VC instincts. Every few years, investors like him would go to their institutional partners to pool millions of dollars in a new fund. Venture capitalists like Doerr would then use that money to purchase stakes in promising startups around the Valley. Like Bill Gates and his era of Windows-based applications, Doerr saw that an iPhone App Store would open a huge new field to programmers—whose startups he could fund.

…

Doerr knew how controlling Apple was under Jobs’s reign. Everything had to be perfect, from the industrial design led by Jonathan Ive—a dapper British lieutenant and longtime confidant of Jobs—to the software and apps under the direction of Scott Forstall, a fiery and talented executive leading Apple’s mobile operating system. Asking Doerr to kickstart a sea of new smartphone apps with a multimillion-dollar fund would create a wave of innovation much messier than Apple was used to dealing with. But Doerr wasn’t going to question an opportunity. He offered to raise $100 million from his limited partners, an unheard-of amount of money—especially one earmarked for funding a new form of program that was unproven and untested.

…

Meanwhile, Uber takes a 20 to 30 percent cut of every ride for providing the network that connects riders to drivers. “Everybody wins,” Geidt said. “It was honestly pretty much a no-brainer for the livery company operators, since the cars were just sitting there otherwise,” one early employee said. To kickstart demand, UberCab would dole out incentives to both drivers and riders, a method that proved to be one of the company’s most enduring marketing techniques. Riders, for instance, would get a free first trip upon signing up for the app. Drivers were promised hundreds of dollars in bonuses if they completed a minimum number of trips during the week.

Aiming High: Masayoshi Son, SoftBank, and Disrupting Silicon Valley
by Atsuo Inoue
Published 18 Nov 2021

The three words could be completely nonsensical together, but could still produce good ideas, no matter how eccentric. For a historical precedent, the 19th-century poet Comte de Lautréamont (a contemporary of Rimbaud’s) would take two things which at first glance had nothing in common – say, a sewing machine and an umbrella – and then combine them to create a unique idea, effectively kick-starting the surrealist movement. Whilst manually turning the cards over, the thought occurred to Son that there should be a more systematic way of performing such a task – or better yet a way of getting a computer to do it. A computer would certainly be able to come up with inventions more easily and efficiently.

…

Son had only gambled in a casino once – when he was a student at Berkeley he had been to Las Vegas – and he had thrown all of his money away on the night. Ever since then he had resolved not to touch gambling, but the next few days in Las Vegas were equally as thrilling and an utter rush. Since the age of 19 what Son had wanted more than anything else was to kick-start the digital information revolution – and now it was finally happening. The 21st century and this new era would undoubtedly be led by Son Masayoshi and Bill Gates. In June 1998, Son and Gates met with Kim Dae-jung, the then president of South Korea. At the time the country was going through an economic crisis and Kim asked Son what the best way to rebuild the Korean economy would be.

…

The network system Son had in mind was capable of revolutionising the software business and even the lives of everyday citizens. Each individual instance of software could be instantly beamed anywhere in the world thanks to the IP network and supporting this infrastructure would be SoftBank, with its massive depository of titles and applications. Son was willing to do whatever it took to kick-start the digital information revolution and to this end he was willing to risk it all on the unproven pure IP network configuration, a vision shared by ‘mad scientist’ Tsutsui. The two were completely committed to revolutionising society in this sense. Of course, Son wasn’t so completely drunk on ambition he forgot to properly test the technology Tsutsui was developing, but when he sent what the two had been working on to top engineers around the world the feedback they got was unanimously negative.

The Power Law: Venture Capital and the Making of the New Future
by Sebastian Mallaby
Published 1 Feb 2022

Through Milner, Tiger gained exposure to other Russian internet stocks, including VKontakte, the clone of Facebook.[30] Through Tiger, conversely, Milner’s eyes were opened to the possibility of investing globally. “All of a sudden this whole world opened to me,” Milner said later. “Tiger was an inspiration.”[31] When U.S. venture capital kick-started China’s internet sector, there was a simple one-way flow of influence from the United States to Asia. With the kick-starting of “late-stage” or “growth” investing, the influence flows were more complex. In 1996, a maverick Korean Japanese outsider had demonstrated the king-making power of a $100 million investment. A few fast learners such as Sequoia had picked up on this example and started growth funds, but the 2000 Nasdaq crash took the wind out of this movement.[32] Then, in 2003, the lure of Chinese e-commerce prompted a New York hedge fund to move into private investing, and in 2004 and 2005 the New Yorkers went into partnership with a Russian, sharing their top-down, comparative approach—what they called “global arbitrage.”

…

All he could lose was one times his money.[25] What Khosla cared about were the bets that did pay off, and in the mid-1990s he fastened on an especially audacious and contrarian notion: that, with the coming of the internet, consumers would not be satisfied with a mere doubling or tripling in the capacity of traditional phone lines. Rather, they would clamor for a step change in bandwidth, involving routers that handled data flows a thousand times larger. While the telecom establishment snickered at this sci-fi babble, Khosla set out to kick-start the companies that would make the step change possible. The startups that Khosla backed are largely forgotten names: Juniper, Siara, Cerent. But they illustrate what venture capitalists do best and how they generate both wealth and progress. While incumbent telecom companies planned incremental upgrades, Khosla wagered on the idea of a big leap, even though he had no precise vision of what people would do with all the extra bandwidth.

…

The traditional accounts of economic growth need to make space for this phenomenon, which also explains China’s emergence as a top-flight technology power. Indeed, if the United States risks falling behind China in today’s technology race, this is precisely because Valley-inspired venture capital has kick-started China’s digital economy. Moreover, the Chinese venture industry has an advantage over its U.S. rival. It is more open to women. But that is to jump to the end of our story. To understand venture capitalists—to grasp how they think and why they matter—we must begin at the beginning. For, without this strange tribe of financiers, the orchards of the Santa Clara valley might never have been linked to silicon, and a staggering amount of wealth might never have been created.

What's Yours Is Mine: Against the Sharing Economy
by Tom Slee
Published 18 Nov 2015

It’s why author Rachel Botsman can describe the Sharing Economy this way in a TED talk: At its core, it’s about empowerment. It’s about empowering people to make meaningful connections, connections that are enabling us to rediscover a humanness that we’ve lost somewhere along the way, by engaging in marketplaces like Airbnb, like Kickstarter, like Etsy, that are built on personal relationships versus empty transaction.1 It’s also why stories in the mainstream press tended to start off with the quirky and personal. Here is the Wall Street Journal: The hottest technology trend is apps that let anyone share anything, which is why Grace Lichaa recently found a group of strangers eating her home-cooked macaroni.

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And so it goes with WeWork.7 Botsman and Owyang both extend the definition of the sharing economy to include companies largely outside the scope of this book. Coursera and others are challenging university education by providing massively open online courses (MOOCs), online marketplaces for products—such as eBay and Etsy—predate the rise of the Sharing Economy and its focus on “real-world” exchanges, and crowdfunding platforms such as Kickstarter can be seen as an extension of the peer-to-peer finance platforms. The Sharing Economy landscape is defined not only by what it includes, but by what kind of sharing organizations are missing. Sociologist Juliet Schor sums up the situation: There is great diversity among activities as well as baffling boundaries drawn by participants.

…

That’s one reason why Uber CEO Travis Kalanick admitted to undermining the fund-raising efforts of his main competitor, Lyft.38 The ridesharing model is a “two-sided marketplace” in which Uber manages the supply of both riders and drivers. The more riders on the platform, the better it is for drivers; the more drivers available, the better it is for riders. Getting this spiral kick-started is one of the challenges to any new entrant seeking to gain entrance. The technology component of the business is amortized over all the cities in which Uber operates, so its success in New York helps its business in San Diego. If the ridesharing market is indeed winner-take-all, then restructuring the transit system to accommodate Uber (allowing them to operate without the expenses and regulations to which taxi companies are subjected) amounts to handing over the taxi market to the company.

Robots Will Steal Your Job, But That's OK: How to Survive the Economic Collapse and Be Happy
by Pistono, Federico
Published 14 Oct 2012

University of Cambridge. http://www.sms.cam.ac.uk/media/517352;jsessionid=62FE4CCB3807753999235E2EA54E5009 220LATEX– a document preparation system. http://www.latex-project.org/ Open at the source. Apple. http://www.apple.com/opensource/ 221 Kickstarter Expects To Provide More Funding To The Arts Than NEA, Carl Franzen, 2012. http://idealab.talkingpointsmemo.com/2012/02/kickstarter-expects-to-provide-more-funding-to-the-arts-than-nea.php 222 Marcin Jakubowski: Open-sourced blueprints for civilization, Marcin Jakubowski. TED. http://www.ted.com/talks/marcin_jakubowski.html 223 Jimmy Wales interviewed by Miller, Rob ‘Roblimo’.

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But also Wikipedia, Creative Commons, many Flickr photos and videos on YouTube and Vimeo are released under some sort of free/open licenses. More recently, there has been a wave of Open Source projects throughout the whole spectrum, even physical objects such as flashlights, sensors, bicycles, solar panels, and 3D printers. Internet communities such as IndieGoGo and Kickstarter are great places to start directly supporting Open Source projects that will help you live a better life. The concept is simple. Somebody has a great idea that they would like to develop, they tell that to the community and ask for certain amount of money to complete or to continue the project.

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You can choose which projects to support, and the amount of money you want to pledge. It gives you a sense of fulfilment and power. It makes you feel part of a community of like-minded people. And most of all, it is fair. There are no under-the-table-games, no special interests, no bribing of government officials. It is meritocracy at its best. To put things in perspective, Kickstarter is on track to distribute over $150 million dollars to its users’ projects in 2012, or more than entire fiscal year 2012 budget for the National Endowment of the Arts (NEA), which was $146 million.221 We cannot expect governments to solve all of our problems. Of course, it would be nice if public money were spent wisely and on programmes that helped everyone, operating at maximum efficiency.

Spoiled Brats: Short Stories
by Simon Rich
Published 14 Oct 2014

The government had banned the beverage months ago, claiming its high caffeine and alcohol content caused liver damage. But he’d saved one can to drink on a special occasion. And now, for the first time since graduating, he finally had something worth celebrating. At 12:00 a.m. EST, he had officially achieved funding on Kickstarter for his jazz blog. Starting tomorrow, he’d be sticking it to the mainstream jazz media one post at a time. His parents had offered to get him an internship at Jazz Masters Monthly (they were friends with the editor in chief). But Rip wasn’t interested in working for a soulless place like that.

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When they’d first started out, as seniors at Yale, they barely had enough songs for an EP. Now, the Fuzz had four self-released LPs under their belt. Their latest single—a reggae-inflected surf tune—had amassed more than twenty-five thousand plays on SoundCloud. And when they’d needed to raise five thousand dollars to record their latest album, they’d gotten it on Kickstarter in less than twenty days. No one had ever come to see them perform, though. At least, not anyone important. Tim tried not to stare, but it was difficult. The talent scout was tall and frighteningly thin, in a form-fitting charcoal suit. Club Trash served only beer and wine, but somehow he’d gotten hold of a martini.

…

“You can go to Columbia and we’ll work around your schedule.” “He’s going to Yale,” Death said. Sanjay began to dance. “You can’t do this,” Tim begged his drummer. “What about our fans?” “You have no fans,” Death informed him. “Oh yeah?” Tim said. “Then how did we raise five thousand dollars on Kickstarter?” “All the money came from Pete’s mom’s bridge club.” Tim winced. He’d always wondered why they had such a large Boca Raton fan base. “Pete’s going into finance,” Death told Tim. “He’s already been through four rounds of interviews.” “I was going to tell you,” Pete said. Tim’s eyes filled with bitter tears.

Machine, Platform, Crowd: Harnessing Our Digital Future
by Andrew McAfee and Erik Brynjolfsson
Published 26 Jun 2017

“Veronica Mars: TV Series (2004–2007),” accessed February 8, 2017, http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0412253. 262 To find out, they launched a campaign: Rob Thomas, “The Veronica Mars Movie Project,” Kickstarter, accessed February 8, 2017, https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/559914737/the-veronica-mars-movie-project. 262 offer of rewards for different levels of support: Ibid. 262 within the first twelve hours: Sarah Rappaport, “Kickstarter Funding Brings ‘Veronica Mars’ Movie to Life,” CNBC, March 12, 2014, http://www.cnbc.com/2014/03/12/kickstarter-funding-brings-veronica-mars-movie-to-life.html. 262 The movie premiered on March 14, 2014: Business Wire, “Warner Bros.’

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This continued interest intrigued the movie studio Warner Brothers, Bell, and the show’s creator, Rob Thomas. They wondered whether it meant that there would be sufficient demand for a Veronica Mars movie, even one that came out several years after the show had last aired. To find out, they launched a campaign on the popular crowdfunding site Kickstarter. The campaign included a short trailer for the proposed movie, videos from Bell and Thomas, and the offer of rewards for different levels of support.*** The campaign’s stated goal was to raise $2 million. It actually took in that amount within the first twelve hours and went on to generate $5.7 million in total.

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(TV show), 17 Jeppesen, Lars Bo, 259 Jobs, Steve curation of iPhone platform, 165 Dropbox acquisition offer, 162 and iPhone apps, 151–53, 157, 163 joint-stock company, 320 journalism, See newspapers Joyce, James, 178 judges, parole granted by, 39–40 judgment, human as complement to computer power, 35 in decision-making loop, 53–56 flaws in, 37–42 and justification, 45 “superforecasters” and, 60–61 System 1/System 2 reasoning, 35–46 justification, 45 Kadakia, Payal, 178, 179, 184 Kaggle, 261 Kahneman, Daniel, 35–36, 43, 44, 56, 325 Kalanick, Travis, 200 Kapor, Mitch, 142 Katz, Michael, 141n Kaushik, Avinash, 45 Kay, Alan, 61 Kazaa, 144 Kehoe, Patrick J., 21 Keirstead, Karl, 143 kernel, 240 Keynes, John Maynard, 278–79, 287, 309–10 Khosla, Vinod, 94 Kickstarter, 262 “killer app,” 157 Kim, Pauline, 40–41 Kimberley Process, 289–90 kinases, 116–17 kitchen, automated, 94 Kiva Systems, 103 Klein, Gary, 56 knowledge access to, in second machine age, 18 markets and, 332 prediction markets and, 238 knowledge differentials, See information asymmetries Kodak, 131, 132 Kohavi, Ronny, 45, 51 Kohl’s, 62–63 Koike, Makoto, 79–80 Komatsu, 99 Koum, Jan, 140 Krawisz, Daniel, 304 Kurzweil, Ray, 308 Lakhani, Karim, 252–55, 259 landline telecommunications, 134–35 land title registry, 291 language learning styles, 67–69 Lasker, Edward, 2 Lawee, David, 166 law of one price, 156 Lea, Ed, 170 leadership, geeky, 244–45, 248–49 lead users, 265 LeCun, Yann, 73, 80, 121 ledger, See blockchain Legg, Shane, 71 Lehman, Bastian, 184 Lei Jun, 203 Leimkuhler, John F., 182 “lemons,” 207 Lending Club, 263 level 5 autonomy, 82 leveraging of assets, O2O platforms for, 196–97 Levinovitz, Alan, 3 Levinson, Art, 152 libraries, 229–32 Library of Congress, 231 links, 233 Linq, 290–91 Linux, 240–45, 248, 249, 260 liquidity and network effects, 206 O2O platforms as engines of, 192–96 Livermore, Shaw, 22–23 locking in users, 217 lodging; See also Airbnb differences between Airbnb and hotels, 222–23 Priceline and, 223–24 “Logic Theorist” program, 69 Long, Tim, 204 Los Angeles, California hotel occupancy rates, 221–22 Postmates in, 185 Uber’s effect on taxi service, 201 LTE networks, 96 Luca, Michael, 209n Lyft, 186, 201, 208, 218 Ma, Jack, 7 machine age, See second machine age machine intelligence mind as counterpart to, 15 superiority to System 1 reasoning, 38–41 machine learning, 66–86; See also artificial intelligence AlphaGo and, 73 back-office work and, 82–83 early attempts, 67–74 in Obama’s 2012 presidential campaign, 48–51 O2O business data and, 194 statistical pattern recognition and, 72–74 machine(s); See also artificial intelligence; robotics; standard partnership and business process reengineering, 32–33 and creativity, 110–19 defined, 14 human connection in digitized world, 122–24 human judgment and, 34–45 new mind-machine partnership, 46–62 and uniquely human domains, 110–26 Mad Men (TV drama), 48 Madrigal, Alexis, 295–96 magazines ad revenue (late 1990s), 130 ad revenue (2013), 132–33 new content platforms’ effect on revenue, 139 MakerBot, 273 maker movement, 271–72 Makhijani, Vish, 324–25 malls, 131, 134 Malone, Tom, 311, 313 management/managers continued importance of, 320–23 and economics of the firm, 309 as portion of US workforce, 321 in post-standard partnership world, 323–26 manufacturing electricity’s effect on, 19–24 robotics in, 102 transition from molds to 3D printing, 104–7 Manyika, James, 332 Manzi, Jim, 62–63 Marchant, Jo, 66n Marcus, Gary, 5, 71 marginal costs bundling and, 147 of computer storage, 136 of digital copies, 136, 137 of perishing inventory, 180, 181 of platforms, 137 of platforms vs. products, 147, 220 and Uber’s market value, 219 marginal utility, 258–59 “Market for ‘Lemons,’ The” (Akerlof), 207 market research, 13–14, 261–63 market(s) centrally planned economies vs., 235–37 companies and, 309–11 costs inherent in, 310–11 as crowd, 235–39 information asymmetries and, 206–7 prediction markets, 237–39 production costs vs. coordination costs, 313–14 Markowitz, Henry, 268 Marshall, Matt, 62 Martin, Andrew, 40–41 Marx, Karl, 279 Masaka, Makoto, 79–80 “Mastering the Game of Go with Deep Neural Networks and Tree Search” (Nature article), 4 Maugham, Somerset, 110 Mazzella, Frédéric, 190 McCarthy, John, 67 McClatchy Company, 132 McDonald’s, 92 McElheren, Kristina, 42 McKinsey Global Institute, 332 Mechanical Turk, 260 Medallion Fund, 267 medical devices crowd-designed, 272–75 3D printing and, 106 medical diagnosis, 123–24 Meehl, Paul, 41–42, 53–54, 56, 81 MegaBLAST, 253, 254 Menger, Carl, 25 Men’s Fitness, 132 Merton, Robert K., 189 Metallica, 144 Microsoft core capabilities, 15 machine learning, 79 proprietary software, 240 as stack, 295 Windows Phone platform, 167–68 Microsoft Research, 84 Milgrom, Paul, 315n milking systems, 101 Mims, Christopher, 325 mind, human as counterpart to machine intelligence, 15 undetected biases in, 42–45 Minsky, Marvin, 73, 113 Mitchell, Alan, 11, 12 MIT Media Lab, 272 mobile telephones, 129–30, 134–35 Mocan, Naci, 40 molds, 104–5 Moley Robotics, 94 Momentum Machines, 94 Moody’s, 134 Moore, John, 315 Moore’s law, 308 and Cambrian Explosion of robotics, 97–98 defined, 35 neural networks and, 75 System 2 reasoning and, 46 and 3D printing, 107 Morozov, Evgeny, 297 Mt.

Sunfall
by Jim Al-Khalili
Published 17 Apr 2019

But the subject matter now was far more important than a theoretical curiosity about the structure of dark matter. ‘But,’ continued Qiang, ‘if this liquid core gets disturbed, the magnetic field gets weaker. And right now, turbulent vortices thousands of kilometres below our feet are disrupting its smooth circular flow. ‘So, my question is this: if we really had to, is there a way of kick-starting the core again? How could we deliver a massive boost of energy to the right spots at the right time to push the liquid metal in the right direction?’ Marc was intrigued. ‘I guess it’s a bit like sticking your finger into emptying bathwater above the plughole and stirring it to recover the steady circular vortex after it has been messed up.’

…

What if you aimed multiple beams of neutralinos down into the ground from different locations around the planet, all meeting at one point deep in the core? They would each travel through the Earth as though it were completely transparent, but if they met … He tried to do the calculations in his head to determine how big a bang that would make. Big enough to kick-start the Earth’s core again? He couldn’t tell whether the idea was even feasible; he knew too little about geophysics. It was certainly a daring idea. Actually, scratch that, it was a crazy idea. Even if it worked, it would take years to put it into practice. He realized Qiang was still staring at him, waiting for him to say something.

…

As far as he could see, it would, even if successful, be at best just a temporary fix – deflecting coronal mass ejections was not a permanent solution to the loss of the magnetosphere. The planet’s atmosphere would continue to be gradually eroded by the solar wind. Over time, the entire biosphere would suffocate and die. No, the only hope for humanity was to kick-start the Earth’s core again and bring the magnetosphere back to life. It was then that Qiang let out a quiet whoop of triumph, snapping Marc out of his reverie. He turned back from the screen. ‘OK, I’m happy with the numbers,’ Qiang said, deftly touching and swiping to one side the virtual displays floating around his head, then removed his visor and gloves.

The Business Blockchain: Promise, Practice, and Application of the Next Internet Technology
by William Mougayar
Published 25 Apr 2016

Special thanks to Wiley executive editor Bill Falloon, who believed we could do this faster than humanly possible, and to Kevin Barrett Kane at The Frontispiece who designed and produced the book in the nick of time. Finally, much appreciation to the group of friends who helped support this book's Kickstarter campaign in February 2016, which made its production feasible. I could not have done this without you, and without the support of Margot Atwell and John Dimatos from Kickstarter. One of a kind, Most Generous Supporter: Brad Feld (Foundry Group). Really GENEROUS Supporters: Jim Orlando (OMERS Ventures), Ryan Selkis (DCG), Matthew Spoke (Deloitte). Super SPECIAL Supporters: Kevin Magee, Piet Van Overbeke, Christian Gheorghe, Jon Bradford.

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Some of these exchanges even offer foreign currency exchange services in real-time between a variety of cryptocurrencies and popular currencies, such the U.S. dollar, Canadian dollar, Euro, British pound, and Japanese yen. Already, these are more capabilities than what the average bank user can do without visiting a branch. If you are running a crowdfunding campaign (such as on Kickstarter), you are also required to link your bank account. At the completion of a successful campaign, your earnings are automatically deposited into that account. When you link your ApplePay account to checkout and pay for items in seconds, the money is actually coming directly from one of your bank or credit card accounts.

Epic Win for Anonymous: How 4chan's Army Conquered the Web
by Cole Stryker
Published 14 Jun 2011

Just as genes propagate themselves in the gene pool by leaping from body to body via sperms or eggs, so memes propagate themselves in the meme pool by leaping from brain to brain via a process which, in the broad sense, can be called imitation. This is an excerpt from Dawkins’s groundbreaking book, The Selfish Gene, published in 1976. Dawkins didn’t originally come up with the idea of a meme, but he was the first one to use the word, and thus to inadvertently kick-start a new branch of anthropology called memetics, a catchall term for the study of human social evolution as opposed to biological evolution (i.e., genetics). I think that a new kind of replicator has recently emerged on this very planet. It is staring us in the face. It is still in its infancy, still drifting clumsily about in its primeval soup, but already it is achieving evolutionary change at a rate that leaves the old gene panting far behind.

…

He points to the increasing role that 4chan users have in geopolitics, as they have successfully brought down the sites of massive multinational corporations. Second, Hwang claims that although 4chan exists as this “other” state outside of the rest of life online, it is an important part of the web’s cultural production. Hwang laughs at the raw visual power of the Xzibit meme, which 4chan kick-started in 2007. You may know Xzibit as a rapper and host of the MTV show Pimp My Ride. But on the Internet, he’s become so closely linked with his meme that the usual words used to caption image macros are no longer necessary; his smiling face says it all. Pimp My Ride featured Xzibit and his gearhead crew retrofitting jalopies with outlandish accoutrements like flat-screen TVs or fish tanks.

…

We’re getting bigger every day—and solely by the force of our ideas, malicious and hostile as they often are. If you want another name for your opponent, then call us Legion, for we are many. Knowledge is free. We are Anonymous. We are Legion. We do not forgive. We do not forget. Expect us. Thus began Project Chanology, kick-started by anonymous users of 4chan and other chan-style boards where anti-Scientology discussions were held following the release of the Tom Cruise video. I got in touch with “c0s,” an Anon who claims to be the guy who created and uploaded the “Message to Scientology” video, in AnonOps, an anonymous IRC channel devoted to Anonymous’s operations.

Whiplash: How to Survive Our Faster Future
by Joi Ito and Jeff Howe
Published 6 Dec 2016

Cheap, effective 3-D printers have made prototyping a breeze; knowledge once accessible only inside large corporations or academic institutions can now be found through online courseware or within communities like DIYbio, a collection of citizen scientists who engage in the kind of genetic experiments that were only recently the stuff of expensive, exclusive laboratories.19 Finally, crowdfunding sites like Kickstarter and Indiegogo have built nearly frictionless platforms for raising money to develop anything from small art projects to major consumer appliances. These are real-time examples of emergence in action. They allow creators to test the validity of that unique information—a water bottle turned Super Soaker!

…

Ozzie also made the suggestion that Geiger counters strapped to cars could collect more data, more quickly, than those carried by hand. Bonner, Franken, and a team at Tokyo HackerSpace set to work designing and building a new type of Geiger counter, the bGeigie, which fits in a container about the size of a bento box and includes a GPS receiver. All of the pieces were now in place. With nearly $37,000 from a Kickstarter campaign and additional funding from Reid Hoffman, Digital Garage, and The John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, Safecast began deploying Geiger counters and gathering data from citizen scientists across Japan. By March 2016 the project had collected more than fifty million data points, all available under a Creative Commons CC0 public domain dedication, which places them in the public domain.

…

The developers often share the inner workings of the game and even allow fans to use copyrighted content to create videos or other derivative goods. It’s very hard to see where the company ends and the customer begins in these systems. You see pull at work not only with parts and labor, but with financial capital as well. Kickstarter allows people to raise what they want in a fashion that’s far more agile and responsive than traditional fund-raising methods. Crowdfunding demonstrates that the same logic behind Amazon Web Services—the “distributed computing” division—works for the aggregation of financial capital as well. People often associate crowdfunding with dubious ideas for new products, but Experiment.com shows that the same system can be used to fund serious scientific research.17 Beyond crowdfunding, crowdsourcing also provides independent creators with affordable options for extending their resources.

Who Needs the Fed?: What Taylor Swift, Uber, and Robots Tell Us About Money, Credit, and Why We Should Abolish America's Central Bank
by John Tamny
Published 30 Apr 2016

Returning to Spike Lee, his early successes made him bankable in Hollywood. But in 2014, he turned to Kickstarter to attain $1.25 million in financing for Da Sweet Blood of Jesus. Kickstarter is a website where the creative go to find investors for their projects. They set a number they’d like to raise, and if successful they find individuals eager to “crowd-source” whatever project it is they seek funds for. The investors acquire a stake in the creative dream of others who need credit to animate their dreams. Capitalism is always and everywhere a two-way street. Explaining his utilization of Kickstarter to The Economist, Lee observed that traditional movie studios “are looking for tent-pole movies, movies that make a billion dollars, open on the same day all around the world.

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See federal government Gray, Freddie, 135 Grazer, Brian, 22–23, 24–25, 26 Great Depression, 106, 141–43, 147, 168 The Greatest Trade Ever (Zuckerman), 45, 120 Greenspan, Alan, 119, 120, 164 Greider, William, 121 Griffin, Ken, 41 Guest, Christopher, 22 Guillies, Wendy, 175 Hamm, Harold, 73 Hanks, Tom, 22 Hannah, Daryl, 23 Harbaugh, Jim, 16–18, 20, 21, 79, 103, 127 hard assets, 118 Harford, Tim, 32, 64–65 Hartnett, Josh, 24 Hastert, Dennis, 52 Hawaiian Airlines, 34–35 Hawn, Goldie, 24 Hayward, Steven, 49, 50 Hazlitt, Henry, 22, 64, 74, 113, 163, 176 Heaven Can Wait (film), 23 hedge-fund managers, 48 Heller, Walter, 54 Hemingway, Ernest, 91 Hendrickson, Mark, 80 high-yield “junk bonds,” 37–40, 126 Hilsenrath, Jon, 147, 148 Hoffman, Dustin, 23 Hoke, Brady, 16, 20–21, 78–79, 103, 115, 127, 128, 148 Hollywood Shuffle (film), 109 Hoover, Herbert, 142, 168 Hoover Institution, 102 housing booms and “easy credit,” 113–22 and value of the dollar, 116–22 housing market and mortgage-backed securities, 150–52 Howard, Ron, 22–23 How We Got Here (Frum), 118 Human Action (von Mises), 20 Humphrey-Hawkins Full Employment Act, 165 hyperinflation in post-WWII Germany, 90–91 IBM, 53 Imagine Entertainment, 22–23 inflation Friedman’s view of, 136 inability of Fed to control, 159–61, 165 and value of the dollar, 43 inherited wealth, 29–30 initial public offering (IPO), 29, 124 innovation and definitions of success or failure, 29–30 and entrepreneurs, 66 and failure, 57–58 The Innovators (Isaacson), 31 insider trading, 38 Inside the Nixon Administration (Burns), 170 Intel, 143 intellectual property rights, 9–10 interest rates and the cost of credit, 1–3, 13–14, 47–48, 147 and the Fed on inflation as source of economic growth, 156–61, 165–66 housing boom and “easy credit,” 113–16, 120–22 and quantitative easing (QE) program, 149–51 Internet banking, 108, 111 Internet “bubble,” 57–58 Internet job creation, 178–79 investment banking, 123 Iron Man (films), 25 Ishtar (film), 23 Jagger, Mick, 25 James, LeBron, 137–38 Japan after World War II, 128 Bank of Japan and Nikkei index, 152, 159 job creation and robots, 176–80 Jobs, Steve, 30–31 Johnson, Lyndon B., 49, 53 Johnson, Mark, 153 Jones, Jesse, 167 “junk bonds,” 37–40, 126 Kalanick, Travis, 12, 13 Karlgaard, Rich, 160 Kashgar, 138 Kauffman Foundation, 175 Keaton, Diane, 24 Kelly, Jason, 126 Kennedy, John F., 49–50, 169 Kennedy, Robert F., 34 Keynesian economics, 78–82, 88, 93–96, 140–41 Keynes, John Maynard, 78, 147 Kickstarter, 110 Kiffin, Lane, 20 Kinski, Nastassja, 24 Knowledge and Power (Gilder), 57 Kohli, Shweta, 107 Kohn, Donald, 156 Kornbluth, Walter, 22 labor as credit, 15–21 Laffer, Arthur, 55, 137, 157, 158 Laffer curves, 50, 54–55 Lawrence, Jennifer, 37–38 Lee, Spike, 109, 110 Lending Club, 107–8 Leubsdorf, Ben, 156 Levy, Eugene, 22 Lewis, Nathan, 72, 137, 141–42, 144 LewRockwell.com website, 94 Lisa computer, 30 Lombard Street (Bagehot), 46 Luck, Andrew, 16–17 McAdams, Hall, 89–90, 104 McConnell, Mitch, 51 Mack, John J., 123, 130 Madoff, Bernard, 163 Mann, Windsor, 78 Margolis, Eric, 94, 96 market “bubbles,” 56–63 market forces and government spending, 59–60 price of goods versus price of dollars, 1–2 von Mises on, 20, 152 market intervention and the Fed, 159–61 Mazursky, Paul, 24 Medicare, 53, 78, 174 Merrill Lynch, 120 Metro public transit, 10–11 Meyer, Urban, 17–18 Microsoft, 30–31, 125, 143, 155 Milken, Michael, 38–40, 114, 126 Mill, John Stuart, 76 Mindich, Eric, 45–46 Mission Asset Fund, 107 mobile phones, 53–54 monetarism, 135–36, 138 money and Chinese economy, 135–36, 137 and economic activity, 3, 136–37, 140, 143 and gold standard, 68 and the Great Depression, 141–43, 147, 168 market monetarism, 138–39 as measure of wealth, 67–68 monetarism, 135–36, 138 “money multipliers” and “fractional lending,” 87–90 private money supplies, 144–45 and stable currency, 137, 144 Money and Foreign Exchange After 1914 (Cassel), 119 Moore, Gordon, 31 Moore, Stephen, 50–51 Morgan, J.

The Geek Feminist Revolution
by Kameron Hurley
Published 1 Jan 2016

I am imperfect, and I am tired, and now that I’m in my midthirties I’ve been able to see the cycles of rage and erasure happen time and time again, and yes, it gets frustrating. As opportunities for women in geek spaces have risen, so too has the backlash. Anita Sarkeesian’s popular Tropes vs. Women in Video Games video education series about problematic depictions of women in video games raised nearly $160,000 on Kickstarter and simultaneously made her one of the largest targets of abuse on the internet—no small feat considering how vast the rage of the online beast can be. A single forum post by a spurned ex-boyfriend triggered an internet deluge of threats against game creator Zoe Quinn, which rapidly organized itself under the Gamergate hashtag, an online mob ostensibly about “ethics in gaming journalism” that primarily targeted women for harassment.

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I’m ordering an overpriced drink that I’ll be writing off as a business expense, because I’ll likely lose 30 percent of that $7,000 to taxes in a few months. While I wait, I overhear a successful self-published author talking to a group of folks about how self-publishing can make everyone big money, and how traditional publishing is fucked. I’ve heard this a thousand times. Kickstarter is the key, he says. You can pre-fund all that work ahead of time, and generate income. He boasts about how he gave this advice to many underadvanced authors, folks paid “these seven-thousand, ten-thousand-dollar advances,” who were obviously small, silly fish. He sounds like a self-help guru. He makes writing books sound like a get-rich-quick scheme.

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Unlike novels, marketing communications like emails and web pages and direct mailings can be written rather quickly, so I know that this process of fail again, fail better can work, ultimately. The trouble is that publishing doesn’t give you twelve failures to fuel a success. Publishing gives you one shot, maybe two, and then it’s back to the self-publishing mines or Kickstarter to prove your worth. Which I am okay with doing, but really? Publishing is a broken beast, still churning along with the same payment schedules and margins and advances it had, what, a hundred years ago? I run into the same issue at large companies that insist that marketing has always been done this way, that we’ve always sent out direct marketing pieces and why do we have to change even though the people who buy our products have totally revolutionized the way they purchase goods?

The Introvert Entrepreneur: Amplify Your Strengths and Create Success on Your Own Terms
by Beth Buelow
Published 3 Nov 2015

We were observers of each other’s professional practices, we taught together, I’d read her work. We had tested the waters of a professional relationship in many small ways before agreeing to a more significant affiliation. What did you learn through the process of doing a successful Kickstarter campaign that would be useful to an introvert entrepreneur considering a similar endeavor? I was emotionally unprepared for how vulnerable I would feel with such a public “ask” as a Kickstarter campaign. I resisted reading about “how to conduct a successful campaign” and participated full out, from the heart, with my most authentic voice. After thirty years as a public figure it was a roller coaster ride asking for contributions to fulfill a double dream.

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After thirty years as a public figure it was a roller coaster ride asking for contributions to fulfill a double dream. Deanna and I both reached out to our shared and individual communities. I was overwhelmed with the outpouring of support and affirmation. Still am every time I think about it. And the process that Kickstarter funded is already helping me make a bigger difference in the way I am able to teach and offer processes. Preparing for a public “ask” or making such a “strong offer,” as author Patti Digh likes to call it, requires emotional preparation. I do not usually define myself by much external assessment. That said—there were a few days when the program was inert that my confidence was impacted.

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See also Tribe authenticity with, 49 business expansion with, 221 FUDs and, 35 networking with, 94 Fripp, Patricia, 21 Frisch, Max, 158 FUDs, 34–43 bringing into open, 36–43 choices and, 40 identifying, 35–36 list of, 37 in marketing, 34–35 in networking, 106 in politics, 34–35 prosperity perspective and, 40–43 reality check for, 38–40 Truth and, 58 Full Circle Coaching, 36 Fund-raising, 78 moves management in, 131–32 Funnel of engagement, 132–36 Gates, Bill, 13 The Genius of Opposites (Kahnweiler), 157–58 Godin, Seth, 154, 161 Golden Circle, 99–100 Good to Great (Collins), 14, 159 Google+, 20, 157, 167 Grant, Adam, 148 Gretzky, Wayne, 231 Grow Your Own Business Expo, 27 Guillebeau, Chris, 185–87 Hamlet (Shakespeare), 87 Handwritten note, for follow up, 107 Happiness authenticity of, 67–68 of introverts, 22 The Happiness of Pursuit (Guillebeau), 185 Happy hour, 44 at conference, 109 for networking, 76–94, 111 Havel, Václav, 236 Helgoe, Laurie, 22–23 Herodotus, 103 Herron, Christian Marie, 53 Herron Media, 53 Hessler, Jim, 57–58 High-arousal positive feelings, 22 Hobbies business as, 145–46 for networking, 95 on social media, 167 Home-study courses, content from, 140 Hsieh, Tony, 61 Humor, in public speaking, 184 IBM, 34 Impatience, 10 Improvisation, 232–33 Independence, 190 Info@ email account, 138 Information processing, 8–9 by introverts, 15 Insight Selling: Surprising Research on What Sales Winners Do Differently (Doerr), 149 Intention, for networking, 98 Internal motivation, 33 Internet radio, content from, 140–41 Interviews for content, 139 for networking, 95 Introvert entrepreneur authenticity of, 49–50, 67–69 authority of, 69–70 capacity zone for, 118, 234–36 challenges of, 17–23 collaboration for, 20–21, 189–214 company culture for, 61–64 core values of, 32, 57, 62 credibility of, 69–70 energy management by, 19–20 expertise of, 114, 155 external action by, 53–54 extrovert in, 66 fear of, 25–55, 87 isolation of, 20–21, 87 kindred spirits of, 51–53 networking for, 18–19, 75–114 original thoughts of, 59 public speaking by, 173–94 purpose of, 57 risk of, 66, 71–73 sales by, 115–51 as self-effacing, 14 as self-possessed, 15 self-promotion of, 19, 122–28 self-reflection of, 15–17 as self-reliant, 14–15 strengths of, 12–17 sustainability for, 21, 236–39 transparency of, 153, 164–65 trial and error by, 74 tribe for, 153–87 values of, 73–74 voice of, 17–18, 57–74 vulnerability of, 66, 70 The Introvert Manifesto: Introverts Illuminated, Extraverts Enlightened (Vogt), 45 Introvert Power: Why Your Inner Life Is Your Hidden Strength (Helgoe), 22 Introverts communication by, 8–12 defined, 3–5 depression of, 22 happiness of, 22 improvisation and, 232–33 independence of, 190 information processing by, 8–9, 15 motivation for, 33 observation by, 23 overactive brain of, 34–35 privacy and, 51, 131 public speaking by, 49 talking to, 10–11 Truth for, 18, 57 Isolation, 20–21, 87 Janeczko, Bryan, 112–14 Jeffers, Susan, 29, 98 Jobs, Steve, 65 Jordan, Michael, 13 Jung, Carl, 3, 50 Kahnweiler, Jennifer, 157–58 Katie, Byron, 40 Kawasaki, Guy, 92 Keirsey, David, 5 Kickstarter, 213 Kindred spirits, 51–53 Kiwanis, 179 Lamott, Anne, 18, 19 Leadership for business expansion, 219–20 Level 5, 14, 15 Lead-in, for networking, 90–91, 102 Lectures, for networking, 94 Lee, Felicia, 192 Letting go, 239–40 Level 5 Leadership, 14, 15 Limiting beliefs, 38–40 Lindbergh, Anne Morrow, 67 LinkedIn, 20, 82 events on, 168 for networking, 95 tribe and, 157, 161–62 Listening leadership and, 220 in networking, 89 Live a Life You Love (Biali), 141 Love choices and, 31 fear and, 30–33, 97, 121–22 networking and, 97 sales and, 144–45 Low-arousal positive feelings, 22 Marketing.

Working in Public: The Making and Maintenance of Open Source Software
by Nadia Eghbal
Published 3 Aug 2020

Taylor, Watch Me Play: Twitch and the Rise of Game Live Streaming (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2018), 260. 331 Ralf Gommers, “Re: [Pandas-dev] Tidelift,” The Pandas-dev Archives, June 11, 2019, https://mail.python.org/pipermail/pandas-dev/2019-June/000972.html. 332 “Font Awesome 5,” Kickstarter, March 13, 2018, https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/232193852/font-awesome-5. 333 “Kent Overstreet Is Creating Bcachefs - a Next Generation Linux Filesystem,” Patreon, accessed March 13, 2020, https://www.patreon.com/bcachefs. 334 Na Sun, Patrick Pei-Luen Rau, and Liang Ma, “Understanding Lurkers in Online Communities: A Literature Review,” Computers in Human Behavior, no. 38 (September 2014): 110–117, https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0747563214003008. 335 “Eran Hammer Is Creating Open Source Software,” Patreon, accessed November 29, 2017, https://www.patreon.com/eranhammer. 336 “Support Django,” Django Software Foundation, accessed March 15, 2020, https://www.djangoproject.com/fundraising/. 337 Tim Graham, “Django Fellowship Program: A Retrospective,” Django Software Foundation, January 21, 2015, https://www.djangoproject.com/weblog/2015/jan/21/django-fellowship-retrospective/. 338 Matt Holt, “The Realities of Being a FOSS Maintainer,” Caddy Forum, September 3, 2017, https://caddy.community/t/the-realities-of-being-a-foss-maintainer/2728. 339 Sindre Sorhus (@sindresorhus), “My Patreon campaign is going well . . .,” Twitter, March 7, 2019, 12:46 p.m., https://twitter.com/sindresorhus/status/1103713423605432325 340 “GitHub Sponsors,” GitHub, accessed March 13, 2020, https://github.com/sponsors.

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For security-related issues, it’s actually better when the participating developers aren’t already familiar with the codebase, because they bring a fresh set of eyes. Crowdfunding campaigns can also work well because, like bounties, they fund bigger projects that require more focused time than contributions would normally allow. Font Awesome ran a Kickstarter campaign to fund the development of Font Awesome 5, a major update to their icon set, and raised just over $1 million.332 And Linux kernel developer Kent Overstreet set up a Patreon to fund his work on bcachefs, “a next generation Linux filesystem.”333 There is a lot of motivation, both intrinsic and extrinsic, that already powers open source work; we shouldn’t disturb the parts that are currently working.

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There’s the broadcasting effect, when someone climbs onstage to control the crowd and everyone turns to watch. And then there’s the small-group effect, when people strike up side conversations with their neighbors, ignoring the main stage. Social platforms must rebuild their infrastructure to accommodate these two use cases. Yancey Strickler, who cofounded Kickstarter, calls this the “dark forest theory” of the internet: “an increasing number of the population has scurried into their dark forests” to avoid the mainstream web, which has become “a relentless competition for power.”347 He points to newsletters, podcasts, and group chats as examples of dark forests, while Facebook and Twitter are examples of the mainstream, which will continue to exist alongside more private channels.

Alternatives to Capitalism
by Robin Hahnel and Erik Olin Wright

Consider the following example: Suppose a group of people have an idea for some new product but they cannot convince the relevant council or federation to provide them the needed capital equipment and raw materials to produce it. There is just too much skepticism about the viability of the project. An alternative way of funding the project could be through a form of crowdsourcing finance along the lines of Kickstarter. The workers involved would post a description of the project online and explain their specific needs for material inputs. They appeal to people (in their role of consumers) to allocate part of their annual consumption allowances to the project. Consumers might decide, for example, to put in extra hours at work in order to acquire the extra funds needed for their contribution, or they might just decide to consume less of some discretionary part of their consumption bundle.

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Or it could be used for some new manufactured product. There are a variety of motivations that might lead people to voluntarily make this allocation. They might believe in the social value of the project and therefore be willing to give the funds as an outright grant. This is currently the motivation behind a range of Kickstarter projects in the arts. Or they might be really keen on the product, and give the funds in exchange for a promise of being the first to get the product itself at an equal value to what they gave. This would, in effect, be simply a long-term pre-order of the product, although operating outside of the mechanism of the IFB.

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It is not clear to me why, for these kinds of technical regulatory matters, state institutions with field offices and extension services wouldn’t do this job more effectively. 11It is worth noting that in capitalism there is a very wide range of ways that small businesses can acquire the necessary capital for projects: There are ordinary banks, of course, but in many countries there are a wide variety of specialized banks with different criteria for making loans, including some with social and environmental mandates. Community banks are different from national banks, and state banks are different from multinational banks. There are also government agencies in many countries that give far below market-rate loans for targeted purposes and even outright grants. And there are things like Kickstarter and other unconventional ways of raising capital. I am not at all saying that this generates a fair and open access to capital. It does not in capitalism. The point is that this constitutes a heterogeneous institutional environment. I think a participatory economy is also likely to function best with qualitatively distinct devices for funding projects. 12It is worth noting that the massive reduction of the work week was basically Marx’s conception of how this problem would be dealt with in a communist society: the “realm of necessity”—the amount of work that needed to be done to satisfy needs—would be dramatically reduced and the “realm of freedom” would expand. 13As in the earlier discussion of Robin’s potential willingness, on the grounds of incentives, to accept pay differentials for innovative behavior even though this violates effort-based pay, I assume more generally that he would regard some contribution-based pay differentials as legitimate if this was the result of a robust democratic decision. 14This problem of non-comparability of effort measures across workplaces is especially important because of the way aggregate effort ratings figure in all sorts of planning processes, not just individual remuneration.

Becoming Data Literate: Building a great business, culture and leadership through data and analytics
by David Reed
Published 31 Aug 2021

“We needed a watershed moment that brought all the teams together, unify against a set of issues, and get to an outcome where we could focus on a higher mission and their role in delivering it,” said Ruckley. His solution was to create the data squad as a transformational way of working to leverage the value in the existing capability and the skills incumbent practitioners had. To kick-start this new approach, he held an offsite meeting to clear the air about all of the issues and identify common problems. It quickly emerged that all three teams were struggling with the decade-old legacy data platform that lacked data management principles and documentation. Duplication of effort was also recognised, together with a lack of communication.

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This is a very demanding role in which she is accountable for all the external merchant reporting that is processed daily on the company’s platform. Allen is also a data subject matter expert for Barclays Payments Acquiring and is often the go-to person for high-profile projects. But Barclaycard realised there was a need to kick-start new data conversations to keep the business going forward. With the aim of connecting colleagues outside of the data department to the world of data and letting them explore how data can be a useful asset, the DASA team wanted to encourage colleagues to partner with them to improve ways of working.

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From this level, however, progress can be significant and even swift. Maturing from data user to data-driven Vision – a data leader working in a low maturity organisation needs first and foremost to educate the senior executive about the possibilities that data can deliver. Embracing data as an enabler of corporate goals will kick-start adoption and demand. Business strategy – if the corporate vision starts to reflect usage of data, then the data leader needs to lay out a clear strategy for how data will come into play across lines of business. At this stage, the first data strategy for the organisation is likely to be created to spell out how this will happen.

Bike Boom: The Unexpected Resurgence of Cycling
by Carlton Reid
Published 14 Jun 2017

They didn’t get them then, and there are still none today. For Robert “Bicycle Bob” Silverman, and all of the other 1970s cycle advocates who tended cycling’s flame when planners and politicians were trying to snuff it out. THANKS TO MY KICKSTARTER PATRONS Rose Ades James Moss Jens Bemme Hannes Neupert, ExtraEnergy Chris Boardman Simon Nurse Denis Caraire Michael Prescott David Cox Eric Robertson See page 218 for all 461 Kickstarter backers. | Contents Foreword by Joe Breeze Preface Introduction 1 How Cyclists Became Invisible 2 From Victory Bikes to Rail Trails 3 Davis: The Bicycle Capital of America 4 Cycling in Britain—From Swarms to Sustrans 5 The Great American Bike Boom 6 The Rise and Fall of Vehicular Cycling 7 Where It’s Easy to Bike and Drive, Brits and Americans Drive 8 How the Dutch Really Got Their Cycleways Epilogue Acknowledgments Appendix A: “Bike Boom” Mentions, 1896–2016 Appendix B: How the Bicycle Helmet Safety Institute Was Formed from a 1970s-era Cycle Advocacy Organization Appendix C: Vive la Vélorution!

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History is a lesson, it is not a template. Fight. | Acknowledgments THANKS TO ALL at Island Press, including but not only Heather Boyer and Mike Fleming. For their patience, thanks are due to the loves of my life—my wife, Jude, and my children, Josh, Hanna, and Ellie Reid. Thanks also to my Kickstarter backers, listed overleaf. As much of this book is based on original research, it has involved wading through personal papers and dusty archives. Librarians in America and the UK proved to be exceptionally helpful. It was wonderful—albeit distracting—to work in such gob-stoppingly beautiful libraries such as the Library of Congress in Washington, DC, and the library at the Royal Automobile Club in London.

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I also looked at Ministry of Transport papers held in The National Archives in Kew, London (which is the most technologically advanced archive I have ever visited, but the concrete building leaves a lot to be desired). Portions of chapters 1 and 6 were previously published in Roads Were Not Built for Cars (Carlton Reid, Island Press, 2015). However, I have expanded the content, including adding more period sources. | Kickstarter Backers Philip Bowman Trickhand Chris Niewiarowski Stewart Duncan Chelle Destefano David Goodstein Graham George Irene McAleese Simon Woodward Chris Murphy Allen Dickie James Grant Jnik Ken Callan Edouard Guidon Mike Skiffins Mark Philpotts Andy Fox Edgar Fernandez Jaime Lee Pabiloña Jon H Ballentine Jonathan Winston Maree Carroll Michael Charland Tim Doole Ray Lea Tui The Warmans Richard Evans Steffen Lohrey John Cooper Alan Couchman Richard Ashurst Bristolpedalrevolution Shaun Connor Dr John Darling Michael Josephy Kevin Hasley Adam Bower Thomas NIcol Paul Tildesley Sara Rich Dorman Frankie Roberto John Boyd William Chong Donald Pillsbury Kyle Griggs Jim Baltaxe Bruce Lewandowski Ian Clark Martin Packer Melvin Bailey Tedder Robin Holloway James Johnston Chris Dorling Charles Frazer Harvey Chris Whiley John Donnelly Andrew Lamberton Anthony McDougle Nigel Oulton Fredrik Jönsson Alan Cragg Richard Worth Ken Neal Paul Shortland John Grocock Peter Hawkins Don Springhetti Christopher Fox Rick Rubio Darren Steele Catherine Bedford Graham Parker Jacqueline Campbell Dave Robinson Jonathan Streete Hans Dorsch Terry Coaker David Houghton Seamus Kelly Ben Wooliscroft Tina Bach Michael Beverland Graham Connor Mark Carlson Miles Rickelton Pj roon Barista Graham Robinson James Evans Frode P.

Big Capital: Who Is London For?
by Anna Minton
Published 31 May 2017

This is not dissimilar to the principle that underpinned the success of the Garden Cities in the early part of the twentieth century, which is that they were able to take land at agricultural values and plough back the resulting profits from development into the community. Likewise, the New Towns built after the war and in the 1960s were kick-started by grants of land at agricultural value. This is broadly how the planning system operates in Germany and Holland. The wartime authors of the report concluded that ‘a means must be found for removing the conflict between private and public interest’ and that this should be done by imposing a development charge, similar to a land tax, on landowners.

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Often these are in edgy locations such as Goldfinger’s Balfron Tower in East London, and the community of artists who move in briefly also brings a cachet which adds to the appealing nature of an area in the throes of change. In the past artists squatted in abandoned buildings in places such as Hoxton and Shoreditch in East London and Brixton in South London in a process that has long been credited with maintaining diversity in cities while also unwittingly kick-starting a slower process of gentrification in those areas. But in 2013 legislation was passed which made squatting in residential buildings illegal, and property guardianship can be seen as an attempt to co-opt the perceived desirable elements of squatting by artists in a blatant bid to accelerate gentrification.

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Instead ‘the pendulum has swung too far off’ and rather than the social contract it should be, planning has become an ‘obscure, legalistic and specialized activity, “practised” by suits and fought over largely behind closed doors’, leading to the scandal of secret financial viability assessments engineered to provide no affordable housing. The other crucial difference is that municipal governments in Europe have greater power and financial backing, through mechanisms which create large pots of public money to kick-start European-style developments. In contrast, government in England is very highly centralized and local authorities no longer have the resources or the confidence to initiate large-scale projects. Instead, they act as enablers for the private sector, with public money used to lever in private sector development which then assumes the lead and takes ownership of places.

The Internet of Garbage
by Sarah Jeong
Published 14 Jul 2015

Sarkeesian wrote: “In addition to the torrent of misogyny and hate left on my YouTube video (see below) the intimidation effort has also included repeated vandalizing of the Wikipedia page about me (with porn), organized efforts to flag my YouTube videos as ‘terrorism,’ as well as many threatening messages sent through Twitter, Facebook, Kickstarter, email and my own website. These messages and comments have included everything from the typical sandwich and kitchen ‘jokes’ to threats of violence, death, sexual assault and rape. All that plus an organized attempt to report this project to Kickstarter and get it banned or defunded.” That was in 2012. In August 2014, she was forced to flee her home after receiving a threat. In October of 2014, she canceled a lecture at Utah State University after someone sent a message to the university saying that they would commit “the deadliest school shooting in American history” if Sarkeesian was allowed to speak.

Your Computer Is on Fire
by Thomas S. Mullaney , Benjamin Peters , Mar Hicks and Kavita Philip
Published 9 Mar 2021

Nick Statt, “Google Dissolves AI Ethics Board Just One Week after Forming It: Not a Great Sign,” The Verge (April 4, 2019), https://www.theverge.com/2019/4/4/18296113/google-ai-ethics-board-ends-controversy-kay-coles-james-heritage-foundation. 16. April Glaser, “Kickstarter’s Year of Turmoil,” Slate (September 12, 2019), https://slate.com/technology/2019/09/kickstarter-turmoil-union-drive-historic-tech-industry.html. 17. Googlers Against Transphobia, “Googlers Against Transphobia and Hate” Medium.com (April 1, 2019), https://medium.com/@against.transphobia/googlers-against-transphobia-and-hate-b1b0a5dbf76. 18.

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For decades, computing companies have tried to convince all white-collar workers that they were management, or aligned with management, and so did not need to argue with those at the top, or need unions to help press for change. As recent events in the tech industry have shown, nothing could be further from the truth. From Google to Kickstarter, tech workers have begun to see that, if they don’t have a real voice in deciding the direction of the company, they don’t have any control over the harms created by the products they make. As individuals, their voices can be easily ignored, as the Boeing example shows. As a group, however, tech workers—and citizens—have power.

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As the cases of Project Dragonfly and Project Maven at Google show, worker pushback can shut down projects and save lives. As the Google Walkout showed, until more people speak up it is still more acceptable to pay a sexual harasser millions of dollars to leave than it is to pay women an equal wage or give them equal opportunities to stay. Unionization efforts at Kickstarter and other corporations provide a blueprint for the next steps we need to take back our democracy and to make it possible for people to speak in favor of what is right in a broader sense.16 And as we saw from the rejection of the transphobic and xenophobic Google ethics board due to intense pressure from employee organization and protest, workers can begin to call the shots about what actually makes good and ethical technology if they work together and fight.17 But they can only do this within a framework of a stable, elected democratic government that has, at its core, a commitment to protecting citizens and workers instead of seeing them as expendable.

Designing for Emotion
by Aarron Walter
Published 4 Oct 2011

In a quest for higher crop yields and lower production costs, farms have become headless corporations pitting profits against human welfare. But local farmers are finding new markets as consumers search for food produced by people for people. While big-box stores proliferate disposable mass-market goods, websites like Etsy and Kickstarter are empowering artists, craftspeople, and DIY inventors who sell goods they’ve designed and created. And their customers love the experience. When you buy from an independent craftsman, you support creative thinking and families (not corporations), and you gain the opportunity to live with an object that has a story.

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q=%22Guess+I+could+have+waited+for+today+if+all%22&in=81&type=contents&view=posts&search=true&button_search.x=54&button_search.y=-106&button_search=true 13 http://www.alistapart.com/articles/understandingprogressiveenhancement/ 14 http://google.com/websiteoptimizer Resources 15 http://amzn.com/1592535879 16 http://getmentalnotes.com/ 17 http://amzn.com/0465051367 18 http://amzn.com/0393334775 19 http://amzn.com/014303622X 20 http://amzn.com/030746086X 21 http://amzn.com/0979777747 22 http://amzn.com/0321607376 23 http://uxmag.com/design/beyond-frustration-three-levels-of-happy-design 24 http://uxmag.com/design/the-psychologists-view-of-ux-design 25 http://uxmag.com/design/organized-approach-to-emotional-response-testing 26 http://boxesandarrows.com/view/emotional-design Index 37Signals 8-10 A Able Design 88 aesthetic-usability effect 27-28 A List Apart 90 Apple 7, 27 anticipation 54-58, 87 apathy 75 Arts and Crafts movement 2, 94 B baby-face bias 18-20, 28, 32 Basecamp 8-10, 70 Betabrand 13-16, 75 Blue Sky Resumes 88-90, 93 bible 31-33 Biological Homage to Mickey Mouse, A 19 Bowman, Doug 21, 55-56 Brain Rules 12 Breathing Status LED Indicator 27 Bringhurst, Robert 20 Brizzly 19-20 C calligraphy 31 Carbonmade 40, 42-45 Clippy 60 CoffeeCup Software 85-87, 90 Cornelius, J. 86 contrast 22-25, 28, 44 Convertbot 40-41 D Damasio, Antonio 67 Darwin, Charles 17-18 design persona 35-40, 48, 91, 92 Don’t Make Me Think 77 dot-com bubble 3 Dribbble 55-56, 59 Dropbox 72-74 E Etsy 2 Elements of Content Strategy, The 75 Elements of Typographic Style, The 20 Emotional Design 27 Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animal, The 17 F Facebook 3, 7, 54, 59, 74, 86-87 face-ism ratio design principle 46 fail whale 7 Fletcher, Louise 90 Flickr 3, 51, 54, 79-82, 93 Freddie Von Chippenheimer IV 37, 60-65 G Getting Real 8 GigaOm 56 Gmail 70 golden ratio 20-21, 27 Google Site Optimizer 93 GoToMeeting 76 Gould, Stephen Jay 19 Gorum, Dave 44 Groupon 62 Gruber, John 42 Gupta, Amit 51-52 Gutenberg, Johannes 31-33 gut instinct 67-68 H Hale, Kevin 11 Happy Cog 46 Hick’s Law 24, 28 hierarchy of needs 5-6, 35 Hipmunk 7 Hodgman, John 33, 36 Housing Works 40, 45-46, 75, 93 HTML 3 Human-Computer Interaction 29 I iPhone 40 iPod 20 industrial revolution 1 iTunes 7 Ping 7 Pink Panther 15-16 Putorti, Jason 69, 71 priming 59-65, 76 progressive enhancement 90-91 Pythagoras 20, 27 J Jobs, Steve 27 Jardine, Mark 41-42 K Kickstarter 2 Kissane, Erin 75 Krug, Steve 77 L Lindland, Chris 13-16 Long, Justin 33, 36 M Mac 33, 36 Mall, Dan 46 MailChimp 20, 36-40, 60-65, 91 Mashable 56 Maslow, Abraham 5-6 Medina, John 12 memory 11-13, 49, 82 messagefirst 33-35 Mestre, Ricardo 25-26 Microsoft Office 60 Mint 69-72, 93 N Norman, Donald 27, 82-83 O open system 54 Oprah Magazine 90 P Parthenon 20 party pooper 91 persona 33-40 Photojojo 49-52, 59, 65 Q Quicken 72 R rosy effect 82 S Scoutmob 62 Shakespeare 10 Silverback 77 Sims 54 Skype 76 Smith, Matthew 88-89 StickyBits 20 Squared Eye 88 Super Mario Brothers 54 surprise 49-54 T Tapbots 40-42 Tumblr 23-24 Trammell, Mark 55 Twitter 3, 7, 20-21, 54, 55-59, 74, 86-87 V variable rewards 62, 87 velvet rope 57, 87 Volkswagen Beetle 32 W WALL•E 41-42 Warfel, Todd Zaki 33 Weightbot 40-41 Wilson, Rainn 4 Wufoo 9-11, 13, 52-54, 93 Y YouTube 37, 60 About A Book Apart Web design is about multi-disciplinary mastery and laser focus, and that’s the thinking behind our brief books for people who make websites.

Grave New World: The End of Globalization, the Return of History
by Stephen D. King
Published 22 May 2017

And, in many cases, the mavericks have succeeded by forcibly expressing their opposition to globalization on social media, while being economical with the truth. Money, meanwhile, has become a means of conducting economic warfare, in a twenty-first-century version of coin clipping aimed at the foreign investor. For all the talk of central bankers kick-starting economic growth, monetary stimulus has increasingly ended up creating only winners and losers both within and across borders – a process that has served to create an even bigger gulf between policymakers and the citizens they are supposed to serve. TECHNOCRATIC SOLUTIONS, OBLIGATIONS AND MORALITY Part Four argues that many of the ‘solutions’ to the problems associated with globalization are simply too technocratic.

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The numbers involved were staggering: the US provided $13 billion in aid, worth almost 5 per cent of US national income in 1948 and around $130 billion in 2015 dollars. At America’s insistence, the money was to be allocated by the Europeans themselves through the Organisation for European Economic Co-operation (OEEC). Four GATT rounds in just nine years – all aimed at reducing trade tariffs – also helped to kick-start economic activity: Geneva in 1947 (pre-dating Marshall), Annecy in 1949, Torquay in 1950 and Geneva (again) in 1956. There were, however, several strings attached. To keep Soviet communism at bay, European nations were encouraged to embrace free-market principles. That meant getting rid of unnecessary regulations, abolishing price controls, supporting free trade and, bit by bit, rebuilding Europe on principles consistent with Washington’s strategic ambitions.

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Given that around 90 per cent of the total value of financial assets in the US is owned by the top 10 per cent of households, this was – particularly for the very well-off – a very pleasant windfall gain. Yet despite this financial uplift for the wealthy, broader economic gains – those that might have benefited society more widely – proved few and far between. Quantitative easing may have been designed to kick-start economic growth, but the pace of recovery in the US – and elsewhere – was unusually weak. In particular, despite strong gains in equity markets, companies mostly remained unwilling to invest. In many cases, they didn’t need to. Subdued labour incomes – thanks to a mixture of weak demand, technological change and competition from cheaper labour elsewhere in the world – meant that gains in sales revenues alone led to higher corporate profits; higher profits, in turn, fed through to further stock market gains, even in the absence of a recovery in investment.

How to Be the Startup Hero: A Guide and Textbook for Entrepreneurs and Aspiring Entrepreneurs
by Tim Draper
Published 18 Dec 2017

You will hear very little from academics here. You will hear a lot from people who are out there pursuing careers in the fields they speak about. Since they are not professional teachers but from the real world, be tolerant of their quirks, etc. We have a green room and a sound room. Feel free to use them to create commercials, Kickstarter or Indiegogo videos, or viral videos. I recommend each of you create a video and a theme song. At times, there will be people videotaping. You will get used to having cameras around. Get comfortable with them. They will try to stay out of your way, but still capture the content they need. We hope you will always think of the reputation of the school while you are here.

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It is simple to get incorporated on LegalZoom or Clerky, get legal advice on LawTrades, and apply to Draper University or an accelerator like Boost.vc, Y Combinator or TechStars. It is simple to list your company on AngelList or Crowdfunder and attract people to invest angel money with you. It is easy to list products on ProductHunt, Kickstarter or Indiegogo to see if there are customers interested in what you are doing. Legal terms are getting standardized and easy to research, terms like “SAFE” (Standard Agreement of Future Equity--innovated by Y Combinator) notes, “KISS” (innovated by 500 Startups) and our favorite with Draper Associates, “Series Seed” (with our addition of “TATS [Tradeable Automated Term Sheet],” which you can find at www.lawtrades.com).

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He was going to build a smart watch company, which he eventually called Pebble. It was an inauspicious beginning. Almost immediately after I invested in Pebble, Eric tried to build up his inventory and he ran out of cash. But then, like a Hail Mary pass in the last seconds of a football game, he tried something outrageous. He put a video together for a Kickstarter campaign (one of the first), and within three weeks, he had $10 million in pre-orders. He got the cash up front. In those three weeks, he went from near bankruptcy to a darling of the industry and he had cash with which he could build the inventory and ship the watches. The company sold over two million watches, reaching over $100 million in sales.

The Man Who Broke Capitalism: How Jack Welch Gutted the Heartland and Crushed the Soul of Corporate America—and How to Undo His Legacy
by David Gelles
Published 30 May 2022

Layoffs were unheard of, and in 1985, IBM even retooled its own marketing efforts to differentiate itself from GE, unveiling a new ad campaign with the tagline, “Jobs may come and go. But people shouldn’t.” It was an explicit rebuke of Welchism, a rejoinder to CEOs who fetishized downsizing. By the early 1990s, however, market pressures were too powerful for even IBM to resist. After Big Blue reported a sharp quarterly loss, the company was eager to kick-start its languishing stock price and went looking for a new CEO who could work the Welchian magic. At one point, the IBM board even tried to entice Welch to consider the job. He declined to entertain the offer. But the board was able to attract Lou Gerstner, a former American Express executive who for the previous few years had served as chief executive of RJR Nabisco, following its leveraged buyout by the private equity firm Kohlberg Kravis Roberts.

…

Included in their bylaws are explicit commitments to have a positive influence on society, and to take care of workers, the environment, and communities. Maryland became the first state to allow public benefit corporations in 2010, and a decade later almost every state has passed laws that enable companies to choose this path. Already, some well-known companies, including Kickstarter and Patagonia, have done so. By writing a more expansive set of priorities into their governing documents, executives are at once codifying their values and rebuking the notion that they are obliged to maximize its short-term profits. As Patagonia founder Yvon Chouinard said when his company made the transition to public benefit corporation, “Benefit Corporation legislation creates the legal framework to enable mission-driven companies like Patagonia to stay mission-driven through succession, capital raises, and even changes in ownership, by institutionalizing the values, culture, processes, and high standards put in place by founding entrepreneurs.”

…

Yet more than anyone else, it was Welch himself who created the schism between the Golden Age of Capitalism and the unequal, unsustainable era of shareholder primacy in which we now live. He was the first CEO to take a healthy company and treat it like a turnaround job, preemptively laying off tens of thousands of workers and kick-starting the era of mass downsizing, outsourcing, and offshoring. He was the first to use dealmaking to expand the business into any industry possible, setting in motion decades of consolidation that concentrated industries and made the economy less dynamic. He was the first who brought to his job a singular focus on quarterly earnings, and employed financialization, earnings smoothing, buybacks, and everything else in his power to see that GE’s stock price continued to rise.

The New Digital Age: Transforming Nations, Businesses, and Our Lives
by Eric Schmidt and Jared Cohen
Published 22 Apr 2013

People have more insight and visibility into the suffering of others, and they have more opportunities to do something about it. Some scoff at the rise of “slacktivism”—slacker activism, or engaging in social activism with little or no effort—but transnational, forward-thinking organizations like Kiva, Kickstarter and Samasource represent a vision of our connected future. Kiva and Kickstarter are both crowd-funding platforms (Kiva focuses on micro-finance, while Kickstarter focuses mostly on creative pursuits), and Samasource outsources “micro-work” from corporations to people in developing countries over simple online platforms. There are other, less quantifiable ways to contribute to a distant cause than donating money, like creating supportive content or increasing public awareness, both increasingly integral parts of the process.

…

Yet less than a month after the public revelations about these cyber weapons, security experts at Kaspersky Lab, a large Russian computer-security company with international credibility, concluded that the two teams that developed Stuxnet and Flame did, at an early stage, collaborate. They identified a particular module, known as Resource 207, in an early version of the Stuxnet worm that clearly shares code with Flame. “It looks like the Flame platform was a kick-starter of sorts to get the Stuxnet project going,” a senior Kaspersky researcher explained. “The operations went separate ways, maybe because Stuxnet code was mature enough to be deployed in the wild. Now we are 100 percent sure that the Stuxnet and Flame groups worked together.” Though Stuxnet, Flame and other cyber weapons linked to the United States and Israel are the most advanced known examples of state-led cyber attacks, other methods of cyber warfare have already been used by governments around the world.

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Hormuud https encryption protocols Huawei human rights, 1.1, 3.1 humiliation Hussein, Saddam, itr.1, 7.1, 7.2, 7.3, 7.4 Hutus Identity Cards Act identity theft identity-theft protection, 2.1, 2.2 IEDs (improvised explosive devices), 5.1, 6.1 IEEE Spectrum, 107n income inequality, 1.1, 4.1 India, 2.1, 2.2, 3.1 individuals, transfer of power to Indonesia infiltration information blackouts of exchange of free movement of see also specific information technologies Information and Communications Technologies Authority Information Awareness Office information-technology (IT) security experts infrastructure, 2.1, 7.1 Innocence of Muslims (video), 4.1, 6.1 innovation Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, n insurance, for online reputation integrated clothing machine intellectual property, 2.1, 3.1 intelligence intelligent pills internally displaced persons (IDP), 7.1, 7.2 International Criminal Court, 6.1, 7.1, 7.2 internationalized domain names (IDN) International Telecommunications Union Internet, 2.1, 6.1, 6.2, 6.3, 6.4 Balkanization of as becoming cheaper and changing understanding of life impact of as network of networks Internet asylum seekers Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) internet protocol (IP) activity logs internet protocol (IP) address, 3.1, 3.2, 6.1 Internet service provider (ISP), 3.1, 3.2, 6.1, 7.1 Iran, 2.1, 2.2, 3.1, 3.2, 3.3, 3.4, 3.5, 3.6, 4.1, 4.2, 5.1, 6.1, 6.2, 6.3, 7.1 cyber warfare on “halal Internet” in Iraq, itr.1, 3.1, 4.1, 6.1, 6.2 reconstruction of, 7.1, 7.2 Ireland iRobot Islam Israel, 3.1, 3.2, 3.3, 3.4, 6.1, 6.2, 6.3 iTunes Japan, 3.1, 6.1n, 246 earthquake in Jasmine Revolution JavaOne Conference Jebali, Hamadi Jibril, Mahmoud Jim’ale, Ali Ahmed Nur Join the Club: How Peer Pressure Can Transform the World (Rosenberg), 4.1 Joint Tactical Networking Center Joint Tactical Radio System Julius Caesar justice system Kabul Kagame, Paul, 7.1, 7.2 Kansas State University Karzai, Hamid Kashgari, Hamza Kaspersky Lab Kenya, 3.1, 7.1, 7.2 Khan Academy Khartoum Khodorkovsky, Mikhail Khomeini, Ayatollah Kickstarter kidnapping, 2.1, 5.1 virtual Kinect Kissinger, Henry, 4.1, 4.2 Kiva, 7.1, 7.2, 7.3 Klein, Naomi, n Kony 2012, 7.1 Koran Koryolink “kosher Internet,” 187 Kosovo Kurds, 3.1, 3.2, 4.1 Kurzweil, Ray Kyrgyzstan Laârayedh, Ali Lagos language translation, 1.1, 4.1, 4.2 laptops Latin America, 3.1, 4.1, 4.2, 5.1 law enforcement Law of Accelerating Returns Lebanon, 5.1, 7.1, 7.2 Lee Hsien Loong legal options, coping strategies for privacy and security concerns legal prosecution Lenin, Vladimir Levitt, Steven D.

Samsung Rising: The Inside Story of the South Korean Giant That Set Out to Beat Apple and Conquer Tech
by Geoffrey Cain
Published 15 Mar 2020

Formerly the powerful lieutenant to Samsung’s ruling Lee family and head of the Future Strategy Office, Samsung’s highest body that houses many of the elite executives, known as “the Tower.” Now serving a five-year prison sentence for bribery and embezzlement. Shin Jong-kyun (J.K. Shin). CEO of Samsung’s mobile unit from March 2013 to December 2015. He oversaw the kick-starting of the Galaxy smartphone line and helped to initiate the smartphone wars against Apple. Koh Dong-jin (D.J. Koh). Successor to J.K. Shin and CEO of Samsung’s mobile unit from December 2015 to the present. He oversaw the recall and cancellation of the Galaxy Note 7 after the product began catching fire.

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State Department was watching Korea Semiconductor’s precarious financial situation closely, worried about the fallout of a default, since projects like this had loans from the U.S. government. They were believed to be in the national interests of both the United States and South Korea, a means to kick-start the sluggish Korean economy. With the OPEC oil embargo under way, it was clear that the United States and Korea needed to build new value-added industries that depended on highly skilled workers and not on natural resources like petroleum. Semiconductors were a good bet. They were an essential technology behind the Apollo space shuttles sent to the moon and in the laser-guided missiles deployed in the Vietnam War.

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Our guide opened the doors to the room where what would become known as Samsung’s revolution took place: the main conference room. The hotel was under renovation when I visited, so the site wasn’t completely historically accurate. But I stood in the conference room in awe. This was the site of the speech that kick-started a radical managerial transformation within Samsung. It was a moment that would help redefine the world of tech. On the morning of June 7, 1993, the assembled Samsung executives were seated around the table with notebooks, wearing identical white shirts and blue or black suits. At the front of the room stood a speaker’s table with a bed of pink flowers—a South Korean tradition.

Marx at the Arcade: Consoles, Controllers, and Class Struggle
by Jamie Woodcock
Published 17 Jun 2019

Nintendo launched the Wii U, which sold 14 million units, relatively few in comparison to the handheld 3DS, which sold 53 million units.82 The Switch, a hybrid of mobile and home consoles, was launched later, selling 18 million in one year alone.83 While these console battles raged, PC gaming entered a new phase. The independently developed (indie) game Minecraft sold an astonishing 144 million copies (across multiple platforms, with a high of 74 million monthly players), and the developer was purchased by Microsoft for $2.5 billion.84 The crowdfunding platform Kickstarter provided a new way for developers to raise money for games, shifting the business model of many titles. In addition to games, hardware like the virtual reality headset Oculus Rift were also funded this way. A growing number of games—including Gone Home, The Last of Us, and Papers, Please— began dealing with ethics and more mature themes.

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The first segment is development, without which there are no games to be published or sold. Games are made by studios, which can either be independent or owned by a publisher. The link between publisher and studio has become more complex, particularly with the emergence of alternative sources for raising capital like Kickstarter. There was, broadly speaking, around £639.1 million in GVA from development in 2013, which equates to an average of around £68,000 per worker. While this is a rough average, it does give a sense of the scope for extracting surplus value from these workers. If the average salary is lower than the amount workers are contributing, the company is clearly making a lot of money.

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S., 19 Douglas, Dante, 94 Draper, Hal, 132 Duke Nukem, 2, 29 Dune II, 28 Dungeon Fighter Online, 38 Dungeon Keeper, 2 Dungeons & Dragons, 2, 23, 25, 125 Dye, Dale, 116 Dyer-Witheford, Nick, 15–16, 19, 21, 29, 37, 46, 86, 106, 160 Dyson, Jon-Paul, 127 E Eagleton, Terry, 109, 111 EA Sports, 39 Edinburgh, 40 EDSAC, 19 Ehrhardt, Michelle, 96 The Elder Scrolls, 125 Electronic Arts, 46–47, 50–51, 82–84, 93 Engels, Friedrich, 67, 108–10, 132 England, 67, 138 Epic Games, 33 Esposito, Nicolas, 13 E.T. the Extra Terrestrial, 26 Eugen Systems, 94 EuroMayDay, 142 Europe, 38–39, 116 EVE Online, 149 EverQuest, 30 Every day the same dream, 142–43 F Facebook, 31, 96 Fallout, 2, 24, 126 Famicom, 27 Farmville, 31 Feenberg, Andrew, 114 Ferris, Rupert, 4–5 FIFA 17, 39 Financial Times, 144–45 First World War, 117–18 Fisher, Sam, 120–21 Fleming, Ian, 115 Football Manager, 42 Forbes, 147 Fordism, 23 Fortnite, 33, 38 Foxconn, 141 France, 57, 68, 94–95, 99 Freeman, Gordon, 121 French Revolution, 4 Frye, Jacob and Evie, 4–6, 63 Full Spectrum Warrior, 54 F-Zero, 28 G Gagné, Jean-François, 80 GAME, 48, 50 Game Boy, 27–28, 29, 152 Game Boy Advance, 30 Game Boy Color, 28 GameCube, 30 Game Developers Conference, 95, 96, 98, 99 Game Dev Story, 61–64, 75 Game of Life, 22 Gamergate, 154–55, 161–62 Games London, 42 Games of Empire, 15 Game Workers Unite, 96–100, 102, 160, 163 GEORGINA, 24 Germany, 39, 98, 110, 142 Global North, 42, 44, 71, 140, 148 Global South, 37 God of War: Ghost of Sparta, 82 GoldenEye 007, 115–16, 120, 149 Gone Home, 32 Good, Owen, 117, 119 Google, 47, 147 Google Play, 147 Graeber, David, 148 Grand Theft Auto, 71 Grand Theft Auto V, 39–40, 43–44 Greenbaum, Joan, 78 Green, Joshua, 155 Guild Wars 2, 155 Gulf War, 118–119 H Habert, Félix, 95 Half-Life, 31, 70, 121, 159 Half-Life 2, 52 Hall, Stuart, 1, 161 Halo, 120 Halo: Combat Evolved, 30 Halt and Catch Fire, 23 Hamurabi, 23 Harvey, David, 67 Hernandez, Patricia, 137 Hewlett Packard, 32 Hexapawn, 23 Higinbotham, William, 20, 22 Hirsch, Marianne, 118 Hitchens, Michael, 115 Hitler, Adolph, 115 Hollis, Martin, 58 Hollywood, 116, 135 Home Pong, 22–23 Huizinga, Johan, 14–16, 148 Huntemann, Nina, 113 Hutspiel, 19 I IBM, 19, 29 IBM 701, 19–20 IBM 704, 20 IBM 1620, 20 Independent Workers Union of Great Britain, 102 Industrial Revolution, 4 International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees, 96 International Center for the History of Electronic Games, 127 International Game Developers Association, 74, 84, 87–88, 95–97 Internet Gaming Entertainment, 154–55 IRA, 57 Iran-Contra scandal, 119 Iraq, 118 Italy, 69 iTunes, 140 J Japan, 24–27, 30, 39, 114 John Madden Football, 27 Johnson, Boris, 40–42 Johnson, Mark R., 147 Jørgensen, Kristine, 122 Joseph, Daniel, 26, 52–53, 123–24 Jung, Carl, 135 K Kasparov, Garry, 29 Kassar, Ray, 152 Kemeny, John, 21–22 Kerr, Aphra, 43 Kickstarter, 32, 45 Kirkpatrick, Graeme, 78 Kotaku, 64–65 Kraft, Philip, 78 Kunkel, Bill, 12 L Labour Party, 145 Lamia, Mark, 119 The Landlord’s Game, 138 The Last of Us, 32 League of Legends, 32, 38, 70, 146, 150–51, 154, 156–57 Leblanc, David, 142 Lebowitz, Michael, 68 Lees, Matt, 155 The Legend of Zelda, 27, 28 Le, Minh, 70 Lemmings, 1 Lind, Maria, 144 London, 4–6, 41, 63, 105, 128, 146 Lumino City, 42 Lunar Lander, 24 M MacLean, Jen, 95–97 Magie, Elizabeth, 138 Magnavox, 22 Mandel, Ernest, 106–7 Manhattan Project, 19, 22 Marine Doom, 54 Mario, 2, 25, 27 Marxism, 3, 8, 12, 67, 159–62 crisis of overproduction and, 26 Eagleton on, 111 labor and, 63 Mandel on, 106–7 on mass culture, 107–8 Ollman and, 137 revolution and, 108 socialism from below and, 132–33 Marx, Karl, 17, 36, 64, 108–10, 139 in Assassin’s Creed Syndicate, 3–8, 63, 66–67, 163 Capital, 8, 53, 67–69, 74 on commodities, 47 materialism of, 129, 133 on ruling ideas, 132 on surplus, 85 MayDay NetParade, 142 May, Theresa, 145 Maze War, 23 McGonigal, Jane, 148 McLuhan, Marshall, 17–18 Medal of Honor, 116 Medal of Honor: Warfighter, 56 Mega Drive / Genesis, 28 Meier, Sid, 129–31, 147 Metal Gear Solid, 2 Microsoft, 30–32, 39, 46 Middle East, 122 Midvale Steel Company, 76 Miles, Desmond, 3–4 Miller, Monica K., 153 Minecraft, 32, 47 MIT, 20–21 Modular One, 24 Molleindustria, 13, 140, 141, 142 Monopoly, 137–38 Monument Valley, 40 Mortal Kombat, 28 Mouse in the Maze, 20 MS-DOS, 1, 105, 106 Muncy, Julie, 117 N Namco, 25 NASA, 42 National Health Service, 42, 145 NATO, 19 Navy SEALs, 56 Nazis, 115 Nearing, Scott, 138 NetEase, 47 New Left, 21 New York, 18, 137, 139 Nexon/Tencent, 38 Ngai, Pun, 73 Niantic, 147 Nicaragua, 119 Nieborg, David, 48, 51 Night in the Wood, 96 Nim, 18, 23 Nimatron, 18 Nintendo, 25–28, 30, 32, 47, 101, 147, 152 Nintendo 64, 28, 32, 115–16 Nintendo Classic Mini Entertainment System, 27 Nintendo Classic Mini Super Nintendo Entertainment System, 28 Nintendo DS, 30 Nintendo Entertainment System, 27 Nintendo Game Boy, 2 North America, 38–39 North, Oliver, 119 Notes from Below, 69, 86, 92, 97, 160 O Oculus Rift, 32 Odyssey, 22 Ollman, Bertell, 137–40 Oregon Trail, The, 22 Origin (EA), 51 Osborne, George, 42 Overwatch, 39 Owen, Wilfred, 117 P Pac-Man, 25 Pajitnov, Alexey, 28 Pakistan, 140 Palestine, 122 Papers, Please, 32, 143 Parkin, Simon, 56 Patterson, Jimmy, 116 Payne, Matthew, 119–20 Pedercini, Paolo, 140, 142 Perfect World Games, 53 de Peuter, Greig, 15–16, 19, 21, 29, 46, 86, 106, 160 Philippines, 41 Phone Story, 140–41 Player Unknown’s Battlegrounds, 38–39 PlayStation, 2, 28, 30, 31, 50, 116, 152 PlayStation 2, 30 PlayStation 3, 30 PlayStation 4, 31, 50 PlayStation Portable, 30 Pokémon GO, 147 Pong, 20, 22 Populous, 31, 127 Prado, Jason, 92 Price, Jessica, 155 Probst, Larry, 83 PS4 Pro, 31 Punch the Trump, 145 Q Quake 2, 70 Quinn, Zoë, 154 R Raytheon, 20–21 Ready at Dawn, 82 Riot Games / Tencent, 38 Roarem Castle, 138 Rockefeller, Nelson, 139 Rockstar, 39, 71 Rockstar North, 40 Rocksteady Studios, 40 Royal Ulster Constabulary, 57 Russell, Steve, 21, 22 Russia, 115, 118–19, 132 Ryse, 86 S SAG-AFTRA, 91, 93, 94, 99 Salen, Katie, 15 Samuel, Arthur, 20 San Francisco, 95 Sarkeesian, Anita, 154 Saving Private Ryan, 116 Scientific American, 22 Screen Actors Guild, 91 Sears Roebuck, 22 Seattle, 91 Second World War, 27, 116–18 Sega, 27, 28, 30 Sega Genesis, 31 Senate, 29 Shannon, Claude, 18–19, 29 Shaw, Carol, 151–52 A Short History of the Gaze, 142 Short, Tanya, 85–86 Silicon Valley, 23, 99 SimCity, 2, 31, 128–29 SimCopter, 2 Sims, The, 31, 127–28 Smilegate/Tencent, 38 Solitaire, 28 Sonic, 2, 27 Sonic the Hedgehog, 28, 97 Sony, 27, 28, 30–32, 39, 46, 82, 152 Sony Online Entertainment, 30 South Armagh Brigade, 57 South Korea, 27 Soviet Union, 19–21, 28 Space Invaders, 24–25 Spacewar!

Impact: Reshaping Capitalism to Drive Real Change
by Ronald Cohen
Published 1 Jul 2020

It provides legal protection for acting in accordance with their moral purpose. In the United States, 34 states have already introduced benefit corporation legislation, and six more are in the process of doing so.104 By the middle of 2019, more than 5,400 benefit corporations were active in America. Patagonia and Kickstarter are examples of companies that are both certified by B Lab and incorporated as benefit corporations. A similar effort has taken place in the UK, with the introduction of Community Interest Companies (CIC) in 2005. The initiative is directed at small businesses and allows them to use their profits and assets for public good.

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In the first ten years after its launch, over 14,000 companies registered as CICs.105 This trend of passing legislation to enhance the status of social enterprises is spreading to other countries, including France (which we will discuss in Chapter 6), Luxembourg and Italy. Impact Entrepreneurial Networks For any new business starting up, mentorship and seed investment are crucial. Recent decades have given rise to numerous kick-starter organizations that foster impact entrepreneurship in the early stages, as their groundbreaking innovations take shape. The non-profit Ashoka is a good example. Founded by Bill Drayton in 1980 with the aim of mitigating income inequality through social entrepreneurship, it identifies entrepreneurs who have large-scale solutions to social challenges, supporting them as they strive to achieve their vision.

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Aboyeji, Iyinoluwa ‘E’ 48 ABP (Dutch civil service pension fund) 74 accelerators, start-up 175–7, 197 Accenture 90 Access Foundation 175 accounts, impact-weighted financial v, 29–30, 67, 84, 107–17, 159, 183, 186, 190–1, 201 Acumen 84 Adidas 93, 101–4, 107 Adidas x Parley 102–3 Adie 162–3 Africa 1, 27, 39, 48, 49, 83, 84, 136, 148, 167–8 agriculture 36, 45–6, 78, 83, 84, 94–5 Ahrens, Andreas 105 Ailman, Christopher 77–8 Align17 80 Aliko Dangote Foundation 136 Alpert, Sharon 145 Amazon (online retailer) 14 Andela 46, 47–9 AOL 15, 48 Apax Partners 1, 2–3, 15, 18, 35, 174–5 AP funds (pension fund) 74 APG (pension fund) 73 Apple 14, 15, 77 Apposite Capital 142 Argentina 125, 164, 173, 176, 177 artificial intelligence (AI) 39, 40 Ashoka 58, 59 Asian Women’s Impact Fund 144 asset classes 7, 13, 27, 67, 187, 191 asset management 33, 63, 64, 65, 69, 70, 71, 72, 73, 74, 79–85, 172 Ather Energy 56 Australia 6, 22, 40, 124, 158, 176, 204 Avanath 143 Aviram, Ziv 40 Avishkaar 84 Bain Capital 81 Baldinger, Michael 79 Ballmer, Steve 127 Bangladesh 94 Bank of America 81, 115 Bank of Palestine 163 Bannick, Matt 148 Barby, Clara 29 Barclays 169 Bassa, Naim 39–40 Bayer 150 B Corp (Benefit Corporation) 57, 92, 96, 149, 177, 189, 197 Bedouin community, Israel 52–3, 163 Beijing, US embassy 28 Ben & Jerry’s 57 Bertelsmann Stiftung 153 Bhatia, Amit 7 Big Lottery Fund 175 Big Society Capital (BSC) v, 19, 72, 76, 160, 169–70, 171–2, 175 Big Win, The 136 Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation 149–50 Strategic Investment Fund (SIF) 149–50 biodiversity loss 16 biotechnology 45 BlackRock 32, 62, 82 Blair, Tony 160, 179 B Lab 56–7, 107 blended finance 197 Blood, David 19, 26, 49, 82 Blue Orchard Finance 80, 145 BNP Paribas 163 Bolton, Emily 20 Bombas 54 bond markets 71, 191 Bono 79 BP 111 Branson, Richard 88 Brazil 7, 41, 42, 94, 160–1, 177 Bridges Fund Management v, 18–19, 29, 53, 83, 125, 126, 127, 165 Bridges Ways to Wellness SIB 126 British Asian Trust 27, 137, 191 Brodin, Jesper 104, 106 Brown, Gordon 25, 27, 136, 179 B Team 88 Buffet, Warren 117 Burberry 54 Business for Inclusive Growth 88 Business Roundtable 87–8 Buycott 89–90 Cabinet Office 160, 161, 169 California Public Employees’ Retirement System (CalPERS) 76, 77 California State Teachers’ Retirement System (CalSTRS) 77–8 Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation 144, 153 Cameron, David 6, 19, 160, 169, 179 Camfed 137 Canada 6, 124, 144, 158, 160, 171 Capital Impact Partners 143 capitalism 3, 4, 5, 82, 117, 146, 148, 154, 181, 182, 186, 191, 193, 194, 200 impact capitalism 4, 180, 181–94, 200 see also impact investment Capricorn Investment Group 149 carbon emissions 18, 36, 55–6, 62, 66, 74, 76, 83, 90, 91, 97, 105, 106, 107, 111, 112–13, 139, 149 Carlyle Group 81 Carney, Mark 106–7 Cartigny, Gerald 73 Casa de Depositi e Prestiti (CDP) 171 Case, Steve 48, 52 Catalyst Strategies initiative 167 catalytic capital 151 Catalytic Capital Consortium 151–2 CDC (UK’s development finance institution (DFI)) 167 Central Outcome Funds 165–6 Chang, Alan 149 Chan, Priscilla 48–9, 151 Chan Zuckerberg Initiative (CZI) 48–9, 151 Charities Act (2016) 141 Charles, Prince 21–2, 191 Chiang, John 77 Children’s Investment Fund Foundation 132 Chobani 93, 98–101, 107 Clevedon Pier 173 Climate Action 100+ 76 climate change 16–17, 28, 45, 66, 73, 74–5, 76, 77, 81, 95, 104, 105, 106, 107, 139, 177, 191 Coca-Cola 90, 91, 110–11 Commission on Unclaimed Assets (2005–7) 19, 169 Community Interest Companies (CIC) 57 Cone Communications Millennial Employee Engagement Study (2016) 92 Conservative Party 160, 179 Consumer Goods Forum, Berlin (2017) 86–7, 97 contraceptive implants 150 coronary heart disease 113 corporate social responsibility (CSR) 92–3, 96 corporation, redefining purpose of 57, 87–8, 93 see also benefit corporation CRE Venture Capital 49 credit 43–4, 80, 83, 95, 144, 163 Crédit Agricole 95 crop production 45–6 CureVac 150 Daimler AG 112 Danone 57, 86, 87, 91, 93, 94–8, 107 David and Lucile Packard Foundation 144 DBL Partners 83–4 Delaney, John 179 Department for International Development (DFID) 137, 167, 168 Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) 164 Designated Utilization Foundation 170 development aid 134, 136, 166–8, 198 Development Finance Institutions (DFI) 166, 167, 198 DIBs (Development Impact Bonds) 8, 27, 68, 80, 124, 130–5, 137, 138, 153, 157, 163, 165, 167–8, 184, 198, 203, 204 Dimon, Jamie 87 dormant accounts 170, 171, 198, 205 Dormant Account Utilization Bill (2016), US 170 Dormant Assets Commission, UK 170 ‘double bottom line’ investment strategy 83–4 Dove 90, 91 Drayton, Bill 58 driverless cars 39, 40 drones 37–9, 149 Dutch SDG Investing Agenda 73 Dyson, Tasha 126 Eccles, Toby 20 Echoing Green 58–9 Edmond de Rothschild Foundation 153 Educate Girls Development Impact Bond 80, 132–4, 137 Education Commission 27, 134, 136 Education Outcomes Funds 26–7, 136, 148 Education Outcomes Fund for Africa and the Middle East (EOF) 136, 148 electric vehicles 55–6 ELMA 136 Elvis & Kresse 54–5 emerging markets 7, 13, 131, 167 Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) 157 Endeavor 59 endowment 9, 138–46, 149, 152, 153, 173, 187, 188, 202, 204 entrepreneurship 3, 4, 5, 9, 14, 15, 17, 31, 33, 83, 131, 146, 153, 154, 156, 158, 174, 175, 176, 177, 178, 183, 186, 191, 193, 194, 197 age of impact entrepreneurship 34–61, 188–9 government support for 60, 70, 174–5, 176, 177, 178 micro-entrepreneurs 83 social entrepreneurship 8, 19, 21, 82, 137, 144, 148., 176–7 tech entrepreneurship 5, 17, 55, 61, 138 environmental challenges 3, 4, 5, 8, 9, 12–13, 16, 17, 18, 27, 32, 181–2, 183, 191, 192, 193, 194, 197, 198, 199, 200, 201, 202, 203, 205 asset management and 83, 84 B Lab and 56–7 business and 88, 89, 90, 93, 97, 101, 102, 107, 108, 109–13, 114, 116 climate change 16–17, 28, 45, 66, 73, 74–5, 76, 77, 82, 95, 104, 105, 106, 107, 139, 177, 191 government and 154, 156, 159, 162, 163, 164, 166, 171, 172, 174, 176, 177–8, 179 green bonds 63, 173, 191, 199 impact philanthropy and 121, 131, 138, 139, 140, 141, 142, 143, 153 measuring impact on 28 pension funds and 72, 78 SDGs and see United Nations: Sustainable Development Goals SIBs and 68 Environmental Sustainable Governance (ESG) 63, 64, 70, 71, 72, 75, 76, 77, 78–9, 80, 81, 82, 83, 115, 145, 159, 187, 190, 198–9, 200, 203, 205 Esmée Fairbairn Foundation 23 European Bank for Reconstruction and Development 163 European Union 1, 6, 159–60, 171, 173, 176 Everplans 47 externalities 28 Exxon Mobil 111 Faber, Emmanuel 86–7, 94, 95, 96, 97 Facebook 14, 48, 83 family offices 71, 81, 146 Fawcett, Mark 74–5 FC United of Manchester 172–3 Ferrari, Sara 81 fiduciary duty 75, 145, 199 financial crisis (2008) 158–9, 185–6 financial markets, size of 71 Fink, Larry 33, 62, 82 Fink, Lord (Stanley) 19 Finland 124, 163 Fintech 42–5, 199 Flint, Michigan water crisis 54 FMO (Dutch development finance institution) 163 Fondece 176 Ford 111–13, 136, 140, 142–4, 153 Foundation 140, 142–4, 153 France 1, 6, 22, 58, 63, 75–6, 86, 88, 95, 124, 158, 159, 160, 161, 162–3, 173–4, 175–6, 177, 184, 187, 204–5 Francis, Pope 6 Freedom Bakery, Glasgow 172 Friedman, Milton 185 FTSE Blossom Japan Index 78 Fusion Housing SIB, The 126–7 Gates, Bill 55, 149–50 Gaudio, Paul 103 G8 Social Impact Investment Taskforce (G8T) v, 6, 7, 148, 160, 235 gender bond 191 generally accepted accounting principles (GAAP) 110, 115, 117 generally accepted impact principles (GAIP) 110, 114 General Mills 113 General Motors 112 Generation Investment Management 49–50, 82–3 Georgieva, Kristalina 68 Ghislane 37 Giddens, Michele 18 Gilbert, Jay Coen 108 Glencore 76 Global Family Office Report (2017) 81 Global Impact Investing Network (GIIN) 108 Global Impact Investing Rating System (GIIRS) 108 globalization 13, 16 Global Reporting Initiative (GRI): Sustainability Reporting Standards 108 Global Steering Group for Impact Investment (GSG) v, 7, 27, 29, 109, 136, 148, 158, 171, 206 Global Value Exchange 31, 162 Goldberg, Randy 54 Goldman Sachs 80, 127 Goldstein, John 80 Google 14, 49 Gore, Al 28, 49, 83 government 3–4, 30–1, 70, 154–80, 189–90 how impact investment can help governments do their job 155–8 local government 26, 125–6 measuring and valuing impact of 30–1 nine things for governments to do 158–77 Government Pension Investment Fund (GPIF), Japan 78 Grameen Danone Foods Social Business Enterprise 94–5 Great Depression vii, 185 green bond 63, 173, 191, 199 G7 166 gut microbiome, human 45 Guy’s and St Thomas’ Charity 142 GV (formerly Google Ventures) 49 Haas School of Business, University of California, Berkeley 51 Harrison, Peter 64 Harvard Business School 2, 25, 26, 29, 92–3, 109 Hawkes, Richard 191 Hayes, Lisa 40 Heath, David 54 hedge funds 13 Heron Foundation 139, 145 Hewlett Foundation 137, 153 high-net-worth individuals (HNWIs) 70, 71, 81, 145, 200 high-sustainability investments 74 Hines, Luke 39–40 Hohn, Sir Christopher 66 homelessness 30, 31, 54, 124, 125, 126, 127, 166, 170 Horn, Bernard 20 Houlahan, Bart 108 HSBC 75, 169 Hulme, Philip 19 Husain, Safeena 132 Hutchison, David 20 IBM 47, 189 IKEA 93, 103, 104–6, 107 impact capitalism 4, 180, 181–94, 200 impact economies 68, 85, 155, 157, 159, 161, 178, 180, 184, 186, 192, 200 impact investment birth/origins of 17–28 business, embedding in 86–117 defined 11–13 entrepreneurs, rising generation of 34–61 future of 9–10, 32–3, 186–94 government, role of see government impact capitalism, move from selfish capitalism to 181–94 ‘impact investing’ term coined 11 market growth 64 measuring/valuing 10, 13, 14, 28–31, 64, 67–8, 69, 107–17, 119, 120–1, 159, 183, 186, 190–1, 201 philanthropy and 9, 70, 118–53, 187–8 risk and see risk specialist impact investing firms 82–3 wholesalers 168–72, 184, 201 ‘Impact Investment: The Invisible Heart of Markets’ report (2014) 6 Impact Management Project (IMP) v, 29, 109 impact philanthropy 9, 70, 118–53, 187–8 Impact Revolution v, 1, 5, 8, 9, 10, 14, 28, 32, 33, 85, 152, 180, 182, 186, 188, 189, 235 impact unicorn 35, 188–9 impact ventures/impact enterprises 34–61, 63, 66 impact washing 30, 64 Impact-Weighted Accounts Initiative (IWAI) v, 29–30, 109–17, 201 impact-weighted financial accounts v, 29–30, 67, 107–17, 159, 183, 186, 190–1, 201 Impresa Sociale 177 Imprint Capital 80 incubator (collaborative program designed to help new start-ups grow their business) 175, 176, 202 India 7, 27, 43, 47, 53, 56, 80, 84, 94, 124, 131–4, 153 Indigo Agriculture 45–6 inequality vii, 1, 3, 14, 15–16, 58, 88, 116, 140, 154, 155, 177, 179, 181, 182, 186, 192–3, 194, 200 Ingka Group 104 inheritance, generational 65, 81 Instiglio 132 institutional investors 63, 76, 81, 85, 95, 125, 174, 202 insurance companies 69, 71, 73, 157, 170, 202 Intarcia Therapeutics 150–1 Intel 40 intermediary 22, 202 International Committee of the Red Cross Program for Humanitarian Impact Investment (PHII) 133 International Finance Corporation (IFC) 64, 68–9 ‘Operating Principles for Impact Management’ 68–9 ‘The Promise of Impact’ report 69 Investing with Impact Platform 81–2 Invest Palestine 163 ‘invisible hand’ of markets 10, 97, 184, 185 invisible heart of markets 6, 10, 185 iPhone 77 Ireland 171 Israel 7, 39, 40, 50, 52, 53, 83, 124, 152, 158, 163, 177 Italy 6, 11, 58, 133, 158, 159, 171, 173, 177 Jana Partners 77 Japan 6, 63, 78–9, 124, 144, 158, 159, 170, 171 Japan National Advisory Board 171 Jewish Vocational Services (JVS) 128–9 Jobs, Steve 55 Joby Aviation 149 Johnson, Jeremy 48 Jonathan Rose 143 JP Morgan 87, 169 J.W. McConnell Family Foundation 144 Karboul, Dr Amel 137 Kassoy, Andrew 108 KETOS 53–4 Keynes, John Maynard 114, 185 Kickstarter 57 Kind 90 Kirklees Council 127 KKR 81 Kleissner, Charly 145–6 Kleissner, Lisa 145–6 KL Felicitas Foundation 145–6 Klop, Piet 73 KLP (pension fund) 74 Knorr 91 Kogiso, Mari 144 Komolafe, Tolulope 47, 49–50 Kopp, Wendy 59–60 Korea Inclusive Finance Agency 176 Korea Small and Medium Business Corporation (SBC) 176 Korea Social Enterprise Promotion Agency (KoSEA) 176 Kresge Foundation 127, 144, 153 Kubzansky, Mike 148 Kuper, Andy 83 Labour Party 19, 160, 179 laissez-faire economics 185 Large Outcome Funds 138 LeapFrog Investments 83 Learn Capital 49 leather waste 54–5 LED lightbulbs 106 Lego 90 Le Houérou, Philippe 69 Liberian Educational Advancement Program (LEAP), The 137 Liedtke, Eric 103 Life Chances Fund (LCF) 26, 165 life insurance 71 Lipton 91 Livelihoods Fund for Family Farming 95 Livox 42 Lloyds Bank 169 local government 26, 125–6 London Stock Exchange 19 Lööf, Torbjörn 104 Loop 102–3 MacArthur Foundation 151, 153 Machado, Antonio 180 Macron, Emmanuel 88 Maersk 76 malaria 37 Maltzahn, Geoffrey von 45–6 Mars 90, 95 MaRS Center for Impact Investing 171 Martin, Roger 138 Massachusetts Pathways to Economic Advancement SIB 127–8 Maude, Francis 160, 169 Maurer, Peter 133 Maycomb Capital 127 MAZE Mustard Seed Social Entrepreneurship Fund 144 Mazzucato, Mariana: The Entrepreneurial State 158 McGrath, Sir Harvey 170 McKinsey 65, 71 Mercedes 112 Merck & Co 150 Merrill Lynch 81 MESIS 159 microbiology 45 microfinance 43–4, 80, 94, 145, 163 migration 1, 2, 16, 98–9, 127–8, 144, 163 millennials 65, 81, 92, 188 Miller, Clara 139, 145 Minett, Helen 127 Ministry of Justice 21, 26–7 mission-related investment (MRI) 142–3, 202 Mizuno, Hiro 78 MN (pension fund) 73 Mobileye 40 Morgan Stanley 81–2 MSCI Japan Empowering Women Index (WIN) 78–9 MSCI Japan ESG Select Leaders Index 78–9 Musk, Elon 55–6 mutual funds 95 MyEye 2 40 Nadosy, Peter 142 Nassara, Ibrahim 52–3 Nathan Cummings Foundation 145 National Employment Savings Trust (NEST) 74–5 National Health Service (NHS) 126 NaturALL Bottle Alliance 91 Nazid Impact Food 50, 53 neoliberalism 152, 185 Nestlé 90, 91 Neudorfer, Yaron 163 Newborough, Philip 18 Nike 90 Ninomiya Sontoku 78 non-financial information statement (NFIS) 159 Non-Profit Finance Fund 120 non-profit sector 25 NovESS 159, 175–6 Novogratz, Jacqueline 84 O’Donohoe, Nick 169, 170 Office for Civil Society 160 Office of Social Innovation and Civic Participation, US 141 Omidyar Network 48, 49, 136, 146–8, 151, 153 Omidyar, Pamela 146 Omidyar, Pierre 146–8 100 per cent Impact Network 146 One Service 123–4 OPIC (US DFI) 167 OrCam 39–41, 42 organic food 51, 96–7 Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) 3, 70, 178 Origin Materials 91 Osberg, Sally 138 outcome-based contract 9, 22, 31, 126–7, 134, 137, 161, 163, 164, 165, 166, 180, 188, 189, 202–5 see also individual contract type outcome payers 22, 27, 123, 129, 133, 152, 163–4, 204–5 Outcome Fund 26–7, 130, 134–8, 148, 153, 156–7, 165–6, 167, 184, 187, 188, 203 Pacte Law, France 177 Page, Larry 55 Palandjian, Tracy 25 Palestine 163–4 Palestine Investment Fund 163–4 Palestine Telecommunications Company 163 Palestinian Authority 163 Palestinian Ministry of Finance 163 Palihapitiya, Chamath 83–4 Pardo, Ivan 89–90 Parley for the Oceans 102, 103 Partners Group 81 Passeport Avenir 163 Patagonia 36, 57 pay-for-outcomes model 128–9, 134, 152, 156–7, 167, 180, 192, 203 PayPal 44–5 Pension Danmark 74 pension funds/savings 62, 65, 70, 71, 72–9, 157–8, 170, 172, 173–5, 187, 202 PepsiCo 110–11 Pereira, Carlos Edmar 41–2 PET bottles 106 Peterborough SIB 8, 20–2, 23–4, 25, 26–7, 30, 123–4 PFS (Pay for Success) (SIB in US) 22, 204 Pfund, Nancy 83 PGGM (pension fund) 73 philanthropy, impact 9, 70, 118–53, 187–8 DIBs (Development Impact Bonds) and 130–5 endowment and 138–46, 173 future of impact investment and 152–3 impact measurement and 118–21 measuring impact in 120–1 new crop of foundations 146–52 Outcome Funds and 134–8, 203 SIBs (Social Impact Bonds) and 121–30, 205 Phillips, Andi 127 Pioneers French Impact 175–6 PlantBottle 91 plastic 90, 91, 92, 97, 101–3, 104 PME (Dutch pension fund) 73–4 pollution 5, 28, 66, 138, 154, 155 Polman, Paul 88, 90 Porter, Professor Michael 26, 92–3 portfolio diversification 13, 67 Portland Trust, The 163, 235 Portugal 7, 31, 144, 153, 158, 160–2, 171, 173 Portugal Inovação Social (PIS) 171 poverty 16, 69–70, 84, 95, 140, 156, 167–8, 171, 182, 205 PPL Therapeutics 15 Principles of Responsible Investment (PRIs) 32, 203 Prior, Cliff 170 Pripp-Kovac, Lena 105 prisoner reoffending rates/recidivism 8, 20–2, 23–4, 25, 30, 80, 123–4, 161, 166 private equity 1, 3, 13, 53, 67, 71, 80, 171, 191, 235 PROESUS 176 profit-with-purpose model 35–6, 148 program-related investments (PRIs) 142–3, 148, 203–4 Prudential Financial 127 public-private partnerships 137, 204 QuantumScape 149 Rajasthan, India 131–2 Ratan Tata 153 Rausing, Sigrid 19 Reclaim Fund 169 recycling 90, 91, 97, 101–3, 104, 105, 106, 113 Red Cross 133 Refugees United 147 regulation boosting supply of impact capital through changes in 172–5, 187 risk of future 65–6, 92, 159–60 repurposing items 54 Responsible Investment (RI) 63 retail investors 204 Revolution Foods 50, 51–2, 57 Revolution Growth fund 52 Riboud, Franck 94 Richmond, Kristin Groos 51, 52 Rikers Island, New York City 80 Rinaudo, Keller 37–9 Rise Fund 79 risk defined 13 lower level of in impact investing 65–6, 92 measuring 7, 13, 67–8 risk and return, model of 6, 13, 67, 84, 93, 114 risk-return-impact, triple helix of 6, 9, 12–14, 27, 31, 33, 35, 60, 65, 66, 68, 72, 79, 84, 85, 93, 109, 115, 154, 155, 157, 178, 180, 183, 186, 190, 192 robotics 37–8 Rockefeller Foundation 11, 23, 151, 153 Root Capital 84 Rothschild, Lord (Jacob) 153 Rottenberg, Linda 59 Rousseau, Jean-Jacques: The Social Contract 184 Royal Bank of Scotland 169 Royal Dutch Shell 76, 111 Rubin, Jerry 128, 129 Ryan, Paul 179 Saildrone 149 Sankaran, Meena 53–4 Sasakawa Peace Foundation (SPF) 144 Sass, Christina 47–8, 49 SBB (Social Benefit Bond) 22, 204 school meals 50–3 Schroders 64, 80 Second Bounce of the Ball, The (Cohen) 7 Securities Exchange Commission, US 117 Serafeim, George 29, 109, 114 shareholder activism 66 Shashua, Professor Amnon 40 Siroya, Shivani 42–5 Skoll Foundation 148–9 Skoll World Forum (2019), Oxford 152 Small Business Administration, US 171 smart water grid management 54 Smiley, Scotty 39–40 Smith, Adam: The Theory of Moral Sentiment 10, 185 The Wealth of Nations 10, 184–5 Social Capital 83–4 social entrepreneurship 58, 82, 144, 175–7 Social Finance v, 19–20, 22, 23, 25, 26, 235 Social Finance Israel 163 Social Finance US 26, 127, 148 Social Impact Accelerator (SIA), EU 176–7 Social Impact Bond (SIB) 6, 8, 20–8, 67, 78, 80, 179, 198, 204–5 global spread of 25–8, 124–30 government and 122–4, 125, 126, 127, 130, 133, 157, 162–4, 165, 173 origins of 8, 20–5, 123–4 outlined 22–5 philanthropy and 121–30, 133–4, 135, 137, 138, 153, 187–8 Social Impact Contract 22, 162–3, 204 Social Impact Measurement Initiative (SIMI) 159 Social Impact Partnerships to Pay for Results Act (SIPPRA) (2018), US 165–6 social investment 7, 11–12, 141, 143, 160, 172–3, 179 social investment bank v, 19, 72, 76, 160, 169–70, 171–2, 175, 201 Social Investment Task Force (SITF) v, 6, 18, 19, 169, 235 Social Investment Tax Relief (SITR) 172–3 social pension funds 76 social prescribing 126 social service providers 22, 125, 130 Social Value Act (2012) 164 Social Value UK 162 solidarity funds, 90/10 75–6, 173–4, 187, 204, 205 Solomon, Sir Harry 163 South Korea 158, 160–1, 171, 176 sovereign wealth funds 70 Spark Capital 49 Starr, Megan 81 State of the Non-Profit Sector Survey 119–20 Straw, Jack 20–1 Subramanian, Savita 115 subscription services 105 Summers, Larry 6, 26 Sure 90 Sustainability Accounting Standards Board (SASB), The 108 Swensen, David 65–6 Tala 43–5 Task Force on Climate-Related Financial Disclosures (TCFD) 107 Tata Trusts 153 taxation 31, 36, 65, 66, 92, 141, 143, 154, 157, 158, 168, 172–5, 177, 185 Teach For America 58–9 Tech revolution 5, 7, 9, 13, 14–17, 35, 61, 138, 156, 178, 182, 189 Tesla 55–6, 83, 149 thermoplastic polyurethane (TPU) 102–3 Thompson, Mark 75 Tobey, Kirsten Saenz 51, 52 TOMS shoes 36, 54 Toniic 146 TPG 79, 80–1 trans fat 113 Treasury Department, US 6, 25–6, 141, 166 Treasury, UK 6 Triodos Investment Management 83 Troubled Families program 164 UBS 44, 79–80, 81 Optimus Fund/Optimus Foundation 80, 132, 137 UK government 6, 19, 26, 27, 30–1, 136, 158, 160, 161, 162, 164, 165, 167, 169, 170, 172, 175, 179 Ulukaya, Hamdi 99–101 unclaimed assets v, 19, 157, 168–72, 198, 201, 205 unemployment vii, 2, 30, 52, 100, 123, 124, 156, 164, 170 unicorn 35, 188–9 Unilever 89, 90–1 Unit Cost Database 1, 161 United Nations 32 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) 69–72, 73, 74, 78, 79, 85, 97, 104, 108, 131, 166, 174, 190–2, 205 United States 113 benefit corporation and 57 government 157, 158, 165–6, 167, 171, 177, 178, 179 pension funds in 76 PFS (pay for success) in 22, 80, 124, 204 philanthropy in 118, 119–20, 127, 129, 140–1, 143, 148, 149, 152 Social Finance US 26, 127, 148 US Agency for International Development (USAID) 167, 168 US Trust 65 venture capital 1, 2, 5, 7, 13, 14–16, 18, 20, 32, 35, 39, 49, 67, 71, 83, 138, 148, 157–8, 172, 175, 176, 178, 191, 205, 235 Village Enterprise DIB 167–8 Vir Biotechnology 150 Walker, Darren 140, 141, 142, 143 Wall Street Crash (1929) 116–17, 158–9 Warby Parker 36, 57 water usage 53, 54, 69, 73, 84, 90–1, 100, 106, 110–11, 112, 116, 205 Wesling, Kresse 55 WhiteWave 96–7 wholesalers, impact capital 168–72, 184, 201 World Bank 64, 68–9, 78, 163 World Benchmarking Alliance 108 World Economic Forum: International Business Council 108 Yad Hanadiv 153 Yale University 65–6 Yates, Shannon 44 Young, Todd 179 Yunus, Muhammad 94 Zipline 37–9, 42 Zuckerberg, Mark 48–9, 55, 151 THIS IS JUST THE BEGINNING Find us online and join the conversation Follow us on Twitter twitter.com/penguinukbooks Like us on Facebook facebook.com/penguinbooks Share the love on Instagram instagram.com/penguinukbooks Watch our authors on YouTube youtube.com/penguinbooks Pin Penguin books to your Pinterest pinterest.com/penguinukbooks Listen to audiobook clips at soundcloud.com/penguin-books Find out more about the author and discover your next read at penguin.co.uk This ebook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law.

The Organized Mind: Thinking Straight in the Age of Information Overload
by Daniel J. Levitin
Published 18 Aug 2014

Proceedings of the 24th IEEE Conference on Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition, 1793–1800. Wikipedia is an example of crowdsourcing Ayers, P., Matthews, C., & Yates, B. (2008). How Wikipedia works: And how you can be a part of it. San Francisco, CA: No Starch Press, p. 514. More than 4.5 million people Kickstarter, Inc. (2014). Seven things to know about Kickstarter. Retrieved from http://www.kickstarter.com the group average comes Surowiecki, J. (2005). The wisdom of crowds. New York, NY: Penguin. and, Treynor, J. L. (1987). Market efficiency and the bean jar experiment. Financial Analysts Journal, 43(3), 50–53. the cancer is now in remission Iaconesi, S. (2012).

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Wikipedia is an example of crowdsourcing: Anyone with information is encouraged to contribute, and through this, it has become the largest reference work in the world. What Wikipedia did for encyclopedias, Kickstarter did for venture capital: More than 4.5 million people have contributed over $750 million to fund roughly 50,000 creative projects by filmmakers, musicians, painters, designers, and other artists. Kiva applied the concept to banking, using crowdsourcing to kick-start economic independence by sponsoring microloans that help start small businesses in developing countries. In its first nine years, Kiva has given out loans totaling $500 million to one million people in seventy different countries, with crowdsourced contributions from nearly one million lenders.

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So the observed effect may not be due to Internet dating per se, but to the fact that Internet daters tend to be more educated and employed, as a group, than conventional daters. As you might expect, couples who initially met via e-mail tend to be older than couples who met their spouse through social networks and virtual worlds. (Young people just don’t use e-mail very much anymore.) And like DARPA, Wikipedia, and Kickstarter, online dating sites that use crowdsourcing have cropped up. ChainDate, ReportYourEx, and the Lulu app are just three examples of a kind of Zagat-like rating system for dating partners. Once we are in a relationship, romantic or platonic, how well do we know the people we care about, and how good are we at knowing their thoughts?

WEconomy: You Can Find Meaning, Make a Living, and Change the World
by Craig Kielburger , Holly Branson , Marc Kielburger , Sir Richard Branson and Sheryl Sandberg
Published 7 Mar 2018

You Aren't the First and You Won't Be the Last Know Your Dragon Keep It High Level Know the Details Be Yourself Chapter 19: Change Without Cash Become a Professional at Pro Bono: A Snapshot of WE's In-Kind Offers Want to Give Back? Head to the Mall Don't Show Me the Money Good Housekeeping: Our Deal with a Seal Chapter 20: Your WEconomy Assignment: Build A 100-Year Purpose Plan But Then Again Pretty Much Anything is Possible When Two Visionaries Unite … Tips to Kick-Start Your Weconomy 100-Year Purpose Plan: Conclusion: The Weconomy Needs You Epilogue Appendix Acknowledgments End User License Agreement Praise for WEconomy “As global citizens, it is important that we all decide how we can help build a better future for everyone who inhabits this planet.

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I like to call it the Super Bowl of Social Change. Like the world's biggest football game, WE Day is a stadium-sized event. It was held in 15 cities in 2017, with smaller, community-run events in even more locations. It brings together world-renowned speakers and performers with thousands of young volunteers to honor their contributions and kick-start another year of change. The “price” of their ticket is paid in food drives, charity dance-a-thons, and bake sales. Every young person at every WE Day in cities around the world earns entry by supporting one local and one global cause. Annually, this adds up to helping more than 2,500 causes and charities.

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Everything your parents taught you about not getting into cars with strangers has become obsolete. You can hail a ride through an app instead of a using a taxi service. You can bypass traditional organizational structures and rely on the kindness of strangers to buy almost anything (Craigslist, Etsy); fund your next venture (Kickstarter); board your pet (Rover); borrow power tools (Zilok); or support charity projects (Change .org, Crowdfunder UK). All of these structures have been broken down by building a community with shared values or a binding purpose. We trust in a group of peers with shared interests as much as—or more than—we trust in big companies.

Rocket Billionaires: Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, and the New Space Race
by Tim Fernholz
Published 20 Mar 2018

A former girlfriend told reporters in the nineties that his business success was driven by his desire to go to the stars himself; according to Stone, Bezos’s high school valedictory address had proposed the idea of “saving humanity by creating permanent human colonies in orbiting space stations while turning the planet into an enormous nature preserve.” You get the idea. The vision that captivated Bezos still drives him now. It is a different strain of space economic utopianism than the one that drives those who propose colonizing Mars, and it holds itself out as the more pragmatic approach. In this narrative, kick-started by Gerard O’Neill’s 1976 book The High Frontier, the fragility of the human species on earth is intimately connected to industrialization—the way the massive use of fossil fuels to drive the economy has altered the ecosystem. Instead of taking humans away from the planet and into space, why shouldn’t the space industry develop the ability to put heavy industry up there in the cosmos?

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Nearly all of them involved three key steps: extending the space shuttle for two more flights to complete construction of the space station, canceling or postponing the Ares rocket, and expanding NASA’s commercial partnerships to include flying astronauts as well as cargo to the space station. Though neither SpaceX nor Orbital had launched a rocket yet, the promise of a cost-effective alternative led policy makers to kick-start what would become the Commercial Crew program. “It seemed after Augustine that everyone would accept the cancellation of Orion and Commercial Crew was ready for prime time,” Garver told me. “When I got there and started on transition, it was clear that COTS was going to become the program of record.

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“They have that crappy printed picture where all the crew had signed it properly framed and hanging up in their hallway,” he told me. 11 Capture the Flag Going through test pilot school, there isn’t a student who doesn’t think the dream job would be to be a flight-test engineer on a brand-new spaceship and then get a chance to go fly on it. —Astronaut Robert Behnken Blue Origin’s first real step out into the public eye came in 2010, thanks to the Obama administration’s enthusiasm for commercial space exploration. To kick-start the next stage of its commercial partnerships, this time focused on flying astronauts to the space station, NASA put up a small pot of money for a program called Commercial Crew Development, or CCDEV. (NASA loves acronyms.) The first $50 million was part of the nearly $100 billion stimulus legislation the new president devised to goose the flagging economy, and NASA put a share of that money into the commercial program.

A New History of the Future in 100 Objects: A Fiction
by Adrian Hon
Published 5 Oct 2020

Thanks to my family, especially to my parents, Metis and Bernard Hon, and my partner, Margaret Maitland, for their support and encouragement. Thanks to my friends, Naomi Alderman, Andrea Phillips, and Alexandre Mathy, for their advice and humor. And thank you to all of those who backed the first edition of this book on Kickstarter. Without you, this book wouldn’t exist. INTRODUCTION Why write a history of the twenty-first century? Now that we’ve reached the end of the century, it may seem foolhardy for a mere human to attempt to analyze the data at our disposal. After all, we’re awash with information from every corner of the world, covering every second of the century.

…

Robotics historian Stan Malhotra relates the students’ path to success: The students drew up the first plans for the Speeky more as a thought experiment than a business venture, and when they sent them to a factory in Guangdong, they weren’t expecting to make anything other than mementos. But like many breakthroughs, it was a chance encounter between one of the team, Alice Stephenson, and a group of amateur performers from Boston University that gave them the idea to create online tools that would allow actors to easily ‘puppet’ the Speeky. One Kickstarter project later, and they had more than $20 million in pre-orders. It wasn’t the first internet-connected toy to be sold, but it was the first that combined cheap but well-designed robotics components with a puppet interface. Crucially, that interface was simple to use for anyone who’d ever played an action or role-playing video game—in other words, several hundred million people across the globe.

…

Some viewed this as a long-expected reversion to the historical norm, where writers would have a “day job” that would support their writing on evenings and weekends. The only problem was that day jobs were evaporating as well. A partial solution lay in traditional crowdfunding websites such as Kickstarter, through which creators would announce their books, films, toys, utilities, and products, and ask for advance orders. If they raised enough money, the project would go ahead—and if they didn’t, the money would be refunded, establishing a critically important signal of demand that was missing in more centrally controlled art schemes.

Move Fast and Break Things: How Facebook, Google, and Amazon Cornered Culture and Undermined Democracy
by Jonathan Taplin
Published 17 Apr 2017

It wasn’t Levon’s decision. In fact, for many years after The Band stopped recording, Levon made a good living off of the record royalties of The Band’s catalog. But no more. So what is your solution—charity. You want to give every great artist a virtual begging bowl with Kickstarter. But Levon never wanted the charity of the Reddit community or the Kickstarter community. He just wanted to earn an honest living off the great work of a lifetime. You are so clueless as to offer to get The Band back together for a charity concert, unaware that three of the five members are dead. Take your charity and shove it. Just let us get paid for our work and stop deciding that you can unilaterally make it free.

…

Like I said on stage, I wanted to offer a solution to help make right what the music industry did to members of The Band… I’m hopeful that innovations like the ones I discussed tonight and the others that are being worked on by entrepreneurs right now will continue to do right by artists and cut out those who’d mistreat them… Like I said on stage, it would be an honor to gather members of The Band together to produce one more album with unreleased content or something to honor Levon Helm—really any kind of creative project they’d like to produce—(this time funded on kickstarter) and we’ll gladly launch it on the IAMA section of reddit. I replied in an open letter to him. Dear Alexis, Last week at our debate, I talked about the essential unfairness that my friend and colleague Levon Helm had to continue to tour at the age of 70 with throat cancer in order to pay his medical bills.

The End of the Free Market: Who Wins the War Between States and Corporations?
by Ian Bremmer
Published 12 May 2010

During the financial crisis and global recession, an enormous market meltdown that provided globalization with its first true stress test, political officials in both the developed and the developing worlds seized responsibility for decisions that are usually left to market forces—and on a scale not seen in decades. Governments around the world responded to the implosion of major financial institutions and key economic sectors with massive doses of state spending meant to kick-start growth and, in some cases, to bail out companies considered “too big to fail.” States grabbed control of firms once considered industry flagships. They did all this because they believed it was necessary—and because no one else could do it. During the financial crisis and its aftermath, this dynamic generated a massive shift in financial decision-making power from New York to Washington.

…

This was a massive failure of government oversight and regulation in which hunger for short-term profit and a post-Cold War capitalist triumphalism allowed too many people to believe that markets can regulate themselves.c Since 2008, the global recession has pushed dozens of governments back toward the left side of the spectrum. Policy makers and legislators in Europe and America have embarked on the largest state economic intervention since the 1930s. Less than one month after taking office, President Barack Obama signed into law a $787 billion stimulus plan, a package of government spending and tax cuts meant to kick-start U.S. growth and create millions of jobs. Intervention on this scale is meant to prevent a huge market failure—to move left along the spectrum so that the economy can recover its balance following a thirty-year-long lurch to the right. But America’s massive government intervention in markets was not simply a victory of Democrats over Republicans.

…

In less developed rural areas, small farmers and business owners struggle to access credit from state-owned banks, sharply limiting their ability to produce growth in areas of the country that badly need it. In other words, state capitalism is burdened with its own brand of shortsighted, short-term thinking, especially when powerful players within the system have their own set of incentives for earning short-term rewards. The injection of hundreds of billions of dollars can kick-start any developing economy, but the problems that threaten future growth continue to metastasize. In addition, as we’ve seen, the ties that bind political and business elites in state-capitalist countries shape the environment in which some of their largest companies operate. In China, the leadership reserves the right to select the heads of all major banks and large industrial enterprises.

Rules for Revolutionaries: How Big Organizing Can Change Everything
by Becky Bond and Zack Exley
Published 9 Nov 2016

The good news is there are more than enough amazing volunteer leaders among the people, and three or four talented and committed volunteers working part time can often do the work of a full-time paid staffer. When you’ve got at least a handful of people committed to a cause signed up on a list, you’ve got what you need to kick-start a vibrant organization. Most hard work gets done by teams. In the world of organizing, the 2008 Obama primary popularized the strategy of forming “neighborhood teams.” A detail often forgotten about the historic 2008 race was that Obama was far behind in the polls in South Carolina, including with African American voters, for most of the race.

…

But if you’re a grassroots activist, or a revolutionary leader in a local community, I imagine you could be looking at all of these fundraising lessons from presidential campaigns and organizations with national profiles and thinking, “What does any of this have to do with me?” It’s true that it took a lot of national campaigns over time to prime the small-dollar pump. But now all kinds of local projects are kick-started with small donations. Winning support from your community to lead a campaign or make change has never been easier. But to raise funds this way, you need to have a base that wants to support you. If you don’t have that base, you face two options: seek large donations from rich people and foundations, or build a base so you can seek small-dollar donations.

…

You’d be clicking as fast as you could, but you’d see the scroll bar shrinking down and down,” which meant an unseen mountain of unclicked numbers were piling up below the screen—voters that could be reached if only you had more clickers! No problem. Everyone knew what to do next: form a new volunteer team. This pattern had been established in the DNA of our department. Sam took the lead in kick-starting the dialer monitor team (they decided “clickers” sounded too unglamorous). But Sam was way too busy with a million other things, including supporting the burgeoning state field and communications teams in states all over the country. So Sam gave the job of forming the team to Kyle, who had officially joined our staff as a paid intern just days earlier.

London Like a Local
by Florence Derrick

Double-tap images in the book to open images to full screen and to be able to zoom-in and see details clearly. - Contents - How to use this eBook Welcome to the City Through the Year Know-How Neighbourhoods On the Map EAT DRINK SHOP ARTS & CULTURE NIGHTLIFE OUTDOORS DIRECTORY ACKNOWLEDGMENTS COPYRIGHT - meet the locals - FLORENCE DERRICK Florence moved to London to kick-start her career in journalism. Though her writing takes her all over the world, it’s East London that she knows like the back of her hand. Outside of eating, drinking and dancing – in the name of journalism – Florence is sipping flat whites, browsing charity shops and researching gig tickets. MARLENE LANDU Regulatory advisor Marlene settled in London in the 2000s and doesn’t plan on leaving any time soon.

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It’s a must-see. g City History g Contents Google Map EAST END WOMEN’S MUSEUM Map 6; Abbey Green, Barking; www.eastendwomensmuseum.org In 2015, a proposed women’s history museum in East London instead opened as a museum dedicated to serial killer Jack the Ripper. Uproar ensued, culminating in a Kickstarter campaign to fund this museum, which is dedicated to the telling of women’s stories via exhibitions, events and workshops. The museum is opening in a brand new space in Barking in 2023; visit with your girlfriends and celebrate girl power. » Don’t leave without getting the inside line on monuments to women’s history that can be visited across London.

The Startup Way: Making Entrepreneurship a Fundamental Discipline of Every Enterprise
by Eric Ries
Published 15 Mar 2017

And yet, in the acknowledgments to that book, I thanked eighty-nine people (I counted). This book, by contrast, has felt like a true community effort. No doubt that’s in part because it got its start from the community that developed around my Kickstarter MVP book, The Leader’s Guide. I owe a huge debt to the nearly 9,677 people who backed the Kickstarter campaign, making possible the research that eventually led to The Leader’s Guide, as well as everyone who joined and participates in the Leader’s Guide community on Mightybell that has become a dynamic, active place for discussions about the principles in the book.

…

What is really known about what customers want in that solution? By writing down what they think will happen ahead of time, team members are reminded that they won’t always be right—which is fine. The goal is to learn. KEEP IT SIMPLE Here’s what an entrepreneur named Pedro Miguel, a member of the online community connected to my Kickstarter book, The Leader’s Guide,3 has to say about the process of asking questions as the first step in creating a new product or process: Validating ideas by talking to people is hard but crucial to understand if people really have the problem you are trying to solve. One way that works for me is to build a simple three-question survey that validates key assumptions: Do people really have the problem you think they do?

…

There is a whole separate discipline to this called “customer development,” a term originally coined by Steve Blank. See startuplessonslearned.com/​2008/​11/​what-is-customer-development.html. 3. Part of the research that went into this book came from a project called The Leader’s Guide. In 2015, I launched a Kickstarter campaign to publish a limited-run, 250-page book aimed at helping entrepreneurs, executives, and project leaders put lean principles into practice. The campaign was backed by 9,677 people choosing from 30 different reward levels and raising $588,903. The content of the book was derived from materials I’d used in the years prior; the goal was to provide a concrete road map for leaders who want to transform their management practice in an entrepreneurial direction.

How I Built This: The Unexpected Paths to Success From the World's Most Inspiring Entrepreneurs
by Guy Raz
Published 14 Sep 2020

And I realized my innovation alarm was going off, because I’d ask these really, really simple questions, and no one could give me a clear answer.” Like Jen and Steph, Tim decided he was going to be the one to solve this creative problem and answer the questions the shoe manufacturers couldn’t. Five years later, he launched the idea on Kickstarter. Two years after that, barely a month after Away delivered its first 2,000 suitcases, Tim, now with a partner named Joey Zwillinger, turned that idea into a company called Allbirds. And two years after that, it was worth $1.4 billion. Apparel. Ice cream. Footwear. Luggage. They’re all different, but they’re all the same.

…

In this way, each person in your inner circle is both a potential resource in and of themselves and also a launching pad to someone in the circle one step removed. In theory, you can move like this out through the concentric circles almost infinitely. In fact, that’s kind of how crowdfunding sites like Kickstarter, Indiegogo, and GoFundMe tend to work. They’re word-of-mouth mechanisms designed to help innovators and creators just like you get started, by reaching the fifth, sixth, or seventh circle of people whom you could never reasonably expect to know or meet, but whose capital you can use to actually produce the thing you are trying to sell.

…

Ask­ing people for money is always a difficult, and sometimes uncomfortable, thing to do. Having to do it a hundred times at $20 to $50 a pop isn’t just tedious, it’s impractical. When are you going to find the time to run the actual business? Crowdfunding consolidates all those small asks into a single conversation broadcast through the loudspeaker we call the internet. In fact, Kickstarter is how Tim Brown first launched Allbirds and how several other companies, such as Oculus, Brooklinen, and the card game Exploding Kittens, initially raised their money. The lesson here is that despite the sometimes daunting advantages that privilege can confer, this process for raising early money really is available to anyone.

Owning the Earth: The Transforming History of Land Ownership
by Andro Linklater
Published 12 Nov 2013

The incomes of old-established families dependent on fixed rentals were progressively reduced, and at the same time the despised merchant class began to benefit from a rapidly increasing trade as European vessels found new routes to the east. Silver originally mined in Bolivia and shipped to Cadiz was exchanged by Portuguese and later Dutch shippers for Chinese silk and porcelain. In modern Indonesia and along the coasts of the China Sea, the massive purchases of spices by the newcomers kick-started a general trade within the Far East that enriched the merchants of Canton and Shanghai still further. In the last century of the Ming dynasty, up to 1644, almost seventy-five hundred tons of silver flowed into China, not only from Europe but from the rising trade economy of Japan. The surge of precious metal completed the destruction of the old order, with inflation tripling once more in the second half of the sixteenth century.

…

Thus the effects of the Meiji land reforms were to tame the samurai landlords but to leave the pattern of land holding virtually unchanged. In the absence of any movement by Japan’s landed interests to assert claims to political power, the Meiji government deliberately taxed agriculture heavily in order to finance industrial development. Up to 80 percent of the revenues that kick-started Japanese industrial growth in the 1890s came from land taxes and were channeled either into military expenditure for Japan’s successful wars with China and Russia, or into railroad construction and shipbuilding. Yet for all their political impotence, the values of Japan’s landowners, inherited from the samurai, became the standard for Japan’s new industrialists, even though by the 1920s their manufactured products were three times as valuable as those grown on the land.

…

The exodus of more than one million people, some 10 percent of the population, served as a popular vote on the policy. The economic goal of INRA was more practical, to generate enough profit from sugar, coffee, and tobacco to invest in the development of the island’s mouthwatering deposits of nickel—as much as one fifth of the world’s reserves. Guevara intended mining profits to kick-start the process of industrialization allowing Cuba to become a modern, but socially owned, economy. The United States economic blockade played a large part in INRA’s failure to achieve this goal too. But falling sugar yields and Castro’s repeated attacks on corruption, inequality, and materialism within the ranks of his own dictatorial administration, notably in the “rectification campaign” he launched at the end of the Cold War, made it clear that Guevara’s system simply did not work.

Track Changes
by Matthew G. Kirschenbaum
Published 1 May 2016

The scratch-built writing software admits no customization whatsoever: no preferences, no notifications, no toolbars, and certainly no anthropomorphic paperclips. It supports backspace and deletion, but there is no copy and paste option—“just like … before 1979 (and the debut of WordStar),” the KickStarter page explains.35 While there is no Web access as such, built-in Wi-Fi allows it to continually sync to a cloud-based storage system. The battery is supposed to be good for four weeks of steady use. There is a carrying handle. Within thirty days KickStarter backers had funded the project at roughly 125 percent of what the developers were seeking. The concept is not strictly new. The TRS-80 Model 100, a small notebook-style computer first introduced by Radio Shack in 1983, remained popular, especially with journalists, for years after the end of its natural market cycle because of its light weight and long battery life.

…

See John Brownlee, “Microsoft Research Invents a Stylus That Can Read Your Mind,” Design, Fast Company, October 10, 2014, http://www.fastcodesign.com/3036931/microsoft-research-invents-a-stylus-that-can-read-your-mind?partner=rss. 34. See “Hemingwrite—A Distraction Free Smart Typewriter,” Kickstarter.com, accessed August 19, 2015, https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/adamleeb/hemingwrite-a-distraction-free-digital-typewriter. 35. Ibid. 36. For example, Peter Swirski, From Literature to Biterature (Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2013). 37. For this last, see Shelley Poldony, “If an Algorithm Wrote This, How Would You Even Know?

…

If the Hanx Writer is a celebrity vanity project, the Hemingwrite has greater ambitions. The Hemingwrite is being marketed as a “distraction-free” writing device, essentially a dedicated word processor with a number of carefully chosen limitations and constraints. It debuted in December 2014 in a well-promoted KickStarter campaign, meaning that its developers went public in search of backers to bankroll the manufacturing run. “We engineered the Hemingwrite to do one thing, and do it sublimely well,” the video introducing the fundraising campaign relates.34 At a glance, it looks like a small, portable typewriter.

Do Over: Rescue Monday, Reinvent Your Work, and Never Get Stuck
by Jon Acuff
Published 6 Apr 2015

Contents Praise for Jon Acuff Title Page Copyright Dedication 1 The Career Savings Account 2 Do This First INVESTMENT 1 RELATIONSHIPS 3 You Don’t Know Who You Know 4 Give Your Foes What They Need Most 5 Casual Counts 6 Great Careers Take Great Advocates 7 Don’t Burn Many Bridges 8 Community Shines Brightest in the Darkness of a Career Bump INVESTMENT 2 SKILLS 9 You Have More Skills Than You Think 10 Master the Invisible Skills 11 Never Become a Dinosaur 12 Win the Way You Won Before 13 Kick-Start Your New Skills with Something Fun 14 Skills Get Sharp Slowly and Dull Quickly 15 Grab the Right Kind of Hammer for Your Career Ceiling INVESTMENT 3 CHARACTER 16 Plant an Orchard 17 Generosity Is a Game Changer 18 Empathy, No Longer Just for People Who Like to Cry with Friends 19 Be Present 20 Never Jump Without Character INVESTMENT 4 HUSTLE 21 Grit Is a Choice, Not a Feeling 22 Hustle Has Seasons: Use Awareness to Recognize Them 23 Career Yoga 24 Always Use This to Multiply the Moment 25 Three Final Words You’ll Tell Me Someday Soon Acknowledgments Tell Me About Your Do Over!

…

Casual friendship. Shauna Callaghan, who I met once, built my blog after my last Career Do Over. Casual friendship. Andy Traub, who I’d known mainly via the Internet, helped me get back up on my feet after my last Do Over. Casual friendship. Shawn Hanks, who I hadn’t seen in a year, helped me kick-start my speaking career after my last Do Over. Casual friendship. My tender heart tried to remember that moment of lifelong friends rallying around me during my career transition, but the truth is that many of the relationships that did the heaviest lifting were casual at first. Which doesn’t mean superficial.

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Remember If you want to win in the future, sometimes you have to look to the past. Interview a former win. Why did it work? What about that situation made it more successful than others? Never reinvent the wheel. What can you do today to help re-create some of the circumstances that helped you win yesterday? 13 Kick-Start Your New Skills with Something Fun So, friends, every day do something that won’t compute. —WENDELL BERRY We need new skills because they lead to new jobs, new dreams and new opportunities. We’ve won before and we’re ready to win again. Now, what’s one new skill we want to learn?

Smart Money: How High-Stakes Financial Innovation Is Reshaping Our WorldÑFor the Better
by Andrew Palmer
Published 13 Apr 2015

Results released in August 2014 showed an 8.4 percent reduction in reconvictions since the start of the program compared with the national baseline. If the scheme keeps performing like that and achieves a reduction in reconvictions of 7.5 percent or more compared with the control group, the original investors will receive a payout in 2016. Whatever its eventual results, the real impact of the Peterborough SIB will have been to kick-start a new market. Britain is home to the greatest number of SIBs, helped along by the enthusiasm of David Cameron, the Conservative British prime minister, for an idea he calls the “Big Society.” Almost no one knows what this phrase means, but if it has any substance at all, it is in the area of social investment.

…

“These plans would help all students get the financing they need—including students from disadvantaged backgrounds—but without the anxiety that comes with traditional loans,” said Petri in a statement at the time. *** AT THE SAME TIME that policy makers are becoming more intrigued by the idea of income-share agreements, the technological landscape is shifting. The example of firms like Kickstarter, Crowdcube, Lending Club (discussed in the next chapter), and others is habituating people to the idea of funding strangers over an online platform. And the availability of data online means that firms like Upstart can analyze the likely earnings power of youngsters in more sophisticated ways than ever before.

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Flowers, 69, 81 Japan, banking crisis in, 75 Japan, financial innovation in, 27, 29, 39–40 Jha, Saumitra, 27 Jiménez-Martín, Sergi, 73 Job creation, young small firms and, 147–148 Joint-stock firms, 23 JPMorgan, 77, 169 Jump-to-default risk, 238 Käärmann, Kristo, 190 Kabbage, 218 Kahneman, Daniel, 47, 137 Kanjorski, Paul, 145 Kauffman Foundation, 158 Kennedy, John F., 32 Keys, Benjamin, 48 Kharroubi, Enisse, 79 Kickstarter, 172 King, Stephen, 99 Klein, David, 182 Krugman, Paul, xv Lahoud, Sal, 166 Lang, Luke, 153, 161–162 Laplanche, Renaud, 179, 184, 188, 190, 193–194, 196–197 Latency, 53 Law of large numbers, 17 Layering, 57 Left-digit bias, 46 Lehman Brothers, x, 44, 65 Lending direct, 84 marketplace, 184 payday, 200 relationship-based, 11, 151, 206–208 secured, xiv, 76 unsecured, 206 See also Loans; Peer-to-peer lending Lending Club, 172, 179–180, 182–184, 187, 189, 194–195, 197 Leonardo of Pisa (Fibonacci), 19 Lerner, Josh, 59 Lethal pandemic, risk-modeling for demographic profile, 230 exceedance-probability curve, 231–232, 232 figure 3 historical data, 228–229 infectiousness and virulence, 229–230 location of outbreak, 230–231 Leverage, 51, 70–71, 80, 186, 188 Leverage ratio, 76–77 Lewis, Michael, 57 Liber Abaci or Book of Calculation (Fibonacci), 19 LIBOR (London Interbank Offered Rate), 41 Liebman, Jeffrey, 98 Life expectancy government reaction to, 128–129 projections of, 124–127, 126 figure 2 ratio of young to older people, 127–128 Life-insurance policies, 142 Life-settlements industry, 142–143 Life table, 20 Limited liability, 212 Liquidity, 12–14, 39, 185–186 List, John, 109 The Little Book of Behavioral Investing (Montier), 156 Lo, Andrew, 113–115, 117–123 Loans low-documentation, 48–49 secured, 76 small business, 181, 216 student, 164, 166–167, 169–171, 182 syndicated, 41 Victory Loans, 28 See also Lending; Peer-to-Peer lending Logistic regression, 201 London, early fire insurance in, 16–17 London, Great Fire of, 16 London Interbank Offered Rate (LIBOR), 41 Long-Term Capital Management, 123 Longevity, betting on, 143–144 Loss aversion, 136 Lotteries, 212, 213 Low-documentation loans, 48–49 Lumni, 165, 168, 175 Lustgarten, Anders, 111 Lynn, Jeff, 160–161 Mack, John, 180 Mahwah, New Jersey, 52, 53 Marginal borrowers assessment of, 216–217 behavioral finance and, 208–214 industrialization of credit, 206 microfinance and, 203 savings schemes, 209–214 small businesses, 215–219 unsecured lending to, 206 Wonga, 203, 205, 208 Marginal borrowers (continued) ZestFinance, 199, 202, 205–206 Maritime piracy, solutions to, 151–152 Maritime trade, role of in history of finance, 3, 7–8, 14, 17, 23 Market makers, 15–16, 55 MarketInvoice, 195, 207, 217–218 Marketplace lending, 184 Markowitz, Harry, 118 Massachusetts, use of inflation-protected bonds in, 26 Massachusetts, use of social-impact bonds in, 98 Matching engine, 52 Maturity transformation, 12–13, 187–188, 193 McKinsey & Company, ix, 42 Mercator Advisory Group, 203 Merrill, Charles, 28 Merrill, Douglas, 199, 201 Merrill Lynch, 28 Merton, Robert, 31, 113–114, 123–124, 129–132, 142, 145 Mian, Atif, 204 Michigan, University of, financial survey by, 134–135 Microfinance, 203 Micropayment model, 217 Microwave technology, 53 The Million Adventure, 213–214 Minsky, Hyman, 42 Minsky moment, 42 Mississippi scheme, 36 Mitchell, Justin, 166–167 Momentum Ignition, 57 Monaco, modeling risk of earthquake in, 227 Money, history of, 4–5 Money illusion, 73–74 Money laundering, 192 Money-market funds, 43, 44 Monkeys, Yale University study of loss aversion with, 136 Montier, James, 156–157 Moody, John, 24 Moody’s, 24, 235 Moore’s law, 114 Morgan Stanley, 188 Mortgage-backed securities, 49, 233 Mortgage credit by ZIP code, study of, 204 Mortgage debt, role of in 2007–2008 crisis, 69–70 Mortgage products, unsound, 36–37 Mortgage securitization, 47 Multisystemic therapy, 96 Munnell, Alicia, 129 Naked credit-default swaps, 143 Nature Biotechnology, on drug-development megafunds, 118 “Neglected Risks, Financial Innovation and Financial Fragility” (Gennaioli, Shleifer, and Vishny), 42 Network effects, 181 New York, skyscraper craze in, 74–75 New York City, prisoner-rehabilitation program in, 108 New York Stock Exchange (NYSE), 31, 52, 53, 61, 64 New York Times, Merrill Lynch ad in, 28 Noncorrelated assets, 122 Nonprofits, growth of in United States, 105–106 Northern Rock, x NYMEX, 60 NYSE Euronext, 52 NYSE (New York Stock Exchange), 31, 52, 53, 61, 64 OECD (Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development), 128, 147 Oldfield, Sean, 67–68, 80–84 OnDeck, 216–218 One Service, 94–95, 105, 112 Operating expense ratio, 188–189 Options, 15, 124 Order-to-trade ratios, 63 Oregon, interest in income-share agreements, 172, 176 Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), 128, 147 Overtrading, 24 Packard, Norman, 60 Pandit, Vikram, 184 Park, Sun Young, 233 Partnership mortgage, 81 Pasion, 11 Pave, 166–168, 173, 175, 182 Payday lending Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, survey on, 200 information on applicants, acquisition of, 202 underwriting of, 201 PayPal, 219 Peak child, 127 Peak risk, 228 Peer-to-peer lending advantages of, 187–189 auction system, 195 big investors in, 183 borrowers, assessment of, 197 in Britain, 181 commercial mortgages, 181 CommonBond, 182, 184, 197 consumer credit, 181 diversification, 196 explained, 180 Funding Circle, 181–182, 189, 197 investors in, 195 Lending Club, 179–180, 182–184, 187, 189, 194–195, 197 network effects, 181 ordinary savers and, 184 Prosper, 181, 187, 195 RateSetter, 181, 187, 196 Relendex, 181 risk management, 195–197 securitization, 183–184, 196 Peer-to-peer lending (continued) small business loans, 181 SoFi, 184 student loans, 182 Zopa, 181, 187, 188, 195 Pensions, cost of, 125–126 Perry, Rick, 142–143 Peterborough, England, social-impact bond pilot in, 90–92, 94–95, 104–105, 112 Petri, Tom, 172 Pharmaceuticals, decline of investment in, 114–115 Piracy Reporting Centre, International Maritime Bureau, 151 Polese, Kim, 210 Poor, Henry Varnum, 24 “Portfolio Selection” (Markowitz), 118 Prediction Company, 60–61 Preferred shares, 25 Prepaid cards, 203 Present value of cash flows, 19 Prime borrowers, 197 Prince, Chuck, 50–51, 62 Principal-agent problem, 8 Prisoner rehabilitation programs, 90–91, 94–95, 98, 108, 112 Private-equity firms, 69, 85, 91, 105, 107 Projection bias, 72–73 Property banking crises and, xiv, 69 banking mistakes involving, 75–80 behavioral biases and, 72–75 dangerous characteristics of, 70–72 fresh thinking, need for, xvii, 80 investors’ systematic errors in, 74–75 perception of as safe investment, 76, 80 Prosper, 181, 187, 195 Provisioning funds, 187 Put options, 9, 82 Quants, 19, 63, 113 QuickBooks, 218 Quote stuffing, 57 Raffray, André-François, 144 Railways, affect of on finance, 23–25 Randomized control trials (RCTs), 101 Raphoen, Christoffel, 15–16 Raphoen, Jan, 15–16 RateSetter, 181, 187, 196 RCTs (randomized control trials), 101 Ready for Zero, 210–211 Rectangularization, 125, 126 figure 2 Regulation NMS, 61 Reinhart, Carmen, 35 Reinsurance, 224 Relendex, 181 Rentes viagères, 20 Repurchase “repo” transactions, 15, 185 Research-backed obligations, 119 Reserve Primary Fund, 44 Retirement, funding for anchoring effect, 137–138 annuities, 139 auto-enrollment in pension schemes, 135 auto-escalation, 135–136 conventional funding, 127–128 decumulation, 138–139 government reaction to increased longevity, 128–129 home equity, 139–140 life expectancy, projections of, 124–127, 126 figure 2 life insurance policies, cash-surrender value of, 142 personal retirement savings, 128–129, 132–133 replacement rate, 125 reverse mortgage, 140–142 savings cues, experiment with, 137 SmartNest, 129–131 Reverse mortgages, 140–142 Risk-adjusted returns, 118 Risk appetite, 116 Risk assessment, 24, 45, 77–78, 208 Risk aversion, 116, 215 Risk-based capital, 77 Risk-based pricing model, 176 Risk management, 55, 117–118, 123, 195–197 Risk Management Solutions, 222 Risk sharing, 8, 82 Risk-transfer instrument, 226 Risk weights, 77–78 Rogoff, Kenneth, 35 “The Role of Government in Education” (Friedman), 165 Roman Empire business corporation in, 7 financial crisis in, 36 forerunners of banks in, 11 maritime insurance in, 8 Rotating Savings and Credit Associations (ROSCAs), 209–210 Roulette wheel, use of in experiment on anchoring, 138 Royal Bank of Scotland, 186 Rubio, Marco, 172 Russia, mortgage market in, 67 S-curve, in diffusion of innovations, 45 Salmon, Felix, 155 Samurai bonds, 27 Satsuma Rebellion (1877), 27 Sauter, George, 58 Save to Win, 214 Savings-and-loan crisis in US (1990s), 30 Savings cues, experiment with, 137 Scared Straight social program, 101 Scholes, Myron, 31, 123–124 Science, Technology, and Industry Scoreboard of OECD, 147 Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), 54, 56, 57, 58, 64 Securities markets, 14 Securitization, xi, 20, 37–38, 117–122, 183–184, 196, 236 Seedrs, 160–161 Sellaband, 159 Shared equity, 80–84 Shared-equity mortgage, 84 Shepard, Chris, xii–xiii Shiller, Robert, xv–xvi, 242 Shleifer, Andrei, 42, 44 Short termism, 58 SIBs.

Humans as a Service: The Promise and Perils of Work in the Gig Economy
by Jeremias Prassl
Published 7 May 2018

Crowdsourcing is by no means limited to labour markets: consumers, governments, and businesses have turned to the Internet in a wide range of areas—from the US National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) asking citizens for help in its quest to identify exoplanets (http://www.zooniverse.org/projects/marckuchner/backyard-worlds-planet-9, archived at https://perma.cc/LR8S-7QUF), to start-ups raising capital for new business ideas through platforms such as Kickstarter (http://www.kickstarter. com, archived at https://perma.cc/9DNZ-ACZ9). 3. Orly Lobel, ‘The law of the platform’ (2016) 101(1) Minnesota Law Review 87, 91. 4. European Commission, ‘Introduction to Deliveroo’ (European Commission 2016), http://ec.europa.eu/information_society/newsroom/image/document/ * * * Notes 143 2016-6/deliveroo_13855.pdf, archived at https://perma.cc/6J2T-8XK9; Foodora, ‘About us’, http://www.foodora.com/about/, archived at https://perma.

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If a large number of consumers are using a particu- lar app to hail taxis, it will become more attractive for drivers to sign up to that app. A large available pool of drivers, in turn, will make it easier and cheaper for consumers to find their next ride, further increasing the incen- tives for new drivers to join—and so on. It is unsurprising that gig-economy platforms will often try to kick-start this process by investing significant amounts of cash in subsidies for drivers as well as passengers. Hubert Horan, however, is sceptical that this is the entire story. Cash burn, he suggests, is not merely about harnessing network effects, but rather a step in platforms’ quest for monopoly power.

Creative Selection: Inside Apple's Design Process During the Golden Age of Steve Jobs
by Ken Kocienda
Published 3 Sep 2018

Apple certainly had its core enthusiasts at that time, and they were passionate about its products, but to everyone else, the Mac was a computer they might have used in college but forgot about when they became adults and got jobs. Four months after I started at Apple, things started to change. The release of the iPod was as much a surprise to me as it was to everyone else, and this portable music player kick-started Apple’s shift from computers to personal technology. The iPod also provided the money and the confidence that would lead to the development of the wildly successful devices that followed. This culminated with the iPhone, the product that transformed Apple from a technology bit player into one of the world’s most profitable enterprises.

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In the large projects Brooks was speaking about, where teams of hundreds or thousands are working against schedules and initiatives with mutual dependencies, the size of the effort bounds the speed of the work, and the overhead of communication and coordination swamps the impact of individuals, even the geniuses. However, in the early phase of software development, it’s possible to shake free of these restrictions, especially when teams are small and the hunt for ideas is still on. This was the scenario when Richard joined us at Apple. We were still looking for an organizing concept to kick-start our web browser effort, and Richard showed us how. Not only that, he proved that a 10x productivity gap is a conservative upper limit on the possible in early stage software. Indeed, Richard did more to move our project ahead in two person-days of work than Don and I had done in the preceding twelve person-weeks.

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Of course, a program that produced nothing but a Black Slab was far from a fully functioning web browser. We were still a long way from delivering a finished app, but our technical dawn had broken, the lights were now on, so at least we could see where we were going. 4 One Simple Rule We’d begun as three programmers trying to kick-start a project. Within a few months, we’d hired a few more people, and we were nine, a small web browser software team starting to hit its stride. By that time, word had come down the management chain. Steve Jobs himself had decided how he would judge our browser as a product. The focus would be on one thing: speed.

Happy Inside: How to Harness the Power of Home for Health and Happiness
by Michelle Ogundehin
Published 29 Apr 2020

It’s another small thing that sets you up with a positive bias from the off. Be sure to make your expectations realistic, though – for example, a wish for seamless train travel rather than the purchase of a winning lottery ticket. ‘Never skip breakfast. It kick-starts your metabolism, gives you the energy to start your day with vigour, and keeps you focused.’ Prioritise breakfast. Never skip breakfast. It kick-starts your metabolism, gives you the energy to start your day with vigour, and keeps you focused. Porridge in particular is a golden charm as it’s an excellent source of vitamins and minerals as well as complex carbohydrates that release their energy slowly, thus less reaching for sugary pick-me-ups come 11 a.m.

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Again, have it prepped by your bed the night before and you can do it without thinking. Otherwise, have them ready for taking with your breakfast. Jump-start the neurons. Open curtains and blinds as soon as you get up, especially if you have blackout screening. A shot of daylight sends a ‘wake-up’ message to your brain and gives your internal body clock a kickstart. In the winter, it can be helpful to invest in an alarm that mimics the sunrise, rather than sounding a klaxon, as darker mornings make bouncy starts that much harder. The second best way to jump-start your brain? Have a shower; it’ll wake you like nothing else. Otherwise, splash your face with cold water.

Austin Like a Local
by DK

g EAT g Contents Beloved Bakeries TEAL HOUSE BAKERY SOUR DUCK MI TRADICIÓN LA MEXICANA BAKERY EASY TIGER QUACK’S PAPER ROUTE BAKERY ZUCCHINI KILL BAKERY g Beloved Bakeries g Contents Google Map TEAL HOUSE BAKERY Map 5; 2304 South Congress Avenue, South Congress; ///fitter.wolf.rings; www.tealhouse.co The Phillips started selling cinnamon rolls from their teal-painted home to fund a family trip to Disneyland in 2016. Flash forward to 2020 and their fluffy pastries had garnered such a devoted following that the cottage bakery spawned a food truck and brick-and-mortar store. Here, hungry commuters kick-start their morning with drip coffee and vegan, gluten-free, or gluten-full rolls. g Beloved Bakeries g Contents Google Map SOUR DUCK Map 3; 1814 East Martin Luther King Jr Boulevard, Chestnut; ///crust.wording.pouch; www.sourduckmarket.com Sour Duck is the definition of a neighborhood bakery.

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g Wine Bars and Wineries g Contents Google Map AVIARY WINE & KITCHEN Map 5; 2110 South Lamar Boulevard, South Lamar; ///racing.glades.sublime; www.aviarywinekitchen.com With its funky bar stools and globular hanging lights, it won’t come as a surprise that Aviary started off life as a home goods store. Internet shopping (Amazon, we’re looking at you) put an end to the boutique, but a Kickstarter campaign launched this wine bar in its place. And, boy, are the folks of Austin glad. Join them over charcuterie boards and wines from the Jayne Mansfield (rosés), David Bowie (bubbles), or Robin Williams (lively reds) lists. g Wine Bars and Wineries g Contents Google Map WINEBELLY Map 5; 519 West Oltorf Street, Bouldin Creek; ///backers.give.bland; www.austinwinebelly.com The concept might be distinctly Spanish, but this tapas and wine bar is Austin through and through.

Future Crimes: Everything Is Connected, Everyone Is Vulnerable and What We Can Do About It
by Marc Goodman
Published 24 Feb 2015

Schwartz, “Hackers Offer Free Porn to Beat Security Checks,” Dark Reading, June 20, 2012. 42 The guard was disabled: Caroline McCarthy, “Bank Robber Hires Decoys on Craigslist, Fools Cop,” CNET, Oct. 3, 2008. 43 Soon half a dozen police cars: David Pescovitz, “Bank Robber Uses Craigslist to Hire Unsuspecting Accomplices,” Boing Boing, Oct. 1, 2008; “Armored Truck Robber Uses Craigslist to Make Getaway,” King5.​com, Sept. 21, 2009. 44 The most popular of these sites: Kickstarter, “Stats,” accessed on May 25, 2014, https:/​/​www.​kickstarter.​com/​help/​stats, indicating Kickstarter had raised $1,131,653 since launching. 45 Criminals are of course happy: Jason Del Rey, “Kickstarter Says It Was Hacked (Updated),” Re/code, Feb. 15, 2014. 46 The answer was: “Apple Fingerprint ID ‘Hacked,’ ” BBC News, Sept. 23, 2013. 47 Using elements of both: John Bowman, “iPhone 5S Fingerprint Hacking Contest Offers $20K Bounty,” Your Community (blog), CBC News, Sept. 20, 2013. 48 Finally, white wood glue: Frank, “Chaos Computer Club Breaks Apple TouchID,” Chaos Computer Club, Sept. 21, 2013. 49 Donations have been made: Andy Greenberg, “Meet the ‘Assassination Market’ Creator Who’s Crowdfunding Murder with Bitcoins,” Forbes, Nov. 18, 2013. 50 As a result, the master criminal-hackers: Marc Santora, “In Hours, Thieves Took $45 Million in A.T.M.

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Crowdfunding is a process by which money is collected from a crowd of backers who agree to support either a new start-up company or a nonprofit project, usually described in great depth on a Web site. The most popular of these sites are Kickstarter and Indiegogo, and tens of thousands of projects have successfully been funded, raising in excess of $1 billion from the crowd. Criminals are of course happy to hack anybody raking in that much money and have already successfully compromised the Kickstarter Web site. That said, criminal hackers have much bigger and more nefarious crowdfunding plans in mind, such as hacking the iPhone in your pocket. When Apple released its iPhone 5s mobile phone, it included a feature known as Touch ID, a fingerprint-recognition scanner touted as a “convenient and highly secure way to access your phone.”

The Great Post Office Scandal: The Fight to Expose a Multimillion Pound Scandal Which Put Innocent People in Jail
by Nick Wallis
Published 18 Nov 2021

Inspired by the superb book Beyond Contempt, which detailed Peter Jukes’ crowdfunded reporting of the News International phone-hacking trial at the Old Bailey, I wondered if there was any way I might be able to try something similar. After looking at various options, I settled on a Kickstarter campaign. Kickstarter is an ‘all-or-nothing’ crowdfunding platform. Supporters make pledges and give the Kickstarter website their account details. If you don’t reach your target, your supporters’ money stays in their accounts, and everyone walks away. If I failed to reach my target there would be no hassle or fallout, and at least I could say I tried.

…

Alan seemed convinced he would do so insofar as they allowed him to give important information to the court. ‘I don’t even have to look at them,’ he said. Once we were back in the Rolls Building, Alan said, ‘There’s something I want to show you.’ He produced from his pocket several homemade business cards, all of which had the logo of my Post Office Trial website on them, with a link to the Kickstarter page on the back. ‘Where on earth did you get these from?’ I asked. ‘I had them made,’ Alan replied. He told me that whilst the crowdfunding period was live, he’d been handing them out or leaving them lying around at meetings when he came to London. I was touched. Alan and I have different perspectives on certain issues, to put it mildly.

…

INDEX A Abdulla, Naushad 329 Abraham, Ann 409 Adedayo, Teju 316, 450 Allan, Lucy, MP 387 Allen, Nigel 147, 230, 236 Allen, Roger 450 Altman, Brian, QC 194, 431–436, 437–438, 447, 459–461, 465, 473 Andre, Dionne 391 Apparent bias 348 Appeals system in England & Wales 345 Arbuthnot, Lord (James) 86, 100–101, 101, 158, 168, 171, 175, 177, 186–190, 191, 198, 205, 211, 214, 215, 240–246, 271, 333, 381, 423, 434, 438, 474, 476 accuses the Post Office of lying 435 appears on Inside Out 158 asks David Cameron to intervene 271 calls for judge-led inquiry 423 calls on Paula Vennells to resign 291 gets involved 100 goes on Today 241 leads parliamentary campaign 171 role in the Chinook campaign 86 secures adjournment debate 241 tells Alice Perkins about Horizon 168 writes to the CCRC 333 Arch, Nicki 354–363, 355, 376, 403, 457, 471 Aria Grace Law 400, 425, 428, 430, 432 Ashraf, Kamran 62–68, 83, 396, 425, 440–442, 471 conviction quashed 441 Aujard, Chris 206–208, 240, 412 Automated Teller Machines (ATMs) problems with 196, 219 training 196 B Bailey, Adrian, MP 256 Bajaj, Amar 89 Baker, Colin 32, 146, 148 Baker, Mark 128, 146–148, 225, 243, 249, 256, 257, 331, 344, 453, 454 appears at BIS Select Committee hearing 256 appears at the inquiry 453 concerns over Horizon 146 helps Pete Murray 249 helps Taro Naw 93 helps Wendy Buffrey 128 is described by the High Court as ‘redoubtable’ 344 is snubbed by Alan Bates 243 Baker, Simon (former Post Office project manager) 172–176, 180–182, 187, 197, 206 Baker, Simon, QC (barrister for Post Office) 441 Baker, Sue 363 Balancing to zero 40 requirement to 47 Barang, Jasvinder 316, 440 conviction quashed 441 Bardo, Matt 281, 394, 398 Bates, Alan 58–61, 83, 88, 89, 100, 151, 155, 159, 169, 171, 177, 186, 188, 190, 198, 203, 213, 217, 221, 240, 243, 247, 252, 256, 269–271, 273, 285, 290–295, 309, 338, 345, 366, 369, 386, 392, 398, 404, 408, 419, 420, 421, 423, 436, 469, 474, 475 becomes a Subpostmaster 51–54 cross-examination in Common Issues trial 325–327 founds the JFSA 97–99 given notice by the Post Office 59 launches legal action 295 launches Parliamentary Ombudsman complaint 408 settles legal action 372 snubs Mark Baker 243 Bates v Post Office 306 case management conference 335 Common Issues judgment 343–346 appeal against 349 dismissal of appeal against 367 Common Issues trial 309, 315–334, 343–346 Group Litigation Order hearing 298 Horizon trial 335–341, 346–349, 364–365 judgment 376 recusal application 348 appeal 352 hearing 350 settlement agreement 372, 383, 419 Steering Committee 419 strikeout judgment 313 BBC News website 218 BBC North East 218 BBC Radio 4 218, 378, 406 BBC South West 225 BBC Surrey 155 Beal, Nick 329, 344 cross-examination in Common Issues trial 330 BEIS Select Committee inquiry 411–419 Fujitsu’s written evidence 415 Nick Read’s written evidence 413 oral evidence hearing 392 Paula Vennells’ written evidence 411 Bell, Peter 419 Benefits Agency 8 Bentwood, Richard 434 Binley, Brian, MP 266–267 BIS Select Committee inquiry 49, 254–269, 273 Angela van den Bogerd 260–266 George Thomson 254–259 Ian Henderson 260–266 Paula Vennells 260–266 Blackstone’s ratio 397 Blakey, David conviction quashed 473 Bloom, Detective Sergeant Hayley 434 Boeing 737 Max crashes 45 Bourke, Patrick 289 Branch Focuses 258 Branch suspense account 37 Branch user forum 260 Brennan, Lisa conviction quashed 472 Bridgen, Andrew, MP 177, 240, 244 Bristow, David 100, 155, 158 Brooks, Richard 170 Brown, Alan 89 Brown, Tom 190, 224 Buffrey, Doug 125 Buffrey, Wendy 125–131, 355, 376, 392, 396, 425, 426, 427, 470, 471, 474 conviction quashed 472 Burden of proof 122 Burgess-Boyde, Sarah 278 Burgess, Tim conviction quashed 472 Busch, Lisa, QC 444–448, 455, 460 Butoy, Harjinder 474 conviction quashed 473 C Cable, Sir Vince 273 Callanan, Lord 390, 435 Callendar Square bug 46, 89 Cameron, Alisdair 24, 313, 391 Cameron, David, former PM 173, 271, 273 Capon, Barry conviction quashed 472 Carter, Julie 277, 391 Carter, Kevin 391 Cartwright King Sift Review 192–193, 209, 224 Cash, Andy 193 Castleton, Lee 78–84, 89, 97, 383 Castleton, Lisa-Marie 78 Caveen, Jayne 382 Cavender, David, QC 323–329 Centre for Effective Dispute Resolution (CEDR) 238 Chatur, Mahebub 471 Chinook helicopters 85–87, 100–101, 160 Chip and pin machine 71 Clark, Nicholas conviction quashed 472 Clarke Advice 191–193, 224, 430–436, 444, 459–461 disclosure management document 432 first Advice 191, 459 second Advice 193, 459 Clarke, Simon 191–193, 410, 432, 459 Cleife, Julie 440 conviction quashed 441 ‘Clint’ 3, 11–16, 192 Coffey, Jonathan 273 ‘Colin’ 173–174, 183, 187, 212–213, 274 Collins, Tony 88 Collinson, Patrick 18 Common Issues trial 309, 315–334, 343–346 Alan Bates’ evidence 325 first day 315 judgment 343 Pam Stubbs’ evidence 327 Post Office witness evidence 329–333 Communication Workers Union (CWU) 30, 148, 254, 258, 401, 453 Compensation payments, receipt of 403 Computer Weekly 86, 88–92, 101–102, 118, 134, 151, 155, 282, 430, 469 breaks the story 88 Contempt of court 430–436 Convictions, quashed 426, 472 Coomber Rich 119 Cooper, Joe 284 Cormack, Lord 423 Coulson, Lord Justice 352 Court of Appeal hearings 428–435, 457–467 Flora Page stands down 434 judgment day 470–474 limb 2 argument (affront to the public conscience) 428, 444–449 Paul Marshall stands down 444 Post Office alleges contempt 431 Cousins, Wendy 466 Coyne, Jason 336–337, 364–365 Craddock, Jenny 155 Credence system 166 Crichton, Susan 171, 176, 179, 180, 182, 193, 196, 206 Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC) 292, 311, 333, 387, 396–400, 423–425, 440, 450, 466, 472 grounds for referral 424 Croft, Jane 318 Crowdfunding 309 Kickstarter 311 Crown Post Offices 4 losses at 83 Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) 20 D Daily Mail 76, 277, 382, 398 Darlington, Scott 316, 421, 426, 458 conviction quashed 472 Dar, Louise 329, 371 Davies, Mark 240, 254, 271, 354, 363 appears on Today 241 meets the Panorama team 289 Davies, Olivia 445, 471 Davison, Margaret 16, 56 Debt notices (debt recovery letters) 38, 347 de Garr Robinson, Anthony, QC 299, 307, 338, 339, 341, 349, 350 Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) 386 Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) 135, 243, 254, 273, 274, 330, 331, 386, 413, 435, 470 Detica Report 195–196 Dickinson, Helen 332 cross-examination in Common Issues trial 332 Dickson, John 167 Dinsdale, Mark 236, 237 Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) 378 Disclosure 120, 140, 307 Horizon error logs 416 Discrepancies acceptance of 37 access granted to Subpostmasters 53 balance to zero 40 debt notices 38, 347 Settle Centrally 38, 109, 347 in dispute 347 Settle to Cash or Cheque 37, 109 suspected or unreported 49 Transaction Acknowledgements 56 Transaction Corrections 38, 56 applying for 56 challenging 56 Donnelly, Kathleen 307, 309 Duncan, Lord 387 Dunks, Andy 417 E Edwin Coe 279 Ernst and Young audit 166 F Falconer, Lord Charlie 433 False accounting 39, 132–133 definition 133 plea bargaining 42, 222, 268, 458 strict liability offence 132 Theft Act 1968, section 17 132 the trap 222, 268, 458 Farbey, Mrs Justice 431, 437 Fed, The See National Federation of Subpostmasters (NFSP) Fell, Stanley 465 Felstead, Tracy 4–6, 27–30, 280, 355, 376, 392, 396, 425, 426, 428, 444, 457 conviction quashed 472 Flinders, Karl 318, 338, 373 Fontaine, Senior Master 298–300, 424 Ford, Julie 89, 147 Fowles, Dr Sam 445 Fraser, Mr Justice 306–307, 313, 314, 319, 323–324, 330, 336, 339, 341, 343, 377–378, 387, 417 recusal application 349–354 Freeths 293, 474 French, Jane 155 commissions first Inside Out investigation 155 commissions second Inside Out investigation 220 Fujitsu 320, 323, 348, 365, 366, 378, 379, 382, 411, 413, 415–418 accountability 417 cross-examination of Richard Roll 336–342 evidence to BEIS Select Committee inquiry 415 headquarters 156, 181 ICL takeover 8 judicial criticism 417 provision of witness evidence 416 Full Authority Digital Engine Control (FADEC) 85 Furey, Andy 256, 314, 392 Furniss, Gill, MP 391 G Gahir, Rajinder 231 Galaxy software 195 Garrard, Roch 88 Gilhooly, Donna 302 Gill, Bal 363 Gill, Kashmir conviction quashed 472 Glover, Amanda 159, 166 Goddard, Jane 220 Godeseth, Torstein 348 Gordon, Ben 461 Gould, Nick 400 Grabiner, Lord 350–352 Graham, William conviction quashed 472 Grant Funding Agreement (GFA) 330, 331, 344 Greenhill, Sam 318 Greenhow, Calum 382, 392 Green, Patrick, QC 294, 298–299, 323, 330–333, 338, 346–353, 366, 370–371, 378, 384, 420 addresses Master Fontaine 299 cross-examines Post Office witnesses 329 explains the mediation process 384 responds to the recusal application 351 sets out the claimants’ case 319 Griffiths, Gina 199–204, 247–248 withdraws from the mediation scheme 247 Griffiths, Martin 199–204 Group litigation/Bates v Post Office first judgment 306 Group Litigation Order (GLO) 295, 305 H Hadrill, Keith 141 Hall, Alison 428 conviction quashed 472 Hamilton, David 70 Hamilton, Jo 70–77, 83, 88, 89, 95, 97, 100, 118, 143, 158, 159, 162, 179, 221, 241, 252, 271, 290, 310, 316, 333, 338, 343–345, 350, 371–372, 376, 425, 426, 428, 458, 470 appears in Computer Weekly 89 appears in Taro Naw 95 appears on BBC Inside Out South 159 appears on BBC Panorama 290 attends Bates v Post Office 310 attends founding JFSA meeting 97 conviction quashed 472 finds out her conviction will be quashed 426 has her conviction quashed 472 helps Seema Misra 118 is prosecuted and sentenced 77 is referred by the CCRC 396 meets James Arbuthnot 100 takes on a Post Office 70 Harrison, Sian 318 Hartley, James 294, 298, 305, 309, 325, 345, 348, 349, 369, 370, 372 attends mediation 369 defends the settlement 383 putting the case together 306 reacts to Common Issues judgment 345 reacts to the recusal application 349 teaming up with the JFSA 294 Head, Andy 214 Head, Chris 390 Head Postmasters definition 23 Hedges, Tom 413, 439, 475 conviction quashed 472 Henderson, Allison 428 conviction quashed 472 Henderson Chambers 293 Henderson, Ian call for a judge-led independent inquiry 392 contradicts Paula Vennells 263 is told about remote access 181 Second Sight appointed 176–179 starting the Second Sight investigation 179–185 Henry, Edward, QC 437 Herbert Smith Freehills 370, 389, 401 Higginson, Andrew 439 Hill, Max 378 Historical Shortfall Scheme 401, 421, 425 application window 401 eligibility criteria 401 History of the Post Office 18 Hogg, Issy 77, 97–99, 118, 133, 155, 159, 171, 177, 245 Hollinrake, Kevin, MP 400 Holmes, Marion 475 Holmes, Peter 252, 458 conviction quashed 472 Holroyde, Lord Justice 431–436, 437, 444, 447–449, 459–464, 471–472 Hooper, Sir Anthony 197, 206, 208–209, 213, 215, 245 Horizon system arrival of Horizon Online 98 back-end data input 55 balancing the books 35 bugs Callendar Square bug 46, 141 one-sided transactions 184 Receipts and Payments Mismatch 139, 143, 188, 320, 458 Reversal bug 46 Riposte Lock/Unlock bug 46 business impact analysis 16 cash account 14 Clint’s involvement 11 dealing with a surplus 36 development of EPoS system 12 discrepancies 37, 38, 49, 109 auditors’ visit 49 level of access granted to Subpostmasters 53 early days 3 fixing bugs by Fujitsu 160 helpline 35–41, 49, 53, 55, 63–64, 71–73, 78–80, 98, 107, 111–112, 126, 136, 143, 147, 164, 169, 180, 216, 229–230, 278, 347, 356 balance to zero option 40 Software Support Centre 40 Horizon Online 136, 140, 167, 171, 172, 188, 192, 299, 379 Legacy Horizon 379 length of time data kept 56 locating errors 36 logging on and off 4 logistics 9 NFSP endorsement 32 prototype 14 Riposte message store 13, 46, 342 rolling discrepancy over into next trading period 36 rollout 22, 134, 136 Sio Lohrasb 22 training 4, 35, 43, 71, 104, 105, 110, 112, 126, 164, 187, 216, 257, 258, 356, 465 Transaction Acknowledgements 56 Transaction Corrections 38, 55, 72, 105, 110, 126, 127, 139, 180, 184, 236, 422 applying for 56 challenging 56 Transaction Information Processing (TIP) 16 upgrades and patches 45 Horizon trial 335–341, 346–349 Howard, Gillian conviction quashed 473 Howe and Co 49, 50, 269 submission to BIS Select Committee inquiry 470 Hudgell, Neil 400, 402 Hudgells 400, 474 Humphrys, John 241 Hussain, Neelam 466 Hutchings, Lynette conviction quashed 472 I Information technology (IT) 11, 44 Boeing 737 Max crashes 45 Callendar Square bug 46, 89, 141 classification of 12 fixing of by Fujitsu 160 Horizon upgrades and patches 45 logging of by Fujitsu 416 Receipts and Payments Mismatch 139, 143, 320, 458 Reversal bug 46 Initial Complaint Review and Mediation Scheme 197 application window 198 BIS Select Committee inquiry 254–269 Angela van den Bogerd 260 Paula Vennells 260 Case Questionnaire Response (CQR) 198 Case Review Report (CRR) 198 eligibility criteria 198 Post Office Investigation Report (POIR) 198 Post Office’s Final Report 271 refusal to allow convicted claimants 241 suitability for 213 Westminster Hall adjournment debate 241, 243–246 Working Group 197 terminated 271 Inquiry first evidence heard 453–455 first oral evidence session 453 MPs call for 393 review announced 423 review made into statutory inquiry 476 scope 423 Sir Wyn Williams appointed 423 Inside Out South 155, 158, 163, 214, 220, 234 International Computers Ltd (ICL) 8 Irranca-Davies, Huw, MP 241 Ishaq, Khayyam conviction quashed 472 Ismay report 136–137, 166, 410, 457 Ismay, Rod 136 J Jackson reforms 370 Jenkins, Gareth 124, 138, 181, 191, 348, 430 Johnson, Boris, PM 390 Jones, Bryn 92 Jones, Darren, MP 411, 455 Jones, David, MP 100, 101 Jones, Dylan 95 Jones, Kevan, MP 244, 393 Justice for Subpostmasters Alliance (JFSA) 102, 134, 136, 151, 166, 169, 174, 177, 181, 186, 190, 194, 197, 198, 205, 213, 217, 220, 234, 242, 245, 251, 252, 254, 256, 258, 279, 286, 291, 292, 294, 305, 309, 313, 314, 346, 373, 383, 385, 401, 402, 408, 436, 454, 471 approves Second Sight 178 is formed 99 joins forces with Kay Linnell 177 jointly launches the Mediation Scheme 197 makes complaint to the Parliamentary Ombudsman 408 meets MPs at Portcullis House 171 reacts to dissolution of the Working Group 273 settles High Court litigation 372 starts working towards a High Court litigation 292 K Kalia, Parmod 321–323, 450 conviction quashed 450 reply from Angela van den Bogerd 322 Kamran, Siema 62–68 Kickstarter campaign 311 Kit swapouts 217 Knight, Nigel 316 Knight, Sue 190, 224, 252, 316 L Latif, Adrees 381 Law Commission 121–122, 455 Lawrence, Patrick, QC 437 Legacy Horizon 192, 379 Legal aid 292 Legal presumption of reliability in computers 455 Letwin, Oliver, MP 101, 175 Lewell-Buck, Emma, MP 391 Lewis, Julian xiii Lilley, Peter, MP 32 Limb 2 428, 444–449 Linnell, Kay 177, 206, 208, 209, 211, 214, 256, 257, 258, 292, 298, 338, 343, 369, 384, 404, 408, 420, 421, 474 Litigation funding 293, 294, 305 ‘Local’ Post Offices 168 Lock, Pamela 451 conviction quashed 473 Lohrasb, Sio 22 Longman, Jon 115 Lyons, Alwen, OBE 182, 188, 412 M Machines and Artificial Intelligence 455 Mahmood, Tahir conviction quashed 472 Malicious prosecution 420, 421, 426, 428 Mandelson, Peter, MP 100 Manning, Frank 227, 319 Marshall, Paul 400, 420, 428, 430–435, 437–438, 444, 459, 476 McCormack, Tim 16 McDonald, Jackie 143, 145, 458 conviction quashed 472 McFadden, Pat, MP 134 McLachlan, Professor Charles 123–124, 134, 138–142, 144, 218, 283, 332, 336 Media coverage BBC News website 218 BBC regional programmes 218, 225, 252 BBC Surrey 155 Computer Weekly 86, 88–91, 92, 101, 102, 118, 134, 151, 155, 282, 430, 469 Daily Mail 76, 277, 382, 398 Inside Out, other regions 220 Inside Out South 155, 158, 163, 214, 220, 234 Panorama 281, 290, 393, 400 Private Eye 166, 170, 171, 218 Radio 4 218, 378, 406 Taro Naw 92–96, 155 The One Show 238, 242, 245, 298, 302 Today 241 Mediation 369–375 See also Initial Complaint Review and Mediation Scheme Meggitt, Graham 92 Membury, William 418 Merritt, Tracey 101, 179, 252, 316 Message store 13 See also Riposte message store Metropolitan Police Service 387, 430, 479 Miliband, Ed, MP 433 Miscarriage of justice 86, 120, 137, 194, 214, 268, 277, 278, 282, 323, 393, 411, 413, 435, 451, 477 Misra, Davinder 102 first meeting with Nick Wallis 151 Misra, Seema xi, 102–119, 123, 138–145, 151–154, 162, 178, 179, 221, 290, 336, 350, 376, 396, 425, 426, 428, 444, 457 conviction quashed 472 Moloney, Tim, QC 431, 447, 455, 457–461 Murray, Ian, MP 244 Murray, Pete 249–250, 453 N National Federation of Retail Newsagents 81 National Federation of Subpostmasters (NFSP) 30, 31–34, 51, 60, 115, 127–128, 146, 156, 254, 291, 321, 330, 344, 363, 382, 392, 451, 458, 477 Baker, Colin 148 Baker, Mark 146 denials of problems with Horizon 32–33, 51, 60, 96, 146, 291 formation of 24 Grant Funding Agreement (GFA) 330, 344 Greenhow, Calum 382, 392 Rudkin, Michael 156 Thomson, George 148, 256 National Lottery 110 Network Transformation scheme 173, 330 Nicholson, Bob 406 Norris, Adrian 114 Noverre, Keith 106, 114 NT event log 141 O Oates, Graham 97 O’Connell, Dawn 461–464 conviction quashed 472 O’Connell, Mark 462 O’Connell, Matthew 462 Official Secrets Act 1989 25 One Show, The 238, 242, 245, 298, 302 One-sided transactions 184 Osborne, Kate, MP 390, 393 Overnight Cash Holding 69 Owen, Albert, MP 244 Owen, Damien conviction quashed 472 Owens, Les 171 P Page, Carl conviction quashed 472 Page, Flora 401, 425, 428, 432–435, 437–438, 459, 474–475 Page, Lewis 431–435 Panorama 281, 393, 400 Scandal At The Post Office (2020) 408 Trouble At The Post Office (2015) 290 Parekh, Vijay conviction quashed 472 Parker, Stephen 417 Parker, Tim 345, 427 Parliamentary Ombudsman complaint 408, 423, 436 Patel, Sandip, QC 425 Patel, Varchas 441 Patel, Vipin 440 conviction quashed 441 Pathway 8 Perkins, Alice 168, 172, 175, 186, 412 Peters and Peters 425, 458 Phillips, Dawn 346 Phillips, Steve 225, 245, 252 Picken, Mr Justice 431, 437, 460 Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 (PACE) section 69 121 Pooler, Michael 318 Post Office annual reports 367 apologies to Subpostmasters 373, 475 attitude to MPs xiii, 190, 197, 240, 244, 266, 271 attitude towards Subpostmasters 81 audit function 21, 50, 195, 231 automation of the network 7–16, 32 belief in Horizon 50, 120, 121, 187 board sub-committee 411 concerns over Horizon 410, 457 debt recovery process 347 dependency on government 173, 274, 293 document shredding 192, 457, 459, 473 enforcement of the Subpostmasters Contract 194, 388 estate 15 evidence to select committees 260, 411, 413, 435 history 18 inability to function as a going concern 425, 468 interpretation of the Subpostmasters Contract 83, 309, 345 Investigation Branch (IB) 19 investigation function 184, 189, 217, 267, 276 Investigations Department (POID) 20 joins Time to Change 354, 363 lack of concern over Horizon 79, 136, 410, 471 number of prosecutions xiii, 30, 155, 158, 171, 397, 398, 408, 466, 500, 501 publicly defends Horizon 95, 175, 178, 477 recusal attempt 346 relationship with Fujitsu 10, 120, 161 relationship with the NFSP 32, 96, 330 responses to media 89, 158, 189, 299, 478 response to CCRC 397 Security and Investigation Services (POSIS) 20 Security Group 20 services available 7 strategy for litigation 312, 313, 314, 415 PostOfficeTrial.com 311 Post Office Victims website 60 Pre-action letters of claim 169 Private Eye 166, 170, 171, 218 Richard Brooks 170 Proceeds of Crime Act 2002 (POCA) 42, 117 orders under 333 Prodger, Matt 178, 189, 221 Prosecution statistics 397, 466 Putland, Rob 411, 415 R Ramms, Joseph 23 Rasul, Mohammed conviction quashed 472 Read, Nick 371, 411, 413, 468 Reasons to Urge (RTU) meeting 80 Receipts and Payments Mismatch 139, 143, 320, 458 Recusal application 348 apparent bias 348 appeal dismissed by the Court of Appeal 352 halts the Horizon trial 349 hearing 350 refusal 352 Rees-Mogg, Jacob, MP 387 Remote access 181, 299, 341, 366, 413, 414, 415 Gareth Jenkins’ confirmation of 181 Post Office denial of 183 Richard Roll’s confirmation of 341 Robert Worden’s confirmation of 366 Reversal bug 46 Ridge, Elaine 332 Riposte Lock/Unlock bug 46 See also Callendar Square bug Riposte message store 13, 341 Robinson, Anna Marie 92 Robinson, Della 354 conviction quashed 472 Robinson, Tim 220, 282, 394 Rodgers, Shann 454 Rolfe, Martin 156 Roll, Richard 159, 181, 338 at Fujitsu 160–162 cross-examination in Horizon trial 339 Panorama 290 the recorded conversation 285–289 Royal Mail 19 Rozenberg, Joshua 350 Rudkin, Michael 156, 252 Rudkin, Susan 252, 426, 440 conviction quashed 441 S Sabir, Mohammad 329 Sayer, Siobhan conviction quashed 472 Schedule of Sensitive Material 121, 458 Scott, John 136, 192 Scully, Paul, MP 390, 477 Second Sight 175, 176–191, 205–209 appointment 177 Briefing Reports 215 Post Office’s reply to Briefing Report 2 218 summit following the Post Office’s reply to Briefing Report 2 240 evidence to 2015 select committee 260 Final Report 276 Post Office’s response 276 Interim Report 186, 188 launch of 190 Spot Review SR05 189 notice of termination 271 Post Office board sub-committee 412 Security Group 20 Service level agreement between the Post Office and Fujitsu 161 Settlement agreement announced 372 finally revealed 419 Sewell, Lesley 182 Shaheen, Mohamed 222 Shaheen, Rubbina 222, 458 conviction quashed 472 Shaikh, Eleanor 376 Shepherd, David 354 Shoosmiths 159 withdrawal from case 206 Shredding of documents 192, 459 Sidhpura, Chirag 376 Simpson, Alan 140 Singh, Jarnail 124, 138, 144, 180, 192 Singh, Nippi 100 Skinner, Janet 393, 396–398, 403, 428 conviction quashed 472 Smith, Dave 136 Smith, Jacqui 134 Smith, Martin 191 Smith, Sandy 238 Software Support Centre (SSC) 40, 160, 338 Spackman, Conor 282 Stanley, Peter 172 Stein, Sam, QC 455, 458 Stockdale, Liz 329 Stock units 5 Storey, Susannah 412 Strict liability offence 132 Strikeout application by Post Office 311 Stubbs, Martin 226 Stubbs, Pam 225, 226–238, 252, 319, 371 cross-examination in Common Issues trial 327–334 gives evidence 327 is suspended 232 moves into a temporary branch 228 Sturgess, Geoffrey 26 Subpostmasters appointment of 61 definition 21, 23 Subpostmasters Contract 25, 47, 293, 309, 319, 323 Section 12:12 25, 59, 324 Suspense accounts, branch 37 removal of 37 Suspense accounts, internal 208 Sweeney, John 281 Sweetman, Stuart 32 Swinson, Jo, MP 188, 245 T Taro Naw 92–96, 155 Tatford, Warwick 142, 143 Taylor, Andrew 474 Tecwyn, Sion 92 Theft Act 1968 section 17 132 Therium 293, 383 Thomas, Eira 34 Thomas, Noel (Hughie) 34–43, 89, 252, 426 conviction quashed 472 Thomas, Sian 95 Thomson, George 148, 256 Thomson, Pauline conviction quashed 472 Thomson, Rebecca 88 Time to Change 354, 363 Tobin, Sam 459 Tolhurst, Kelly, MP 386 Training 4, 35, 43, 71, 104, 105, 110, 112, 126, 164, 187, 216, 257, 258, 356, 465 Branch Focuses 258 Transaction acknowledgements 56 Transaction corrections 38, 55, 72, 105, 110, 111, 126, 127, 139, 180, 236, 422 applying for 56 challenging 56, 110 Transaction Information Processing (TIP) 16 Trousdale, Chris 440 conviction quashed 441 Turner, Karl, MP 394 Tweedie, Neil 277 U ‘Unders and overs’ tin 36 V Valters, Jon 155 van den Bogerd, Angela 180, 197, 208, 218, 240, 254, 256, 289, 318, 322, 331, 332, 338, 344, 346 cross-examination in Common Issues trial 331 cross-examination in Horizon trial 346 questioning at Select Committee hearing 261–266 Vennells, Paula 174, 175, 176, 178, 188, 273, 291, 297, 322, 330, 335, 368, 382, 385, 393, 411, 476–479 apologises 382, 475 call to be stripped of CBE 476 gives evidence to BIS Select Committee 260–265 incentive payments 368 is appointed as Post Office CEO 172 is doorstepped 382, 478 meets James Arbuthnot 175 meets the JFSA 178 resignation boards of Dunelm and Morrisons 476 Cabinet Office 393 Chair of the Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust 438 Church’s ethical investments advisory group 413 response to BEIS questions 410–414 Short Term Incentive Payments (STIP) 368 Verity, Andy 273 W Wagstaff, Caroline 372 Wakely, Mike 58 Walker, Janet 187 Ward, Gail conviction quashed 472 Warman, Matt, MP 455 Warmington, Ron 474 call for a judge-led independent inquiry 392 frustration at lack of progress 208 querying destination of ‘missing’ money 381 Second Sight appointed 176–179 starting the Second Sight investigation 179–185 Warren, Ian conviction quashed 472 Westminster Hall adjournment debate 243–246 Post Office’s response 251 Wildblood, Mark 354 Williams, Margery conviction quashed 472 Williams, Paul 329 Williams, Rachel 252 Williams, Sir Wyn 423, 453–454 Wilson, Julian 97, 169, 252, 296–297 conviction quashed 472 Wilson, Karen 98, 169, 252, 316 Wilson, Rob 140 Winn, Andrew 237 Witherow, Tom 382, 398, 438 Withers, Jim 278 Wood, Mike, MP 177 Worden, Dr Robert 336–337, 364–365 Wyllie, Kym 190 Y Yates, David conviction quashed 473 Z Zahawi, Nadhim, MP 261–264 Alan Bates A Horizon terminal in 2003 Jo Hamilton and Seema Misra Noel Thomas Lee Castleton Pete Murray outside Hope Farm Road Post Office Ron Warmington Lord Arbuthnot Kay Linnell Kamran Ashraf and Siema Kamran Mark Baker Nicki Arch Pam Stubbs Chirag Sidhpura Julian Wilson David Hill, Emma Jones, Karen Wilson and Trevor Wilson Henry Warwick, Patrick Green, Ognjen Miletic, Deirdre Connolly, Kathleen Donnelly and Reanne Mackenzie Cheering Subpostmasters and their supporters on 16 December 2019 Seema Misra with the Horizon trial judgment Jayshreeben Patel, Varchas Patel and Vipin Patel Richard Roll Sue Knight Victorious Subpostmasters celebrate after their convictions were quashed on 23 April 2021 Tom Hedges and Marion Holmes Wendy Buffrey Scott Darlington and Steve Darlington Seema Misra, Janet Skinner and Tracy Felstead Peter Holmes and Marion Holmes Chris Trousdale, Neil Hudgell, Vipin Patel, Varchas Patel, Jayshreeben Patel, Siema Kamran, Kamran Ashraf, Jasvinder Barang and family Parmod Kalia and Teju Adedayo Martin Griffiths Photo credits: Nick Wallis, Erika Baker, Marion Holmes, the Wilson Family, the Griffiths Family, Pete Murray, Nicki Arch, Unknown.

Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity
by David Allen
Published 31 Dec 2002

Well, it could be with a phone call or an e-mail, but to whom? Decide. If you don’t decide now, you’ll still have to decide at some other point, and what this process is designed to do is actually get you to finish the thinking exercise about this item. If you haven’t identified the next physical action required to kick-start it, there will be a psychological gap every time you think about it even vaguely. You’ll tend to resist noticing it. Until you know what the next physical action is, there’s still more thinking required before anything can happen. When you get to a phone or to your computer, you want to have all your thinking completed so you can use the tools you have and the location you’re in to more easily get things done, having already defined what there is to do.

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Empty Your Head Put in writing (in appropriate categories) any new projects, action items, waiting-fors, someday/maybes, and so forth that you haven’t yet captured. Review “Projects” (and Larger Outcome) Lists Evaluate the status of projects, goals, and outcomes one by one, ensuring that at least one current kick-start action for each is in your system. Review “Next Actions” Lists Mark off completed actions. Review for reminders of further action steps to capture. Review “Waiting For” List Record appropriate actions for any needed follow-up. Check off received items. Review Any Relevant Checklists Is there anything you haven’t done that you need to do?

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Figure out what kind of life and work and life-style would best allow you to fulfill that contract. What kind of job and personal relationships would support that direction? What key things would you need to put in place and make happen right now, and what could you do physically as soon as possible, to kick-start each of those? You’re never lacking in opportunities to clarify your priorities at any level. Pay attention to which horizon is calling you. In truth, you can approach your priorities from any level, at any time. I always have something that I could do constructively to enhance my awareness and focus on each level.

Pax Technica: How the Internet of Things May Set Us Free or Lock Us Up
by Philip N. Howard
Published 27 Apr 2015

Russia’s Pussy Riot does aggressive culture jamming. In Ukraine, the Femen network of young women bare their breasts in public but then talk about pension reform. The Russian art collective Voina painted a two hundred–foot penis on a Saint Petersburg drawbridge to protest heightened security. Ukrainian activists launched a Kickstarter campaign to buy themselves a “people’s drone” that would let them watch Russian troop movements in their country.14 The internet of things is putting tough regimes into digital dilemmas on a regular basis, because leaders have to choose between two equally distasteful actions. Should they keep the internet on for the sake of the economy?

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And these days, when individuals feel that their government is not providing the governance goods needed in specific domains, digital media provides the workaround. Average Americans who felt that the U.S. government was not doing enough to support the Green Movement in Iran in 2009 could dedicate their own computational resources to democracy activists. Citizens unhappy with government efforts at overseas development assistance turn to Kickstarter.com to advance their own aid priorities. The next cyberwar might be started by Bulgarian hackers, the Syrian Electronic Army, or Iranian Basiji militias, but it might also be started by Westerners using basic online tools to launch their own Twitter bots.14 Even when state failure is partial, or perhaps especially when state failure is partial, people increasingly organize to provide their own governance goods through the internet.

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See also internet of things; political internet internet exchange point, 2, 296 Internet Governance Forum, 33 internet interregnum, xxiv, 42, 66, 110, 220, 229 internet of things, xi, xix, 297; affecting current events, 142; bot usage easier in, 205; civic strategy for, xvii, 234–35, 243; civil society groups and, 202; collective action and, 111–12, 136–39; conflict in, dynamics of, 155; connective action and, 168–73; consequences of, 148–49, 219; control of, 224, 226–27; defined by communication between devices, xiv; design of, 228–29; diffusion of, 34–35; encoding with democratic virtues, 232–33; evolution of, 45–46, 65–66; expression and experimentation in, 243; governance and, 110, 119–23, 148, 157–61; growing the size of big data, 140; human security and, 65; ideological package of, 125–26; market for, 57; numbers of devices in, xi–xii; openness of, 111, 226–27; open sharing of data from, 244–46; opting out of, 246–48; political culture in, 230, 232, 233; political impact of, xiv, xxi, 65, 66, 68, 99, 174–75; as political tool, 224; preparing for, xxiii–xxiv; stability and, 68, 88, 112, 158, 253; structural threats to, 183; surveillance and censorship tasks, 223; taking on dirty networks, 99; tithing for the public good, 243–46; weakening radical ideology, 111, 123–24, 126, 133; weaponizing of, 110, 112–19 internet revolution, 60 Internet Society, 13 interoperable networks, 162 I Paid a Bribe project, 170–71 IRA (Northern Ireland), 83 Iran, 115; bots in, 205–7; developing network infrastructure, 183; doctoring images, 123–24; fighting piracy, 98; Green Movement in, 105, 115, 161, 221–22; hacking by, 40; nuclear program of, cyberattack on, 115–16; protests in, 136–37; social media of, 31, 43, 201, 220 Iraq War, 20 Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS), 81, 82, 118, 217 Islamists, moderating positions of, 131–32 Israel: cyberwarfare by, 40, 41, 154–55; Pillar of Defense assault, 59 Israeli Defense Forces, 59 Israel Security Agency, 114 ITU. See International Telecommunications Union Japan, fighting piracy, 98 Joint Threat Intelligence Group, 31 Jordan, Arab Spring in, 156 Jubilee 2000, 49–50 Karber, Phillip, 193 Kenya: Map Kibera project in, 88–91; money transfer in, 159–60; slums in, 83 Kiberia mapping project, 120 Kickstarter.com, 86, 105, 161 Kiirti platform, 171 Kissinger, Henry, 12 Kolena Laila, 76–78, 79 Kony, Joseph, 81 Kony 2012, 81 Kosovo Liberation Army, 83 Kovačič, Primož, 88, 89–91, 100 Kraken Botner, 32 Kyrgyzstan, 20 Latin America, drug wars in, 216 Lavabit, 26 Lawful Interception Gateway device, 115 Lee Hoi-chang, 128 LG televisions, 212–13 liberation technologies, 256–57 Li Chengpeng, 192–93 life expectancy, in failing and failed states, 95 Lim, Merlyna, 121 Liu Ya-Zhou, 129 Liza Alert, 170 Logic of Collective Action (Olson), 137 Lonely Planet Guide, 75 Lord’s Resistance Army, 178 Los Zetas, 216 Louis Philippe, 108 machine learning, 141 MacKinnon, Rebecca, 234 Maduro, Nicolas, 93 mafia states, 96–97 Maher, Ahmed, 136, 139, 168, 173 Malaysia: digital dilemma in, 87; elections in, 128–29; Islamists moderating message in, 132 Malaysian Airlines Flight 370, 211–12 Maldives, revolution in, 238 Mali, rebel groups in, 80–81 Maluf, Paulo, 253 malware, 30, 113–14, 115–16 Mandela, Nelson, 52 Mandiant, 38, 39 Manning, Chelsea, xxii, 235, 238 Map Kibera, 88–91 mapping, 70–71, 88–91, 101; of dirty networks, 98; refuting government claims, 176–77; social-media, 157–58 maps: disconnection with, 67; of nations, 67; political power and, 67, 101–2, 120, 160 Marco Civil, 165 marquee slums, 89 Marx, Karl, 241 McLuhan, Marshall, 16 media monopolies, 228 media use, political change and, 167 media-watchdog organizations, 56–57 Meier, Patrick, 70, 100, 239 metadata, 24, 189, 297 Mexico: bots as political tool in, 31; drug wars in, 17–22, 94, 161 Miami Herald, 181 Microsoft, xiv, 8, 248, 249; commitment to, 63–64; partnering with Egypt, 74–75; sovereignty of, 64 military: defining periods of political history, 153; losing control over technology, 118–19; media strategies of, 117 Milošević, Slobodan, 238 Mirim College, 40 mobile money, 55, 56 mobile phones: company ownership, xxiv; production of, 58; providing new political structure, 73; surveillance of, 133 Mobilization Lab, 119 modernity, 125–26 money-transfer systems, 159 Montenegro, 97 Monterrey (MX), 161; public alert system in, 120; social media in, 17–22 MOOC (massive open online course), 252 Morocco, Arab Spring in, 156 Morozov, Evgeny, 44 M-Pesa, 102–3, 105, 159–60 MS-13, 216 Mubarak, Hosni, 45, 74, 121, 221, 252 Mugabe, Robert, 92 Muhammad, Feiz, 217 Mukuru kwa Reuben, 83 Muslim Brotherhood, 131–32 Myanmar, 45; digital dilemma in, 87; organized crime in, 97.

The Bitcoin Guidebook: How to Obtain, Invest, and Spend the World's First Decentralized Cryptocurrency
by Ian Demartino
Published 2 Feb 2016

It is only when they want to move that Bitcoin out of their ChangeTip account and turn it into fiat that they have to start learning about wallets, private keys, and various other aspects of the Bitcoin ecosystem. ChangeTip isn’t the only service enabling users to contribute to their favorite content creators. Another service, ProTip, was created by Christopher Ellis and crowdfunded through Kickstarter. It intends to make accepting Bitcoin donations as simple as putting a Bitcoin address anywhere on a website. This goal is worthwhile, because one of ChangeTip’s problems is that it isn’t easy for content creators to integrate. ChangeTip is best used in environments like Reddit or Twitter where everything is set up for the user.

…

—Kevin Systrom, cofounder of Instagram One of the most interesting developments in Bitcoin has been start-up funding. Crowdfunding has taken the world by storm. It is full of success stories and industry-creating giants. Oculus, which was eventually purchased by Facebook for $2 billion and has singlehandedly resurrected the virtual reality industry, got its start on Kickstarter. Likewise, smartwatch company Pebble was so successful that companies ranging from LG to Samsung to Google and Apple got into the industry. There is also equity-based crowdfunding, which is like normal crowdfunding except the funders receive shares of the company rather than a product or one of the rewards typical in crowdfunding campaigns.

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Although I would advise you to speak to a lawyer before making any commitments to the cryptocommunity you might not legally be able to keep, I doubt the SEC is going to be too concerned with legitimate businesses raising money in a transparent and open way, especially with so many illegitimate businesses doing the same thing. However, it is definitely illegal to sell ownership of your company in any form of share or stock. For business owners in the US, offering voting rights is a viable alternative. Another alternative is to give away rewards similar to Kickstarter. The SEC doesn’t care if you give away free pizza, or whatever product you sell, to “token” holders. One of the many names Bitcoin has been given is “programmable money” and this describes a critical feature of Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies. They are more often called “the currency of the Internet.”

Super Founders: What Data Reveals About Billion-Dollar Startups
by Ali Tamaseb
Published 14 Sep 2021

There are also a few cases where billion-dollar companies were started by more than three people: 12 percent of billion-dollar companies had four co-founders; a very small percentage had five or more. These numbers are similar to those in the random group, suggesting no specific advantage or disadvantage to any of these situations, including the solo-founder scenario. Again, it’s a nonfactor. A study done by Jason Greenberg and Ethan Mollick on projects crowdfunded on Kickstarter even showed a slight advantage for solo founders.1 Projects started by solo founders were more likely to succeed as companies and had higher preorder revenues. There are some clear advantages to starting a company solo. Co-founder conflict—whether a clash of personalities, a struggle for power, or lack of a shared vision—is one of the main reasons startups fail.

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Now unemployed, he started cold-calling scientists working on the technology. One of them, Herbert Boyer, a professor at University of California, San Francisco, would end up becoming his co-founder. Boyer, a pioneer in the field of recombinant DNA, agreed to commercialize the technology. Genentech kick-started the modern biotech industry, was the first company to produce synthetic insulin for diabetic patients, and later invented many of the critical drugs patients use today.6 Genentech eventually amassed massive shareholder value and was acquired for $47 billion in 2009. Ideation is an essential part of every startup.

…

“It’s been hard; there are so few investors who can get their brain around how unique what we are doing is,” Foley said. “It’s been a head scratcher as to why they haven’t been rushing to put capital into the category.” They ended up raising a total of $3.5 million in a series A round from unknown angel groups, and another $300,000 in product preorders on Kickstarter. “Every round, for six rounds. Andreessen, Bessemer, Sequoia… they passed again and again.” It was only in the series E round—by which point Peloton’s customer base and revenue numbers were too good to ignore—that well-known VCs like Kleiner Perkins joined the mission and invested. Despite these prominent examples, fundraising was easier for many startups that eventually became billion-dollar companies.

Cloudmoney: Cash, Cards, Crypto, and the War for Our Wallets
by Brett Scott
Published 4 Jul 2022

This promise for a claim on future money is encoded in a legal contract called a share, but the company can also be charged up by promising other investors (called creditors) fixed cuts of future money, in exchange for their present money. The true lifeblood of an economy is not money but people carrying out labour. But a heart can be made to beat through an electrical shock. Once a corporation is charged up through capitalisation, it can blast that charge out through the monetary nervous system like a defibrillator kickstarting thousands of human bodies into large-scale action. This is how ten thousand labourers can be mobilised to make and assemble the components of an oil rig, and then operate it to extract the oil which their bosses can sell to customers. Those customers are a source of uncertainty because they could be poached by a rival corporation (and so managers seek to suppress costs, for example by replacing human labour with machine labour), but as the product is sold, it sends a flash of money back up the circuit.

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The net effect of this is that previously autonomous people offered their labour to a colonial force, moved away from their traditional economies, and were incorporated into the fluid trading networks that we associate with capitalism. These monetary systems dissolve smaller communities into larger networks of people who are strangers to each other. This is what kick-starts the system, and after that it can take on a life of its own. Given that production expands when small communities of people fragment into dispersed networks of strangers that specialise and trade, the state gets far more resources via these means than if it were a mere warlord pillaging subsistence farmers.

…

I tend to bypass this discussion by describing our current monetary system: money is a composite system of state and bank IOUs, activated within legal systems set within political systems, which in turn come to act as economic-network access tokens among vast interdependent networks of people. Once kick-started into life, money solidifies its strength through network effects, the situation of millions of us being interdependent, in the context of institutions that reinforce and shape that interdependence. While states and banks are the core institutions, many ‘non-bank’ systems – such as PayPal, Venmo, WeChat, M-Pesa and Paytm – can plug themselves into the banks as add-ons.

Uncomfortably Off: Why the Top 10% of Earners Should Care About Inequality
by Marcos González Hernando and Gerry Mitchell
Published 23 May 2023

Few acknowledge their luck in not having had any significant structural barriers impeding their social mobility, such as health emergencies, caring responsibilities or having to work to put food on the table. Gemma, a management consultant in her late thirties in the top 3%, does, however. She mentions that although gaining a place at university did kick-start her successful career, her “very supportive family” helped with rent during a degree internship in London. This opportunity allowed her to pursue a structured career in a large corporate firm, providing the stability she did not experience growing up. 59 Uncomfortably Off There is also little distinction between educational qualifications and the networks and social capital (private) education can provide.

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In 2018, a third of those privately renting in the UK only had £23 to spend on anything else each week after 110 Business class tickets for a sinking ship paying for their rent, gas, electricity, and food.43 And this was before COVID-19 and the cost of living crisis. The housing market continues to move further out of reach for many young people. The stamp duty holiday introduced in July 2020 to kick-start the housing market, together with increased demand for larger properties due to homeworking, has contributed to the fastest rise in house prices since 2005.44 The average age for owning your first home is now 33 and a third of those first-time owners will have had help from ‘the bank of mum and dad’, partnering or government support.45 After more than a decade of low interest rates and rising house prices following the 2008 financial crisis, the 2020s are now seeing interest rates and house prices increase – and sharply so.

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The rich emit more carbon, not only through the goods and services they consume but also through their investments. This means that high earners will have to make a greater effort at curbing emissions, but the opposite is happening. Lower-income groups are shouldering the burden as recently happened in France, where the government raised carbon taxes in a way that hit those on low incomes in rural areas, kick-starting the gilets jaunes (yellow vests) movement. One of the few interviewees who spoke at length on the climate was Jonathan, a barrister near retirement. On a gloomy note, he said: ‘The world’s collapsing. We’re at the end of our days. Global warming, rising seas, floods […] I see no remission in that.

MacroWikinomics: Rebooting Business and the World
by Don Tapscott and Anthony D. Williams
Published 28 Sep 2010

When it comes to evaluating risk, this interconnected digital crowd comprises people who are financially sophisticated and can provide the fresh and innovative insight that will clarify the questionable dealings in the financial services business. A more open and collaborative approach would restore trust in banks, kick-start venture capital, unfreeze the paralysis of lending markets, and lay a foundation for a financial service industry that continues to underpin the growth and prosperity of the world’s economies. WHERE THINGS WENT WRONG If the financial crisis taught us one thing it is that the financial service industry is absolutely at the core of our economic structures.

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The community at VenCorps (made up of thousands of entrepreneurs, scholars, scientists, angel investors, service providers, and government officials) then reviews and ranks each entry using a five-criteria weighted scorecard. During a challenge the top nine start-ups (as determined by the community) go on to the next round, where they can win an investment (typically $50,000). That may not sound like a lot in typical VC terms, but it’s enough to kick-start a small enterprise, as some of VenCorps’ early successes have demonstrated. On a sunny spring day in 2009, for example, Wise and others from VenCorps were meeting with IBM to discuss how the VenCorps platform might be used to solve some really big societal problems. Only a few days later VenCorps and IBM’s Smarter Cities program launched The Congestion Challenge, whose tagline, “Help Make Traffic History,” became a rallying cry for the VenCorps community.

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That’s the estimated size of the Linux economy, including Linux-related hardware, consumer electronics, and related services. That’s up by a factor of five since 2006 and it’s more than the GDP of some small countries like Costa Rica, Lebanon, and Bolivia. Finally, for good measure, consider two considerably smaller numbers: 0 and 1. Zero is the cost of using Linux and one is the number of people it took to kick-start this incredible process. On the Right Side of History Although much in the Linux community revolves around the persona and leadership of Linus Torvalds, the truth is that the Linux community is now a highly sophisticated organism. While Linux may not have stock options, corporate campuses, or free haircuts, its community includes a core of five thousand developers and a much broader ecosystem of users-contributors.

Lonely Planet Pocket Florence (Travel Guide)
by Planet, Lonely , Maxwell, Virginia and Williams, Nicola
Published 31 Dec 2013

Top Sights Duomo ( Click here ) Uffizi Gallery ( Click here ) Palazzo Vecchio ( Click here ) Best of Florence Eating Osteria Il Buongustai ( Click here ) Cantinetta dei Verrazzano ( Click here ) Grom ( Click here ) ‘Ino ( Click here ) Drinking Coquinarius ( Click here ) La Terrazza ( Click here ) Gucci Museo Caffè ( Click here ) Obikà ( Click here ) Le Renaissance Café ( Click here ) Caffè Rivoire ( Click here ) Gilli ( Click here ) Getting There From Piazza della Stazione Walk southeast along Via de’ Panzani and Via de’ Cerretani and you will find yourself at the duomo. From here, Piazza della Signoria and the Uffizi Gallery are a short walk south down Via dei Calzaluoli. The Sights in a Day Kick-start the day on Piazza della Repubblica with a quick breakfast at the Liberty-style bar in Gilli ( Click here ), then walk to the Uffizi, pausing to admire the exquisite sculpted facade of Chiesa e Museo Orsanmichele ( Click here ) en route. Devote the morning to world-class art at the Uffizi Gallery ( Click here ).

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Top Sights Piazza dei Miracoli ( Click here ) Best of Florence Art Museo Nazionale di San Matteo ( Click here ) Museo dell’Opera del Duomo ( Click here ) Battistero ( Click here ) Eating Osteria Bernardo ( Click here ) Il Montino ( Click here ) Il Crudo ( Click here ) Drinking Keith ( Click here ) Sottobosco ( Click here ) Salza ( Click here ) Getting There Train Regular services leave Florence (€7, 1¼ hours) for the conveniently located Pisa Centrale station. Car Take the toll-free SCG FI-PI-LI (SS67) from Florence. Street parking costs €2 per hour, but you must be careful to stay outside the city’s Limited Traffic Zone (ZTL). There’s a free car park outside the zone on Lungarno Guadalongo. The Sights in a Day Kick-start your Pisan peregrination in Borgo Stretto, the city’s medieval heart, with a coffee and sweet treat at the bar of historic Salza ( Click here ). Then wander alongside the Arno to visit the Museo Nazionale di San Matteo ( Click here ) with its rich collection of painting and sculpture from the Tuscan school.

Straphanger
by Taras Grescoe
Published 8 Sep 2011

Moses-era regulations requiring new construction to include off-street parking spaces still prevail—and the more parking there is, the more people tend to drive. Over Sadik-Khan’s shoulder I could see the rusting piers of the Brooklyn waterfront and the multiple lanes of traffic on the Bronx-Queens Expressway, a Moses project that kick-started the decline of the Red Hook neighborhood. “We’ve stopped looking at the streets as these utilitarian, 1950s-style corridors for moving cars as fast as possible. We really look at them as valuable public spaces. In many ways, the Department of Transportation is the largest real estate developer in New York City.”

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It all started with a pair of visionary mayors, the likes of which no North American city has ever seen. But it never would have happened if it weren’t for that most maligned of vehicles, the humble city bus. The Subway on the Street I had a confession to make to Carlos Pardo, who had volunteered to introduce me to the system that kick-started the transformation of Bogotá. “I don’t like buses,” I told him. “Actually, I hate them.” I laid out my objections. While there is something aristocratic about riding the rails, in most of North America a ride on a standard-issue city bus is a second-class experience. After being forced to wait outside, in all kinds of weather—or, at best, in some malodorous Plexiglas shelter—you pay for the privilege of boarding the slowest, bulkiest vehicle on the road, one whose progress is impeded by every double-parked car and FedEx truck with its flashers on.

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To really bloom, all that the City of Roses needs is a little more tolerance for density in its core, policies—like higher parking rates—that discourage drivers from bringing cars downtown, and for TriMet to pay a little more attention to the way it irrigates intact traditional neighborhoods with buses, streetcars, and light rail. But if Portlanders really want to kick-start the process, they need only look 300 miles to the north, to a Canadian city that has lately become a transit metropolis on overdrive. “Vancouverism,” for Better and Worse It’s hard not to see Vancouver, British Columbia, and Portland, Oregon, as the long-lost twins of Cascadia, separated when they were still young.

A History of Modern Britain
by Andrew Marr
Published 2 Jul 2009

Millington, standing for Common Wealth and supported by local vicars, had fought a remarkably aggressive campaign whose tone can be summarized by a banner he put up in the middle of the market town which read, ‘This is a Fight between Christ and Churchill.’ By 1945, there was a whiff of Oliver Cromwell in the air. The Labour conference which kick-started the election campaign one hot afternoon in Blackpool is still remembered for the youth of the delegates. Denis Healey was there, in battledress and beret, fresh from the battlefront in Italy, preaching red-hot socialist revolution. Across Europe the upper classes were ‘selfish, depraved, dissolute and decadent’ he told the cheering hall.

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In effect, the weaker British economy was subsidizing the fast-growing West German one because of the huge expenditure on the British Army of the Rhine. The entirely predictable result of the balance of payments gap was that the pound was under constant pressure. There were periodic devaluations which damaged the reputation of the politicians in charge at the time – though the 1949 Labour devaluation is widely credited with kick-starting the Tory good times which followed. Trying to maintain British power through the sterling area (not just most of the Old Commonwealth, except Canada, but other countries including most of Scandinavia and traditional trading partners such as Portugal) meant that defending the value of the pound was an issue inflamed by pride and political sensitivity.

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The harnessing of youth spirit for maximum commercial return proved as tricky and unstable as the early days of harnessing nuclear fission – though it was finally achieved by the eighties, when the death of punk allowed entirely commercial and packaged pop unquestioned dominance. In the early days it was not always quite as obvious that money would always trump vitality. There were still battles to be had. The Who was a west London band which had, like so many others, emerged from skiffle and been kick-started by the success of the Beatles. They were encouraged by their manager, Peter Meadon, to dress stylishly and address themselves to the new audience of Mods. But their violence and guitar-smashing, while delighting their live audience, kept them away from mainstream venues for ages. Throughout a stellar career during which they gave the Beatles a run for their money in the concept-album stakes, the Who were never properly tamed.

Ground Control: Fear and Happiness in the Twenty First Century City
by Anna Minton
Published 24 Jun 2009

Because much of the area remained among the poorest and most deprived in Britain, the gates and high security were marketed to offer reassurance to the finance professionals who were the pioneers of the new economy, living on the frontline. For Mrs Thatcher and Michael Heseltine, who was instrumental in kick-starting Docklands as secretary of state for environment, the deprivation of the area was a central justification for what was being created. The development slotted in perfectly with one of the defining concepts of Thatcherite economics: ‘trickle-down’. This is the idea that the creation of wealth in an area will ‘trickle down’ to the poorer parts which need it the most.

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He replied that they should be put in a concrete bunker underneath the West-way, the flyover through London, and left there. Most people in the audience thought his comment was a joke and didn’t take it seriously. Joking apart, Frank Field has always been something of a soothsayer for New Labour; his thinking in the mid 1990s was instrumental in kick-starting the whole approach towards antisocial behaviour. Field’s comments about concrete bunkers and his suggestions for the police to act as ‘surrogate parents’ reveal the extent to which these policies are underpinned by a philosophy of control and exclusion. The consequence of excluding problem families from social housing is the creation of ghettoes of terrible conditions described in the last chapter.

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There is one man who is able to generate real excitement in places. Eric Reynolds is a property developer with a difference. With his shock of blond hair and well-cut suits, he is known to be a shrewd businessman who is not shy of making money. He also knows a thing or two about creating cutting-edge places and was responsible for kick-starting the transformation of Camden Town in the 1970s by setting up the market at Camden Lock and the rock venue Dingwalls. Later he painted the shopping centre at the Elephant and Castle pink and was at the heart of the campaign to save Spitalfields, the east London market on the border with the City.

Ten Technologies to Save the Planet: Energy Options for a Low-Carbon Future
by Chris Goodall
Published 1 Jan 2010

One of wind’s primary but often underestimated virtues is that it delivers electricity without such financial volatility. The output of a wind farm may be uncertain, but the cost is not. And, of course, wind power is independent of political intervention—countries that invest in wind are less reliant on the two or three countries that provide much of the world’s natural gas. KICK-STARTING AN INDUSTRY Denmark began to build substantial numbers of wind turbines in the 1990s and became the first nation to generate a significant fraction of its electricity from this source. The early years were characterized by the installation of hundreds of what are now considered very small turbines.

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If we can completely charge a car battery in five minutes, we will simply get used to driving into a “filling” station, plugging the car in, and having a coffee. And if electric cars remain too expensive because of the up-front cost of the battery, then car-leasing companies will come forward to offer better financing terms. The world may not need Shai Agassi’s scheme for kick-starting the electric revolution after all. CARS AND THE GRID The way to battery-based driving will encounter substantial obstacles, but the economic and environmental arguments are too compelling for the electric car not to eventually win the day. Electric cars will save drivers money and, with private cars and light commercial vehicles responsible for 20 percent of European carbon dioxide emissions and more in the U.S., they represent a big step forward on the road to a low-carbon future.

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He says that by the end of this century, we could capture 9.5 billion tons of carbon each year simply by adopting biochar manufacture on a large scale in tropical agricultural systems. This figure is striking; if we achieved this level of carbon capture today, atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide would be falling. KICK-STARTING THE BIOCHAR REVOLUTION What do we need to do to get meaningful amounts of biochar into the world’s soils? In countries where we can install substantial numbers of large-scale plants, such as those that BEST Energies or EPRIDA will produce, all we probably need is for governments to acknowledge that biochar should be included in carbon trading schemes.

Beginners: The Joy and Transformative Power of Lifelong Learning
by Tom Vanderbilt
Published 5 Jan 2021

Sites like CourseHorse and ClassPass provide a marketplace for lessons (an online version of the posters for guitar and Spanish lessons that have long adorned coffee-shop bulletin boards). Maker spaces like Portland’s ADX and Chicago’s Lost Arts give people the space and tools to let them play around with serious machines and ask their neighbors for advice. Charles Adler, who co-founded Kickstarter before opening Lost Arts, told me the name comes not from looking back to the past but from the chance to “lose yourself in self-discovery.” He’d been motivated by the experience of trying to build furniture to house his DJ equipment. He had an idea but like many novices struggled to get to the next step.

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He had to navigate slowly, deliberately, sometimes to the impatience of passersby who saw no visible reason why this fit young man shouldn’t be moving faster. He found himself in support groups mostly populated by stroke victims, where he was the youngest member by decades. A few weeks in, his speech therapist suggested singing might help. Among other things, the rhythm and slower articulation of singing seem to help kick-start the flow of speech. And so, much as I had done, he went to the internet and found Britpop. He and his future wife, a shoe designer named Roz, joined up (Roz, who came to support Adrian, has since become a dedicated member, even if, as she jokingly insists, she cannot sing). Amid a heavy schedule of chemotherapy, among all his other therapies, he was now singing Oasis, with people.

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it’s often “preserved” in the face: One study, for example, found that in twenty-four patients with Broca’s aphasia twenty-one had the “capacity to sing in some degree.” See A. Yamadori et al., “Preservation of Singing in Broca’s Aphasia,” Journal of Neurology, Neurosurgery, and Psychiatry 40, no. 3 (1977): 221–24. As Oliver Sacks suggests: Oliver Sacks, Musicophilia (New York: Vintage Books, 2007), 240. kick-start the flow of speech: See Benjamin Stahl, “Facing the Music: Three Issues in Current Research on Singing and Aphasia,” Frontiers in Psychology, Sept. 23, 2014. “Lombard effect”: See Steven Tonkinson, “The Lombard Effect in Choral Singing,” Journal of Voice 8, no. 1 (1994): 24–29. “Choral directors are from Mars”: See Sharon Hansen et al., “On the Voice: Choral Directors Are from Mars and Voice Teachers Are from Venus,” Choral Journal 52, no. 9 (2012): 51–58.

How to Spend a Trillion Dollars
by Rowan Hooper
Published 15 Jan 2020

Nor does it help that Musk likes to talk about establishing colonies on Mars, and ‘conquering’ the Moon. The language is inflammatory to some because it recalls the evils of imperial colonisation and slavery. He also suggested we nuke Mars – presumably at the poles, to melt the ice there and warm the planet, in order to kick-start the terraforming process. It’s unclear if he’s behaving like an amped-up Bond villain to irritate his critics, or if he really wants to nuke Mars.* Either way, we can do it differently. As it happens, a group of entrepreneurs and former NASA scientists calling themselves the Open Lunar Foundation have similar ideas – we will end up collaborating with them.1 Some reasons put forward for space travel, not mutually exclusive, are: to do science; to explore; to save the Earth’s environment; to start independent human settlements; as insurance against catastrophe; to make fabulous amounts of money; to go for glory; to go for greed.

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I would like to argue that there’s nothing wrong with mining dead asteroids and even the Moon, but then we thought there was nothing wrong with ploughing the rainforest and farming cattle on an industrial scale. As a society we actually still accept those destructive processes. My impulsive response to those who want to exploit the Moon is: go for it, better there than Mars, which may well contain archaeological evidence of past life and may even harbour existing life forms. Once we’ve kickstarted the process of settlement, it should become self-sustaining. Phil Metzger and Julie Brisset of the Florida Space Institute have modelled the business case for setting up a water-mining operation on the Moon, aimed at producing rocket fuel which could be sold at space stations in low Earth orbit.

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We will give $100 million to the company that can create new sorbents that can fix and release carbon dioxide without the expensive heating process currently required, and that can fix a tonne of CO2 for $200. Additionally we will offer $100 million to the first company able to remove and safely bury 100,000 tonnes of CO2 in a year. $ $ $ OUR ROLE IS TO KICK-START the carbon-capture business, to scale it up, and get it down in price, so that governments can take over. If DAC can deliver at a cost of less than $100 a tonne, which is not impossible to imagine, then it may be that it can be financed through taxation. Some useful provisions already exist. In 2018, the United States launched a tax scheme called 45Q that pays $50 per tonne for companies to bury carbon dioxide underground.

The Flat White Economy
by Douglas McWilliams
Published 15 Feb 2015

Manchester Science Parks (MSP) boast of five locations and 150 science and tech companies across the Greater Manchester region including the ‘Corridor’ centred around Oxford Road, traditionally the university sector in the city. In addition the £950 million MediaCityUK development in Salford was kick-started by the move of some BBC personnel and functions to Salford. Cebr’s report for the Glasgow Chambers of Commerce on the Glasgow media cluster36 showed that a third of all the Scottish jobs in media were based in Glasgow with over 100 production companies and 300 facilities operators, whose combined turnover is about £1.2 billion annually.

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We have seen from the analysis in Chapter 6 that if London does badly, it is not necessarily to the advantage of other parts of the UK because slower growth in London would be likely also to lead to slower growth of complementary activity in other parts of the UK. But more importantly, slower growth in London would reduce the ability to use the model of recycling the £39 billion surplus of tax over expenditure in London (nearer £50 billion if commuters are taken into account) to kick-start the economies of other regions. The public finances model that developed particularly under Gordon Brown (both as Chancellor and Prime Minister) was to use the surplus taxation raised in London to finance public spending in other regions. This could to some extent alleviate some of the deprivation that existed outside London.

The End of Jobs: Money, Meaning and Freedom Without the 9-To-5
by Taylor Pearson
Published 27 Jun 2015

I had grown the eCommerce business, which sold fold up, portable bars to caterers and hotels, by 527% over the same two-year period that wages for jobs in the U.S. were growing 0.5% per year. Jimmy was back, and Doug had quit his job in New Zealand. The travel shirt idea had been put on hold—getting shirts custom tailored in the Philippines is easier said than done. Instead, they had raised $341,393 through a Kickstarter campaign for their Minaal travel backpack at the end of 2013 in just thirty days, so they’d shifted focus to the faster growing product line. Jesse Lawler was back. His freelance software development had grown from a one-man show into a software development agency for iPhone Apps, run from his house in Vietnam.

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Jimmy and Doug from Minaal wanted to make a stylish travel bag specifically for entrepreneurs, something that was both practical and would look good in a board room. They were able to find one of the best bag factories in the world, have their prototypes made for free, and then pre-sell the product using Kickstarter, a crowdfunding platform. Ten years ago, companies that sold products in the U.S. would never announce who their suppliers were overseas for fear that competitors would use them. That’s starting to break down. Most suppliers are listed on the internet on sites like Alibaba.com and easy to find.

Start It Up: Why Running Your Own Business Is Easier Than You Think
by Luke Johnson
Published 31 Aug 2011

And there is equity backing out there: if professional investors won’t give it to you, there are all sorts of pockets of institutional and private cash for a sound project, from government agencies to angel investors. It has never been easy to tap these sources of finance, so you need to be good – and persistent. Howard Schultz, founder of Starbucks, did more than 240 presentations to raise the early-stage funding to really kick-start his coffee-bar chain. A second imagined obstacle is income: people get addicted to a nice safe salary as an employee, and are unwilling to give it up for the uncertainties of the entrepreneurial life. It is true that plenty of the self-employed earn less than they would working for others – and may put in longer hours.

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In 1902, Dr Willis Carrier, an engineer recently out of Cornell University earning just $10 a week, invented a mechanism he called process cooling, for use in a printing plant in Brooklyn. Reputedly he had his brainwave while waiting for his train on a cold, foggy night. He patented his ‘Apparatus for Testing Air’ four years later – and kick-started an entire industry. Carrier employed a centrifugal system that used the evaporation of a refrigerant liquid to cool and dehumidify the environment. Carrier was a classic American man of action. He said: ‘I fish only for edible fish, and hunt only for edible game, even in the laboratory.’ Remarkably, the business he founded remains the world leader today, a division of United Technologies Corporation with annual sales of $11 billion.

New Year, Same Trash: Resolutions I Absolutely Did Not Keep
by Samantha Irby
Published 24 Jan 2017

I would always feel kind of guilty about it, but none of those assholes ever wanted to see me in the flesh anyway, and now that I’ve moved to Michigan we all can breathe a little easier and stop feeling bad for making plans we never intended to keep. I love them and everything, but can’t you just post a picture of what you’d wear if we actually did meet up to chill, so I can keep these pajamas on and continue mainlining these old episodes of 30 Rock?! 14. Support the art of people I love. Thankfully a lot of my artist friends made Kickstarters and sold things I could buy over the internet without ever having to interact with another human being, so this was easy for me. 15. Make good on all those tentative brunch plans. But I don’t like getting out of bed. Or going anywhere. Or watching people I would rather occasionally interact with on Twitter eat soft eggs.

Data for the Public Good
by Alex Howard
Published 21 Feb 2012

That has already happened with weather data and with America’s GPS satellite-navigation system that was opened for full commercial use a decade ago. And many firms make a good living out of searching for or repackaging patent filings.” As Clive Thompson reported at Wired last year, public sector data can help fuel jobs, and “shoving more public data into the commons could kick-start billions in economic activity.” In the transportation sector, for instance, transit data is open government fuel for economic growth. There is a tremendous amount of work ahead in building upon the foundations that civil society has constructed over decades. If you want a deep look at what the work of digitizing data really looks like, read Carl Malamud’s interview with Slashdot on opening government data.

No Is Not Enough: Resisting Trump’s Shock Politics and Winning the World We Need
by Naomi Klein
Published 12 Jun 2017

Fail again. Fail better” as a lighthearted motto. I’ve always liked the attitude; we can’t be perfect, we won’t always win, but we should strive to improve. The trouble is, Beckett’s dictum doesn’t work for climate—not at this stage in the game. If we keep failing to lower emissions, if we keep failing to kick-start the transition in earnest away from fossil fuels and to an economy based on renewables, if we keep dodging the question of wasteful consumption and the quest for more and more and bigger and bigger, there won’t be more opportunities to fail better. Nearly everything is moving faster than the climate change modeling projected, including Arctic sea-ice loss, ice-sheet collapse, ocean warming, sea-level rise, and coral bleaching.

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It was these same systems of human ranking that were deployed to justify the mass kidnapping, shackling, and torturing of other humans in order to force them to work that stolen land—which led the late political theorist Cedric Robinson to describe the market economy that gave birth to the United States not simply as capitalism but as “racial capitalism.” The cotton and sugar picked by enslaved Africans was the fuel that kick-started the Industrial Revolution. The ability to discount darker people and darker nations in order to justify stealing their land and labor was foundational, and none of it would have been possible without those theories of racial supremacy that gave the whole morally bankrupt system a patina of legal respectability.

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— I will never forget the experience of being at the main camp when the news arrived, after the months of resistance, that the Obama administration had finally denied the pipeline permit. I happened to be standing with Tokata Iron Eyes, a fiercely grounded yet playful thirteen-year-old from Standing Rock who had helped kick-start the movement against the pipeline. I turned on my phone video and asked her how she felt about the breaking news. “Like I have my future back,” she replied, and then she burst into tears. I did too. Thanks to Trump, Tokata has again lost that sense of safety. And yet his action cannot and does not erase the profound learning that took place during all those months on the land.

Reimagining Capitalism in a World on Fire
by Rebecca Henderson
Published 27 Apr 2020

Benefit corporations must also produce an auditable report every year detailing their progress toward generating the public benefit they have promised to create. You can incorporate as a benefit corporation in thirty-six US states81—including Delaware, and there are at least 3,500 benefit corporations in operation, including Kickstarter, Patagonia, Danone, Eileen Fisher, and Seventh Generation.82 Choosing to incorporate as a benefit corporation offers a number of tangible advantages to firms hoping to make the world a better place. It makes clear that neither the directors nor the managers have a legal responsibility to maximize shareholder value.

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Since 2010 Tesla’s efforts have helped to drop the price of battery storage by at least 73 percent.96 New farming technologies introduced by firms like Jain Irrigation and John Deere are rapidly becoming industry standard, making it cost effective for many farmers to use water and fertilizer much more efficiently.97 Sometimes the innovation is not technological, per se. Solar City, for example, pioneered a new model of financing solar panels that greatly expanded demand and saw the idea spread across the industry.98 Firms can thus help to kick-start a number of reinforcing processes that have the potential to drive change at scale. By demonstrating a new business model—and in the process potentially driving down costs and persuading consumers to demand it—they can push competitors to adopt the same practice, diffusing it widely across the industry.

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—Hiro Mizuno, executive managing director and chief investment officer, GPIF “Capitalism as we know it has gotten us this far, but to take the next steps forward as a society and species we need new ways of seeing and acting on our world. That’s exactly what Rebecca Henderson’s book helps us do. This is a smart, timely, and much-needed reimagining of what capitalism can be.” —Yancey Strickler, cofounder and former CEO, Kickstarter, and author of This Could Be Our Future: A Manifesto for a More Generous World “A breakthrough book, beautifully written, combining deep humanity, sharp intellect, and a thorough knowledge of business. It rigorously dismantles old arguments about why capitalism can’t be transformed and will reach people who haven’t yet connected with the need for deep change.”

One Click: Jeff Bezos and the Rise of Amazon.com
by Richard L. Brandt
Published 27 Oct 2011

It’s not exactly something to help sell books, at least not in the short run. But because bad reviews were allowed as well as good, customers learned they could rely on Amazon.com to point them to books that wouldn’t disappoint them—at least to a certain extent. Friends and family of authors often help out with reviews on Amazon to help kick-start sales. Negative reviews are usually genuine, unless posted by an author with a competing title. Very early on, Bezos started adding best-seller lists on Amazon. By 1998, Amazon customers could see where books ranked on any of two thousand different lists. One of Bezos’s favorite stories is that of a book called Endurance, by Alfred Lansing.

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While Apple and Google waited for the record labels to decide if they would license music for streaming, Bezos decided to take a chance, launch the service first, and ask for permission later. By storing the music online, people can access it from any device. Amazon will charge $20 per year for twenty gigabytes of storage space. (Google charges $5 for the same amount of storage, but not for music files.) Amazon is kick-starting the service by offering up to five gigabytes for free, or twenty gigabytes for free for one year for anyone who buys an album from its MP3 3 store. As of early 2011, Bezos would only say that there are “hundreds of thousands” of customers using Amazon Web Services. Wall Street analysts estimate it will be a $750 million business for Amazon in 2011, and $2.5 billion in 2014.

Big Mistakes: The Best Investors and Their Worst Investments
by Michael Batnick
Published 21 May 2018

Sacca became a billionaire in under 10 years and before the age of 40 because he is an expert at spotting unicorns, private companies that have reached the $1 billion valuation mark. Lowercase Capital was one of the first investors in Uber, putting $300,000 into the concept. Recently, it owned as much as 4% of the company, giving the fund a 5,000 bagger.7 Some of Sacca's other home runs include Instagram, Uber, Kickstarter, Slack, Automattic (WordPress parent company), Twilio, and most notably, Twitter. By the time of the initial public offering, he and Sacca's funds had accumulated 18% of the company. He originally invested in Twitter at a $5 million valuation,8 and it's currently valued at $15 billion, giving Sacca a 3,000 bagger.

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Penney, Ackman targeting, 90 Jobs, Steve, 148 Johnson, Edward, 68, 69 Johnson, Ned, 69 Jonas, Stan, 39 Jones, Paul Tudor, 15, 52, 103, 119, 159 Jordan, Michael, 105 JP Morgan, liquidity, 19 Kahneman, Daniel, 5, 15, 75, 87 Kahn, Irving, 4 Keller, Helen, 31 Kennedy Slide, The, 70 Keynes, John Maynard, 117, 121, 157 education, 122 endowment fund control, 123 First Bursar, 123 Kickstarter, Sacca investment, 149 King's College assets, decline, 126 endowment, 123–124 Estates Committee memo, 125 Klarman, Seth, 57 Knetsch, Jack Louis, 75 Kovner, Bruce, 103 Krass, Peter, 27 Kuwait, pension fund, 40 Leverage, impact, 41 Lewis, Michael, 39 Listerine, comparison, 91 Little Book of Common Sense Investing, The, (Bogle), 159 Livermore, Jesse (JL), 13, 15–16 bankruptcy, 21 Boy Plunger, 18, 20 lesson, 22 rebound, 19 windfall, evaporation, 18 Loeb, Dan, 92 Long‐Term Capital Management (LTCM), 104 arbitrage strategies, 41 fall, 42 Federal Reserve Bank of New York takeover, 42 founding, 38–39 problems, Russia (impact), 41 success, 40–41 Long‐term investment program, building, 62 Loomis, Carol, 40, 41 “Loser's Game, The” (Ellis), 38 Lowell Shoe, 80 Lowenstein, Roger, 4, 7, 68 Lowercase Capital, 149 Macro traders, problems, 103 Manhattan Fund (Tsai), 69, 71 Margin of safety, 5, 8 Market capitalization, 7 growth, 120 psychological forces, impact, 124 Market participants, stock motivation, 109 Market Wizards (Schwager), 159 Markowitz, Harry, 147, 152 Marron, Donald, 40 Marx, Karl, 4 Mauboussin, Michael, 38, 100, 131 MBIA, Inc.

Startupland: How Three Guys Risked Everything to Turn an Idea Into a Global Business
by Mikkel Svane and Carlye Adler
Published 13 Nov 2014

GigaOM got back to us pretty quickly and asked for an exclusive. We were thrilled. Om Malik did the interview himself. Then, right before it ran, TechCrunch reached out. “We want to run this story. Give us the details.” Christoph wrote back, “You didn’t respond, so we gave the story to Om Malik.” That kick-started an exchange with Michael Arrington that had me shaking in my sneakers. “Don’t ever email me again,” Arrington wrote. I tried to step in and smooth things over between Christoph and Arrington, emailing some funny remarks. They were no better received. “Take me off your email list,” Arrington responded.

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It was a very creative phase: No investors, no upset customers, no VC pressure.” Michael Hansen is still one of my best friends. He very much personifies the original soul of Zendesk and is still with us, now based in Australia, or is it Hong Kong? Michael is still a gypsy. Over three years he traveled the APAC region and kick-started our operations from Melbourne to Manila to Tokyo. He’s not the biggest fan of bureaucracy, processes, and all the other big company stuff, and he struggles with some of the elements of growth. But things change all the time in a 180 Page 180 Svane bother03.tex V3 - 10/24/2014 10:53 P.M. Epilogue company that is growing quickly, and that is not always easy.

Terms of Service: Social Media and the Price of Constant Connection
by Jacob Silverman
Published 17 Mar 2015

Memes, then, are what happens when one greedy industry meets another.” In other words, social networks play favorites, while PR companies, producers, journalists, and others have the power to influence what rises to the top. A video featured on YouTube’s home page will accrue tens or hundreds of thousands of views simply by virtue of being placed there. Kickstarter, an ostensibly meritocratic crowdfunding platform, regularly features selected projects in its newsletter and on its home page. Such a distinction can bring thousands of dollars into a project’s coffers, which is often the difference between achieving a fund-raising goal—and being seen as a success—and walking away with nothing.

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It was then that Ruckus—who, in his initial post, said that a threesome was “perhaps one of the greatest things imaginable (right behind midget tossing)”—said that he would institute a mechanism to allow the group members to vote on who would complete the threesome. Ruckus threw in some sweeteners (today, on Kickstarter, this would be known as adding a “stretch goal”). If the group reached 300,000 members, his girlfriend would let him take and share pictures of the event. And if the group became the largest on Facebook—surpassing the 850,000-member group that at the time was the site’s largest—then, there’d be a video in it for all of Ruckus’s new fans.

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Then we sit in judgment, parsing their tweets or postings, moving them up or down in a mental hierarchy, deciding if they’re still worthy of following. We decide whether to heart Tumblr posts or repin their image, with each decision point serving as a critical judgment, a de facto review, one that might improve their ranking on Klout or Favstar. We rate their ideas on Kickstarter, and if we deem them worthy, we donate and share the listing. We endorse colleagues on LinkedIn and request endorsements from others. On dating apps such as Tinder, we rate on a simple binary, swiping away those we don’t want to meet and hearting those we do. On many commenting platforms, we rate other comments and give stars or other plaudits to individual commenters.

Facebook: The Inside Story
by Steven Levy
Published 25 Feb 2020

At one point, Luckey said he was thinking of just doing his headset with some friends as a Kickstarter project. (Kickstarter was a site where people could conditionally pay for new products that would only exist if funding goals were met.) But he didn’t even have any working prototypes of his own technology anymore. Iribe wrote him a check for $3,700 for the parts. That impressed Luckey, who shook hands. They were in business, along with Iribe’s friends. By July 4, Luckey had built the headsets to give Iribe his first demo. The demo made Iribe nauseated, but he was famously prone to motion sickness. The Kickstarter run would be more professional, manufactured in bulk in China.

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The Kickstarter went live on August 1, 2012. If the sum from prospective buyers reached $250,000, the project would proceed. Oculus made its goal in two hours. A few days later, when the amount hit $2,427,429, they finally stopped taking money. By then professional investors were making bids. Oculus wound up raising $16 million in its “A” round. By late 2013, Oculus was coping with classic start-up problems of developing a product while trying to manage a ballooning workforce. It had only thirty employees but was planning to triple its size in order to fulfill the now-delayed Kickstarter orders.

The Network Imperative: How to Survive and Grow in the Age of Digital Business Models
by Barry Libert and Megan Beck
Published 6 Jun 2016

When it comes to savings accounts, millennials are turning to digital-only banks such as Fidor, companies that go as far as to provide outside developers with APIs (application programming interfaces), which give developers tools to interface with the banks’ software source code to let them innovate the banks’ platforms. Those in need of loans can crowd-source via Kickstarter or Lending Club. This trend is even moving beyond the individual. Many small businesses have turned to Square or ApplePay to take credit and debit card payments. The rise of network orchestration as a business model for financial services has led to great opportunities for customer self-service, peer-to-peer interaction, and collective collaboration.

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See also big data; data collection; intellectual capital subscription model using, 80 Innocentive, 15, 73 innovation Google and, 167–168, 183, 190 new core beliefs needed for, 196–197 in open organizations, 116, 118 Instagram, 21, 42, 60, 78, 79, 143 intangible assets big data collection from, 100 categories of, 41–42 digital technology for producing, 42, 45 importance of shifting to, 46 inventory of, 144–145 management practices for, 42–44 market valuation of tangible versus, 40, 46 move from tangible assets to, 44–45 questions to ask about, 44–45 integration, 31, 98–99, 100 intellectual capital business model based on, 15, 132 digital networks and, 12 as intangible asset, 41–42 inventory of, 126, 144, 145, 146, 148–149, 163 market valuation related to, 40 mental model values on, 138 network orchestrators’ use of, 15 network platforms and, 159 internet of things, 30, 32, 101, 148, 162 Inventory step in PIVOT, 126, 144–153 asset types included in, 145, 146 Enterprise Community Partners example for, 152–153 goal of, 144–145 of human capital assets, 147–148 of intellectual capital assets, 148–149 of network capital assets, 149–151 of physical capital assets, 147 possible gaps during process of, 151 task force team needed for, 145–147 iPads, 30 iSentium, 98 JPMorgan Chase, 133 Jobs, Steve, 62 John Deere & Company, 101 Joint Special Operations Task Force, 55–56 Kalanick, Travis, 85, 197 Kashi, 103–104, 105 Kellogg Company, 103–104, 105 key performance indicators (KPIs), 20, 96, 135 Kickstarter, 130 King, Mark, 73 Knudstorp, Jørgen Vig, 67, 68 Kodak, 46, 49–50, 54 law of increasing returns, 12 leaders and leadership, 27, 55–63 accessibility of, 60 assessing business model with, 131 big data use and, 100 capital allocation strategy and, 49, 50, 51, 53 change leader in PIVOT process and, 132 decision making and, 61 employee loyalty and, 57 individual personality characteristics and, 61–62 Joint Special Operations Task Force example of, 55–56 Kellogg’s purchase of Kashi and, 103–104 mismatch between employees, customers, and networks and, 104–105 move from commander to co-creator in, 56, 59–61, 71 network orchestrator business model and, 23–24 new environment requiring changes in, 58–59 open organizations and, 114, 115, 116 Pinpointing mental models of, in PIVOT process, 137–139 relationship changes affecting, 56–58 scoring your company on, 121–122 shared vision and, 61 skills evaluation of, 138 value creation and, 62–63 values evaluation of, 138 legacy firms best practices of, compared with network companies, 20 business model adoption by, 23 importance of moving to digital technology by, 34–35 Lego Group, 67–68, 70, 72, 73 Lending Club, 130 Lenovo, 48, 50 Levinson, Sara, 109 Li & Fung, 110 LinkedIn, 8, 10, 15, 21, 44, 79, 80, 87, 91, 97, 107, 160, 171, 174, 199 loyalty to brands, 57, 58 of customers, 41, 65–66, 71, 76, 97–98, 194 of employees, 57, 97 of networks, 10, 158, 174, 180 loyalty programs, 80, 81, 96, 97–98, 100, 110, 174 L2 Digital IQ Index, 110 Ludwig, Terri, 128, 140, 141, 163, 164, 183, 184 Lundgren, Terry, 110 Lyft, 44, 113–114, 155, 197 Macy’s, 109–110, 144 management practices big data analysis and use and, 100–101 for intangible assets, 42–44 management team business model assessment and, 131 See also leaders and leadership Mankiw, Gregory, 49 market valuation business model comparison for, 18–19 capital allocation strategy and, 53–54 of tangible versus intangible assets, 40, 46 mass career customization, 91 Match.com, 15, 21, 41 McChrystal, Stanley, 55–56, 58 McKinsey & Company, 50, 51, 52, 106, 199 McRaney, David, 191–192 measurement, 28, 95–102 Dickey’s Barbecue Pit example of use of, 95–96 external data in, 97–98 goals of, 99–100 move from accounting to big data in, 99–101 new kinds of assets requiring new approaches to, 96–97 scoring your company on, 121–122 timeliness of data in, 98–99 Mellendick, Craig, 140, 152 mental models.

Soonish: Ten Emerging Technologies That'll Improve And/or Ruin Everything
by Kelly Weinersmith and Zach Weinersmith
Published 16 Oct 2017

Brockman. New York: Harper Perennial, 2014a. Vrije Universiteit Science. “Robot Baby Project by Prof.dr. A.E. Eiben on evolving robots / The Evolution of Things.” May 26, 2016. youtube.com/watch?v=BfcVSb-Q8ns. Wang, Brian. “$250,000 Slingatron Kickstarter.” NextBigFuture. July 29, 2013. nextbigfuture.com/2013/07/250000-slingatron-kickstarter.html. Wei, F., Wang, G.-D., Kerchner, G. A., Kim, S. J., Xu, H.-M., Chen, Z.-F., and Zhuo, M. “Genetic Enhancement of Inflammatory Pain by Forebrain NR2B Overexpression.” Natural Neuroscience 4, no 2 (2001):164–69. Werfel, Justin. “Building Structures with Robot Swarms.”

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Another type of RNA (transfer RNA) brings amino acids over to the ribosome, attaching them to the appropriate sticky spots. Each amino acid is then chemical bonded to the amino acid next to it, forming a long chain. When you assemble these amino acids in a certain order, they fold up into the complex shapes that allow proteins to move around, kick-start chemical reactions, and do all sorts of other tricks needed so that you can continue to do things like eat chips or yell at the news. Okay, so that’s a little complicated. Let’s use an analogy. Think of your DNA as the library of information for how to make machines. In this analogy, if you opened the book of DNA at a random place it might say something like “TNOIJ, EVLAV, POTS, SNEL, EBUT, SNEL, EBUT, TRATS, EVLAV, GNIR, SNEL . . .” and so on for many thousands of pages.

The Golden Thread: How Fabric Changed History
by Kassia St Clair
Published 3 Oct 2018

Sue, ‘Captive Breeding and Husbandry of the Golden Orb Weaver Nephila Inaurata Madagascariensis at Woodland Park Zoo’, Terrestrial Invertebrate Taxon Advisory Group, 2014 <http://www.titag.org/2014/2014papers/GOLDENORBSUEANDERSEN.pdf> [accessed 3 January 2017] An Individual’s Guide to Climatic Injury (Ministry of Defence, 2016) ‘A Norse-Viking Ship’, the Newcastle Weekly Courant (Newcastle-upon-Tyne, 5 December 1891), section News ‘Apollo 11 – Mission Transcript’, Spacelog <https://ia800607.us.archive.org/28/items/NasaAudioHighlightReels/AS11_TEC.pdf> [accessed 7 December 2017] Appleton Standen, Edith, ‘The Grandeur of Lace’, the Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin, 16 (1958), 156–62 <https://doi.org/10.2307/3257694> Arbiter, Petronius, The Satyricon, ed. by David Widger (Project Gutenberg, 2006) <http://www.gutenberg.org/files/5225/5225-h/5225-h.htm> [accessed 14 August 2017] Arena, Jenny, ‘Reboot the Suit: Neil Armstrong’s Spacesuit and Kickstarter’, National Air and Space Museum, 2015 <https://airandspace.si.edu/stories/editorial/armstrong-spacesuit-and-kickstarter> [accessed 7 December 2017] Arnold, Janet (ed.), Queen Elizabeth’s Wardrobe Unlock’d: The Inventories of the Wardrobe of Robes Prepared in July 1600, Edited from Stowe MS 557 in the British Library, MS LR 2/121 in the Public Record Office, London, and MS v.6.72 in the Folger Shakespeare Library, Washington DC (London: W.

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Most sources from the era say twenty-one, so this is the figure I have stuck to here. Amanda Young, however, who wrote a book on the topic for the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum, says the Omega contained twenty-six layers. 28Today, the suits are beginning to degrade and decay, as the chemicals within the layers react with one another. A campaign on Kickstarter has even been launched to revamp the very suit Armstrong wore on mankind’s first voyage to the moon. Arena. 29DeGroot, p. 149. 30‘What Is a Spacesuit’; Allan Needell, in Amanda Young, p. 9. 31Case and Shepherd, p. 33. 32Collins, pp. 127, 100, 192. 33Ibid., pp. 115–16; Case and Shepherd, p. 16. 34DeGroot, p. 209; Amanda Young, p. 75. 35Aldrin and McConnell, pp. 122–3; Heppenheimer, p. 218; Monchaux, p. 111. 36Walta Schirra, in Glenn et al., pp. 47–8. 37Heppenheimer, p. 222; Kluger; Monchaux, p. 104. 38A.R.

Bad Blood: Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup
by John Carreyrou
Published 20 May 2018

A talented engineer who loved to build stuff, he was also dabbling with a side project in his spare time: bicycle lights that lit up both wheels and the road, providing improved visibility and safety for the rider at night. He’d pitched the concept on Kickstarter and, much to his surprise, was able to raise $215,000 in forty-five days. It was the seventh-largest sum raised on the crowdfunding platform that year. What had been a hobby suddenly looked like it could become a viable business. Kent told Elizabeth about his successful Kickstarter campaign, thinking she wouldn’t mind. But he badly miscalculated: she and Sunny were furious. They viewed it as a major conflict of interest and asked him to transfer his bike-lights patent to Theranos.

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During his visit to Palo Alto, she had shown him the miniLab and the six-blade side by side and he had volunteered for a demonstration, receiving what appeared to be accurate lab results in his email in-box before he even left the building. What he didn’t know was that Elizabeth was planning to use the Walgreens launch and his accompanying article containing her misleading claims as the public validation she needed to kick-start a new fund-raising campaign, one that would propel Theranos to the forefront of the Silicon Valley stage. * * * — MIKE BARSANTI WAS vacationing in Lake Tahoe when he received a call on his cell phone from Donald A. Lucas, the son of legendary venture capitalist Donald L. Lucas.

The Future of Fusion Energy
by Jason Parisi and Justin Ball
Published 18 Dec 2018

5.Fusion Technology 5.1Magnets 5.2Plasma Heating and Current Drive 5.2.1Inductive 5.2.2Neutral beam 5.2.3Electromagnetic wave 5.3First Wall 5.4Divertors 5.5Tritium Breeding Blanket 5.6Vacuum Vessel 5.7Diagnostics 5.8Radioactive Waste and Remote Maintenance 5.9Generating Net Electricity PART 3THE STATE OF THE ART 6.The Past: Fusion Breakthroughs 6.11920s: Understanding Stars 6.21950s: A Kick-Start for Fusion 6.31960s: Superconducting Magnets 6.41960s: The Tokamak 6.51970s: Bootstrap Current 6.61980s: H-Mode 6.71980s: Plasma Shaping 6.81990s: Deuterium–Tritium Fuel 6.92000s: Supercomputers 7.The Present: ITER 7.1ITER’s Goals 7.2ITER’s Strategy 7.2.1Heating systems 7.2.2Divertor 7.2.3First wall 7.3ITER’s Schedule and Cost 7.4Transition to DEMO 7.5Other Things to be Excited for 8.The Future: Designing a Tokamak Power Plant 8.1Power Plant Design from First Principles 8.2Maximizing Net Electric Power 8.3Maximizing Plasma Pressure 8.4Maximizing Plasma Current 8.5Maximizing Magnetic Field Strength 8.6Minimizing External Power 8.7Minimizing Heating Power 8.8Maximizing Plasma Density 8.9Minimizing Current Drive Power 8.10Maximizing Material Survivability 8.11Striking the Right Balance PART 4SPECIAL TOPICS 9.Alternative Approaches to Fusion Energy 9.1Stellarators 9.2Inertial Confinement Fusion 9.3Private Fusion Startups 9.3.1Tokamak Energy Ltd 9.3.2General Fusion 9.3.3Lockheed Martin 9.3.4TAE Technologies 9.3.5Lawrenceville Plasma Physics 9.3.6Helion Energy 9.3.7Commonwealth Fusion Systems 10.Fusion and Nuclear Proliferation 10.1Nuclear Physics: A Double-edged Sword 10.2Building Nukes 10.2.1Uranium enrichment 10.2.2Plutonium production 10.2.3Weapon designs 10.3Conventional Fission Reactors 10.4Breeder Reactors 10.5Fission Proliferation Risks 10.6Fusion Proliferation Risks 10.7The Nuclear Energy Transition 10.8Reshaping Geopolitics 10.9Being a Role Model 11.Fusion and Space Exploration 11.1Basics of Spaceflight 11.2Fusion Thruster PART 5CONCLUSIONS 12.When Will We Have Fusion?

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Figure 6.2:The proton–proton chain (left), which dominates energy production in smaller stars like our Sun, and the CNO cycle (right), which dominates in larger stars. In 70 years, humans went from thinking that chemical reactions might power the stars to a fully-developed theory of the nuclear processes underlying stellar physics. 6.21950s: A Kick-Start for Fusion Following World War II, scientists took fusion research from the stars and began work on bringing it down to Earth. Initially, the only application was nuclear weapons — specifically to follow-up on the Manhattan project and build “super,” the hydrogen bomb. However, on March 24, 1951, a little-known scientist named Ronald Richter in Argentina changed this all.6 On this date, he and the Argentinian president Juan Perón held a press conference claiming that they had achieved “enormous temperatures of millions of degrees” and produced the “controlled liberation of atomic energy” in a “solar reactor apparatus” called the “thermotron.”

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This lengthens the time when fission is possible, enhancing the yield of the weapon. The second layer is a spherical core of Pu-239 known as the “pit.”23 This is what fissions and produces most of the bomb’s energy. The innermost layer, the neutron initiator, is known as the “urchin.” It is typically made of beryllium and provides a strong neutron source to kick-start the fission chain reaction. Figure 10.9:The designs of four types of nuclear weapons. A gun-type bomb (top left) fires one U-235 segment into another. An implosion bomb (top right) simultaneously detonates a large number of chemical explosives, collapsing the fissile fuel inwards. A boosted implosion bomb (bottom left) includes D–T fusion fuel in an implosion bomb to act as an additional source of neutrons.

Getting Things Done for Hackers
by Lars Wirzenius
Published 15 Jun 2012

When you’re actually doing the task, especially if it is urgent or stressful, it can be nice to not have to think about each step every time you do the task. 35 36 CHAPTER 14. AUTOMATION AND CHECKLISTS Chapter 15 Getting started You’ve read all about the GTD system, and you’ve decided to go for it. Now what? There’s at least two approaches for getting started. The one I did was to start big. I allocated a whole weekend and did nothing else than kickstart my GTD system. I cleared my dining table to use as a giant inbox. I collected every bit of paper, every unopened letter, every unread book and magazine, every appliance that needed fixing, and everything else that I needed to do anything about, and put them on the table. When I found large items that were too big for the table, I wrote down what it was, where it was, and what I needed to do about it, on a separate piece of paper, and put that on the table instead.

The Gig Economy: The Complete Guide to Getting Better Work, Taking More Time Off, and Financing the Life You Want
by Diane Mulcahy
Published 8 Nov 2016

Obtaining our own skills-based certifications: coding certificates, chartered financial analyst (CFA), certified financial planner (CFP), or actuary, insurance, or real estate licenses. These are just a few examples of credentials that can be obtained by passing a test and/or taking a course (often online). Fundraising through sites like Kickstarter, making it easier to pursue our creative, startup, or nonprofit ventures (Raise enough money and you, too, can record your own CD, manufacture that fun new widget, or launch a nonprofit to save the world). The list goes on, but we can see that with so many low-cost and highly convenient options to learn at our keyboards, there’s no longer any reason to rely on a company or a job to provide us the opportunity to build skills.

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Manager schedules car payments cash flow, negative categorizing workers, eliminating Center for a New American Dream survey certifications Certified Financial Planner (CFP) Board checkbook diagnostic exercise Christakis, Nicholas Christensen, Clayton Clark, Dorie Reinventing You Stand Out cognitive biases cognitive resources collective bargaining, by contractors college graduates, unemployment and underemployment comfort zone Comment step in speaking in writing commitment dropping or reducing exit strategy from connecting without networking inbound connecting offer and ask outbound connecting consulting pricing strategy Consumer Federation of America contractors autonomy of collective bargaining by eliminating category vs. employees pricing strategy savings plans contracts corporate ladder corporate time suck costs of full-time employees of home ownership Create step in speaking in writing credentials-based economy, vs. skill-based Curate step in speaking in writing curated groups daily work schedule Dash exercise debt from education perspectives on decisions, either/or vs. and deferred life plan delegating denial, job security and Department of Labor (DoL) dependent contractor Dickson, Peter digital nomads directors and officers (D&O) insurance disability insurance disability issues, leaving work involuntarily diversifying expertise and portfolio of gigs risk of excess Doodle “double opt-in,” for introductions downsizing dream job Eagleman, David earned income education accessing debt from elevator pitch Ellis, Linda, “The Dash” Employee Mindset employee-in-a-job model employees advantages of being vs. contractors corporate benefits impact of Gig Economy learned helplessness about time prorated and portable benefits tax rate employers contribution retirement plans student loan repayment benefits tax compliance rate end dates, negotiating Entrepreneur Magazine equity in home ownership Ernst & Young eulogy virtues Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation exercises calendar diagnostic checkbook diagnostic on priorities exit strategy creation facing fears and reducing risks finding gigs personal burn rate surrogation and success taking year off vision of success defined vision of success refined exit strategy creating for leaving job for reducing uncertainty for startup Expensify experimenting, gigs for expertise, diversification and failure, expecting and preparing for fear exercise for facing facing fee-only financial planner financial flexibility corporate perks in increasing with more income from low personal burn rate planning from savings and time off financial team, for independent workers finding gigs exercises Fitbit fixed costs income security from low flexibility debt and ownership impact see also financial flexibility Forbes 401(k) Fowler, James Fox, Jessica, Three Things You Need to Know About Rockets Framingham Heart Study, social connections Freelancer Freelancers Union FreshBooks full-time employees job disappearance as last resort fundraising Gabriel, Allison Gaignard, Jayson, Mastermind Dinners Gallup poll Generation X Gig Economy finding gigs of future good work vs. good job growth labor issues MBA course newness of pitch for outbound connect retirement to mix work and leisure rules for success size of Gilbert, Daniel giving time away Gladwell, Malcolm, Outliers Glassdoor, Employee Confidence Survey goal creep “good jobs,” future of The Good Jobs Strategy (Ton) government positions, layoffs Graham, Paul Granovetter, Mark Great Generation (65 and older) Groupon Gupta, Prerna Hanauer, Nick Handy, Charles happiness Harford, Tim Harvard Business Review Harvard Joint Center on Housing Studies Harvard Study of Adult Development health insurance health issues, leaving work involuntarily healthcare costs in retirement help from others Hill, Steven Raw Deal hindsight, power of home ownership vs. access to home impact on middle class myths of real costs Honest Dollar hosting, inbound connecting through Huffington, Arianna hyperbolic discounting “in-between space,” time off to create income security from low fixed costs from multiple income sources from opportunities pipeline from skills building supplemental income in retirement independent workers eligibility for retirement savings financial management savings plans self-insure for unemployment Individual 401(k) inflation information gathering interest, tax deduction for Internal Revenue Service on employee vs. contractor income tax forms, Schedule C interruptions, schedule free of introductions, asking for Intuit investment interval IRA job hunting job interview, time off explanation in job security jobbatical.com jobs, transition to work JP Morgan Chase Kasser, Tim, The High Price of Materialism Katz, Larry Kickstarter Kitces, Michael Kreider, Tim Krueger, Alan Krueger, Norris, Jr. Labor Department labor market, proposals to reform LaLonde, Robert layoffs learning by doing, gigs for LearnVest leaving job, exit strategy for Lee, L.R.W. life insurance Limited Liability Corporation (LLC) loss aversion Maker’s Schedule Manager’s Schedule marketing, for new jobs Marsh, Nigel Mastermind Dinners (Gaignard) material wealth, vs. personal fulfillment MBA students, planning by McDonald’s mental tasks, combining with physical Merchant, Nilofer MetLife, Study of the American Dream Microsoft middle class impact of home ownership middle managers Mihalic, Joe Mint.com Moment money, perspective on mortgage mortgage calculator National Labor Relations Act National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) negative cash flow net worth, in principal residence networks maintaining 99designs Obituary exercise offer in connecting 168 Hours (Vanderkam) opportunity, income security from opportunity mindset outbound connecting Outliers (Gladwell) overconfidence ownership, vs. access paid leave part-time side gigs passion, pursuing in time off passive income Peers.org pension plans personal branding personal burn rate personal fulfillment, vs. material wealth perspective, time off to change Pew Research Center physical tasks, combining with mental pilot tests planning for best-case scenario in financial flexibility for time off playtime portfolio of gigs building for experiments learning by doing opportunity for connections Postmates power, and expanding time predictors of future feelings priorities checkbook diagnostic exercise on extended family as of others, impact of private sector, job creation decline pro-bono legal adviser Proctor & Gamble Profiting from Uncertainty (Schoemaker) public assistance, eliminating public speaking purchases, time cost of Qapital QuickBooks quitting job, exit strategy for Rae, Amber rates of return, for housing Raw Deal (Hill) referrals, asking for regret, risk of Reich, Robert Reinventing You (Clark) rejuvenation, time off for relationships, impact on success renting growth in households vs. ownership reputation RescueTime resources, allocating to short-term activities vs. long-term goals resume, gaps for time off resume virtues retail workers retirement healthcare costs in new vision of plans to work longer before saving to finance traditional savings plans supplemental income in rewards, time for longer-term risk assessment of of boring life debt and of diploma debt facing fear by identifying size of risk reduction by acceptance by eliminating exercise for facing fear by assessing options with insurance by mitigating risk by shifting risk risk taker, learning to be Rohn, Jim Rolf, David Roth IRA Rowing the Atlantic (Savage) S Corporation S&P 500 companies, average life sabbaticals safety net, creating Sagmeister, Stefan Savage, Roz, Rowing the Atlantic saving for retirement traditional plan savings, financial plan and increase ScheduleOnce Schoemaker, Paul, Profiting from Uncertainty Schrager, Allison security creating from diversifying for income for job self-employment income tax form for risk assessment SEP IRA service workers Shared Security Account Shell, Richard Simmons, Gail skill-based economy, vs. credentials-based economy skill-based employment system, vs. tenure-based employment system skilled workers skills, income security from building Slaughter, Anne-Marie Snapchat social capital, of introducer social contagion social media Social Security Social Security Administration Society for Human Resources Management sole proprietor, independent worker as South by Southwest (SXSW) speaking inbound connecting through skills for specialization spending, auditing Stand Out (Clark) Star Plates start dates, negotiating startup exit strategy for Strayed, Cheryl Stride Health strong ties in network student loans success as contagious defining vision of external versions new American dream as definition refining vision of surrogation sweat equity bucket Target TaskRabbit tax data analysis Tax Policy Center taxes deductions for mortgage interest Schedule C withholding teaching technology for delegating outbound connecting by leveraging technology companies tenure-based employment system, vs. skill-based employment system time age-related difference in perception calculating use employees’ learned helplessness about expanding horizon for savings plan for longer-term rewards management mindfulness about and purchase cost reaction to wasting reclaiming tracking investments time frame, for goals time off benefits developing ideas for exercise financing friends and family reaction gaps in resume from between gigs, vs. paid time off planning for Toastmaster tolerance of risk Ton, Zeynep The Good Jobs Strategy Top Chef Topcoder total cost of home travel Twitter Uber drivers uncertainty, cognitive biases about unearned income unemployment insurance unemployment protection, for self-employed universal basic income (UBI) universality of benefits universities, faculty members Upwork Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center vacation. see also time off Vanderkam, Laura, 168 Hours Vanguard, online calculator Virtues exercise volunteer positions during time off wage insurance Walmart Ware, Bronnie weak ties in network wealth gap WeWork withholding taxes Wolff, Edward work flexibility full-time job disappearance future of workers eliminating categorization of last resort workers’ compensation working lives, end of worst case, facing fear by starting with writing skills inbound connecting through Xero YouCanBook.me ABOUT THE AUTHOR Diane created and teaches The Gig Economy, which was named by Forbes as one of the Top 10 Most Innovative Business School Classes in the country.

Troublemakers: Silicon Valley's Coming of Age
by Leslie Berlin
Published 7 Nov 2017

Executives banded together across industries to influence politicians. Scientists and financiers dared to play with DNA, the very stuff of life. Troublemakers tells these stories, which feature some of the most famous names in Silicon Valley history, while also profiling seven other individuals in depth. Bob Taylor kick-started the precursor to the Internet, the Arpanet, and masterminded the personal computer. Mike Markkula served as Apple’s first chairman, with an ownership stake equal to that of Steve Wozniak and Steve Jobs. Sandra Kurtzig, an early software entrepreneur, was the first woman to take a technology company public.

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And Al would think for a half a second and say, ‘Yes, we can do that.’ ”37 The technical discussions in Ann Arbor ran so long that they continued while Taylor drove a number of participants to the airport. During the car ride, Wes Clark proposed an idea: rather than networking computers together directly, the group should build an underlying backbone network of routers to streamline connections between computers and help make the network more reliable.38 His contribution was critical. Taylor kick-started the network. He got it funded. He helped to cajole researchers to contribute to it. No wonder Paul Baran, the inventor of packet switching, called the Arpanet Taylor’s “baby.”39 But after the Ann Arbor meeting, once it was clear the network was going to be built, Taylor stepped back and Roberts stepped forward.

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Again and again over the course of the next decade, Taylor would try to interest the company’s leadership in the technology coming out of the computing labs at PARC. His efforts would meet with little success. In early 1972, the lab was at a critical point. The MAXC computer was almost complete. Soon Bob Metcalfe would connect it to the Arpanet, the computer network that Taylor had kick-started in 1966 when he was at ARPA. Researchers were beginning to complain that the final-stage refinements were “depressing” and too far removed from basic research.42 Around this time, Jerry Elkind, Taylor’s PhD-bearing boss, asked whether Xerox should “buy the ARPANET.” ARPA was looking for an outside institution to run the network as a public service akin to the national phone network.43 After some discussion with Taylor, Elkind, along with Xerox’s head of research, Jack Goldman, put together a group “to analyze the opportunity for buying ARPANET and to recommend the action Xerox should take.”44 In the end, Xerox, like AT&T (which had also considered a purchase), declined to bid for ownership of the Arpanet, and in 1975, the Defense Communications Agency took over operational responsibility.

Horizons: The Global Origins of Modern Science
by James Poskett
Published 22 Mar 2022

Rather, it is the history of encounters between these different cultures which explains precisely why the scientific revolution occurred when it did. With this in mind, I want to tell a new history of the scientific revolution. In this chapter, we explore how encounters between Europe and the Americas kickstarted a major reassessment of natural history, medicine, and geography. Much of what we know about the science produced in the New World during this period comes from the perspective of European explorers, a legacy of the history of colonization that this chapter examines. But if we look a little closer, using sources such as Aztec codices and Inca histories, we can also uncover another side to this story, one that highlights the hidden contributions of Indigenous peoples to the scientific revolution.

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The key event here was the rise of the Ottoman Empire in the eastern Mediterranean, particularly following the conquest of Istanbul in 1453. Byzantine refugees and Venetian traders returned from the Ottoman lands with hundreds of new scientific manuscripts. Some of these were ancient Greek originals, others were more recent Arabic and Persian commentaries. It was this exposure to all these new texts and ideas that really kickstarted the scientific revolution in Europe. Copernicus is a perfect example of this. On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres combined ideas found in Arabic, Persian, Latin, and Byzantine Greek sources to produce a radical new model of the universe. Cultural exchange had a profound effect on the development of science in Renaissance Europe.

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But perhaps the most important breakthrough was the invention of the periodic table, in which all the chemical elements were ordered by atomic weight, beginning with the lightest element, hydrogen. First proposed by the Russian chemist Dmitri Mendeleev in 1869, the periodic table predicted the existence of many as-yet-unknown elements, as there were gaps waiting to be filled in, thus kickstarting a race to find them. There was a certain amount of national rivalry here. Scientists often chose to name new elements after the country of their birth. When the Russian chemist Karl Klaus discovered a new element in the middle of the nineteenth century, he called it ‘ruthenium’, from the Latin word for Russia.

Inside the Nudge Unit: How Small Changes Can Make a Big Difference
by David Halpern
Published 26 Aug 2015

By using a more realistic model of human behaviour and motivation, in conjunction with the staff of jobcentres across the UK (and now other countries), we have been able to get hundreds of thousands of people back to work faster. It’s helping not only to heal the economy more quickly; it’s also healing lives. Kick-starting an economy It was tough running a small business in 2010. Robert was a small builder and much of his work had dried up. The larger house builders that had filled most of his order book had stopped building. Commissions from private clients were almost as bad. People were worried about job security and were putting off the extensions they might have planned.

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The second example concerned a much messier area, sometimes known as operational policy: how policy should be translated into practice by tens of thousands of public servants and, in this case, by the millions of unemployed people passing through the benefits system as they try to get back to work. The third example provided a glimpse into policy where the levers of government are even more indirect: trying to kick-start a stalled economy. It’s for individual businesses to decide whether to invest or hunker down; for banks to decide whether to lend or not; and for consumers to decide whether to spend or save: but nudges can affect some of these decisions. The line between these methods of government and private sector action is far from perfect.

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A policymaker – or public service provider – can be much more confident about importing an intervention that has been replicated in five or six countries than one that has only been shown to work in one place alone. Another key element of this clearing house or platform should be that it will capture and highlight gaps. In this respect, it should work more like a ‘kick-starter’ for systematic reviews and intervention studies. After five or six countries, states or professional bodies have searched for an answer or review and not been able to find what they are looking for, this needs to be picked up so that a What Works centre or some other body can step forward to plug the gap.

10% Human: How Your Body's Microbes Hold the Key to Health and Happiness
by Alanna Collen
Published 4 May 2015

Over weeks, months and years, patients steadily become more cheerful, buoyed by their happiness pacemakers. Adding this electrical pacemaker to the vagus nerve can provide the necessary boost to nerve activity and mood. But under normal circumstances, those electrical impulses have a chemical origin – much like a household battery. These chemicals which kick-start nerve impulses are called neurotransmitters, and you’ll have heard of more of them than you might have guessed. Substances like serotonin, adrenalin, dopamine, epinephrine and oxytocin are mostly synthesised by our own bodies, and they are able to initiate a tiny electrical spark at the end of a nerve.

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He never knew the scent of his mother’s skin, or the touch of his father’s hand. He never played with another child without plastic sheeting preventing the sharing of toys and laughter. To get David out of his bubble, a bone-marrow transplant from David’s sister was needed. The hope was that it might kick-start his immune system and free him of the disease. But his sister was not a transplant match. David had no choice but to remain inside his bubble for the rest of his life. Despite his devastating illness, David lived out his highly protected life in comparative health, and was not unwell once until his death at age twelve.

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Whether this is the missing biological link between suffering stress and developing depression is not yet clear, but as with the gut–microbiota–brain axis, the evidence for it is growing. Depression often accompanies ill-health, from obesity to IBS and acne, but is usually attributed to the misery of the disorders themselves. The idea of a leaky gut leading to chronic inflammation and kick-starting both physical and mental health problems is an exciting one for medical science. Leaky gut is certainly not the cause of every illness, let alone the political and social ills some would like to blame on it. But the concept may need a rethink, and a rebrand, in the face of the scepticism it currently incurs.

The Land Grabbers: The New Fight Over Who Owns the Earth
by Fred Pearce
Published 28 May 2012

In two provinces, Western and West Sepik, over a fifth of the land has been signed away. The customary rights of the forest communities to their neighborhood forests are supposedly enshrined in PNG’s statutes. But the country’s Land Act also contains provisions that allow those communities to do deals with outsiders to kick-start economic development—for instance, by establishing commercial farms in their territory. This is done by leasing forestland to the government, which in turn can issue “special agricultural and business leases” to private companies. This arrangement means the government can act as the policeman for the schemes to prevent isolated communities from being defrauded.

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So too is their friend and fellow green grabber, the Dutch industrialist Paul van Vlissingen. Aside from his place on the founding board of the Peace Parks Foundation and membership of Club 21, Vlissingen was, on his own account, the largest private operator of African national parks. He put $18 million of his own money into kick-starting his African Parks Foundation, which he began in 2000. His foundation was dedicated to taking over ailing national parks and putting them on a sound management and commercial footing. Its seven parks today are in Malawi, Zambia, Chad, both Congos, and Rwanda and cover some 8.1 million acres. They include the Garamba park in the Democratic Republic of Congo (formerly Zaire), an ironic privatization given WWF’s determination a decade ago to give it back to its national government.

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But there is now an organized migration further afield, with approval and assistance from governments at both ends. The men in khaki shorts and Springbok rugby caps are being offered millions of acres, some of it “virgin” bush and some of it already cultivated by smallholders and state farms, or grazed by herders. The hope is that their undoubted agricultural know-how can kick-start an agrarian revolution across the continent. Whatever else, it is a dramatic reversal of the ostracism the Boers suffered in the days of apartheid. The travel agent for these Boers with itchy feet is Agri South Africa, the post-apartheid successor to the old South African Agricultural Union, which was formed in 1904 to represent white farmers.

The American Way of Poverty: How the Other Half Still Lives
by Sasha Abramsky
Published 15 Mar 2013

And a similar one, funded by philanthropist Harold Alfond, was set up statewide in Maine in 2008, giving $500 to every newborn child in the state, so long as that child was enrolled in the state’s 529 college savings plan.10 Three years after it was created, about four in ten babies born in Maine were being enrolled in the education saving programs and were thus becoming eligible for the $500 gift. That wasn’t a great take-up rate, but it was a whole lot better than nothing. There are roughly four million babies born each year in the United States. Providing each one of these with $500 to kick-start their education accounts would cost $2 billion annually. That’s chump change for an economy as large as America’s, but it would have huge benefits down the line, encouraging more families to save for college and thus making higher education more affordable, and less of a debt generator, for millions of people.

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Consider it a mortgage variant on being Born Again: a person who had originally put down almost no cash for a mortgage financed by a predatory loan would essentially spend five years, with the assistance of the government, building up a significant down payment so that he could then reenter the mortgage market to access a smaller loan, payable to the government instead of to a commercial lender, with no predatory conditions attached. There are many pluses to such a scenario. First, it would take large numbers of underwater properties off the housing market for at least five years, thus tightening the supply of for-sale homes and helping to kick-start local property values again. Second, it would keep homes occupied that would otherwise be abandoned, would prevent communities with large numbers of distressed properties from falling into blight, and would keep residents housed who would otherwise be at risk of homelessness. Third, it would build up a pool of affordable housing maintained by the government and available to low- and middle-income families.

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In 2011, a Gallup Poll found that 72 percent of those surveyed supported expanding such public works as school repair programs, and three-quarters wanted to make available more public funds to hire teachers, police officers, and firefighters.10 In September 2012, another survey found that more than half of Americans wanted to increase spending on public infrastructure projects as a way of kick-starting the still-sluggish economy.11 For Katherine Newman, this was another no-brainer. “Fundamentally, the problem of poverty is a problem of people either not having jobs or not having jobs that pay enough,” she explained. Yes, even a healthy economy has a certain level of unemployment, as companies reinvent themselves and people shift between locations and between jobs.

Culture & Empire: Digital Revolution
by Pieter Hintjens
Published 11 Mar 2013

When physical products need to be built, there are many "assembly" firms that will make these; dedicated manufacturing is a thing of the past. Funding, which used to be sought from a few significant investors, can now be sought directly from prospective buyers through crowdfunding platforms like Indiegogo and Kickstarter. And of course, as I've explained before, the costs of communications, both internal and external -- the biggest cost of the classic firm -- have been reduced to near zero. Let me take a concrete example of a young business that wants to develop and sell a new high-tech product. The core design and engineering team consists of perhaps 10 people.

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Possibly, as the Spanish worked their way across the landscape over several years, every smart and mobile Dutch speaker moved north, out of the way. It was literally just a matter of hopping into a boat and floating downstream on the Schelde River. You don't even need to row or steer. By the time they came to Antwerp, only the immobile or suicidally stubborn were left. This mass northwards emigration kick-started the Renaissance in the Netherlands, which for a long time was a beacon of tolerance and enlightenment in Europe. It's also, incidentally, one reason the Flemish still distrust French speakers, who sided with the Spanish. The older the blood, the harder it is to wash it off. I'm half Scottish, and 500 years later, we Gaels still don't trust anyone with an English surname.

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We could build cheap dedicated devices that run the Cellnet: a pocket-sized box that is all battery, with powerful radios, and a couple of blinking lights just because. No screen, no fancy UI software, just a pocket-sized Cellnet node. It could double as a battery recharger for smartphones, which gives plausible deniability to anyone arrested with one, when they are banned. Kickstarter, anyone? The Cellnet would be extremely hard to spy on or disrupt. It is possible to capture WiFi traffic by being physically very close. However it's also quite easy to secure traffic between two peers to the extent that it cannot be read or modified or faked. The only way to get information is then to seize the phone itself.

Prosperity Without Growth: Foundations for the Economy of Tomorrow
by Tim Jackson
Published 8 Dec 2016

The deceptively simple answer of the Number 10 advisor had been just that: deceptive. As it turned out, the advisor in question was on a plane to China at the moment Prosperity without Growth? (with its conciliatory question mark) landed unheralded on the Prime Minister’s desk. It was a matter of days before the G20 leaders convened in London to ‘kick-start growth again’. ‘What on earth had we been thinking?’ roared our former ally. It was a good question, in retrospect. Had we been naïve to suppose such fundamental concerns could be raised with impunity? Possibly. Had we overlooked the ambiguity inherent in the advice we received from Number 10?

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The population of Hydra had declined by almost a third since I had last been there and the island’s continued existence as anything more than a playground for the rich depended heavily on the run-down ferry which an hour or so later would carry me back to Athens across the cold, moonlit sea.9 ***** The past is another country. They do things differently there. The confidence with which world leaders assumed it would be possible to ‘kick-start’ growth again. The belief that business as usual was waiting to return, just round the corner. Even the righteous anger that confronted me on the telephone on that rainy March night has a quaint, other-worldly quality to it now. It’s become much clearer in the interim how far out of balance our economies were.

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The part-nationalisation of financial institutions was justified on the basis that shares would be sold back to the private sector as soon as reasonably possible, something that in many cases still hasn’t been achieved.35 Extraordinary though some of these interventions were, they were largely regarded as temporary measures. Necessary evils in the restoration of a free-market economy. The declared aim was clear. By pumping equity into the banks and restoring confidence to lenders, the world’s leaders hope to restore liquidity, reinvigorate demand and ‘kick-start’ the economy. Their ultimate goal was to protect the pursuit of economic growth. Throughout everything, this has remained the one non-negotiable: that growth must continue at all costs. Renewed growth was the end that justified interventions unheard of only a few months previously. No politician seriously questioned this goal.

Think Like a Rocket Scientist: Simple Strategies You Can Use to Make Giant Leaps in Work and Life
by Ozan Varol
Published 13 Apr 2020

Questioning these assumptions gave us food trucks. We used to assume that late fees and physical stores were necessary for video rentals. Questioning these assumptions gave us Netflix. We used to assume that you needed bank loans or venture-capital funding to launch a new product. Questioning these assumptions gave us Kickstarter and Indiegogo. To be sure, you can’t go through life questioning every single thing you do. Routines free us of the thousands of exhausting daily decisions we would otherwise have to make. For example, I eat the same thing for lunch every day and take the same route to work. I routinely reason by analogy and copy other people’s choices when it comes to fashion, music, and interior design (my living room looks like a page out of the Crate & Barrel catalog).

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The next time you find yourself in a creative jam, ask, “What other industry has faced an issue like this before?” For example, Johannes Gutenberg had a printing press problem, so he looked to other industries—like winemakers and olive oil producers—who used a screw press to extract juice and oil. Gutenberg then applied the same concept to kick-start the era of mass communication in Europe. Organizations can take a cue from Pixar, the creative studio behind numerous box-office hits, such as Toy Story and Finding Nemo. The company encourages its employees to spend up to four hours a week taking classes at Pixar University, its professional-development program.

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They decorated the ceilings, put up whiteboards for visitors to leave messages to the patients, and transformed the style and color of the patient rooms to make them more personal. They also put rearview mirrors on hospital stretchers to allow patients to see and connect with the doctors and nurses wheeling them around. IDEO’s presentation ultimately kick-started a broader discussion to improve the overall patient experience so that patients were “treated less like objects to be positioned and allocated, and more like people in stress and pain,” Brown explained.44 As these examples show, instead of creating artificial testing environments disconnected from reality, we’re better off observing customer behavior in real life.

The Metaverse: And How It Will Revolutionize Everything
by Matthew Ball
Published 18 Jul 2022

Just imagine how different—and limited—society would be today if only 50 to 150 people could attend any given sporting match, concert, political rally, museum, school, or mall. However, we are far from being able to replicate the density and flexibility of the “real world.” And it is likely to remain impossible for some time. During Facebook’s 2021 Metaverse keynote, John Carmack, the former and now consulting CTO of Oculus VR (which Facebook bought in 2014 to kickstart its Metaverse transformation) mused that, “If someone had asked me in the year 2000, ‘could you build the metaverse if you had one hundred times the processing power you have on your system today . . .’ I would have said yes.” Yet 21 years later, and with the backing of one of the world’s most valuable and Metaverse-focused companies, he believed the Metaverse remained at least five to ten years away and there would be “serious optimization” tradeoffs in realizing this vision—even though there were now billions of computers that were a hundred times more powerful than the hundreds of millions of PCs operating at the turn of the century.5 What’s Missing from This Definition So now we understand my definition of the Metaverse: “A massively scaled and interoperable network of real-time rendered 3D virtual worlds that can be experienced synchronously and persistently by an effectively unlimited number of users with an individual sense of presence, and with continuity of data, such as identity, history, entitlements, objects, communications, and payments.”

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Imagine, for example, a model whereby Twitter users were awarded valuable Twitter tokens for reporting poor behavior, could earn more for reviewing previously reported tweets, and lost them if they violated the rules. At the same time, rather than rely on tips or posting promotional tweets on behalf of advertisers to generate income, super-users and influencers could be awarded tokens for hosting events. By the end of 2021, Kickstarter, Reddit, and Discord had all publicly described plans to shift to blockchain-based token models. Blockchain Obstacles There are still numerous obstacles facing a potential blockchain revolution. Most notably, blockchain remains too expensive and slow. For this reason the majority of “blockchain games” and “blockchain experiences” are still running mostly on non-blockchain databases.

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See Apple iOS IP addresses, 38–39, 47, 108 “iPad Natives,” 13, 249 iPhone, 64, 146, 242–44 iPods, 149, 165, 183, 186 Ipsos, 137 Islamic State (ISIS), 291 isometric 3D (2.5D), 9, 30 Japan, 65, 136, 280, 296, 303. See also Nintendo; Sony; Square Enix “jitter,” 81 Jobs, Steve, 138, 148–49, 183, 186, 243, 261, 309 Johns Hopkins, 268 Johnson & Johnson, 166 Johnson, Peggy, 4n John Wick, 139 Jordan, Michael, 139 JPMorgan Chase, 167, 207–8 Keyhole, 4, 9 Khashoggi, Jamal, 11 Kickstarter, 229 Kid Cudi, 12 Kirkman, Robert, 260 Koduri, Raja, 94 Komorebi Collective, 228 Krafton, xiii, 115, 303. See also PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds (PUBG) Krugman, Paul, 24 Kubrick, Stanley, xi, 305 KYC (Know Your Customer) regulations, 301 Lanebreak, 254 language, 15–16, 108, 136–37, 210, 211.

Mastering the VC Game: A Venture Capital Insider Reveals How to Get From Start-Up to IPO on Your Terms
by Jeffrey Bussgang
Published 31 Mar 2010

Paranoia is part of what drives a lot of entrepreneurs in a positive direction, just worrying that everything is going to go wrong and trying to mitigate every possible risk. As Intel’s Andrew Grove said, ‘Only the paranoid survive.’ ” The VCs bought the story and appreciated Christoph’s candor. He raised $5 million in initial financing, co-led by his former firm Polaris, to kick-start the company and recruit a team to pursue the opportunity. CONFIDENCE THAT CREATES CONFIDENCE FROM OTHERS An entrepreneur must be a confident person, of course, but it is not enough to be confident in oneself. The entrepreneur has to inspire confidence in others, which is a wholly different challenge.

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But they’re a little green. So I figured, why don’t I mash them all together?” This mix of American entrepreneurship with Vietnamese know-how and passionate domain experience proved to be a great kickoff for the company. With the business plan developed and the team built, Henry and Bryan saw an opportunity to kick-start the company by merging it with an existing gaming operator, and so some more capital went in. With these humble beginnings, the company exploded on the gaming scene in Vietnam. Since its initial launch in the fall of 2005, VinaGames has grown rapidly with 14 million users—nearly half of all Vietnamese households!

The Secret War Between Downloading and Uploading: Tales of the Computer as Culture Machine
by Peter Lunenfeld
Published 31 Mar 2011

Sometimes the adults who design systems can forget how much younger users are invested in finding ways to fill their downtime. Television, music, and video games can all be seen as preemployment time fillers for adolescents, and even those self-styled “rejuveniles” who are choosing not to abandon the games and pastimes of their youth.22 But those with the desire and access to the culture machine can kick-start their own do-it-yourself (DIY) movements. There are deep desires to categorize and annotate one’s own life as well as the lives of one’s friends and community. This moment is not about professional narratives so much as the development of new tools to create letters, diaries, photo collages, and home movies.23 At its best, these DIY archives transform lived experiences not into commodities sold back to us but instead as realized memory traces that we construct ourselves and communicate to communities of interest.

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Like the Aquarians, he saw this work as a gift, and he offered all of this free of royalties for his inventions and patents—meaning that anybody or everybody could develop the Web. A few years later, Marc Andreesen and a group of other Web developers launched their own browser, known as Netscape, kick-starting the Web bubble of the mid- to late 1990s. This ignited a frenzy of wealth building, earned Berners-Lee a knighthood, and encouraged otherwise-sane people to claim that the invention of the Web had more potential than the discovery of fire. Hyperbole, to be sure, but there is no doubt that the Web was transforming the culture machine.

Think Like an Engineer: Use Systematic Thinking to Solve Everyday Challenges & Unlock the Inherent Values in Them
by Mushtak Al-Atabi
Published 26 Aug 2014

The premise of crowd funding is very simple, an entrepreneur who has conceived and designed a product and needs money to implement it, can start a crowd-funding campaign online, inviting interested people to pledge money in return for the product when the campaign is successful and the product is manufactured. Popular crowd funding platforms include kickstarter.com, pozible.com and pitchin.my. Besides funding commercial undertakings, crowd-funding is now being used for social entrepreneurial endeavours as well. Community projects are being made possible through the pledges of numerous contributors around the world. In my opinion, crowd-funding is a very promising way to raise funds for two reasons.

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Index 5 Whys, 210, 213 awareness, 2, 13, 30, 45-48, 53-54, 58, 63, 151, 180 ABC, 99 abundance, 62, 101 abundant, 13 achievement, 3, 44, 47, 49, 51, 106, 120, 125, 168 ACID, 94 adaptability, 44, 49 adaptable, 23 adaptive, 83 aeronautical, 5 aeroplane, 7-8 Aerospace, 121 aesthetics, 101 affective, 47, 150-151 affordability, 101 affordance, 94, 100,128 Africa, 61 agriculture, 10, 14 Airbus, 6-7 aircrafts, 112 airframe, 7 airline, 8, 79-80, 180, 186 airlines, 111, 180, 186-187 Amazon, 77 analytical, 24 anthropometric, 132 anthropometry, 132-133 AoN, 167 APA, 148 architecture, 37, 94, 97 artefact, 67, 155 auditory, 19 automobile, 221 automotive, 178 avionics, 7 avoidance, 101 Bible, 11 biology, 19-20, 22, 24, 26, 28, 30, 32, 34, 36, 38, 40, 53, 126, 150 biomedical, 5, 15 Biomimicry, 89 Blattaria, 32 Blendtec, 140-141 Blue Ocean Strategy, 78-82, 215 BoM, 98-99, 102 Bozan, Tony 71 brain, 3, 6, 15-16, 19-28, 30-32, 34-36, 38-40, 42, 44-45, 49-50, 53, 67, 71, 89, 140, 143, 220 Brain Rewiring, 30-31, 49-50, 196, 217, 220, 222, 228 Brainology, 19-20, 22, 24, 26, 28, 30, 32, 34, 36, 38, 40 brainstorming, 71-72, 90, 215 Brimo, Adam 189-190 Business Plan, 182-183 CDIO, 3, 5-9, 20, 30, 34-35, 42, 69-70, CDIO, 3, 5-9, 20, 30, 34-35, 42, 69-70, 125, 145, 159, 175, 184, 220 checklist, 107, 111-114 Christensen, Clayton 186 Chunking, 39 Cirque du Soleil, 81-82 civilisation, 4, 10, 16, 67, 83 classification, 31-32, 73, 171 classifying, 31-32, 34, 172 cockroach, 31-32 cognitive, 10, 25, 35-36, 43-44, 136, 150-151 Cognitive Ergonomics, 133 collaborate, 172, 217 collaborating, 26, 172, 227 collaboration, 44-45, 58 collaborative, 150 commodity, 184, 186-187 communication, 12, 15, 26, 44, 55, 58, 63, 118, 137-138, 140-142, 144, 146, 148-152, 154, 156, 158, 168-169, 172, 175, 222 complexity, 5, 36, 110, 160-162 complexity, 5, 36, 110, 160-162 70, 72, 74, 76, 78, 80, 82-84, 86, 88, 90, 92, 115, 118, 137, 155, 175, 184, 220 concrete, 138, 141, 143-144 Configuration, 95 Configuration Design, 94, 96-97 Create, 2, 12, 27-28, 36, 39, 46, 67-69, 78-81, 113, 127, 138, 148, 173-174, 176, 180-181, 187-188, 191, 200, 202, 209, 211-212, 219, 226-227 Critical Thinking, 3, 9, 36, 44 Crossing the Chasm, 185 Crowdfunding, 195 Crowdfunding, 195 226, 228 cyberspace, 15-16 Design Optimisation, 99 Design Process, 54, 94-95, 126-128 designer, 6, 53-54, 89, 97-101, 138 desirable, 9, 91, 101, 178, 184 Detailed Design, 94, 98 Disruptive Innovation, 186-187 Drucker, Peter 159, 173 Dweck, Carol 20 ecological, 37, 227 economical, 7, 13, 94, 115, 212 economically, 9, 91, 101, 110 ecosystem, 179, 182, 188, 225 Edison, 19, 198, 201 efficiency, 14, 89 Einstein, 13, 39, 67, 198 Eliminate, 78, 80-81, 207 Elliot, 25-26 E-mail, 148 E-mail, 148 46, 48-50, 52, 54-56, 58, 60, 62, 64, 66, 70, 156, 216-219, 221-223 emotions, 21, 24, 42, 44-46, 48, 53-54, 142, 144, 149, 151, 217, 222-223 empathy, 42, 53-54, 70, 151 enterprise, 55 entertainment, 16, 81, 142 entrepreneur, 26, 173-177, 181-182, 187, 191, 194-196, 220 entrepreneurial, 173-176, 180, 182, 184, 193-194, 218, 220, 226 Entrepreneurial Ecosystem, 178-183 entrepreneurialism, 44 entrepreneurialism, 44 180, 182, 184, 186, 188, 190, 192-196, 200, 216-220 EPIC Homes, 55-57 ergonomic, 26, 155 ergonomically, 133 Ergonomics, 126, 128, 130, 132, 134, 136 ERIC, 78-80, 191 evolution, 10, 30, 85-88, 115, 153-154, 186 evolutionary, 3, 9, 94-95, 191 Facebook, 55, 83, 88, 131, 157 failure, 2, 7, 29-30, 37, 59, 61, 100, 115, 128, 145, 188, 191, 196, 198, 200-207, 221 feasibility, 160 feasible, 9, 91, 101, 160 feedback, 28-30, 96-97, 126, 128-130, 185, 191, 200-201 financers, 182 Fishbone Diagram, 210, 213 Forming, 21, 40, 104, 154-155 FMRI, 21 Gantt Chart, 162-164 GDP, 226-227 GIHI, 226-227 Gladwell, Malcolm 27, 138 Global Entrepreneurship, 219 GNH, 226-227 GNHI, 227 Goleman, Daniel 42-43, 45-46, 49, 53 Gross Domestic Product, 226-227 Gross Institutional Happiness Index, 226 Gross National Happiness, 226-227 habits, 9, 20, 22-23, 27-28, 32-35, 50, 173 habitually, 137 happiness, 29, 34, 38, 45, 58, 174, 217, 226-228 hardware, 20, 98, 104-106 hardwired, 19-20, 24 hardwiring, 27 HATI, 192 HATI, 192 217, 227-228 Holistic Education, 42, 44, 216-219, 223 Human Centred Design, 126, 128, 130, 132, 134, 136 humankind, 12-13, 69 ideation, 69, 71, 74, 76, 89-90 IDEO, 126 ikea, 111, 149-150 Implement, 3, 5, 8-9, 16, 27, 34, 72, 104, 106, 108, 115, 137, 155, 161, 175, 184, 194, 220, 228 implementation, 7, 104, 113, 118, 163, 175 Increase, 51-52, 71, 78-80, 85, 100, 159, 168, 177, 198, 210, 212 infrastructure, 16, 115 infrastructure, 16, 115 174, 176, 178, 180, 182, 184, 186-188, 190-192, 194, 196, 200 innovative, 14, 26, 49-50, 56, 72, 78, 88, 111, 174-175, 177-178, 188, 200, 219, 228 innovator, 173, 185, 186, 188, 201, 219 INSEAD, 78 inspiration, 89 inspirational, 29, 58-59 integrated, 7, 42, 44, 90, 93, 95, 106, 151-152, 176, 218 Integrated Design, 94, 98 intellectual, 9, 34, 53, 81, 91, 98, 145, 181, 200, 225 intelligence, 43, 67, 106, 137 intention, 77, 225 intentional, 4, 22-23, 27, 36, 38, 69, 127 intentionally, 6, 50 IQ, 43-44 Joffres, Kal 191-192 Kahneman, Daniel 35, 134-135 Kelly, David 34, 126 kickstarter, 194 Kim, W. Chan 78 Kohlieser, George 63 leader, 13, 29, 34, 55, 58-61, 71, 117, 120, 146, 152-153, 173 leadership, 55, 58-59, 121, 154-155, 178 Lean Entrepreneurship, 191, 194 Lean Startup, 191, 193 learner, 16, 21, 28, 151, 201 lifecycle, 3, 184-185, 187 logbook, 145 management, 5-6, 12, 57-59, 81, 104, management, 5-6, 12, 57-59, 81, 104, 170, 176, 226 170, 176, 226 160, 162, 164, 166, 168, 170, 172 Mann, Darrell 71 Manoeuvrability, 164 manufacturability, 91, 98, 100 marketability, 184 Massive Online Open Course, 220 mastery, 23, 27-29, 69, 138, 174, 198 Mauborgne, Renée 78 measurement, 43, 107, 132-133, 219 media, 13, 34, 61, 128, 165, 180, 190 medication, 37 mentor, 30 Mesopotamia, 10 methodology, 82, 147, 150, 214 Middle Brain, 24, 44, 46, 142 mindset, 2, 5, 19-20, 26-30, 36, 38, 42, 69, 173-174, 200, 217 mission, 50-52, 58, 65, 183 Mission Zero, 224-226, 228 MOOC, 16, 43, 55, 64, 173, 194, 217, 216-221, 223 multidisciplinary, 5, 104, 137, 155 myelin, 22-23, 27, 30-31, 50 myelinate, 26 myelinated, 23 myelination, 23, 31 Network Diagram, 166-167, 170 neuron, 21-23, 27-28, 30-31, 50, 53 neuroscience, 22, 25 New Brain, 24-25, 32, 44, 141 NGOs, 191-193 Norming, 154-155 Operate, 3, 5, 8-9, 11, 16, 27, 29, 34, 100, 102, 110-116, 118, 120, 122, 124, 127, 130-131, 137, 151, 155, 161, 175, 178, 182, 184, 220 optimisation, 98 optimise, 106 optimism, 49-50 optimistic, 20, 174 optimum, 115, 203 Orang Asli, 55-56 Organisation chart, 152-153, 183 outliers, 27 overdesign, 100 Panasonic, 215 Panzer, 214 paradigm, 29, 69-70, 174 passion, 2, 196, 219 PDM, 167 performance, 20, 27, 29-30, 81, 89, 94, 106, 156, 170, 173, 176, 184, 186-187, 191, 198, 200-203, 226 Performing, 15, 21, 23, 27, 42, 47, 50, 70, 78, 87, 97, 113, 133, 154-155, 168, 222 personalisation, 16, 88 Picasso, 138-139 Piketty,Thomas 224 pitchin, 194 Polaroid, 97-98 positivity, 196 pozible, 194-195 presentation, 143-144 project based, 122, 225 Project Based Learning, 2 proposal, 34, 144, 162, 164 Oei,John-Son 55-56 Old Brain, 24, 44, 140 openlearning, 190, 219 Random Entry, 74-77, 215 recyclability, 98 recyclable, 101 Reduce, 9, 15, 78, 80, 85-86, 90-91, 168, 204, 225 redundancy, 100 relationship, 42, 45-47, 50, 52, 58,122, 131, 142, 152, 161, 178, 181, 223 Relationship Management, 45, 58 reliability, 90-91, 100, 107 reliable, 7, 124 renewing, 47 reptilian, 24 requirements, 7, 17, 69-70, 83, 94-95, 97-99, 106-107, 115, 159, 169, 184, 222, 225 resilience, 217, 227 resilient, 42, 174 Return on Failure, 191, 198, 200, 202, 204, 206 revenue, 81, 180-181, 225 rewire, 196, 220 rewired, 49 rewiring, 27 Risk Management, 168 Root Cause Analysis, 210 Rumsfeld, Donald 204 SaniShop, 61 sanitation, 14, 61, 175 satisfaction, 159-161, 169-170, 196, 214, 217 scalable, 191 Segway, 187-188 Self Management, 45, 48-49, 223 Self Assessment, 47 Self Awareness, 42, 46 Shakespeare, 19 shareholder, 167-177 Sim, Jack 61-62 simulation, 98, 138, 143 Sinek, Simon 29 Social Awareness, 45, 53, 57, 63, 223 SOPs, 212 Stakeholders Management, 170 stimuli, 19-20, 24, 26, 43-44, 48-49 Storming, 54, 154-155 subsystem, 7, 37, 94-95, 97, 107 subtasks, 166 SUCCES, 138 success, 2, 20, 28-30, 34, 38, 43, 45, 53, 59, 64, 70, 118, 124, 137-138, 142, 144, 59, 64, 70, 118, 124, 137-138, 142, 144, 170, 172-173, 178, 182, 198, 200-205, 216-219, 221-223 SWOT, 47-48, 58 System Architecture, 94-96 systematic, 3-4, 9, 34-35, 69, 90, 124, 191, 209, 220, 228 systematically, 5, 44, 90, 214 systemic, 36 tactile, 19 Taleb, Nassim Nicholas 204 Tandemic, 191-192 Taylor's Racing Team, 107, 116-121, 151 teamwork, 7, 26, 45, 58, 137-138, 140, 142, 144, 146, 148, 150, 152, 154, 156, 158 Tesla, 4 Trend Recognition, 82 trimming, 77, 215 Tuckman Model, 153-154 Twitter, 88 uncertainty, 75, 204 Value, 3, 5, 9, 12, 15, 27-28, 49, 52, 69, 78-81, 90-91, 93, 124, 152, 156, 168, 78-81, 90-91, 93, 124, 152, 156, 168, 212, 214-215, 218-219, 225, 228 Verification, 106 viability, 204 viable, 9, 52, 55, 91, 101 Viagra, 205 vision, 29, 50-51, 58-60, 183, 219, 224, 228 Vodafail, 190 Vodafone, 189-190 Vujicic, Nick 68 Wagner, Tony 44 Warner, Jim 46 Warner, Jim 46 165 WD, 198-199 wellbeing, 218 WMSDs, 133 WTO, 61

Effective Programming: More Than Writing Code
by Jeff Atwood
Published 3 Jul 2012

The most brilliant idea takes great execution to be worth $20,000,000. That’s why I don’t want to hear people’s ideas. I’m not interested until I see their execution. I was reminded of Mr. Sivers article when this email made the rounds earlier this month: I feel that this story is important to tell you because Kickstarter.com copied us. I tried for 4 years to get people to take Fundable seriously, traveling across the country, even giving a presentation to FBFund, Facebook’s fund to stimulate development of new apps. It was a series of rejections for 4 years. I really felt that I presented myself professionally in every business situation and I dressed appropriately and practiced my presentations.

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I really felt that I presented myself professionally in every business situation and I dressed appropriately and practiced my presentations. That was not enough. The idiots wanted us to show them charts with massive profits and widespread public acceptance so that they didn’t have to take any risks. All it took was 5 super-connected people at Kickstarter (especially Andy Baio) to take a concept we worked hard to refine, tweak it with Amazon Payments, and then take credit. You could say that that’s capitalism, but I still think you should acknowledge people that you take inspiration from. I do. I owe the concept of Fundable to many things, including living in cooperative student housing and studying Political Science at Michigan.

Eat People: And Other Unapologetic Rules for Game-Changing Entrepreneurs
by Andy Kessler
Published 1 Feb 2011

Still, with a little forethought . . . Same thing for high finance. I worked on Wall Street just as lower trading commissions democratized the bull market beyond banks and pension funds. Fixed 75-cent-per-share commissions began evaporating after Wall Street’s Big Bang of 1975, which brought negotiated commissions. Lower inflation kick-started the bull market, but it was individuals paying 25-cent commissions, then 12-cent, then 6-cent commissions on their way to a pennyper-share net that provided the steam to drive it ever higher. TI sold calculators, Intel sold microprocessors, Motorola sold StarTAC cell phones. It was the abundance of those transistors that got things cheap enough to change entire industries, and I found myself smack dab in the middle of it.

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Aerosmith and Metallica have had their libraries of songs stolen, so they allow them to be incorporated into the video game Guitar Hero; millions pay for the opportunity to play along with their favorite tracks. Very high definition movies are too big, for now, to download, so Blu-ray disc sales continue to grow. As we know, iTunes is tightly linked to iPods’ legitimized digital music sales. The Amazon Kindle e-book is a start, trying to kick-start a protectable electronic book platform. And newspapers and magazines need to create more than just a display bucket to webify their print words. New services—from alerts to social networking to finance to sports fan participation—need to do things paper versions can’t do. Stuff that is hard if not impossible to copy and steal.

The Polytunnel Book: Fruit and Vegetables All Year Round
by Joyce Russell
Published 3 Apr 2013

If this is a problem, raise them off the ground with twiggy sticks. Beefsteak varieties are always slower to ripen than cherry ones. Don’t be impatient: these giants of the tomato world will colour up nicely next month. If tomatoes are slow to ripen in a dull year, place a banana or one or two red tomatoes among the green trusses. These will help kick-start the ripening process. If border soil dries out rapidly, it is worth using a mulch. Using a mulch of comfrey is a great way to provide tomatoes with potash, but mix it with something like grass clippings to give better coverage over bare soil. Remember to keep feeding with liquid feeds, such as seaweed, every seven to ten days.

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I don’t know why, but I find that pumpkins and squash grown in a polytunnel don’t keep quite as long as those grown outdoors. Butternut squash Liquid feed Plants in a polytunnel keep growing for more of the winter than ones grown outdoors. Any bit of sunshine can raise soil temperature and boost growth. Make a brew of liquid feed in the autumn and it will be perfect to give plants a kick-start in the early months of next year. If comfrey or nettles are growing in the garden, cut them now and put them to soak in a bin full of water. If possible, add some seaweed too. All are rich in minerals and will produce an excellent liquid feed (see Part 7). Enjoy the September harvest Tomatoes Aubergines Cucumbers Peppers Grapes Basil Sweetcorn Lettuce Salad leaves French beans Melons Butternut squash Courgettes September harvest Some harvesting hints • The grape harvest should be in full swing.

The Wichita Lineman: Searching in the Sun for the World's Greatest Unfinished Song
by Dylan Jones
Published 29 Jul 2019

That feeling of boundlessness, I get chills a little bit thinking about it.’ Coincidentally, Campbell would often complain about suffering from claustrophobia, too, hating being contained within small places and increasingly thinking about home. Logically, this made no sense, as he needed to go west in order to make his fortune, which was kick-started by hundreds of hours cooped up in tiny recording studios; but towards the end of his career Campbell longed for the Big Country, and his interviews would be full of references to being trapped. The Webb clan lived in a trailer the size of a rowboat, situated at the end of the runway at Sheppard Air Force Base.

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He was referring, obliquely, to his enormous canvas capturing the agony when the Luftwaffe and the Italian Aviazione Legionaria, at General Franco’s behest, carpet-bombed the Basque town of Guernica. Yet on the subject of painting, Picasso was just about as wrong as a genius can be. Social commentary is a spectrum, and not every work of art has the ambition of Guernica, just as not every song wants to kick-start a revolution. Painting, in common with all of the arts, invariably acts as a second- or third-hand accompaniment or counterpoint to its locale, a way of lifting the spirits in a darkened room or giving a Caribbean sunset extra gravitas. In some cases it’s designed to fit into the service lifts of Upper East Side apartment blocks, and in others it’s designed to sit in the lobbies of large Swiss banks.

How Cycling Can Save the World
by Peter Walker
Published 3 Apr 2017

— If you browse the various cycling-related products seeking investment on the crowdfunding website Kickstarter, it’s easy to get a sense of the scale of this new industry built around a combination of poor road design and the overstatement of the perils this brings. There are cycling tops with LEDs sewn into the seams, ultrareflective beanie hats, bolt-on bike indicator lights controllable from the handlebars of your bike, even gloves with orange blinking lights. You can buy lights with combined HD cameras in case someone drives into you. These are all symptoms and exaggerations, not answers. Elsewhere on Kickstarter you soon reach that other category of bike-related inventions: the solution in search of a problem.

Content Everywhere: Strategy and Structure for Future-Ready Content
by Sara Wachter-Boettcher
Published 28 Nov 2012

With more than $150,000 in a bank account meant to pay content creators and producers, Readability disbanded the program and donated the bulk of its coffers to charity. Of course, Readability isn’t the only organization trying to come up with alternatives to the advertising business model. But despite all the Kickstarters and other services out there, it’s clear no one has a workable answer to the compensation question yet—and most publishers, already obsessed with pageviews and continually adding clutter to their sites, are struggling to do much besides get riled up and angry. Attribution, copyright, and compensation are weighty issues, to be sure—issues I’m pretty hesitant to predict the precise future of.

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After all, it’s beyond obvious that the old pay-per-eyeball thing isn’t working, and that too often, it’s the content creators who are left in the lurch, paid peanuts for what’s often thoughtful, researched, complex work. If you care about solving the problem, then your first step is to get comfortable experimenting, too—to accept that this isn’t all figured out yet, and to be willing to do things differently and see what happens. From launching Kickstarter campaigns to fund content projects to publishing a long article as a Kindle Single—a short ebook that Amazon sells for just a few dollars—there are lots of avenues to explore once you stop clinging to the old model. That doesn’t mean any of them are perfect, but they’re a place to start. And they won’t get better unless we work on them.

Chasing Slow: Courage to Journey Off the Beaten Path
by Erin Loechner
Published 10 Jan 2017

* * * MY FAVORITE STYLING (AND LIFE?) TRICKS 001. When in doubt, add a plant. A rubber plant is foolproof to start with—nearly impossible to kill—and it’s known to clear the air of formaldehydes, chemicals, harmful vapors. You’ll have to clear the rest of the toxins (bitterness, regret, discontent) yourself, but a kickstart helps. No one ever said no to a little helping hand from nature. 002. Edit, edit, edit! Say no to the newest dish towel pattern. Resist another limited-edition hand-poured balsamic cedar soy candle. Practice self-control in the stationery aisle at Target, even when the floral envelopes are on sale.

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While nursing Bee, I found she was allergic to milk and I’d need to cut out all dairy products. After researching many of today’s most-relied-upon foods and their alternate effects on digestion, I embarked on a thirty-day challenge to “just eat real food.” No processed foods, refined sugars, grains, or dairy products. The experience was transformative, and for a thirty-day kickstart to your own life change, I highly recommend whole30.com. X. You know, the X on your web browser? Click on it today. Get offline and get outside. This is my answer to a slower day, each and every time. Yoga. I don’t know what happened exactly, but all of a sudden here I am, borderline obsessed with yoga.

Great American Railroad Journeys
by Michael Portillo
Published 26 Jan 2017

Massachusetts, the home of America’s first railroad at Quincy, had three completed routes by 1835. More expansion followed the drawing of this 1853 map, and by 1870 it had one mile of railroad for every five and a half square miles of territory and per 954 inhabitants. TO BOLDLY GO . . . The work of Ross Winans was so admired in Europe that he was invited to kick-start the railroad age in Russia. In 1843 he sent sons Thomas and William, along with George W. Whistler, to Russia to help fashion the ambitious St Petersburg and Moscow railroad, Tsar Nicholas I’s belated entry into the technological age. A career spent assiduously protecting his inventions by patents helped to ensure he amassed a $20 million fortune before his death, when one obituary called him ‘a bold and original thinker’.

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But Lincoln dreamt of better things and joined the legal profession, where his law partner noted: ‘His ambition was a little engine that knew no rest.’ During his tenure, however, Lincoln did forge links with the nation’s burgeoning railroad system that are recalled to this day. It was by rail that Lincoln chose to enter Washington from his distant Illinois home after he was elected. As president, he signed the legal paperwork that kick-started the route that finally linked the east and west coasts. And, mournfully, the rail journey that took his body home after he was assassinated was talked about in hushed tones for years afterwards, as the country came together in a sense of shared grief. This rare photo shows Lincoln (circled) in the crowd at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, before his 1863 address.

The Milky Way: An Autobiography of Our Galaxy
by Moiya McTier
Published 14 Aug 2022

Sadly, Jo was overwhelmed by the crushing weight and negative energy from the supermassive black hole at its center. The black hole stole or heated up so much of Jo’s gas that it couldn’t make any more stars. It would have been so easy for Jo to do nothing and let its black hole finish the job. But about a billion years ago, in a last-ditch effort to overcome its black hole’s death grip and kick-start some star formation, Jo started careening towards the center of Abell 85 faster than the speed of sound. “Supersonic,” your scientists call it. Abell 85 is a large galaxy cluster, home to about five hundred galaxies. Jo knew that passing through a dense environment like that (not as dense as a black hole, of course, but still packed together compared to the pressureless vacuum of space) at such high speeds would force the gas near its edges to mix and make new stars.

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Most scientists would dismiss Boltzmann Brains as silly, but that doesn’t stop physicists from getting into the most frustrating conversations about whether all of human existence is just one random brain floating for an instant in the universe. 3 Brown dwarfs are the limbo space between planets and stars. They aren’t massive enough to kick-start and sustain hydrogen fusion in their cores, though some of them get massive enough to fuse deuterium (also called heavy hydrogen) for a short while. Astronomers sometimes joke that brown dwarfs are failed stars, but we’re still trying to figure out where the mass cutoff between success and failure is.

Spike: The Virus vs The People - The Inside Story
by Jeremy Farrar and Anjana Ahuja
Published 15 Jan 2021

In turn, those three would spread it to another nine in total; those nine to another 27. That is the nature of exponential spread. That WHO R&D Blueprint Meeting put the agency at the centre of the global response and served as the catalyst that got the world moving: the sharing of samples; more companies starting vaccine work; the kick-starting of networked clinical trials across the world that would allow us to pool findings on potential treatments. That meeting, plus the sense of urgency that many of us had radiated at Davos, was why we got Covid-19 diagnostics, treatments, vaccines in less than a year. ‘Are you a spy?’ asked the taxi driver, as I jumped into his cab at Munich airport on Friday 14 February 2020.

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Action means a public health response, like isolation and social distancing, plus diagnostics, drugs and vaccines. If the WHO has been perceived by some to be toothless, it is because the 194 member states who collectively decide what it does voted for it to be that way. (Contrary to those perceptions, the agency played a critical role in guiding countries, fast-tracking research, kick-starting clinical trials and setting up the ACT-Accelerator.) Each member sends delegates to the World Health Assembly, and it is the assembly which appoints the director general and decides what the WHO does. The WHO did not police global health in the manner that many felt it should during the pandemic, because it was not designed or empowered to.

Slow Productivity: The Lost Art of Accomplishment Without Burnout
by Cal Newport
Published 5 Mar 2024

As the BBC reported, the results were “overwhelmingly positive,” with more than 90 percent of the participating companies claiming they would keep going with the experimental setup, at least for now. Here in America, California congressman Mark Takano proposed legislation that would officially reduce the standard workweek, as established by the Fair Labor Standards Act, from forty to thirty-two hours. Though his bill didn’t gain traction, companies such as Lowe’s and Kickstarter are already experimenting with these shorter schedules on their own. This sudden interest in workplace experimentation is both welcome and needed, as much about how we work in the knowledge sector today is ossified into tradition and conventions, some of which are arbitrary and some of which are borrowed from different, older types of work.

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See also specific film titles Firm, The (Grisham), 204, 206–7 Fleming, Ian, 142–46, 203 Ford, Henry, 18–19 Ford Motor Company, 18–19 43 Folders blog, 86 Four Thousand Weeks (Burkeman), 4 Franklin, Benjamin, 42, 76–80, 82–83 Franklin, Jane, 82 Free Time (Blake), 71, 95 freelancers, 20–21, 43, 61, 84–85, 130, 146, 180–81, 216 Fried, Jason, 150 Frostick, Jonathan, 54–57, 61 G Gaiman, Neil, 156 Galileo, 42, 112, 114–16 Gates, Bill, 202 genetic sequencing pipeline, 100–104 Getting Things Done (GTD) method, 85–88 Gibson, Debbie, 199–200 Glass, Ira, 182–86 Graham, William, 73 Great Movies, The (Ebert), 187 Great Resignation, 4–5 Greece, ancient, 160–62 Gribbin, John, 111–12, 114–15 Grisham, John, 204, 206–7 Guardian, The, 140 H Hall, David, 78–79, 81 Halloween (film), 210 Hamilton (musical), 134–35, 156 “Hand in My Pocket” (Morissette song), 201 Harrison, George, 195–97 Harter, Jim, 24 Harvard, 202–4 Headlee, Celeste, 4–5 Hemingway, Ernest, 70, 185 historic thinkers, 111–16, 163, 191 Honoré, Carl, 35 Horizon (BBC show), 72–73 hourly wage service sector, 62 Hudes, Quiara Alegría, 127 hunter-gatherers, 117–24, 132, 139 I In Praise of Slowness (Honoré), 35 In the Heights (musical), 125–29, 131 income, 140 sacrificed for quality, 145–47, 205–8 traded for freedom, 175–76, 179–82 traded for time, 64, 71, 78–80, 145 turning it down, 169–70, 175–76, 201 industrial labor, 17–22, 25, 62, 97–98, 114, 122–24, 139 Industrial Revolution, 17–18, 122–24 Inklings, the, 189–90 Inner Change Coffeehouse (San Diego), 165–66, 168–70 insight, moments of, 2–3, 29, 42, 111 Interlochen Arts Academy, 167 Interview with the Vampire (Rice), 163 It Doesn’t Have to Be Crazy at Work (Fried), 150 Italy, 31–35, 114 J Jagged Little Pill (Morissette album), 199–201 James Bond spy thrillers, 142–46, 203 Jane Austen: A Life (Tomalin), 50–52 Japan, 194–95 Jarvis, Paul, 178–82 Jaws (Benchley), 157–58 Jewel, 165–78, 181, 199, 201 Jobs, Steve, 176 journalism, long-form, 1–3, 213–16 Ju/’hoansi community, 117–20 K Kail, Thomas, 126–27 Keith, Ben, 170–72 Kemsley Newspapers, 142–43 Kerouac, Jack, 151–53 Kickstarter, 37 knowledge work core activities of, 174–75, 181–82 discontentment with, 3–7, 9, 217 emergence of, 18–21, 114, 123–24, 217 flexibility of, 139, 180 general definition of, 38–39 during the pandemic, 3–6 self-regulation of, 62–63 traditional, 7, 38–40, 42–43 “Knowledge-Worker Productivity: The Biggest Challenge” (Drucker), 15 L labor unions, 98, 123–24 Lake George, New York, 137–39, 142, 145, 147 Lamott, Anne, 183–84 Laziness Does Not Exist (Price), 4 Lean In, 23–24 Lee, Richard, 117–21 legislation, 37, 98, 123–24, 218 leisure time balance with intense effort, 134–35, 149–50 dedicate to projects, 202–5, 208 importance of, 186–87 of prehistoric peoples, 119, 121–22 reset your mind with, 148–49 See also retreats/vacations Lennon, John, 195–96 Lewis, C.

Cocaine Nation: How the White Trade Took Over the World
by Thomas Feiling
Published 20 Jul 2010

Hoping to break this impasse, in the last third of the book I ask some basic questions. How much harm does cocaine do its users? Why do some people become dependent on cocaine while others don’t? What kind of treatment works best for those who want to quit cocaine? I hope that the answers I found and the conclusions I draw go some way to kick-starting the debate over how best to manage drug use in the future. Given the abject failure of current drug policy, the need for a workable alternative isn’t going to go away anytime soon. Author’s Note In June 2009, Barack Obama appointed Gil Kerlikowske as drug tsar. Many critics of the war on drugs had hoped that the new president would appoint somebody with a background in public health to head the Office of National Drug Control Policy.

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These children have seen their parents be called crack-heads, they’ve seen the devastation, and they don’t want any part of it. For them, it’s heavy, heavy marijuana smoking.’ Neither the rise of the crack economy, nor the war on drugs could put young people off drug-taking for good. In 1999, more than half the students of the United States had tried an illegal drug of some kind. The marijuana drought that kick-started the crack economy had not lasted long, and by the late 1990s, marijuana was cheaper and more readily available than ever; 82 per cent of high school seniors said that they found it easy to get their hands on marijuana.8 Teenage marijuana smokers began cussing crack users for their compulsiveness and even assaulting them out of sheer spite.

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Mass drug addiction is a recent phenomenon that has flourished in a specific culture, one notable for the stresses that many of those who live in it have to bear and the solitude that many of them bear it in. But modern city dwellers don’t just take drugs to escape the world. They also take drugs in a misguided attempt to kick-start their participation in it. They are actively encouraged to believe that there is a product that can be bought that can satisfy their every desire, including their desire to participate more fully or escape entirely. The market for escape is partially fed by our notions of success, many of which are as prohibitive and exclusive as our favourite goods.

How to Build a Billion Dollar App: Discover the Secrets of the Most Successful Entrepreneurs of Our Time
by George Berkowski
Published 3 Sep 2014

While Google Glass has received a lot of attention because of Google’s profile, another equally fascinating, and potentially even more disruptive, technology company has captured headline. It is called Oculus VR and it might just be the first company to bring virtual reality to the masses. The company’s founder Palmer Luckey is a self-proclaimed virtual reality enthusiast and hardware geek. He launched a campaign on crowd-funding website kickstarter back in 2012 to build the Oculus Rift – a groundbreaking virtual reality headset for immersive gaming. The campaign was beyond successful and raised not only $2.4 million in funding, but also won the support of three huge gaming companies: Valve, Epic Games and Unity. That success attracted some of the gaming world’s best talent, almost $100 million in venture capital funding and the acquisition of the company by Facebook in March 2014 for $2 billion.

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Advances in hardware, sensors, batteries, operating systems and platforms are now adapting to our lives and the way we prefer to do things. This is a huge shift towards convenience, usability and utility – and it’s a shift that will only become more pronounced. At the same time we’ve seen that you need to focus on big universal problems or needs – combined with a disruptive approach – to kick-start a billion-dollar app. As we’ll discover in Part II, founders of groundbreaking apps don’t just stumble into something great: they have fantastically ambitious visions from Day One. It is a combination of this vision to solve existing problems in novel ways, the refusal to take no for an answer and persevering in the face of scepticism that has launched apps that have changed our lives.

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It’s by far the most impressive site of its kind, and it’s becoming increasingly global. Angel groups are very localised, so you’ll need to do some research in your local capital city or tech hub to see who is active. Check out mybilliondollarapp.com as well – I’ve put together a few great collections in 15 major cities to help kick-start your search. Venture Capitalists You’ve probably come across the name before, but what are venture capitalists (or VCs)? VCs are simply very experienced and knowledgeable (well, some of them) bankers. Just like normal bankers, they will lend you money. Unlike normal bankers they don’t charge interest!

The Burning Answer: The Solar Revolution: A Quest for Sustainable Power
by Keith Barnham
Published 7 May 2015

A lesser-known consequence of these events was a delay in the start of the semiconductor revolution by 16 years. After the war ended, the relatively new industrial laboratories in the US could redirect their attention from the war effort. By looking back at the progress of the quantum revolution in 1931, they were able to kick-start the semiconductor revolution. The entanglement of physics and politics that resulted from these events has had important ramifications for the development of the solar revolution. As we will see, President Eisenhower’s description of civil nuclear power as ‘Atoms for Peace’ was something of a misnomer.

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But, as Orton points out, the early integrated circuits were very expensive. The new industry might have floundered before reaching commercial viability had it not been for US strategic ambitions, in particular, President John F. Kennedy’s decision in May 1961 to put a man on the moon by the end of the decade. As Orton puts it ‘such a dramatic kick-start to a technological revolution smacked of divine intervention by a Higher Being …’ A new type of transistor was particularly suited to the new integrated circuits. This was called the field-effect transistor. It worked just with electrons, directly mimicking de Forest’s triode valve and operating near the surface of the crystal.

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Being of lower quality and requiring less energy input, polycrystalline silicon is cheaper than crystalline silicon. It is also cheaper because, at least until recently, the young PV industry used silicon produced for, but discarded by, the silicon chip industry. Take-off for the solar revolution When, at last, towards the end of the twentieth century, the governments of Germany and Japan decided to kick-start the solar revolution with incentive schemes, polycrystalline silicon solar cells took their place in the van of the revolution. Demand grew, mass production took over and the price of the cells started falling as these governments had expected. Then, in 2004, costs stopped falling as a polycrystalline silicon shortage developed.

Sass for Web Designers
by Dan Cederholm
Published 14 May 2013

More Sass and responsive design In particular, these two articles on responsive web design in Sass and media queries helped me craft Chapter 4 (http://bkaprt.com/sass/25/, http://bkaprt.com/sass/26/). Breakpoint: A plugin for Sass that makes writing media queries even simpler (http://bkaprt.com/sass/27/). Susy: A helper for Compass and Sass for creating responsive grid systems (http://bkaprt.com/sass/28/). Sassaparilla: A kick-start framework for creating responsive web design projects using Compass and Sass. Also has a great name (http://bkaprt.com/sass/29/). Sass tools FireSass for Firebug: A handy Firefox add-on that will display the original Sass filename and line number of Sass-compiled stylesheets, for debugging (http://bkaprt.com/sass/30/).

Show Your Work!: 10 Ways to Share Your Creativity and Get Discovered
by Austin Kleon
Published 6 Mar 2014

These links do well with a little bit of human copy, such as “Like this? Buy me a coffee.” This is a very simple transaction, which is the equivalent of a band passing a hat during a gig—if people are digging what you do, they’ll throw a few bucks your way. If you have work you want to attempt that requires some up-front capital, platforms like Kickstarter and Indiegogo make it easy to run fund-raising campaigns with tiered rewards for donors. It’s important to note that these platforms work best when you’ve already gathered a group of people who are into what you do. The musician Amanda Palmer has had wild success turning her audience into patrons: After showing her work, sharing her music freely, and cultivating relationships with her fans, she asked for $100,000 from them to help record her next album.

Shipping Greatness
by Chris Vander Mey
Published 23 Aug 2012

The first job is maintaining the software that’s in production and is almost certainly experiencing some kind of growing pains. The second job is spinning up the new project, and if it’s like most projects, it requires a huge amount of activation energy to kick-start and substantial mental toughness to survive the inevitable shin bashing as that kick-starter smacks you. Being in transition is a tough place to be, so make the transition short. Make it shorter than you think it should be. If you’ve ever noticed that things at the office go better than you’d expect when you take a long vacation, you’ll find that the same is true when you walk away from your old project.

100 Plus: How the Coming Age of Longevity Will Change Everything, From Careers and Relationships to Family And
by Sonia Arrison
Published 22 Aug 2011

Aside from the important work that has resulted in creating replacement body parts, altering genes, and better understanding aging, there is another huge reason to be optimistic about the prospects of rebuilding humans when they get sick: the ability to sequence the human genome, or the complete set of human DNA. The Human Genome Project (HGP), which was coordinated by the U.S. Department of Energy and the National Institutes of Health (NIH), kick-started this field. Francis Collins, now the director of the NIH, was the leader of the HGP, which set as its goal to sequence all the DNA in the human body. On June 26, 2000, the first draft of the human blueprint was announced at the White House. “Humankind is on the verge of gaining immense new power to heal.

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According to David Popenoe, codirector of the National Marriage Project at Rutgers University, “As of 2002, over 50 percent of women ages 19 to 44 had cohabited for a portion of their lives, compared to 33 percent in 1987 and virtually none a hundred years ago.”39 However, if cohabitation hadn’t kick-started with the sexual revolution, it would have happened anyway in response to longer life expectancies. That’s because it is a relationship structure that allows individuals to be in a serious relationship without being forced to make a premature lifelong commitment. Waiting until the time is right works in tandem with planning a marriage that is more likely to be stable and happy; couples have time to figure out who they are and what kind of relationship is best for them.

Tough Sh*t: Life Advice From a Fat, Lazy Slob Who Did Good
by Kevin Smith
Published 20 Mar 2012

This shaggy paean to those who follow the road not taken offered me a glimpse into a free-associative world of ideas instead of plot, people instead of characters, and Nowheresville, Texas, instead of the usual California or New York settings most movies elected to feature. That Nowheresville was actually Austin speaks volumes on how culturally bereft and state-capital ignorant I was at the time. That night, Richard Linklater and his film not only captured my imagination, they kick-started my ambition. The simplicity of the story and filmmaking, the unpolished cast, the nontraditional storytelling—it was like cumming with someone else for the first time: Suddenly, you never wanted to cum by yourself again; figuratively speaking, this movie was teaching me how to fuck. By the time we hit the turnpike tollbooth on the Jersey side of the Holland Tunnel, I finally said it aloud.

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Scott and I sat with Dershowitz at a press conference, where the legendary lawyer insisted his teenage kid should be able to watch Clerks as a precautionary tale without needing permission from a parent to do so, because the moral of the story he wanted his son to be able to learn was so essential: Go to college or you’ll end up like these two losers behind convenience-store counters. When the time came to actually face the MPAA and argue for an R over the NC-17, we were repped by a Miramax lawyer. Alan Dershowitz, it seemed, only had been retained for that press conference to kick-start publicity. But pay him to actually be a lawyer on the film’s behalf? Why bother! All that freedom of speech and anticensorship talk was hot air, as Harvey told us that if the MPAA upheld the NC-17, then editing out the objectionable material was going to be our next step. We’d take on the establishment to a point, but only for the noise it created.

The Long Good Buy: Analysing Cycles in Markets
by Peter Oppenheimer
Published 3 May 2020

Although there is insufficient data on interest rates to show this for all the cyclical bear markets throughout history, in most cases there is a tendency for equity markets to begin to recover after a period of falling rates. Although this can sometimes take a period of time, because the initial rate falls may not be enough to generate expectations of an imminent economic recovery, an easing of monetary policy is usually an important part of the process of kick-starting growth again and pushing equity prices higher. Various factors are common to cyclical bear markets. Taking the history of these types of bear markets together shows us that the average cyclical bear market experiences a fall of about 30% and lasts for about 27 months. The level of the market has, on average, not recovered to its previous level until just over 4 years after the decline in nominal terms, and 6 years in real terms (although the averages in real terms are highly variable).

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In this way, it is not always easy to recognise where a particular event-driven crisis ends as the shock often triggers follow-on waves of rising uncertainty, falling investment and, possibly, an economic downturn. Oftentimes, such events, particularly if traumatic, can elicit a powerful policy response that kick-starts a recovery or fuels another problem. For example, the Russian debt default and Asian crises of 1997/1998 resulted in a global easing of monetary policy at a time when domestic demand in the developed economies was strong. The cost of capital fell still further. Import costs fell sharply and boosted already strong corporate margins.

How to Do Nothing
by Jenny Odell
Published 8 Apr 2019

Haraway, Staying with the Trouble, 81. Conclusion 1. Wendell Berry, “A Native Hill,” in The Art of the Commonplace: The Agrarian Essays of Wendell Berry, ed. Norman Wirzba (Berkeley, CA: Counterpoint Press, 2002), 27. 2. Leopold, A Sand County Almanac, 197. 3. T. L. Simons quoted in “Long Lost Oakland,” Kickstarter, 2018: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/eastbayyesterday/long-lost-oakland. 4. Walter Benjamin, “Theses on the Philosophy of History,” in Illuminations, ed. Hannah Arendt, trans. Harry Zohn (New York: Schocken, 2007), 257. 5. Martha A. Sandweiss, “John Gast, American Progress, 1872,” Picturing United States History: https://picturinghistory.gc.cuny.edu/john-gast-american-progress-1872/ 6.

The New Nomads: How the Migration Revolution Is Making the World a Better Place
by Felix Marquardt
Published 7 Jul 2021

It allows us to show compassion towards both victims of racism: the immigrant and the racist. Of course, embarking on an external journey does not guarantee we will embark on the crucial internal journey that may eventually allow us to leave Othering behind. But it can play a decisive role in kickstarting that process. This is exactly what happened to Abdi and Jeff. Abdramane thrived at Ranch Sieben because his external journeys, from his childhood walks to his international travels, were mirrored by an internal journey that had taught him, fundamentally, that whether you’re in Mali or Montana, people have plenty in common with each other.

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Beyond the essentials of life like shelter and food – which may be grudgingly given – refugees also need to be offered a community. Too often, though, the bureaucratic processes that surround asylum claims isolate them. These processes can separate them from other refugees and, perhaps more importantly, from the host population. Upon arrival, we should be doing everything we can to kickstart the refugee’s ability to start building a network and become part of a community – and in this digital age, as shown by the EVE Online example, it is easier than ever to meet somebody who shares an interest of yours in real life. Unfortunately, however, a set of policies adopted in many countries, from Britain’s Hostile Environment to the United States’ border internment camps, frustrates refugees’ ability to build community.

Death Glitch: How Techno-Solutionism Fails Us in This Life and Beyond
by Tamara Kneese
Published 14 Aug 2023

In the early twenty-first century, as life insurance has waned in popularity and is no longer provided by most employers—especially for employees in part-time, freelance, gig, or otherwise structurally precarious positions—crowdfunding campaigns fill in for life insurance for those who are unable to prepare for their own burials. Because of institutional malevolence or abandonment, compassionate volunteers donate to campaigns on platforms like Kickstarter or GoFundMe to bury the unfortunate dead.26 Crowdfunding has itself become an after-the-fact, ad hoc form of life insurance. Like many other aspects of the platform economy, death care is a just-in-time, on-demand service. Responsible death is predicated on responsible living, which means optimizing one’s health to avoid sickness in the first place.

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During moments of mass protest, such as the 2020 uprisings in response to the police murders of Breonna Taylor and George Floyd, for people who could not join mass protests (because of their own vulnerabilities or caretaking responsibilities), online acts of mutual aid, such as providing masks or food to protestors or contributing to bail funds through commercial payment systems like Venmo, Kickstarter, PayPal, and GoFundMe, provided a way to contribute to collective care movements. Crowdfunded funerals and memorial services can help ensure that people have dignity in death. In this way, digital platforms can foment a sense of solidarity from afar. Digital mourning can in some ways address the people and events that are not honored by official monuments.

The Rebel and the Kingdom: The True Story of the Secret Mission to Overthrow the North Korean Regime
by Bradley Hope
Published 1 Nov 2022

Then he took peanut butter jars, completely cleaned out with soap, and put the remaining coleslaw vegetables inside, adding garlic powder and a squeeze of sweet-and-sour sauce. Sugar, or even ingredients that contained sugar, was hard to come by inside because it could be used to brew alcohol. But the sweet-and-sour sauce had just enough to kick-start the fermentation process. Ahn stored the jars filled with his concoction in bread bags under his bed. After a week, he revealed his creation of jailhouse kimchi to the other prisoners. It was a hit. * * * — Finally, the work of Christopher Ahn’s legal team seemed to be paying off. On July 16, 2019, Judge Jean Rosenbluth, of the U.S.

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Sources are the unsung heroes of journalism, and some of mine took big risks to help me understand their world better. In 2021, my longtime friend and collaborator Tom Wright and I left our jobs at The Wall Street Journal to found a journalism start-up company called Project Brazen. This book was one of the first two projects we launched at the company, with all of the proceeds used to kick-start the business, hire staff, and invest in storytelling. My thanks to Tom for reviewing parts of the manuscript and offering his friendship and support always. Many thanks also to Project Brazen’s advisers, Stefano Quadrio Curzio and David Giampaolo. Paul Whitlatch, the talented editor who commissioned Tom’s and my first book, Billion Dollar Whale, in 2018, as well as a second book, which I co-authored with Justin Scheck, Blood and Oil, convinced me that I had it in me for a third book project in only six years.

Blockchain Revolution: How the Technology Behind Bitcoin Is Changing Money, Business, and the World
by Don Tapscott and Alex Tapscott
Published 9 May 2016

In the first week, more than 3,500 people from the United States, China, Japan, France, Germany, Spain, the United Kingdom, Korea, Brazil, South Africa, Kenya, and Uganda contributed a total of $4 million. There was no brokerage, no investment bank, no stock exchange, no mandatory filings, no regulator, and no lawyers. There wasn’t even a Kickstarter or Indiegogo. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the blockchain IPO. Matching investors with entrepreneurs is one of the eight functions of the financial services industry most likely to be disrupted. The process of raising equity capital—through private placements, initial public offerings, secondary offerings, and private investments in public equities (PIPEs)—has not changed significantly since the 1930s.78 Thanks to new crowdfunding platforms, small companies can access capital using the Internet.

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The Oculus Rift and the Pebble Watch were early successes of this model. Still, participants couldn’t buy equity directly. Today, the U.S. Jumpstart Our Business Startups Act allows small investors to make direct investments in crowdfunding campaigns, but investors and entrepreneurs still need intermediaries such as Kickstarter or Indiegogo, and a conventional payment method, typically credit cards and PayPal, to participate. The intermediary is the ultimate arbiter of everything, including who owns what. The blockchain IPO takes the concept further. Now, companies can raise funds “on the blockchain” by issuing tokens, or cryptosecurities, of some value in the company.

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In 2009, she became the first woman to win a Grammy solo for engineering her own album, Ellipse. She took all her Twitter followers to the award ceremony by wearing what has become known as the “Twitter dress.” Her outfit, designed by Moritz Waldemeyer, featured an LED zipper that streamed her fans’ tweets around her shoulders. In 2013, Heap kick-started the nonprofit Mi.Mu to invent a musical glove system. It combines mapping software with motion detection sensors so that performers can control lights, music, and video with user-customized gestures. The invention won top prize at the 2015 Berlin Awards for WearableIT/FashionTech. The gloves are quickly catching on.

Lean Analytics: Use Data to Build a Better Startup Faster
by Alistair Croll and Benjamin Yoskovitz
Published 1 Mar 2013

Abandonment Not everyone buys something. At its simplest, abandonment rate is the opposite of conversion rate. But a purchasing process often has several steps—reviewing items in a shopping cart, providing shipping information, entering billing details, and so on. In some cases, the process may even involve a third-party site: Kickstarter sends users to Amazon to provide their credit card information, and Eventbrite links to PayPal so buyers can pay for tickets. The number of people who abandon a funnel at each of these stages is the abandonment rate. It’s important to analyze it for each step in order to see which parts of the process are hurting you the most.

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Customers will often rationalize away the risk and pocket the savings. But if you make money from revenues, then the customer will likely split the winnings with you. Products that boost revenues are easier for people to believe in—just look at lotteries and get-rich-quick schemes versus savings plans and life insurance. Eventbrite and Kickstarter know this. An ecosystem will form around you. This is similar to the platform model. Salesforce and Photoshop are good examples of this: Salesforce’s App Exchange has thousands of third-party applications that make the CRM (customer relationship management) provider more useful and customizable, and Photoshop’s plug-in model added features to the application far more quickly than if Adobe had coded them all itself.

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Changes in churn, segmented by channels, show whether you’re growing your most important asset—your customers—or hemorrhaging attention as you scale. Buffer Goes from Stickiness to Scale (Through Revenue) Buffer is a startup that was founded in 2010 by Tom Moor, Leo Widrich, and Joel Gascoigne. Joel kick-started Buffer because of a pain he was experiencing: the difficulty of posting great content he was finding regularly to Twitter. Solutions already existed for scheduling tweets, but nothing as simple and easy to use as what Joel was looking for, so he joined forces with Tom and Leo, and they built Buffer.

Smart Cities: Big Data, Civic Hackers, and the Quest for a New Utopia
by Anthony M. Townsend
Published 29 Sep 2013

The plan was to entice multinationals to set up Asian operations at Songdo, where they would be able to reach any of East Asia’s boomtowns quickly by air. It was to be a special economic zone, with lower taxes and less regulation, inspired by those created in Shenzhen and Shanghai in the 1980s by premier Deng Xiaoping, which kick-started China’s economic rise.15 But in an odd twist of fate, Songdo now aspires to be a model for China instead. The site itself is deeply symbolic. Viewed from the sky, its street grid forms an arrow aimed straight at the heart of coastal China. It is a kind of neoliberal feng shui diagram, drawing energy from the rapidly urbanizing nation just over the western horizon.

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That is holding them back. Smart cities could also evolve from the bottom up, if we let them. Both the evolution of the Internet, and the history of city planning, shows us that. But it is also crucial to recognize that the Internet didn’t just emerge out of thin air. The US government played a huge role in kick-starting it. As Los Angeles Times columnist Michael Hiltzik wrote, “Private enterprise had no interest in something so visionary and complex, with questionable commercial opportunities. Indeed, the private corporation that then owned monopoly control over America’s communications network, AT&T, fought tooth and nail against the ARPANet,” the Defense Department’s research network that pioneered the technologies that power the Internet.40 One can find National Science Foundation research grants in the DNA of almost every major advance in the software, hardware, and network designs that power the Internet today.

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As Jacob explained to me later, in August 2012 he had taken on a new role advising his peers in several other American cities on how to replicate the success of the Office of New Urban Mechanics. Philadelphia, the first to come knocking “actually called and asked ‘Can we just franchise what you guys do?’ ” Jacob proudly said.53 He was also working to help spread to other cities some of the projects kick-started in Boston. One such tool, Community PlanIt, was an online game designed by Eric Gordon, a visual and media arts professor at Emerson College, to enhance the value of community meetings. When we spoke, Community PlanIt had been successfully rolled out in two of Boston’s suburbs as well as Detroit.

Failures of State: The Inside Story of Britain's Battle With Coronavirus
by Jonathan Calvert and George Arbuthnott
Published 18 Mar 2021

We asked them whether Britain was equipped to fight a pandemic and if the politicians understood the severity of the threat. We wanted to know what the scientists told ministers and why so little was done to equip the National Health Service for the difficult days ahead. Why was it that the government failed to act more swiftly to kick-start the Whitehall machine and put the NHS onto a war footing, and what were the consequences? They told us that, contrary to the official line, Britain was not in a state of readiness for the pandemic. Emergency stockpiles of personal protective equipment (PPE) had severely dwindled and were out of date because they had become a low priority in the years of austerity cuts.

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Located at the very centre of China, Wuhan grew around an inland port on the banks of the Yangtze, the world’s third largest river behind the Nile and the Amazon. The dusty orange waters of the river cleave the city in two as it flows west to east from the Tibetan plateau to the coast at Shanghai. Wuhan was one of the great engines of China’s industrial revolution, kick-starting the country’s steel industry and becoming a major manufacturing centre for textiles, machinery and consumer products. But it is also a place of much political symbolism as the birthplace of the Chinese Republic, which was formed after an uprising in its Wuchang district in 1911. The revolution overthrew the Qing dynasty, the country’s last imperial rulers, and led finally to the abdication of the six-year-old Puyi, who became known as the ‘last’ Emperor.

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‘As soon as the first whiff of something came out of Wuhan what the good regimes did was mobilise their testing laboratories,’ said the Downing Street adviser, ‘but over the last five years, we’ve made all of ours private and commercial.’ It was therefore important, the adviser said, that the government should reach out to Britain’s large network of private biochemical laboratories, seeking help in mass producing tests, as countries such as Germany would do so successfully. But there was no attempt to kick-start testing in the private sector in the crucial initial weeks. ‘We should have communicated with every commercial testing laboratory that might volunteer to become part of the government’s testing regime, but that didn’t happen,’ said the adviser. It would be more than two months before there was a proper attempt to seek the assistance of the private laboratories.

The Dream of the Iron Dragon
by Robert Kroese
Published 6 Dec 2017

Hell, they’d left so little mark on North America that nobody had known for sure until the 1960s that the Vikings had been there. No, hiding a note under a rock wasn’t going to cut it. If they were going to change the future, they were going to have to go big. Go to Otto I with plans for the steam engine and the Bessemer furnace. Show his advisers the formula for gunpowder and teach them how to make penicillin. Kickstart the industrial revolution seven hundred years early. Then when humanity finally met the Cho-ta’an, they’d be so far ahead technologically that they’d be able to set the terms. There was, of course, no way to know what sorts of side effects such an action would have on history. Maybe humanity would wipe itself out with nuclear weapons in the fourteenth century.

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The Dawn of the Iron Dragon follows the crew of Andrea Luhman as they establish a secret facility in Iceland and then trade, negotiate and pillage their way across Europe, contending with power-hungry kings and devious Cho-ta’an agents, with one goal in mind: to build a ship capable of reaching space. The Dawn of the Iron Dragon will go on sale on Amazon in May 2018, but you can get an advance copy by pre-ordering in hardcover, paperback or ebook. Unless you got in on the Saga of the Iron Dragon Kickstarter, this is your only chance to get a hardcover. I’ll even sign it for you! Pre-order your copy now! Review This Book! Did you enjoy The Dream of the Iron Dragon? Please take a moment to leave a review on Amazon.com! Reviews are very important for getting the word out to other readers, and it only takes a few seconds.

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Lucy Rogers, author of It’s Only Rocket Science, who helped me with the space travel stuff; Jackson Crawford, translator of the Poetic Edda, who kept me from mangling Old Norse too badly; Michael Carpenter, who checked my chemistry; Jake Steinman, who assisted with the sailing parts; and Charles Morello, who helped me with the railgun specs and combat tactics; My beta readers: Suzy Cilbrith, Bill Curtis, Mark Fitzgerald, Lauren Foley, Brian Galloway, Mike Hull, Scott Lavery, Christopher Majava, Viktor Nehring, Paul Alan Piatt and Mark Thompson; And the Saga of the Iron Dragon Kickstarter supporters, including: Tom Cannon, Chris DeBrusk, Rick DeVos, Christopher Finlan, Brian and Donna Hekman, Tom Hickok, Aaron James, Andrea Luhman, Arnie M., Matthew J McCormick, Steven Mentzel, Kristi Michels, Cara Miller, Kyle “Fiddy” Pinches, Chad and Denise Rogers, Justin Schumacher, Thomas James Slater, Johannes Stauffer, Christopher Turner, and Gabe Zuehlsdorf.

The Art of Community: Building the New Age of Participation
by Jono Bacon
Published 1 Aug 2009

Here are some tips that might help you improve your chances of success: Make donating easy Be sure to make donating a piece of cake. Most people will want to donate online with a credit or debit card or with PayPal. For Severed Fifth we used PayPal to gather the donations, but you can also use a service such as KickStarter, which rallies prospective donors around a target figure. Regardless of the service you choose, make sure that donating is a breeze and only takes a few minutes. Pick a goal A donation drive should have a target and focus and not just be a case of “give us money, please!” Whether it is a target outcome (e.g., the recording in the previous Severed Fifth example), a target amount, or anything else, be sure to have a goal that people feel passionate about supporting with their wallet.

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It was a great example of focused collaboration. Of course, there are many different forms of collaboration, and when assessing what collaborative opportunities are available to us in our communities, we often need to assess what tools we have available because these affect what we can do. Collaboration is difficult to kick-start if people don’t have the tools they require to participate. We discussed this more in Chapter 5. Social media is heavily optimized toward some forms of collaboration and not others. As an example, social networks are fantastic for communication, but at the time of this writing they lack tools for collaborating around art and media, around code and software, and around documents.

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I wasn’t so much worried about the delivery (I was a fairly outgoing teen) but more the structure, story, and design of my slides. I really wanted people to enjoy my presentation; I didn’t want it to feel like a dorky presentation done by a pimply teenager (which of course it was). Fortunately, it went pretty well. This kick-started years of trial and error in developing my own presentation mojo. Over the course of my career, I have seen some brutally awful presentations and some stunningly entertaining and thoughtful ones. I have always wanted to be in the latter category, and while I don’t consider myself an expert in presentation magic, I have come away with some tips I want to share with you all.

Deploying OpenStack
by Ken Pepple
Published 26 Jul 2011

Complete instructions and links to the development repositories can be found via the RHEL Packaging page on the OpenStack wiki or by going to their build page directly at http://yum.griddynamics.net/. Fedora Packages Another consulting company called Mirantis provides Nova Fedora packages based on the Red Hat Enterprise Linux packages. They provide both Cactus release and trunk packages. Instructions for installing these RPMs and configuring them with a kickstart script are available at the Mirantis blog. Microsoft Windows It is unlikely that you will be able to fully install Nova on Microsoft Windows. Microsoft Windows lacks many of the Nova-supporting Python libraries and is not supported by Nova orchestration features (which are mostly Linux operating system commands).

Architecting Modern Data Platforms: A Guide to Enterprise Hadoop at Scale
by Jan Kunigk , Ian Buss , Paul Wilkinson and Lars George
Published 8 Jan 2019

Finally, after the configuration is loaded, the machine fetches an OS-specific installation binary (often a minimal OS setup executed in memory only) and subsequently executes it. OS setup After bootstrapping, the minimal installer does the rest of the work, contacting the OS-specific configuration service. For Red Hat Linux, a common tool for this task is Kickstart, which defines all of the parameters that should apply to the installation of the OS on a particular machine. In other words, Kickstart is a template that mimics an interactive user entering the desired details while configuring the OS during the setup process. All of the choices are recorded in files and handed to the installer, which automatically executes the installation.

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Afterward, you can configure the installation scripts to use the local mirror repository and install as if you had direct internet access. After you have decided which repository to use—whether online or local—the installation is performed manually, or automated, as discussed earlier (using, for example, Kickstart for Red Hat–based systems). After the installation is complete, you can move on to configure the more dynamic OS settings, as explained in the next section. OS Configuration for Hadoop Running the Hadoop processes requires some configuration of the OS itself. For example, it is known that the Hadoop DataNodes are dealing with file-level I/O, reading and writing Hadoop Distributed File System (HDFS) blocks.

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RAID 10 for broker data disks in Kafka, Deployment considerations RAID-0 arrays, Guidelines RAID1 for HDFS metadata, Deployment recommendations SCSI SYNCHRONIZE CACHE command, not passed to disks, Disk cache raised-floor cooling, Cooling RAM (random access memory), Commodity Serversin computer architecture for Hadoop, RAM range partitioning, Apache Kudu Ranger, Required Databases, Other Servicesbacking up Apache Ranger, Apache Ranger centralized authorization control for Kafka, Kafka centralized authorization with, Centralized Security Management centralized management of YARN queue access controls, YARN HDFS ACLs, controlling, HDFS Key Management Server, Encrypting and decrypting files in encryption zones, KMS implementations Key Management Server (KMS), At-Rest Encryption using in HBase, HBase RDBMS (relational database management systems), Service Databases, Database Integration Options read system call, Important System Calls, The Linux Page Cache read-ahead caching, Read-ahead caching readseffects of disk and storage controller caches on throughput, Disk cache HDFS client local to DataNode process or remote client, The Linux Page Cache measuring speed of distributed reads in HDFS, Distributed writes and reads measuring speed of single reads in HDFS, Single writes and reads performance, erasure coding vs. replication, Read performance short-circuit and zero-copy reads, Short-Circuit and Zero-Copy Reads realmd library, SSSD, Integrating with a Kerberos KDC realms (Kerberos), Principalssuperuser privileges shared across clusters in, Restricting superusers rebuildsfull, Restore partial, Restore records, Kafka recovery, Backup and Disaster Recovery(see also backups and disaster recovery) erasure coding vs. replication, Read performance recovery point objective (RPO), Alternative solutions, Policies and Objectives recovery time objective (RTO), Alternative solutions, Database Integration Options, Policies and Objectives Red Hatinformation on OpenShift container security, Isolation installing and starting NTP service daemon, OS Configuration for Hadoop Kickstart, Operating Systems OpenShift distribution, OpenShift OpenStack distribution, OpenStack, Summary package management, Installation Process Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL), OS ChoiceseCryptfs support removed in RHEL 7, Volume Encryption with Cloudera Navigator Encrypt and Key Trustee Server obtaining sysbench, Validation approaches Satellite, Operating Systems systemd-based Linux, installing and starting caching daemon, OS Configuration for Hadoop Red Hat Identity Management (IdM), Integration Providersproviding KDC and user/group lookup via LDAP, Integration Providers reduce stage (MapReduce), Hadoop MapReduce Redundant Array of Independent Disks (see RAID) refresh tokens, ADLS regionsin AWS, AWS in Azure, Microsoft Azure in Google Cloud Platform (GCP), Google Cloud Platform in public cloud solutions, Compute availability RegionServers (HBase), HBase relational database management systems (RDBMS), Service Databases, Database Integration Options reliability, Consensusenhancing via replication in distributed systems, Replication jumbo frames and, Layer 2 Recommendations statestore and, Statestore remote block storage, SANsCeph support for, Remote block storage EBS in AWS, AWS storage options guidance on from Hadoop vendors, SANs in OpenStack Cinder, Life Cycle and Storage in public cloud solutions, Key Things to Know remote direct memory access (RMDA), Layer 1 Recommendations remote procedure calls (RPCs), Remote Procedure Calls (RPCs)-Latency and cluster services, Programmatic Accessimplementations and architectures, Implementations and architectures latency, Latencyand cluster services, Latency and cluster services platform services and their RPCs, Implementations and architectures process control, Process control remotely attached storage, Storage Virtualization replacements and repair in datacenters, Replacements and Repairoperational procedures, Operational Procedures replicas, HDFSin Kafka, Kafka in Solr, Solrplacement of, Deployment considerations replication, Data Replication, Replication, Replication, Data Replication-Summaryand database high-availability, Replication and workload isolation, Replication and Workload Isolation data replication between geographic sites, Edge-connected networks erasure coding vs., Replication or Erasure Coding?

Career Essentials: The Cover Letter
by Dale Mayer
Published 28 Jul 2011

Take it easy and it will happen faster. This free writing will help to focus your brain. When the phrases start flowing, write everything down until they stop. Then sit back and see what ideas you have generated. There is usually something in this that you can then use to get started on your cover letter. Another way to kick-start the process is to ask yourself various questions. What kind of person would you want to hire? What qualities do you have that you’d like him to know about? What is your greatest accomplishment? What skills are you the most proud of having acquired? What can you do for the company that another person can’t?

Race Against the Machine: How the Digital Revolution Is Accelerating Innovation, Driving Productivity, and Irreversibly Transforming Employment and the Economy
by Erik Brynjolfsson
Published 23 Jan 2012

Apple’s App Store and Google’s Android Marketplace make it easy for people with ideas for mobile applications to create and distribute them. Threadless lets people create and sell designs for t-shirts. Amazon’s Mechanical Turk makes it easy to find cheap labor to do a breathtaking array of simple, well-defined tasks. Kickstarter flips this model on its head and helps designers and creative artists find sponsors for their projects. Heartland Robotics provides cheap robots-in-a-box that make it possible for small business people to quickly set up their own highly automated factory, dramatically reducing the costs and increasing the flexibility of manufacturing.

Space at the Speed of Light: The History of 14 Billion Years for People Short on Time
by Becky Smethurst
Published 1 Jun 2020

As black holes accrete more material, the hotter that material gets and the greater the pressure pushing material away from the black hole. So, when it starts accreting at the maximum rate, the black hole effectively shoots itself in the foot. What you end up with is sporadic accretion: a period of maximum accretion followed by a quiet period where the gas around the black hole cools down enough to kick-start accretion again. Alternatively, a black hole could grow by merging with other black holes. Remember, we’ve detected gravitational waves from mergers of black holes in our own Milky Way, so we know this is definitely possible. We can calculate how many mergers are needed by assuming that the black hole always merges with another black hole of the same mass.

The Wikipedia Revolution: How a Bunch of Nobodies Created the World's Greatest Encyclopedia
by Andrew Lih
Published 5 Jul 2010

He would provide the lifeline to Nupedia. Chapter 4_ WIKI INTRODUCED “Every artist was first an amateur.” —Ralph Waldo Emerson “History is too serious to be left to historians.” —Ian Macleod After both Larry Sanger and Jimmy Wales found out about WikiWikiWeb software and its use for collaboration, both were keen on it helping kick-start Nupedia’s lackluster pace. Nupedia was simply not working, because people were not collaborating efficiently and articles were not being generated fast enough. The wiki software might just get existing Nupedians to work better, while also allowing more participants from the outside world. On January 10, 2001, Wales installed the same wiki software that Ben Kovitz described at the time—a “script” called UseModWiki that ran on a Web server.

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Wikipedia’s reliance on having a critical mass of users to create the swarm effect makes it difficult to imagine substantial efforts for languages of fewer than a million speakers. Not only are the numbers small, but editors need access to the technology of the Internet, as Wikipedia is only edited practically online while connected live in cyberspace. There is nothing lonelier than being the only person on a wiki. Nevertheless, one of those kick-start seed communities in Africa was started by Kasper Souren, working for the NGO Geekcorps to spread Internet literacy to developing nations. Souren, from the Netherlands, while on mission in Mali, helped establish Wikipedia in the Bambara language, only spoken by 6 million people in the country. Souren wrote in his report to an open source conference about his experiences: The Wikipedias in Bambara, Peul and Wolof were started in the beginning of 2005.

The End of Growth
by Jeff Rubin
Published 2 Sep 2013

The sooner central bankers and finance ministers realize that, the better off we’ll be. Massive budget deficits and rock-bottom interest rates are the wrong prescription for the realities of the energy-constrained world we now live in. The US stimulus package in 2009 approved more than $700 billion in spending that was designed to kick-start a recovery. That money has put people to work and will help improve the country’s infrastructure, but eventually it must be repaid. In the final analysis, the spending amounts to a very expensive short-term patch. Such policy measures, which are being enacted in the eurozone as well as the United States, are burdening national economies with a crushing amount of debt.

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Any apparent financial recoveries are a mirage. When the smoke clears, oil prices will still be dictating the economic terms. Unfortunately, the huge deficits we’ve run up since the last recession are very real bills that will need to be paid. Central banks are running printing presses almost nonstop to kick-start economic growth. In the United States, the Fed calls this tactic “quantitative easing”—a fancy way of saying the Fed is finding ways to pour as much new money into the system as it can. Typically, the Fed sticks to using its control over short-term interest rates to help strengthen the economy.

Buying Time: The Delayed Crisis of Democratic Capitalism
by Wolfgang Streeck
Published 1 Jan 2013

Even where this did not involve actual relocation, it exposed the nation-states of democratic capitalism to more intense fiscal competition with one another and pushed their governments to lower the top rates of corporate taxation.33 True, the withdrawal of various exemptions was supposed to ‘broaden’ the national tax base and to make the overall outcome revenue-neutral, but the fact remains that it was no longer possible to contemplate raising taxes. Besides, the pervasive neoliberal insistence on ‘incentives’ to kick-start economic growth entailed higher pay and lower tax rates at the top, along with cuts in wages and benefits at the bottom of the income ladder. In this respect too, the ‘varieties’ of capitalism differed only in degree: the combination of tax reforms and labour-market reform (Hartz IV!) under Schröder’s Red-Green government in Germany34 was matched by Clinton’s abolition of ‘welfare as we know it’ and Bush’s notorious tax cuts after 2001.35 The American case offers convincing evidence that the origins of the public financial crisis have at least as much to do with revenue as with expenditure.

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Kennedy. 6 See the left-wing thecurrentmoment blog on the occasion of Hollande’s election as president on 7 May 2012: ‘The socialist campaign in France was focused on Sarkozy’s record as president. Its own economic programme was far weaker. The main thrust was to halt reform at the domestic level, bringing things back to the status quo ante, and to kickstart growth at the European level by using the creditworthiness of Germany to fund a new round of government borrowing … New governments in Europe, including the French Socialists, are relying on yet more borrowing to promote growth. This is not the end of austerity in Europe so much as a continuation of the underlying trends that brought about the crisis in the first place.’

In Pursuit of Memory: The Fight Against Alzheimer's
by Joseph Jebelli
Published 30 Oct 2017

The results of almost every study reported no effects on memory and no improvement on any tests of cognition. While a few groups declared some benefit, the data backing up such claims was inadequate. Whatever the reason, neurons had given up making acetylcholine, and giving them copious amounts of choline in the hope they would kick-start the mechanism back into action wasn’t enough. But all was not lost. ‘Truth in science,’ the Austrian zoologist Konrad Lorenz said, ‘can be defined as the working hypothesis best suited to open the way to the next better one.’ What if, some scientists asked, instead of trying to make new neurotransmitter from scratch, we simply kept the acetylcholine that was already present in the brain around for longer?

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The problem with ES cells, he soon realised, was that the patient’s immune system would recognise them as foreign and mount a deadly biological defence to remove them from the body. In addition, ES cells were rapidly provoking fierce controversy due to the moral dilemma of destroying human embryos to harvest them. But the more tangible problem for Yamanaka was that he desperately needed other scientists to help kick-start his lab. Every April, 100 students at the Nara had to select one of its twenty research labs to work for–which often left some labs with none. Students were drawn to the old, established professors, who published career-defining papers in prestigious journals like Nature and Science. At thirty-six years old, with no such papers, how, Yamanaka wondered, could he attract them?

New Dark Age: Technology and the End of the Future
by James Bridle
Published 18 Jun 2018

Once again, agriculture collapsed, this time on both sides of the Atlantic, and the regrowth of forests coupled with the reduction in wood burning resulted in an atmospheric decline in carbon dioxide of seven to ten parts per million between 1570 and 1620.27 It has never fallen in such a way since. It is perhaps this event that should be considered the beginning of the anthropocene, rather than some marvellous human invention belatedly recognised as suicidal. Not the invention of the coal-fired steam engine that kick-started the industrial age in the eighteenth century; not the fixation of nitrogen beginning with the invention of the Haber-Bosch process; not the release of billions of particles of radioactive contamination from the detonation of hundreds of nuclear bombs: the anthropocene starts with mass genocide, with planetary violence on such a scale that it registers in ice cores and the pollination of crops.

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Trump’s willingness to repeat what he read on the internet, or was fed by advisors with close links to right-wing conspiracy networks, surprised even Jones: ‘It is surreal to talk about issues here on air, and then word-for-word hear Trump say it two days later,’ he said.34 The fringes of the internet had returned to the centre. In ‘Weather as a Force Multiplier: Owning the Weather in 2025’, the US Air Force report that kick-started the chemtrails conspiracy, the writers noted that while most weather-modification efforts rely on the existence of certain preexisting conditions, it may be possible to produce some weather effects artificially, regardless of preexisting conditions. For instance, virtual weather could be created by influencing the weather information received by an end user.

Upscale: What It Takes to Scale a Startup. By the People Who've Done It.
by James Silver
Published 15 Nov 2018

As soon as I hit “Publish”, things just kind of changed forever for me.’ The key change for Routledge was a reappraisal of his personal attitude to mental health - he began to learn that openness about feelings and being honest about himself could start to ease the burden he’d been carrying in secret. ‘That post also kick-started a load of conversations with friends, family and people around me, and even people I’d never met before. I was just really connecting with them and being really honest and having these meaningful chats. I was pretty much training this muscle of authenticity. What I mean by that is it’s harder to be yourself than it is to conform, and I’d spent a long time trying to conform and trying to be someone that I thought I should be.

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For Series A-stage businesses, having too many subcommittees can become a distraction. Simon Calver is best known for his seven-year tenure as CEO at LOVEFiLM, one of the early successes of the UK venture industry - leading the eventual exit to Amazon in 2011. He went on to become CEO of Mothercare, kick-starting the turnaround plan and accelerating international expansion in over 30 countries. Before this he worked at multinationals such as Unilever, led PepsiCo in the UK, and was General Manager at Dell. He was previously chairman of Moo.com and Chemist Direct and is currently a founding partner of BGF Ventures, where he is on the boards of various UK technology companies.

Brave New Work: Are You Ready to Reinvent Your Organization?
by Aaron Dignan
Published 1 Feb 2019

The public benefit corporation promises the best of both worlds: purpose and profit, scale and impact. As of this writing, thirty-four U.S. states have already passed legislation enabling this form of incorporation, and more are following suit. Some of the most progressive organizations around have already taken the leap and become public benefit corporations, including Method, Kickstarter, Plum Organics, Patagonia, and Danone North America. Good company. While public benefit corporations represent a legal innovation, Certified B Corporations represent an operational one. B Lab, the nonprofit that developed and promotes the model legislation for public benefit corporations, is also the creator of a set of standards for social impact that make it more tangible and measurable.

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Evolutionary Organizations AES Askinosie Chocolate Automattic Basecamp Black Lives Matter Blinkist Bridgewater Buffer Burning Man Buurtzorg BvdV charity: water Crisp David Allen Company dm-drogerie markt elbdudler Endenburg Elektrotechniek Enspiral Equinor Evangelical School Berlin Centre Everlane FAVI Gini GitLab Gumroad Haier Handelsbanken Haufe-umantis Heiligenfeld Hengeler Mueller Herman Miller HolacracyOne Ian Martin Group / Fitzii Incentro John Lewis Joint Special Operations Command Kickstarter Lumiar Schools Medium Menlo Innovations Mondragon Morning Star Nearsoft Netflix Nucor Orpheus Chamber Orchestra Patagonia Phelps Agency Pixar Premium-Cola Promon Group Red Hat School in the Cloud Schuberg Philis Semco Group Spotify stok Sun Hydraulics Treehouse USS Santa Fe Valve Whole Foods W.

About Time: A History of Civilization in Twelve Clocks
by David Rooney
Published 16 Aug 2021

We imagined the clock tower looming over us, the booming sound of its great bell, and the shouts and bustle of traders entering and leaving the exchange, their fortunes made a little greater or less from their day’s trading. But we had an additional reason for visiting. We had heard rumors that the original clock from 1611—the clock that kick-started modern capitalism and kept the world’s first stock exchange on time for the first half century of its existence—might have survived. In 1668, when the building was extended, a new clock had been installed at the exchange, and the old mechanism was sent a mile eastward to be installed in the city’s new Oosterkerk, or Eastern Church, which was just about to be built and which opened three years later.

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But for this new world of mass production to grow and flourish, a new breed of heavy, highly precise specialist machine tools would be needed. The development of American machine tools in the 1860s and 1870s, suitable for widespread use in manufacturing high-precision and interchangeable parts, followed a similar pattern to the British developments exactly a century earlier which brought the factory system into existence and kick-started an industrial revolution. It also followed the pattern of developments in Connecticut fifty years after that, when Eli Terry initiated mass production. Who was already steeped in precision, fine measurement and accuracy? In order to make the machines that made machines, all eyes turned once more to the clockmaking industry.

Perfect Sound Whatever
by James. Acaster
Published 21 Aug 2019

In 1999 he launched a solo project under the name Fog using similar instruments, released three records in the early 2000s and then, with the addition of Mark Erikson and Tim Glen, turned Fog into a full band with the release of 2007’s impeccable Ditherer. And then they split up. In the following years Andrew started painting houses and became a father, then in 2014, out of the blue, he launched a Kickstarter to fund a potential new Fog album. The response was huge, and in 2016 he released For Good, a piano-led solo record in which Andrew set out to recapture the sensitivity and grit of his early work but with ‘a more impactful and better executed electro-acoustic palette’. For the first time in his career he had no label, no deadline and no expectation for the record from anyone other than himself, and this meant he was now able to take his time in the studio.

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The group lasted five years but Carr learnt a great deal from the experience: growing as an artist, exploring different genres and developing her skill set – she emerged from the group a fully formed, accomplished musician with her own voice at just 17 years old. After WFI disbanded, Deja (now living in Northampton, Massachusetts) assumed the moniker Mal Devisa and embarked on her first solo project. After a couple of independent releases on Bandcamp she’d accrued enough fans to finance her next album on Kickstarter, quickly rewarding donors with the sort of compelling listen that doesn’t come around very often. Many of her new tracks were stripped down to bass chords and vocals, with the occasional kick drum thrown in to anchor everything, and Carr’s voice conveying so much wisdom it’s almost impossible to believe she’s just 19 years old.

This Book Could Fix Your Life: The Science of Self Help
by New Scientist and Helen Thomson
Published 7 Jan 2021

For instance, an analysis of 28,000 nuclear shipyard workers who had been exposed to low doses of radiation, an environmental stressor, found that their mortality rate was 24 per cent lower than workers who were not exposed to radiation. Similar findings are found in radiologists compared with other doctors. Stressors like radiation kick-start the body’s natural repair mechanisms. When cells are stressed, from heat or toxins or inflammation, protective proteins shield others from attack. Stress also triggers the production of a protein called sirtuin 1, which triggers the creation of antioxidants – nutrients that protect the brain from something called oxidative stress, which is a build-up of material that can damage brain cells.5 In the face of light stress, these repair systems overcompensate, repairing unrelated damage and rejuvenating your cells.

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We know a bit more than that of course, but our interest in sleep as a biological concept only really began in the 1950s, when PhD student Eugene Aserinsky stared at a sleeping patient and noticed their frantic, jerky eye movements. He’d been expecting far smaller movements, given that, back then, sleep was thought to be a passive, uninteresting state of unconsciousness. His discovery kick-started the area of sleep science – a surprisingly difficult and misunderstood discipline, considering that sleep has such a profound effect on our physical and mental health. Aserinsky’s observations were of what we now call REM, or rapid eye movement, sleep. This is when we experience our most emotionally charged and vivid dreams.

Hands-On RESTful API Design Patterns and Best Practices
by Harihara Subramanian
Published 31 Jan 2019

Also, this chapter discusses topics such as the REST paradigm for application modernization and integration, RESTful services for digital transformation and intelligence, and the best practices for REST-based microservices. Chapter 10, Frameworks, Standard Languages, and Toolkits, introduces you to a few prominent frameworks that can come in handy when deciding on the right framework for your API development needs. It discusses a few prominent frameworks for app developers who want to kick-start their RESTful APIs and microservices with their acquainted programming languages. This chapter is an attempt to provide you with information on a few programming language-friendly frameworks so that you can pick the most suitable framework for your RESTful API development needs. Also, this chapter has a reference table for various frameworks and their supported languages, along with their prominent features.

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It's evident that there are several excellent frameworks you can use to jump-start your RESTful API development using your programming language of choice. But one chapter, and only a few pages of information, doesn't begin to cover the greatness of these frameworks and what they bring to the table. We hope this chapter gave you a fair idea of the popular frameworks so that you can kick-start not only your prototyping but also production-grade RESTful applications. In the next chapter, we'll explore best practices for migrating legacy applications to capable microservices. Further reading Building RESTful Python Web Services by Gastón C. Hillar, https://www.packtpub.com/application-development/building-restful-python-web-services October 2016 Building RESTful Web services with Go by Naren Yellavula, https://www.packtpub.com/application-development/building-restful-web-services-go Legacy Modernization to Microservices-Centric Apps Legacy applications are typically monolithic, massive, and inflexible, comprising millions of lines of code.

City 2.0: The Habitat of the Future and How to Get There
by Ted Books
Published 20 Feb 2013

Tomasulo arrived at a City Council meeting with 1,300 signatures to reinstate the signs, which were soon back in place for an authorized three-month trial. Tomasulo never intended the project to be permanent; he simply wanted to shift the conversation. A year after their debut, a few signs had been stolen, others were vandalized or damaged, and some remained in place. But the impact continued to surface. Tomasulo created a Kickstarter campaign to fund Walk [Your City] (walkyourcity.org), an open-source platform that allows anyone to create signs for their own cities. Projects have popped up in Kentucky, Dallas, Miami, New Orleans, and even in New York City for Hurricane Sandy disaster relief. Tomasulo’s campaign has garnered the attention of everyone from the BBC to private developers looking to liven up their sites to major health care providers that see wayfinding as a key step to reducing obesity and creating healthier lifestyles.

Bootstrap
by Jake Spurlock
Published 8 May 2013

It all depends on what you want to learn and why. If your primary interest is to get started building Bootstrap websites, the online documentation will likely suit you perfectly. The authors, Jacob Thornton and Mark Otto, have been meticulous in providing examples of the codebase, HTML code samples, and more to kickstart your project. It is top notch, and I’ve used it to gather the structure for this book. If you want to contribute to the work of the open source project, you can submit pull requests or use the issue tracker on the GitHub project for updates, downloads, documentation, and more. Are You Sure You Want Bootstrap?

Overbooked: The Exploding Business of Travel and Tourism
by Elizabeth Becker
Published 16 Apr 2013

Costa Rica has turned its wilderness into a venue for highly profitable ecotourism. As soon as Sri Lanka, and now Burma, began seeing an end to conflict, they opened the door to a rush of tourists. After the Arab Spring uprising, Egypt sent out a plea to cruise companies and tour operators to return and kick-start the economy, where one in eight jobs depend on visitors. Winning status for a temple or old city neighborhood as a World Heritage Site from UNESCO, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, is a guaranteed tourist draw. The U.N. tourism organization now places poverty reduction as one of its top objectives, along with the high-minded ideals of improving international understanding, peace and prosperity.

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The plan did fulfill the American goal of getting France back on its feet and firmly within the western camp, as well as establishing a new pattern of trade with the United States. The biggest impact, though, was on France, which exceeded its goal of wooing 3 million tourists to the country in 1952. American government aid had kick-started the modern tourism industry in France with those hotel rooms, tourist airfares and inculcation of the idea of Paris as the ideal city for glamour. From then on, the French government kept its hand in all aspects of tourism. This American-subsidized tourism fit in nicely with the new order being established by some of France’s most conservative politicians.

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The administration wanted to follow the example of Spain, which had profited from heavy promotion of the 1992 Summer Olympics in Barcelona, lifting tourism to that country. But the United States was the only country of any significance without a nationally coordinated tourist program or a top-echelon tourism agency. The White House conference was geared to kick-start the industry through government help. President Clinton opened the event with a thirty-minute address, first telling his audience that it was “about time” that their industry was honored with a White House event. The crowd cheered and gave the president a standing ovation. Then Clinton spoke of the particular moment in history as a “very important time.”

Are Trams Socialist?: Why Britain Has No Transport Policy
by Christian Wolmar
Published 19 May 2016

In rushed an angry crowd led by a local farmer… Suddenly, through the doors of Shipley Town Hall flooded a tide of people who had gained the self-confidence to challenge the unchallengeable. No longer were they to be fobbed off by technicalities, or defeated by rules that loaded the dice in the ministry’s favour.¹⁴ The inquiry was abandoned and the road never built. The road lobby, however, had not gone away, and there were repeated attempts to kick-start a major programme of road building. In London a series of four assessment studies were published in the late 1980s looking at ways of bringing dual carriageways and motorways further into the centre, but fervent opposition and awareness of the high cost meant they came to nothing. With the exception of the M11 Link and a few minor schemes, building new roads in London was now untenable.

Stretch
by Roger Frampton

Whether you have done your steps today or not we’ve all heard the question, ‘Have you done your steps today?’ and there are several reasons why. While recent research has traced the origin of the ‘10,000 steps per day’ goal to a Japanese marketing slogan for a step counter, the catchy marketing gimmick subsequently morphed into a fitness mantra which helped kick-start the ‘move more’ movement. Since then, scientific studies have supported the ‘move more’ theory, with some showing that participants managed to control their diabetes or cholesterol levels better when increasing their daily step count. There are numerous health benefits to be gained by moving often throughout the day, including lowering your blood pressure, stabilizing your blood sugar and reducing your risk of a heart attack.

Paper Money Collapse: The Folly of Elastic Money and the Coming Monetary Breakdown
by Detlev S. Schlichter
Published 21 Sep 2011

Fewer readily available consumer goods arrive on the market. At this point, the fact that credit expansion was funded by money printing rather than by true saving comes into play and begins to develop forces that will work in the opposite direction of the ones at work so far. If the whole process had been kick-started by an act of voluntary saving on the part of consumers, the marginal drop in supply of consumer goods would not be a problem. Increased saving would have meant a lessened demand for consumption goods but this was not the case in this scenario. A shrinking supply of consumer goods coupled with an unchanged urge to consume can mean only that an upward pressure on consumer goods prices will now develop.

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An expansion of money lowers interest rates artificially and thereby encourages a level of investment activity that goes beyond what would be justified by voluntary saving. The resulting shifts in resource use and the extension of the capital stock are therefore unsustainable. The resulting boom is misguided and will end in a correction. Again, error is at work. The spurt of growth that is kick-started by the injection of money is based on an illusion. Economic actors are tricked into believing that a larger amount of resources has been freed up from their previous employment in close proximity to immediate consumption and has been made available for employment farther away from immediate consumption, thus allowing a more extended productive sector or the production of more longer-lasting consumption goods, like houses.

Jony Ive: The Genius Behind Apple's Greatest Products
by Leander Kahney
Published 14 Nov 2013

Before Jobs’s return, in May 1996, Apple had joined Oracle Corporation and thirty other hardware and software companies in the Networking Computing Alliance, which set the standard for cheap, diskless computers based on a common networking platform. Jobs’s billionaire best friend, Larry Ellison, was especially bullish on NCs as the future of the computer industry. And as a newly installed member of Apple’s board, Ellison told the press that Apple was building an NC. He’d recently launched a start-up, Network Computing Inc., to kick-start the sector. Influenced by Ellison’s thinking, but also eager to compete with him, Jobs also talked up the NC idea. “We’re going to beat Ellison at his own game,” he told his Apple colleagues with relish.18 Just as he’d done with the first Macintosh, Jobs began by laying out certain specifications: The Mac NC should be an all-in-one product, ready to use right out of the box, in a distinctive design that made a brand statement.

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Like the iMac before it, the iPod mini would come in a range of colors. It was a big hit; the fastest-selling iPod up to that time, especially with women. It was the first iPod that people started wearing on their bodies, outside their pockets, with a strap or a clip. Some treated it like an accessory, a piece of fashion jewelry. The mini also kick-started the trend of having a small, dedicated iPod just for the gym or running. In just four years, Apple took the iPod from the 6.4 oz. original to the 4.8 oz. nano. In the process, storage was increased sixfold, a color screen and video playback were added and battery life was extended to four hours.

Most Likely to Succeed: Preparing Our Kids for the Innovation Era
by Tony Wagner and Ted Dintersmith
Published 17 Aug 2015

Need your logo designed? Go to Elance. Need careful research about an article? Go to Elance. Elance is hardly unique. Millions of people are generating income through the online microeconomies of sites like Care.com, Freelance.com, eBay, oDesk, TaskRabbit, Uber, Airbnb, Lyft, Teachers Pay Teachers, iTunes, Kickstarter, and on and on. These marketplaces represent the wave of the future, where anyone can: • reach lots of customers readily. • build an online reputation through customer feedback and examples of work. • succeed in a world where customers don’t care about education credentials or standardized test scores

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He started at Tufts, and concluded that the way computer science was taught made no sense. He rebooted at the University of Chicago, studied physics, but concluded that the coursework was largely about memorizing formulas. Ito hasn’t done all that poorly in life. He was an early investor in several spectacular start-ups, including Flickr, Kickstarter, and Twitter. He currently sits on the boards of the Sony Corporation, the New York Times, the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, and the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation. And he directs one of the world’s most innovative research labs. Recently, Ito recruited a student volunteer to spend a week with sensors monitoring her brain activity.

Queens Reigns Supreme: Fat Cat, 50 Cent, and the Rise of the Hip Hop Hustler
by Ethan Brown
Published 22 Nov 2005

Not only had their bosses scored their first multiplatinum success, they’d also secured them deals with Def Jam. Ja celebrated the newfound status of the Lorenzos and southeast Queens in a freestyle piece for a Def Jam live album called Survival of the Illest, which featured DMX, Jam Master Jay, stalwarts Onyx, and the label’s supergroup Def Squad. A memorable freestyle can kick-start a young rapper’s career; it had happened with Nas with his freestyle on “Live at the Barbeque,” from a Queens group called Main Source, and Ja looked to make a huge impression. He also sought to solidify the Lorenzo brothers’ connection with ’Preme even though there was still lingering discomfort from Chris Lorenzo about the former Supreme Team CEO.

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[He was] associating himself with gangsters.… I guess he’s a gangster now.” The New Insurgency The indictment of The Inc. was in many ways the death blow in 50’s long battle against the Lorenzos and ’Preme. Not surprisingly a little more than one month after the arrest of the Lorenzos, 50 kick-started a brand-new insurgency this time against Jimmy “Henchmen” Rosemond. In the years following the Shakur shooting at the Quad Studios in late 1994, Rosemond became one of the most respected and feared producers in hip-hop thanks to his hugely popular, Miami-based music industry conference “How Can I Be Down?”

Fabricated: The New World of 3D Printing
by Hod Lipson and Melba Kurman
Published 20 Nov 2012

Nervous System shares their mathematical systems in an interactive software applet with customers, who can apply the system to design their own unique products. Josh Harker, an independent artist and designer, describes himself as a classically trained artist and sculptor who “uses bits, ones and zeros, to express himself in a human way, to make something new.” I stumbled upon Josh’s artwork on crowdfunding site Kickstarter where he raised a record amount of funds for a sculpture project called Crania Anatomica Filigre, a white, plastic ornately filigreed 3D printed skull. When we spoke on the phone, I learned that he grew up in the Mississippi River valley in Illinois. He described his bohemian childhood as one that “included post ‘60s off-grid communal living, Hell’s Angels babysitters, complete artistic immersion, and family tragedy.”

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“Our lab and others have been experimenting with this idea. What if every home could turn its household plastic waste into usable plastic filament for 3D printing? Wow!” Maybe the first re-cycled plastic filament will soon be commercially available. A student at Vermont Technical College, Tyler McNaney, raised $10,000 on Kickstarter to build a device that grinds up and re-melts discarded 3D printed plastic objects into printing filament. Tyler named this recycling device the Filabot, described on its website as “user friendly, but … also environmentally friendly. Filabot will bring the real power of sustainability to 3D printing.”

Cheese and Culture: A History of Cheese and Its Place in Western Civilization
by Paul Kindstedt
Published 31 Mar 2012

Large-scale production of wool textiles continued in Mesopotamia long after the decline of Uruk, eventually encompassing millions of sheep and an estimated fifty to sixty thousand workers employed in massive state-sponsored textile manufacturing facilities (Algaze 2008). Wool textiles were the major economic driver of Sumerian civilization during the fourth and third millennia BC, and it would seem that Inanna unwittingly, or perhaps not so unwittingly, helped to kick-start this economy through her insatiable appetite for sheep’s-milk cheese and butter. The logistical challenges associated with keeping Inanna adequately provisioned with offerings of cheese, butter, and other agricultural products evidently played an important role in the development of writing.

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Hence, the combination of Harding’s striking advancements in Cheddar technology and the ascendancy of Cheddar as the leading cheese variety on the London market stimulated sweeping changes in American cheese making that would position Cheddar cheese to become the world’s most widely produced variety. The arrival of the cheese factory also came at a crucial time in American history that helped to kick-start its phenomenal success. The factory system had been in operation for ten years and was just beginning to gain steam when the Civil War broke out. The mass exodus of men from northern farms to fight for the Union army left women on the farms with the overwhelming burden of doing it all . . . raising the crops, herding the cows, milking the cows, making the cheese, selling the cheese, raising the children, cooking the meals, keeping the home. . . .

The Lucky Years: How to Thrive in the Brave New World of Health
by David B. Agus
Published 29 Dec 2015

An apple, for example, has a different profile than an apricot or an aspirin. So imagine taking a handy little device and putting it up against an object and getting an immediate readout of all the chemicals in that item. That’s what you could do if you had a database of all the possible profiles. An Israeli company has done just that, funded by a Kickstarter campaign. Their low-cost handheld tool can study a pill, for example, compare the pill’s profile against a cloud database, and come back with “ibuprofen, brand Advil.” Besides eliminating fake drugs, it will bring peace of mind to patients by preventing pill mix-ups. This technology could also be used to point at a plate of food and characterize how much protein, fat, and carbohydrates are in a snack or meal.

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“nonself” in, 34 body mass index (BMI), 22, 134, 141 Boston, Mass., 84 Boston Cooking-School Cook Book, The, 178 Boston University, 47 Bowerman, Bill, 199 brain: decision making in, 227 sleep’s importance to, 208–10 brain cancer, 30 Brave New World (Huxley), viii, 159, 238 Brazil, 199 BRCA genes, 8, 21, 118 breast cancer, 8, 53, 55, 60, 61, 118, 171, 190, 211 genetic mutation and, 21–22 mastectomies and, 21–22 obesity and, 133 statin use and, 220 Breast Cancer Prevention Trial, 53 Brigham and Women’s Hospital, 84 Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, 23, 24 Broedel, Max, 73 Brown University, 58 Brunet, Anne, 63 bubonic plague, 95–101 Bulletin of the New York Academy of Medicine, 2 butterfly effect, 236–37 California, 5, 12, 47, 103 tobacco control program in, 237 California, University of: at Berkeley, 25 at Irvine, 3 at San Francisco, 3 Caltech, 102 Cambridge, University of, 125, 134 Cameron, David, 67 Canada, 4, 11 cancer, 41, 108, 128, 175, 215, 237 aggressiveness of, 53–54 alternative treatments for, 18 aspirin and, 216–17 chemotherapy for, 29 childhood, 6, 49, 170–71 context and, 13–14 diet and, 163 early detection and treatment of, 172 fitness and, 190–94 genetic mutations and, 14, 21–22, 50 genotyping of, 117–18 immunotherapy for, 28–33 inflammation in, 175–77 lifestyle and, 153, 168–69 measurement of success in treating of, 32–33 metastasis in, 60–62 molecular therapies for, 23–24, 49–50, 54–55 muscle mass and, 195 p53 gene and, 57–58 Peto’s paradox and, 57 plasma transfusions and, 5 precision medicine and, 115 radiation therapy for, 29 random mutations in, 169–74, 176 as runaway cell copying, 59 self-seeding in, 61 statins and, 218–20 treatment resistance in, 190–91 Watson supercomputer and treatment of, 88–89 see also specific types of cancer cardiovascular disease, 86, 121, 128, 147, 216 airport noise and, 92 risk factors for, 47 Carlson, Mary, 212, 213 Carnegie Mellon University, 214 CAR T cells, 29–30 CBS This Morning, 67 CCR5 gene, 24, 25 Ceauşescu, Nicolae, 212–13 Celebrex (celecoxib), 62 celiac disease, 113, 164 cell division, 5 cells: death of (apoptosis), 59 endoplasmic reticulum in, 40 oxidative damage to, 40 receptors on, 59 Center for the Study of Aging and Human Development (Duke University), 45 Center for Translational Neuromedicine (University of Rochester), 208 Center for Translational Research in Aging and Longevity (University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences), 194 Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), 47, 103, 133, 205 ceritinib (Zykadia), 53 change, self-assessment of, past vs. future in, 38–40, 39 chaos theory, 236–37 Charaka, 113 Charlottesville Neurology and Sleep Medicine, 204 checkpoint blockage therapy, 29–30 chemotherapy, 29, 60, 190–91 exercise and, 191, 192 Chicago, University of, 17 children, obesity and overweight in, 133 Chittagong University, 232 cholera, 234 cholesterol, 150, 195, 217, 219 dietary vs. blood, 162 online calculator for, 218 chronic disease, 128–29 age-related, 128, 136 diet and, 141–44 management of, 144–46 overweight and, 141 sleep habits and, 147 chronological age, 45, 46, 46, 47, 135–36, 232 circadian rhythm, 123, 138, 139–40, 148, 205 Circulation, 86 climate change, 159 Clinical Practice Research Datalink, 219 clinical trials, 52 double-blind, 53, 155 IRBs and, 52 randomized, 52–53 ClinVar, 9 coarse graining, 229–32, 230 cognitive abilities, 45, 46 cognitive dissonance, 159 Cohen, Jacques, 111–12 colds, 205, 214 Cold War, 94 Coley, William B., 27–29, 28, 33, 48 colitis, 121–22 Collins, Francis, 114, 118 colonoscopies, 93 Colorado, 47 colorectal cancer, 55, 123–24, 190, 217 statin use and, 220 Columbia University, 138 complex carbohydrates, 162 comprehensive metabolic panel (CMP), 151 Congress, US, 114, 237 context: adapting to new data in, 159 aging and, 45 baselines for, 150 changes in, 22 databases as, 83, 91–94 data mining and, 101 diet and, 163, 165 disease and, 13–14, 20 genes and, 14, 20–21, 118 health and, 48, 76–78, 84, 89–90, 91–94, 101, 113, 114–15, 117, 124–25 heart disease and, 22 identifying and optimizing, 135–52 lab tests in, 150–52 medical data and, 78–82 medical education and, 75 Cooper Center Longitudinal Study, 192 coordination, 45 Cornell University, 2 coronary artery disease, 151 cortisol, 123 counterfeit drugs, 10–11 C-reactive protein, 175 CRISPR (Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats), 24–25, 26, 45 Critical Care, 222 Crohn’s disease, 25, 121 CTLA-4, 29–30 cystic fibrosis, 115–16 Cystic Fibrosis Foundation Vertex, 115–16 cytokines, 123 cytoplasm, 111 cytosol, 40 Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Profile program of, 118 Dannon, 235 Dartmouth College, 157 Darwin, Charles, 112 data, medical: context and, 78–82 individual’s role in collection of, 81 databases, medical, 82–83, 95 as context, 83, 91–94 security of, 88–89 data mining, 84–89, 92 context and, 101 infectious diseases and, 100–101 Davos, Switzerland, 161 Dawkins, Richard, 17 death, leading causes of, 129 death certificates, 96 decision-making, 225, 227–28 dehydration, 234 dementia, 5, 41, 90, 91, 151, 204, 210, 215, 221 see also Alzheimer’s disease depression, 122, 211, 215 exercise and, 186 Dhaka, 232 diabetes, 22, 24, 25, 47, 59, 108, 114, 123, 128, 147, 151, 166, 175, 186, 187, 188, 215, 221, 237 gut bacteria and, 120–21 incidence of, 120–21 diet, 22, 114 chronic disease and, 141–44 as contextual, 163 honesty about, 133–34 low-cholesterol, 162 low-fat, 162 moderation in, 144 research on, see nutritional studies weight and, 141 diphtheria, 161 disease: autoimmune, 85, 125, 175 context and, 13–14, 20 genetic markers for, 22, 113–14, 127 surrogate markers for, 127–28 see also chronic disease; infectious diseases; noncommunicable diseases disorders, inherited, newborn screening and, 12 DNA, see genes, genome DNA mismatch repair, 32, 57 docosahexaenoic acid (DHA), 182 dopamine, 211 Doudna, Jennifer A., 25 dreaming, 203 drug abuse, 22 drugs, see medications Duke Cancer Institute (DCI), 191 Duke University, 30 Center for the Study of Aging and Human Development at, 45 Dulken, Ben, 63 Dunedin Study, 45–47, 46 Dyerberg, Jorn, 182–83 Dyson, Esther, 173 Earls, Felton, 213 East Africa, 44, 107 Eat, Sleep, Poop (Cohen), 137 eating patterns, heart disease and, 138–40 Ebola, 18, 221–22 E. coli, 123 eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA), 182 Einstein, Albert, 2, 223 Elder, William, Jr., 115–16 electrodermal response, 230–31 Elledge, Stephen J., 84 emotions, touch and, 214 emulsifiers, microbiome and, 121–22 “end of history illusion,” 38–40, 39 End of Illness, The (Agus), 18 endoplasmic reticulum, 40 endorphins, 211 energy levels, 149 England, see Great Britain environment, see context epidemics: global spread of, 103 prediction of, 103–4 epigenetics, 20–21 esomeprazole (Nexium), 86 esophageal cancer, 217 estrogen, 64 ethics: genome editing and, 24–25 medical advances and, 10, 24 technology and, 25–26 Europe, 77 European Journal of Immunology, 34 exercise, 21, 114, 140, 185–201 chemotherapy and, 191, 192 honesty about, 133–34 ideal amount of, 196–200 intensity of, 197–98 life expectancy and, 189–90 mortality rates and, 148 Exeter, University of, 157 “Experimental Prolongation of the Life Span” (McCay, Lunsford, and Pope), 2 experimental treatments, quicker access to, 56 Facebook, 27 fasting lipid profile, 150 feebleness, aging and, 43 fertility, aging and, 43 Field, Tiffany, 214 financial industry, information technology and, 89 Finland, 220 fish oil, 182–83 Florida, 103 flu vaccine: misinformation about, 157–58 public distrust of, 160 FODMAPs (fermentable oligo-di-monosaccharides and polyols), 164 Fodor, George, 183 food, safety of, 11 Food and Drug Administration, US (FDA), 2, 18, 51, 55, 56, 86, 111, 112, 127–28, 146, 182, 201 Accelerated Approval provisions of, 128 Foundation Medicine, 50 Framingham Heart Study, 47, 118 Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, 169 free radicals, 208 fruit flies, eating pattern studies with, 138–40 fungi, 119 gait, 45 galvanic skin response (GSR), 230–31 gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD), 86 Gates, Bill, 2 Genentech, 56 genes, genome, 45, 83–84 aging and, 20, 41 bacterial, 107, 119 context and, 14, 20–21, 118 DNA mismatch repair and, 32 expression of, 20–21, 125, 139 mitochondrial, see mitochondrial DNA sequencing of, 20, 23, 49–52, 112 SNPs in, 113–14 as switches, 41 viruses and, 119–20 genes, genome, editing of, 24–25, 45 ethics of, 102–5 genetically modified foods (GMOs), 18 genetic markers, 22, 113–14, 127 genetic mutations: aging and, 41 cancer and, 14, 21–22, 50 disease risk and, 9, 12 genetic screening, 103, 117, 137 flawed results in, 8–10 of newborns, 11–12 Georgia State University, 121 Gewirtz, Andrew, 121 Gibson, Peter, 164 Gilbert, Daniel, 38, 39, 40 Gillray, James, 161 Gladwell, Malcolm, 225, 227, 228 Gleevec (imatinib), 55 glial cells, 209 glioblastoma, 30 “Global Recommendations on Physical Activity for Health” (WHO), 187 gluten, debate over, 163–65 Goldstein, Irwin, 211 Google, 87, 88, 101 Google Flu Trends, 101 Grameen Bank, 232, 233–34, 235 Grameen Danone, 235 Graunt, John, 100 Great Britain, 96, 97, 100, 110, 155 Black Death in, 95–101, 98, 99, 100 Greatist.com, 200 Greenland, 182 Grove, Andy, 7, 7 growth factors, 59 gun violence, 91 gut: inflammation of, 120, 122 microbiome of, see microbiome H2 blockers, 86 habits and routines, 136, 137–41, 228, 237–38 see also diet; lifestyle choices Harlow, Harry, 213 Harvard Medical School, 84 Harvard School of Public Health, 142–43 Harvard University, 3, 23, 24, 37, 178, 186, 196, 212, 213, 216 hash tables, health care and, 87–88 Hawaii, 47 HDL cholesterol, 150 health: biological age and, 47 context and, 48, 76–78, 84, 89–90, 91–94, 101, 113, 114–15, 117, 124–25 family history of, 136–37 honesty about, 131–34 inflection point in, 8 lifestyle and, see lifestyle choices optimism and, 65–69 personal baselines for, 150 retirement and, 91–92 technology and, 37–70 health and fitness apps, 200 Health and Human Services Department, US, 103 health care: Affordable Care Act and, 69–70 hash tables and, 87–88 individual’s responsibility in, 12–13, 26, 70, 75, 78, 131–32 misinformation about, 14–15, 18, 19, 154, 157–58 politics and, 11–12 portable electronic devices and, 79, 90–91 Health Professionals Follow-up Study, 142–43, 217 health threats, prediction of, 103–4 heart: biological age of, 47–48 health of, 48 heart attacks, 76, 86, 182, 217, 218 heart disease, 59, 128, 150, 166, 175, 183, 186, 187, 215, 217, 221 context and, 22 diet and, 163 eating patterns and, 138–40 lifestyle choices and, 22 muscle mass and, 195 heart rates, 231 heart rate variability (HRV), 230 Heathrow Airport, 92 “hedonic reactions,” 38–40 heel sticks, 11–12 hemoglobin A1C test, 151 hepatitis B, 175 hepatitis C, 175 Herceptin (trastuzumab), 55 high blood pressure, 22, 188, 195 high-sensitivity C-reactive protein (CRP) test, 151 hippocampus, 214 Hippocrates, 71, 113, 122, 216 HIV/AIDS, 18, 24, 25, 59, 84, 127–28, 131, 159 Hoffmann, Felix, 215, 216 Holland, 41 Homeland Security Department, US, 103 homeostasis, 137–38, 140 Homo sapiens, evolution of, 107 honesty: about health, 131–34 nutritional studies and, 162 hormones, 219 hormone therapy, 201 Horton, Richard, 178 Hospital for the Ruptured and Crippled (Hospital for Special Surgery), 28 house calls, 80 Houston Methodist, 86 “how do you feel” question, 231 hugs, 214 Human Genome Project, 113, 120 human growth hormone, 200 Human Molecular Genetics, 65 human papilloma virus (HPV), 161, 175 Hurricane Sandy, 84 Huxley, Aldous, viii, 6, 159, 238 Hydra magnipapillata, 42, 42 hyperglycemia, 122 hypertension, 125, 195, 203 IBM, 88–89 imatinib (Gleevec), 55 immune reactions, 5 immune system, 175, 190, 209, 211 aging and, 44 impact of hugs on, 214 immunotherapy, 28–33 polio virus and, 30, 31 incentives, 235–36 Indiana University Bloomington School of Informatics and Computing’s Center for Complex Networks and Systems Research, 94–95 infant mortality, 87, 97 infants: genetic screening of, 11–12 premature, 87 infections, 175–76 infectious diseases, 129 antibiotic-resistant, 67–69, 68 data mining and, 100–101 inflammation, 34, 151, 174–77, 181, 187, 190, 195, 215–22 inflammatory bowel disease, 121 inflection points, 7–8, 7 influenza, 161 risks from, 157 vaccine for, see flu vaccine information, sorting good from bad, 19–20 information technology, financial industry and, 89 inherited disorders, newborn genetic screening and, 12 insomnia, 122 Institute for Sexual Medicine, 211 insulin, 56, 190 insulin sensitivity, 5, 87, 120, 122, 151, 195 insurance companies, off-label drugs and, 55 Intel, 7 International Agency for Research on Cancer, 170 International Prevention Research Institute, 180 intuition, 224–29 Inuits, 182–83 in vitro fertilization (IVF), three-person, 109–12, 110 Ioannidis, John, 178 IRBs (institutional review boards), 52 iron deficiency, 231 irritable bowel syndrome (IBS), 164 Islam, 234 Italy, 183 ivacaftor (Kalydeco), 115–16 JAMA Internal Medicine, 142, 143, 192, 196 Jenner, Edward, 160, 161 Jobs, Steve, 2, 23–24, 26, 49 Johns Hopkins Hospital, 71, 72, 128 Hurd Hall at, 74 Osler Medical Housestaff Training Program at, 73–75, 74 Johns Hopkins Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center, 32 Johns Hopkins University, 23, 169, 170, 171, 173, 174, 175, 176, 215 Jolie, Angelina, 21 Jones, Owen, 43 Journal of Sexual Medicine, 211 Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), 72, 114–15, 173, 201, 220, 221 Journal of the American Osteopathic Association, 154 Journal of the National Cancer Institute, 169 Journal of Urology, 168 journals, medical, misinformation in, 154, 179 J. Paul Getty Museum, 225–27, 226 Kahan, Dan, 159 Kalydeco (ivacaftor), 115–16 Kennedy, Eugene, 107 Kentucky, 47 Kenya, 163 Kickstarter, 66 kouros, 225–27, 226 Kutscher, Scott, 204 lactic acidosis, 104 Lactobacillus bacteria, 33–34 Lancet, The, 155, 178, 181, 186, 216 Lander, Eric, 24–25 lansoprazole (Prevacid), 86 Latin America, 77 LDL cholesterol, 150, 195 lean paradox, 193–94 Lechuguilla Cave, 68 lecithin, 121, 122 LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design), 193 Lehninger, Albert, 107 Leigh’s disease, 105, 108 “Let Food Be Thy Medicine” (World Economic Forum panel), 161–62, 166 life expectancy, 126 exercise and, 189–90 lifestyle choices and, 126–27 life span, red meat and, 142–44 lifestyle choices, 20, 37, 114 cancer and, 153 “end of history” illusion and, 39–40 heart disease and, 22 life expectancy and, 126–27 see also diet; habits and routines lifestyle medicine, 165 Li-Fraumeni syndrome, 58 Lily Lake, 103 Linden, David, 215 lipid phosphate phosphatase 1 (LPP1), 187 liver cancer, statin use and, 219 livestock, overuse of antibiotics in, 67, 69 Livingston, N.J., 111, 112 loan sharking, 233 London, 92 Black Death in, 97–101, 98, 99, 100 longevity, exercise and, 197–98 Lorenz, Edward, 236 Lou Gehrig’s disease (ALS), 119–20 Louisiana, 47, 192 lung cancer, 10, 50, 50, 51, 53–54, 65, 118, 176, 190 statin use and, 219 Lung Cancer Master Protocol for Squamous Cell Carcinoma (Lung-MAP), 118 Lunsford, Wanda Ruth, 1–2, 3, 4, 21, 27 lymphoma, 55 lymph system, 209 Lyon, 180 McCarthy, Matt, 202 McCay, Clive, 2 McGill University, Osler Library of Medicine at, 73 Maimonides, 163 Maine, 68 Major League Baseball, 202, 204–5 malaria, 77 malnutrition, 234–35 Malthus, Thomas Robert, 27, 160 Malthusian catastrophe, 27 Massachusetts, 47 Massagué Solé, Joan, 58–62 Massai people, 163 mastectomies, 21–22 MasterCard, 89 Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, 41 Mayo Clinic, 145 measles, 160 media, medical misinformation in, 15, 153–54 medical education: context and, 75 Osler’s revolutionizing of, 71–75 medical journals, misinformation in, 154, 179 medical research, 177–84 newborn genetic screening and, 11–12 rigorously controlled studies in, 155 Medicare, 92, 192 medications, 144–46 antiaging, 201 antidepressant, 145 consistent schedules for, 140 counterfeit, 10–11, 66 off-label use of, 55 over-the-counter, 145 in preventative medicine, 76–78 pricing of, 56–57, 115–17 quicker access to, 56 3-D printing and, 66–67 medicine: coarse graining in, 229–32, 230 personalized, see precision medicine science vs. art in, 26, 112, 118 Mediterranean diet, 141–42, 163 melatonin, 205 Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, 28, 60, 62, 116–17 Cancer Biology and Genetics Program at, 58 memory, 214 Mencken, H.

Ten Billion Tomorrows: How Science Fiction Technology Became Reality and Shapes the Future
by Brian Clegg
Published 8 Dec 2015

Some publicity seekers even claimed to have produced human clones, though strangely they have never been able to produce the very simple proof of the truth of their claims. This brings to mind the borderline science fiction of the 1970s movie from an Ira Levin novel, The Boys from Brazil. The borderline nature was that the science was just a kick-start for an action movie, but there are certainly some powerful science fiction themes in the notion of whether or not it would be ethical to make a human clone, especially when, as in the film, the subject is Adolf Hitler, raised in the hope of generating a replacement of the Nazi leader and bringing back the Third Reich.

…

The first movie only briefly visits 2015, but the sequel is primarily focused on the future, where we are given an object lesson in the pros and cons of science fiction as future gazing. The most famous future technology of the second and third movies is probably the hoverboard, a floating skateboard. The version Marty uses is unlikely to become a reality, despite a real hoverboard appearing on the Kickstarter Web site in October 2014. The good news is that this “Hendo” board, designed by California start-up Arx Pax does work—but by using magnetic levitation (see here), which means it can only function when above a surface made of nonferrous metal, like copper or aluminum. So until we get metal sidewalks, we won’t see hoverboarding kids on the streets.

The End of College: Creating the Future of Learning and the University of Everywhere
by Kevin Carey
Published 3 Mar 2015

Instead of script-reading undergraduates interrupting your dinner to beg for donations to the university general fund, USEED was helping individual students create specific experiential learning projects that alumni can choose to support, in the same way that people fund new comic books and food trucks through Kickstarter, or lend money to impoverished Kenyan farmers through Kiva. A company called Course Hero had amassed a seven-million-document archive of study materials from thousands of college courses by creating a way for undergraduates to upload and share materials online. Quizlet, which was created by a high school student in his bedroom, had millions of users creating and sharing flash cards and learning games—all for free.

…

Press stores, 163 James, Henry, 32 James, William, 32–33, 45, 47, 250 Jefferson, Thomas, 23, 193 Jews, 46, 53 Jobs, Steve, 126 Johns Hopkins University, 27, 29 Johnson, Lyndon, 55, 56, 61 Jones, Tommy Lee, 165 Jordan, David Starr, 26 Junior college, 55 (see also Community colleges) Kamlet, Mark, 72–73, 251 Kantian philosophy, 251 Kennedy, John F., 165 Kerr, Clark, 53–56 Khan, Salman, 148–49 Khan Academy, 149, 155 Kickstarter, 133 King, Danny, 216, 218 King’s College, 23 Kiva, 133 Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, 153 Knapp, Steven, 43 Koller, Daphne, 153–58, 171 Kosslyn, Stephen, 136–37 Kyoto University, 204 Lancet, 222 Lander, Eric, 1–4, 38–39, 44, 177–78, 221 MIT freshman biology course taught by, 11 (see also Introduction to Biology—The Secret of Life [7.00x]) Land-grant universities, 25–27, 35, 51, 53, 55, 95, 108, 122–23, 168 Learn Capital, 130, 156–57 Leckart, Steven, 149 Legally Blonde (film), 166 Levin, Richard C., 157 Lewin, Walter, 190–91 Liberal arts, 16, 27–31, 237, 241, 244–45 in accreditation standards, 50 core curriculum for, 49 at elite universities, 179 online courses in, 158, 244 PhDs and, 35 rankings and, 59 teaching mission in, 253 training, research, and, 29, 33, 261n (see also Hybrid universities) Lincoln, Abraham, 25 LinkedIn, 66, 217 Litton Industries, 75 Livy, 25 London, University of, 23 Lue, Robert, 178–81, 211, 231 Lyft ride-sharing service, 122 MacArthur, General Douglas, 51, 90 MacArthur “Genius” awards, 2 MacBooks, 132, 144 Madison, James, 23 Manitoba, University of, 150 Maples, Mike, Jr., 128–30, 132 Marine Corps, U.S., 140 Marx, Karl, 45 Massachusetts Bay Colony, Great and General Court of, 22 Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), 37–38, 59, 116, 132, 148, 153, 167–79, 245 admissions to, 39, 161, 212, 214–15, 245 Brain and Cognitive Sciences Complex, 1–4, 143, 173–74 Bush at, 51–52, 79, 125, 168 computer science sequence offered online by, 231, 233 founding of, 29, 167 General Institute Requirements, 14, 190, 241 graduation rate at, 8 hacks as source of pride at, 168–69 joint online course effort of Harvard and, see edX MITx, 169, 173, 203 OpenCourseWare, 107–8, 150, 169, 185, 191 prestige of brand of, 163, 181 Saylor at, 176–90 Secret of Life (7.00x) online offering of, see Introduction to Biology—The Secret of Life (7.00x) tour of campus of, 168, 174 wormhole connecting Stanford and cafeteria at, 174–75, 179, 235 Massive open online courses (MOOCs), 150, 154, 156, 158, 159, 185, 204, 255 global demand for, 225 initial audience for, 214–15 providers of, see names of specific companies and universities Master Plans, 35, 60, 64–65 Master’s degrees, 117, 193, 195–96 Mayo Clinic, 242 Mazur, Eric, 137 “M-Badge” system, 208–9 McGill University, 204 Mellon Institute of Science, 75, 76, 229 Memex, 79, 80 Mendelian genetics, 3, 103–4 Miami-Dade Community College, 64 Microsoft, 128, 139, 145, 146, 188, 204 MicroStrategy, 187–91, 199 Middle States Association of Colleges and Schools, 50 Minerva Project, 133–38, 141, 215, 235, 236, 243 Minnesota, University of, Rochester (UMR), 242–43 Missouri, University of, 208 Moore’s law, 176 Morrill, Justin Smith, 25–26 Morrill Land-Grant Act (1862), 25, 168 Mosaic software program, 126 Mozilla Foundation, 205–8, 218, 248 MS-DOS, 87 Myanganbayar, Battushig, 214, 215 NASDAQ, 177, 188 National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), 208 National Broadcasting Company (NBC), 96 National Bureau of Economic Research, 10 National Institutes of Health, 52 National Instruments, 216 National Manufacturing Institute, 208 National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, 208 National Science Foundation, 52 National Survey of Student Engagement, 243 Navy, U.S., 53, 123 Nebraska, University of, 26 Nelson, Ben, 133–35, 139, 181 Netflix, 131, 145 Netscape, 115, 126, 128, 129, 204–5 Newell, Albert, 79, 105 New Jersey, College of, 23 Newman, John Henry, 27–29, 47, 49, 244 Newman Report (1971), 56 Newton, Isaac, 190 New York, State University of, Binghamton, 183–84 New York City public schools, 1, 44 New York Times, 9, 44, 56–57, 107–8, 149, 170 New York University (NYU), 9, 64, 96, 250 Ng, Andrew, 153, 158 Nicomachean Ethics (Aristotle), 17 Nimitz, Admiral Chester W., 90 NLS/Augment, 125 Nobel Prize, 3, 45, 59, 78, 80, 176 Northeastern University, 64 Northern Arizona University, 229–30 Health and Learning Center, 230 Northern Iowa, University of, 55 Norvig, Peter, 149, 170, 227–28, 232 Notre Dame (Paris), cathedral school at, 18 Nurkiewicz, Tomasz, 218 Obama, Barack, 2 Oberlin College, 46 O’Brien, Conan, 166 Oklahoma, University of, 90 Omdurman Islamic University, 88 oNLine system, 125–26 Open Badges, 207 Open source materials and software, 177, 205–6, 215, 223, 232 Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, 9, 224 Overeducated American, The (Freeman), 56 Oxford University, 19, 21, 23, 24, 92, 135 Packard, David, 123 Parkinson’s disease, 70 Paris, University of, 18–19, 21, 137 Pauli, Wolfgang, 176 Pauling, Linus, 70 Pausch, Randy, 71–72 Peace Corps, 125 Pellar, Ronald (“Doctor Dante”), 208 Pell Grant Program, 56 Penguin Random House, 146 Pennsylvania, University of, 23, 24, 31 Wharton Business School, 155 Pennsylvania State University, 53 People magazine, 57 Pez dispensers, 146 Phaedrus (Socrates), 20, 98 PhDs, 7, 55, 117, 141, 193, 237, 250, 254 adjunct faculty replacing, 252 college rankings based on number of scholars with, 59 regional universities and community colleges and, 60, 64, 253 as requirement for teaching in hybrid universities, 31–33, 35, 50, 60, 224 Silicon Valley attitude toward, 66 Philadelphia, College of, 23 Philip of Macedon, 92 Phoenix, University of, 114 Piaget, Jean, 84, 227 Piazza, 132 Pittsburgh, University of, 73–76 Pixar, 146 Planck, Max, 45 Plato, 16, 17, 21, 31, 44, 250–51 Portman, Natalie, 165 Powell, Walter, 50, 117 Princeton University, 1–2, 23, 112, 134, 161, 245 Principia (Newton), 190 Protestantism, 24 Public universities, 7, 55, 177, 224, 253 Purdue University, 96, 208 Puritans, 22–24 Queens College, 23 Quizlet, 133 Rafter, 131–32 Raphael, 16, 17 Reader’s Guide to Periodical Literature, 87 Reagan, Ronald, 56 Regional universities, 55, 60, 64 Reid, Harry, 42 Renaissance, 19 Rhode Island, College of, 23 Rhodes Scholarships, 2 Rice University, 204 RNA, 3 Rockstar Games, 230 Roksa, Josipa, 9, 36, 85, 244 Romans, ancient, 16 Roosevelt, Theodore, 165 Ruby on Rails Web development framework, 144 Rutgers University, 23 Sample, Steven, 64 Samsung, 146 San Jose State University, 177 Sandel, Michael, 177 SAT scores, 63, 136–37, 171, 195, 213 Saylor, Michael, 186–93, 199, 201 Saylor.org, 191, 223, 231 Schelling, Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph, 45 School of Athens, The (Raphael), 16 Schopenhauer, Arthur, 45 Science: The Endless Frontier (Bush), 51 Scientific American, 92, 155 Scientific Research and Development, U.S.

Billion Dollar Brand Club: How Dollar Shave Club, Warby Parker, and Other Disruptors Are Remaking What We Buy
by Lawrence Ingrassia
Published 28 Jan 2020

“It was a big turning point,” recalls Justin Seidenfeld, the chief product officer and one of Udashkin’s first hires. * * * The direct-to-consumer revolution has spawned many success stories, enriching company founders. Kellogg’s paid $600 million for Rxbar, an all-natural “energy bar.” The online watch company MVMT (“movement,” get it?), financed with a Kickstarter fund-raising campaign, was purchased by Movado for $100 million, with the potential for another $100 million in payments to the founders, depending on sales growth. Procter & Gamble acquired Native deodorant for $100 million, and Amazon bought the digital doorbell start-up Ring for about $1 billion.

…

Gilt Groupe Gimenez, Francisco Ginko International Giorgio Armani Gleam Gleem globalization Glossier GlossierBrown Glow Light Goby Goggles4u Goldman Sachs gold star companies Goodman, Marla Google Google Checkout and Shopping Gordon, Stephen Gorecki, Ryan Gormsen, Christian GQ Grand Junction Great Jones Green, Draymond Green, Kirsten Grobart, Sam groceries Guess GV Hacker News hair coloring hair-loss products for men Hales, Derek Happy Belly Harrison, Brad Harry’s hate list Hawkins, David hearing aids HelloBeautiful Henkel Henri Bendel Hill, Ken Hims Hinomoto wheels home décor hOmeLabs Home Try-On Honda Honeywell Horwitz, Jesse HSBC Hubble Huffington Post Huggies Human Ocean Wing E-commerce Hybrid Designs hydrogel ice makers Idea Farm Ventures iHear Medical Inc. 5000 list India Indochino influencers, paid Innovel Instagram inStyle intent platform Interactive Advertising Bureau Interesting Engineering International Sleep Products Association intimate apparel Into the Gloss blog inventory iPhone IPOs iTunes Japan J. Crew Jet.com Jiaxing Zichi Trade Co. Jobs, Steve Johnson, Michael Johnson & Johnson Jones, Michael Kai Kalvaria, Selena Kangaroo Kaplan University Katz-Mayfield, Andy Kaziukenas, Juozas Kellogg’s Kerouac, Jack keyword bids Kickstarter Kim, John Brian kitchenware Kiva Systems Kleiner Perkins Kmart Korey, Steph Koulouris, George Krim, Philip Kumar, Adrian Lackenby, Steve Laczay, Tibor Lai, Patricia Lane Bryant Lark & Ro Laseter, Tim last-mile problem laundry detergent L Brands lead generation Le Conte, Thibault Leesa Lensabl LensCrafters Lerer, Ben Lerer Hippeau Levine, Mark Levi Strauss Levy, Brian lifestyle branding lifetime guarantee Lingley, Ann LinkedIn Lively Locus Robotics logistics Lola Lookalike Audience Lord & Taylor L’Oréal Louis Vuitton LTV (lifetime value) luggage rolling smart Lull Lumi Luxottica LVMH Lyft machinery, hair coloring production MacNeil, Thomas Macy’s Made In Madison Reed Mahoney, Patrick malls Mama Bear manufacturing Maridou, Evan Marino, John-Thomas “JT” marketing.

The Perfect Police State: An Undercover Odyssey Into China's Terrifying Surveillance Dystopia of the Future
by Geoffrey Cain
Published 28 Jun 2021

A mosaic of kingdoms, empires, and tribes had populated the Silk Road for thousands of years.24 The Oxford University historian Peter Frankopan writes that Europeans shifted their share of the global economy and political power away from the East when they began massacring indigenous peoples of the New World, and looting the Americas’ wealth. Global trading and military power transferred from the land to the sea, and the creation of modern European navies helped kick-start the industrial revolution in the eighteenth century.25 While Europe mechanized its forces and built powerful, modern nation-states, China’s leaders were dismissive of modern technologies and weaponry. They clung to the idea that their emperor was the son of heaven with no equal, who had an uninterrupted heritage predating the lineages of neighboring powers like Japan and Korea.

…

It poured more than $21 billion into a variety of start-ups—anything from online gaming to ride sharing to gene sequencing.30 Finally, China’s disparate start-ups, growing in wealth and influence, had the potential to build a nationwide ecosystem that could bring together big data, facial recognition, and AI. Go, the board game beloved in China, kick-started China’s AI engine. For years, AI engineers had believed Go was so hopelessly complex—it has 361 pieces—that it would be impossible to write a software program that could win over a human. The number of possible positions on the board exceeded the number of atoms in the known universe, requiring incredible computing power and pattern recognition.31 Google, which had been investing in AI since its founding in 1998,32 bought the start-up DeepMind in early 2014.

A Second Chance
by Jodi Taylor
Published 31 Dec 2012

‘They’re often the best sort, Eddie. Tell me.’ ‘We open the door.’ What? Was he out of his mind? Had blood loss affected his brain? I stared at him. ‘The benefits being …?’ ‘Out there is nothing. In here is something. Matter exists. Time is passing. We open the door. Something collides with nothing. That collision may – may – kick-start the jump. It’s not a solution, Max. We almost certainly won’t survive. All I’m offering is uncertain death rather than certain death.’ I considered. ‘It’ll be a hell of bang.’ ‘It certainly will.’ ‘I’d have to override the safety protocols.’ ‘Can you? ‘I think so.’ ‘We’ll only need a tiny, minute fraction of a second.

…

You were visiting an educational establishment, for crying out loud, not the sack of Constantinople.’ ‘1204,’ I murmured, helpfully. ‘You melted your pod!’ ‘I’m fine, thank you.’ ‘We had to close Hawking for a day. Residual radiation.’ ‘And the professor. He’s fine, too, thank you for asking. He had a great time.’ ‘There was a fireball!’ ‘And I think we may have kick-started the invention of the reflecting telescope.’ ‘I’ve no idea where to start on Number Eight. The outer casing looks like grilled cheese!’ ‘So, quite a successful jump, I think.’ He drew a deep breath and made a huge effort at staying calm. ‘How are you?’ ‘I melted my pod? Cool!’ Communication – the cornerstone of St Mary’s success.

Berlin
by Andrea Schulte-Peevers
Published 20 Oct 2010

Such confidence was a thorn in the side of the Holy Roman Emperor who, in 1411, put Friedrich von Hohenzollern, burgrave of Nuremberg, in charge of Brandenburg, ushering in five centuries of uninterrupted rule by the House of Hohenzollern. Return to beginning of chapter REFORMATION & THE THIRTY YEARS’ WAR The Reformation, kick-started in 1517 by Martin Luther in nearby Wittenberg, was slow to arrive in Berlin. Eventually, though, the wave of reform reached Brandenburg, leaving Elector Joachim II (ruled 1535–71) no choice but to subscribe to Protestantism. On 1 November 1539, the court celebrated the first Lutheran-style service in the Nikolaikirche in Spandau.

…

The Soviets also occupied the zone surrounding Berlin, leaving West Berlin completely encircled by territories under Soviet control. Return to beginning of chapter THE BIG CHILL Friction between the Western Allies and the Soviets quickly emerged. For the Western Allies, a main priority was to help Germany get back on its feet by kick-starting the devastated economy. The Soviets, though, insisted on massive reparations and began brutalising and exploiting their own zone of occupation. Tens of thousands of able-bodied men and POWs ended up in labour camps deep in the Soviet Union. In the Allied zones, meanwhile, democracy was beginning to take root as Germany elected state parliaments in 1946–47.

…

Although equipped with modern conveniences such as private baths and lifts, these giant developments had little open space, green areas or leisure facilities. Return to beginning of chapter CRITICAL RECONSTRUCTION While mass housing mushroomed on the peripheries, the inner city suffered from decay and neglect, especially in the shadow of the Berlin Wall and nowhere more so than in Kreuzberg. To kick-start the district’s revitalisation, another Interbau was held in 1978. It would blend two architectural principles: ‘careful urban renewal’, which would focus on preserving, renovating and reusing existing buildings; and ‘critical reconstruction’, which meant filling vacant lots with new buildings that reflected the layout or design of surrounding structures.

The World's Banker: A Story of Failed States, Financial Crises, and the Wealth and Poverty of Nations
by Sebastian Mallaby
Published 24 Apr 2006

By the late 1980s and early 1990s, the Bank’s so-called structural-adjustment programs were failing to promote adjustment because that was often not their real purpose; they were really about getting fresh loans to Africa so that Africans could repay old ones. Time and again, the Bank would give these defensive loans a structural-adjustment coating by projecting that they would kick-start growth; time and again, these projections proved wrong, discrediting structural adjustment still further. When internal critics questioned the realism of these growth projections, they were told to be quiet. “Realism” required getting the Bank’s own loans serviced.46 And yet, however compelling the arguments for debt relief, they were heresy at the World Bank when Wolfensohn arrived there.

…

It is hard enough to measure poverty, and economists vary widely on its extent.6 It is even harder, and probably impossible, to measure the relative impact of dozens of interrelated strategies to relieve poverty across scores of countries. The impossibility of showing which interventions trump the rest is easily forgotten, because development advocates generate a steady stream of claims to the contrary: The key to kick-starting development is said to lie in microfinance, or population control, or greater rights for women, or various other worthwhile challenges. Perhaps the most impressive recent claim of this genre comes from Hernando de Soto, a Peruvian economist, who points out that the poor often lack legal title to their land.

…

And if national institutions are corrupt, won’t national politicians be tempted to extract bribes from supposedly uncorrupt enclaves? Rather like Hernando de Soto’s land tenure idea, enclaves might start you down the road toward development. But in the end you can’t duck the question of national governance, however daunting it might be. Because neither the kick-start theories nor the enclave arguments are fully convincing, Wolfensohn was right that the Bank should be comprehensive. He was wrong in other ways, however. He introduced his development framework clumsily, claiming too much originality and alienating the Bank’s board. He insisted that a comprehensive vision of development had to include some subjects that in truth were marginal, such as cultural heritage, and some subjects that were bitterly divisive on the board, such as religion.

Python Requests Essentials
by Rakesh Vidya Chandra and Bala Subrahmanyam Varanasi
Published 16 Jun 2015

• The Session object is another goodie which saves the user's session. It stores the requests of the user so that the application can remember the different requests from the user. • Flask uses the Web Server Gateway Interface (WSGI) protocol while dealing with requests from clients and it is 100 % WSGI compliant. Getting started with Flask We can kick-start our application development with a simple example, which gives you an idea of how we program in Python with a flask framework. In order to write this program, we need to perform the following steps: 1. Create a WSGI application instance, as every application in Flask needs one to handle requests from the client. 2.

Exercise Every Day: 32 Tactics for Building the Exercise Habit (Even If You Hate Working Out)
by S.J. Scott
Published 19 Mar 2015

Heck, even people in solitary confinement find “space” to exercise in a 6x6 box with nothing but a cot, so there should be no problem finding a place to exercise in your home or backyard. HOW TO IMPLEMENT Like I said, there is a variety of home workout programs. Some are a fun way to spend 30 minutes, while others resemble a grueling boot-camp environment. The following are a few resources to help you get started. Extreme Solutions If you really want to kick-start your fitness routine with some serious intensity, workout routines like P90X, high-intensity interval training (HIIT), and Insanity may be what you’re looking for. All three are centered on similar principles: high intensity yields more results. The benefits of high-intensity training include: • Boosted Metabolism • Muscle gain • Increased stamina P90X is unique from HIIT and Insanity because it has a yoga component, which some don’t view as high-intensity training (though it is challenging and beneficial).

Bad Samaritans: The Myth of Free Trade and the Secret History of Capitalism
by Ha-Joon Chang
Published 26 Dec 2007

In June 1947, the US abandoned its previous policy of deliberately weakening the German economy and launched the Marshall Plan, which channelled a large amount of money into European post-war reconstruction.* Even though the sum involved in this was not huge, the Marshall Plan played an important role in kickstarting the war-torn European economies by financing essential import bills and financing the re-building of infrastructure. It was a political signal that the US saw it in its interest that other nations, even its former enemies, prosper. The US also led other rich countries in helping, or at least allowing, poor countries develop their economies through nationalistic policies.

…

These included shipbuilding, steel, mining, textiles (cotton, wool and silk) and armaments.17 The Japanese government privatized these enterprises soon after they were established, but some of them remained heavily subsidized even after privatization – especially the shipbuilding firms. The Korean steel maker POSCO is a more modern and more dramatic case of an SOE set up due to capital market failure. The general lesson is clear: public enterprises have often been set up in order to kick-start capitalism, not to supersede it, as it is commonly believed. State-owned enterprises can also be ideal where there exists ‘natural monopoly’. This refers to the situation where technological conditions dictate that having only one supplier is the most efficient way to serve the market. Electricity, water, gas, railways and (landline) telephones are examples of natural monopoly.

Hacking Growth: How Today's Fastest-Growing Companies Drive Breakout Success
by Sean Ellis and Morgan Brown
Published 24 Apr 2017

Such a response to any marketing effort would constitute a huge success, and yet the viral coefficient of this referral program would be 5 × 10% = .5, a far cry from the 1.0 definition of true virality. But enough with the inside baseball about viral growth definitions. The takeaway isn’t that growth teams shouldn’t try to kick-start viral growth; rather, they need to be more practical in their assessment of viral potential. We encourage teams to experiment with creating viral engagement loops, and in fact to work on creating a number of them for any given product. But in doing so, teams should set and communicate realistic expectations, both within the team and with management.

…

Too many companies add referral programs into their products as afterthoughts (another reason why the product managers, designers, and engineers should be involved in growth team efforts, so they can take these considerations into account when building the initial product) and include them on webpages or screens that are rarely visited; unfortunately, this low visibility all but guarantees that there is never enough critical mass to kick-start the viral loop. Far better to integrate the prompt into the more highly trafficked areas, like the new user experience, or on the home screen. At ScoreBig, a live event ticketing platform Morgan worked for, the team saw a massive spike in friend invites sent out when they integrated the referral program into the new user experience, whereas before it had only been accessible from a small link tucked into the corner at the top of the website home page.

Originals: How Non-Conformists Move the World
by Adam Grant
Published 2 Feb 2016

Coombs and James Bowen, “Additivity of Risk in Portfolios,” Perception & Psychophysics 10 (1971): 43–46, and “Test of the Between Property of Expected Utility,” Journal of Mathematical Psychology 13 (323–37). Baseball owner Branch Rickey: Lee Lowenfish, Branch Rickey: Baseball’s Ferocious Gentleman (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2009). T. S. Eliot’s landmark work: Paul Collins, “Ezra Pound’s Kickstarter Plan for T. S. Eliot,” Mental Floss, December 8, 2013, http://mentalfloss.com/article/54098/ezra-pounds-kickstarter-plan-ts-eliot. Polaroid founder Edwin Land: Victor K. McElheny, Insisting on the Impossible: The Life of Edwin Land (New York: Basic Books, 1999). Pierre Omidyar: Adam Cohen, The Perfect Store: Inside eBay (New York: Little, Brown, 2008).

Bad Samaritans: The Guilty Secrets of Rich Nations and the Threat to Global Prosperity
by Ha-Joon Chang
Published 4 Jul 2007

In June 1947, the US abandoned its previous policy of deliberately weakening the German economy and launched the Marshall Plan, which channelled a large amount of money into European post-war reconstruction.vi Even though the sum involved in this was not huge, the Marshall Plan played an important role in kickstarting the war-torn European economies by financing essential import bills and financing the re-building of infrastructure. More importantly, it was a political signal that the US saw it in its interest that other nations, even its former enemies, prosper. The US also led other rich countries in helping, or at least allowing, poor countries develop their economies through nationalistic policies.

…

These included shipbuilding, steel, mining, textiles (cotton, wool and silk) and armaments.17 The Japanese government privatized these enterprises soon after they were established, but some of them remained heavily subsidized even after privatization – especially the shipbuilding firms. The Korean steel maker POSCO is a more modern and more dramatic case of an SOE set up due to capital market failure. The general lesson is clear: public enterprises have often been set up in order to kick-start capitalism, not to supersede it, as it is commonly believed. State-owned enterprises can also be ideal where there exists ‘natural monopoly’. This refers to the situation where technological conditions dictate that having only one supplier is the most efficient way to serve the market. Electricity, water, gas, railways and (landline) telephones are examples of natural monopoly.

Beyond: Our Future in Space
by Chris Impey
Published 12 Apr 2015

A CubeSat is a bit bigger than a Rubik’s Cube—10 centimeters on a side and weighing less than 1.3 kilograms. Most CubeSat launches have come from academia, but companies such as Boeing have built CubeSats, and amateur satellite builders have gotten their projects off the ground using crowdfunding campaigns on websites such as Kickstarter. NASA’s NanoSail-D was designed to use three CubeSats to de- ploy triangular sails totaling 10 square meters. Unfortunately, it too was scuppered by the launch vehicle when its Falcon rocket malfunctioned in 2008. But NASA persisted, and a twin was successfully launched in 2011 (Figure 43). NanoSail-D was never intended to be more than a test of solar-sail deployment, and it burned up after 240 days in low Earth orbit.

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Frank, 188 behavioral b’s, 15 Bell X-1, 71 Bell, Alexander Graham, 78 Bell Labs, 153 Benford, Gregory, 223–24 Benford, James, 223–24 Bennett, Charles, 230 Bering Strait, land bridge across, 8, 120, 218 Berlin Rocket Society, 32 Berlin Wall, 41 Berners-Lee, Tim, 78–79 Bernoulli, Daniel, 68 Berserker series (Saberhagen), 177, 259 Bezos, Jeff, 103 Bible, 148–49 big bang theory, 131, 255 “Big Ear” telescope, 237 Bigelow, Robert, 102–3 binary stars, 126 biohackers (grinders), 207 biomarkers, 216–18 Biosphere 2 experiment, 192–97, 193, 285–86 black projects, 69–70, 72, 144 Blade Runner, 204, 208, 259 Blue Origin, 103 Boeing X-37, 72, 85 Bohr, Niels, 213, 288 Bostrom, Nick, 207, 245–47, 260–61 Bounty, HMS, 202 Bradbury, Ray, 164 brains: computer interfaces with, 205–7 human, 12–17, 203, 283 of orcas, 190 radiation damage to, 115 simulation of, 259–61 “brain in a vat” concept, 260 Branson, Holly and Sam, 89 Branson, Richard Charles Nicholas, 80, 86–89, 95, 97–98, 101–2, 106 Breakthrough Propulsion Physics, 290 Brezhnev, Leonid, 42 Brightman, Sarah, 102 Brin, Sergey, 275 British Airways, 87 British Interplanetary Society, 221 Brokaw, Tom, 74 Brother Assassin (Saberhagen), 177 Bryan, Richard, 238 buckyballs, 151, 231 Buddhism, 20, 267 Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, 197 Buran, 72 Burnett, Mark, 75 Burroughs, Edgar Rice, 164 Burrows, William, 35–36 Bush, George W., administration of, 93 Bussard, Robert, 222 butterfly effect, 195 By Rocket into Interplanetary Space (Oberth), 31 California, population dispersion into, 8 California, University of: at Irvine, 112, 223 at Los Angeles, 78 Calvin, William, 15 camera technology, 53, 176–77, 205 Cameron, James, 92, 120, 176 Canada, 142 canals, on Mars, 163 canards, 82–83 cancer, 180 cannonball, Newton’s experiment with, 25, 267 cannons: acceleration force of, 26 smooth-bore, 24 carbon, 172 in nanotechnology, 151–52, 182 as requirement for life, 123–24, 256 carbon dioxide, 132, 171, 172–73, 182, 193–94, 196, 218, 278 carbon nanotubes, 151–52 carbyne, 152 Cassini spacecraft, 52–53, 125, 182 Castro, Fidel, 41 casualties, early Chinese, 22 cataracts, 115 cats, 48–49, 251 causality principle, 230–31 cave paintings, 15 celestial property rights, 145–47 Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), 158 centrifuges, 114 Cerf, Vinton, 67 Chaffee, Roger, 43 Challenger, explosion of, 55–56, 56, 74, 107, 271 Chang’e 3 lunar probe, 143, 162 chemical fuels, 219–21, 220 chickens, research using, 26 chimpanzees, 14 genetic diversity of humans vs., 202 China: as averse to innovation, 109 in early attempts at space travel, 21–22, 22, 68, 139, 141 population dispersion into, 7 revolution in, 141 rocket development in, 23–24, 113 space program of, 139–44, 140, 161, 162, 195, 276 US relations with, 144 Christian, Fletcher, 202 Christianity, 20 Chuansheng Chen, 11 civilization: Type I, 253, 254, 257 Type II, 253–54, 254, 257 Type III, 253, 254, 257 Type IV, 253, 254, 255 Clarke, Arthur C., 149–50, 164, 185, 201, 252 climate change, 197–98, 286 Clinton, Bill, 154 cloning, 251 Clynes, Manfred, 205 Cocconi, Giuseppe, 187 Colbert, Stephen, 74, 117 Cold War, 35–39, 41–43, 50, 55, 73, 76, 139, 145, 197 Columbia, disintegration of, 55, 56, 107 Columbia Accident Investigation Board Report, 107 Columbus, Christopher, 243 comets, 183 Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS), 275 Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space, 145 communication: with alien species, 52, 189, 234–35, 238, 239, 246, 253, 255, 259 by digital data transmission, 66–67, 77–80 latency and, 178 space technology in, 153–54 Compaq, 95 computation, future technology of, 258–62 confinement, psychological impact of, 169–70 Congress, US: legislation in, 78, 144 on space programs, 38, 41, 75, 156, 158 consciousness, simulation of, 259–61 conservation biology, 201 conspiracy theories, 238, 240 Constellation program, 104 Contact (film), 236–37, 242 Contact (Sagan), 236 contraception, 200 Copernicus, 19, 20, 127 Coriolis force, Coriolis effect, 152 cosmic rays, 115, 160, 160, 164, 167, 168, 204 cosmism, 27 cosmonauts, 141 disasters of, 108 records set by, 115 selection criteria for, 74 Cosmos 1, 184 cosmos, cosmology, ancient concepts of, 17–20 Cosmos Studios, 184 Cosmotheoros (Huygens), 163 counterfactual thinking, 14 Cronkite, Walter, 74 cryogenic suspension, 250–51 cryptobiosis, 123 cryptography, 231, 291 Cuban missile crisis, 41–42 CubeSat, 184–85 Cultural Revolution, Chinese, 141–42 Curiosity rover, 165, 167, 176, 181 cybernetics, 206–7 Cyborg Foundation, 288 cyborgs (cybernetic organisms), 204–8, 288 Cygnus capsule, 100 cytosine, 6 dark energy, 256 d’Arlandes, Marquis, 68 DARPANET, 78 Darwin, Charles, 265 “Darwin” (machine), 227 Death Valley, 118–19 deceleration, 222, 223 DeepSea Challenger sub, 120 deep space, 126–29 Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), 78, 224 Defense Department, US, 38, 78, 90, 153 De Garis, Hugo, 258 Delta rockets, 72, 113 Delta-V, 111 Democritus, 19 Destination Mir (reality show), 75 Diamandis, Peter, 90–94, 97–98, 147, 156 diamonds, 131, 231 Dick, Philip K., 204–5 Digital Equipment Corporation, 213 DNA, 6–7, 9, 19, 189, 202, 228, 251, 263, 265, 266 Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep (Dick), 205 dogs: brains of, 13 in scientific research, 251 in space travel, 40, 47 Dolly (sheep), 251 Doomsday Clock, 197–98, 246, 286 dopamine, 10, 98 Doppler method, exoplanet detection and characterization by, 127, 128, 129, 130, 133, 215 Doppler shift, 127 Dora-Mittelbau concentration camp, 33 Downey, Robert, Jr., 95 drag, in flight, 68, 83, 223 Drake, Frank, 187–88, 235, 237 Drake equation, 188, 189, 233–35, 237, 241, 243, 244, 253, 291–92 DRD4 alleles, 7R mutation in, 10–12, 11, 15, 98 Drexler, Eric, 226 drones, 180–81 Druyan, Ann, 184 Duke, Charles, 45 Dunn, Tony, 225 Dyson, Freeman, 226–27, 253 Dyson sphere, 253–54, 254 Earth: atmosphere of, 8, 70–71, 70 early impacts on, 50, 172 geological evolution of, 172 as one of many worlds, 17–20 planets similar to, 122, 124–26, 129–33, 224, 235 projected demise of, 197–98 as round, 19 as suited for human habitation, 118–22, 121, 234 as viewed from space, 45, 53, 121, 185, 270 Earth Return Vehicle, 169 “Earthrise” (Anders), 270 Earth similarity index, 215–16 eBay, 79, 95 Economist, The, 105 ecosystem, sealed and self-contained, 192–97, 193, 285 Eiffel Tower, 27, 149 Einstein, Albert, 220, 228, 256 Eisenhower, Dwight D., 36–39, 73, 79 electric cars, 96 electric solar sails, 186 electromagnetic waves, 186 e-mail, 78 embryo transport, 251 Enceladus, 177, 182, 227 potential habitability of, 125, 278 Encyclopædia Britannica, 95, 283 Endangered Species Act (1973), 201 energy: aliens’ use of, 190 civilizations characterized by use of, 252–57, 254, 258 dark, 256 declining growth in world consumption of, 257 Einstein’s equation for, 220 production and efficiency of, 219–24, 220 as requirement for life, 123–24 in rocket equation, 110 Engines of Creation (Drexler), 226 environmental disasters, 245 environmental protection: as applied to space, 147 movement for, 45, 235, 263, 270 Epicureans, 18 Epsilon Eridani, 187 Eratosthenes, 19 ethane, 52, 125 Ethernet, 213 eukaryotes, 172 Euripides, 18 Europa, 52, 97–98 potential habitability of, 125, 125, 161, 278 Europa Clipper mission, 98 Europe: economic depression in, 28 population dispersion into, 7–8, 11, 15 roots of technological development in, 23–24 European Southern Observatory, 133 European Space Agency, 159, 178–79 European Union, bureaucracy of, 106 Eustace, Alan, 120, 272 Evenki people, 119–20 Everest, Mount, 120 evolution: genetic variation in, 6, 203, 265 geological, 172 of human beings, 16–17 off-Earth, 203–4 evolutionary divergence, 201–4 exoplanets: Earth-like, 129–33, 215–18 extreme, 131–32 formation of, 215, 216 incidence and detection of, 126–33, 128, 233 exploration: as basic urge of human nature, 7–12, 109, 218, 261–63 imagination and, 262–63 explorer gene, 86 Explorer I, 38 explosives, early Chinese, 21–23 extinction, 201–2 extraterrestrials, see aliens, extraterrestrial extra-vehicular activities, 179 extremophiles, 122–23 eyeborg, 205–6 Falcon Heavy rocket, 114 Falcon rockets, 96, 97, 101, 184 Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), 82, 93, 105–7, 154 Fédération Aéronautique Internationale, 272 Felix and Félicette (cats), 48–49 Fermi, Enrico, 239–41 Fermilab, 254 “Fermi question,” 240–41, 243 Feynman, Richard, 179–80, 230, 270, 280 F4 Phantom jet fighter, 82 51 Peg (star), 126, 133 55 Cancri (star), 131 F-117 Nighthawk, 69 fine-tuning, 256, 294 fire arrows, 23, 68 fireworks, 21–24, 31 flagella, 180 flight: first human, 68 first powered, 69 principles of, 67–73 stability in, 82–83 “Fly Me to the Moon,” 45 food: energy produced by, 219, 220 in sealed ecosystem, 194–95 for space travel, 115–16, 159, 170 Forward, Robert, 223 Foundation series (Asimov), 94 founder effect, 202–3 Fountains of Paradise, The (Clarke), 149 France, 48, 68, 90 Frankenstein monster, 206, 259 Fresnel lens, 223 From Earth to the Moon (Verne), 183 fuel-to-payload ratio, see rocket equation Fukuyama, Francis, 207 Fuller, Buckminster, 151, 192 fullerenes, 151 Futron corporation, 155 Future of Humanity Institute, 245 “futurology,” 248–52, 249 Fyodorov, Nikolai, 26, 27 Gagarin, Yuri, 40–41, 41, 66, 269 Gaia hypothesis, 286 galaxies: incidence and detection of, 235 number of, 255 see also Milky Way galaxy Galileo, 49–50, 183, 270 Gandhi, Mahatma, 147 Garn, Jake, 114 Garn scale, 114 Garriott, Richard, 92 gas-giant planets, 125, 126–29 Gauss, Karl Friedrich, 238 Gazenko, Oleg, 47 Gemini program, 42 Genesis, Book of, 148–49 genetic anthropology, 6 genetic code, 5–7, 123 genetic diversity, 201–3 genetic drift, 203 genetic engineering, 245, 249 genetic markers, 6–7 genetics, human, 6–7, 9–12, 120, 201–4 Genographic Project, 7, 265 genome sequencing, 93, 202, 292 genotype, 6 “adventure,” 11–12, 98 geocentrism, 17, 19–20, 49 geodesic domes, 192 geological evolution, 172 George III, king of England, 147 German Aerospace Center, 178 Germany, Germans, 202, 238 rocket development by, 28, 30–34, 141 in World War II, 30–35 g-forces, 46–49, 48, 89, 111, 114 GJ 504b (exoplanet), 131 GJ 1214b (exoplanet), 132 glaciation, 172 Glenn Research Center, 219 global communications industry, 153–54 Global Positioning System (GPS), 144, 153–54 God, human beings in special relationship with, 20 Goddard, Robert, 28–32, 29, 36, 76, 78, 81–82, 94, 268 Goddard Space Flight Center, 178 gods, 20 divine intervention of, 18 Golden Fleece awards, 238 Goldilocks zone, 122, 126, 131 Gonzalez, Antonin, 215 Goodall, Jane, 14 Google, 80, 92, 185, 272, 275 Lunar X Prize, 161 Gopnik, Alison, 10, 13 Grasshopper, 101 gravity: centrifugal force in, 26, 114, 150 in flight, 68 of Mars, 181, 203 Newton’s theory of, 25, 267 and orbits, 25, 114–15, 127, 128, 149–50, 267 in rocket equation, 110 of Sun, 183 waves, 255 see also g-forces; zero gravity Gravity, 176 gravity, Earth’s: first object to leave, 40, 51 human beings who left, 45 as obstacle for space travel, 21, 105, 148 as perfect for human beings, 118 simulation of, 168–69 Great Art of Artillery, The (Siemienowicz), 267 Great Britain, 86, 106, 206, 227 “Great Filter,” 244–47 Great Leap Forward, 15–16 “Great Silence, The,” of SETI, 236–39, 240–41, 243–44 Greece, ancient, 17–19, 163 greenhouse effect, 171, 173 greenhouse gasses, 132, 278 Griffin, Michael, 57, 147, 285–86 grinders (biohackers), 207 Grissom, Gus, 43 guanine, 6 Guggenheim, Daniel, 81, 268 Guggenheim, Harry, 81 Guggenheim Foundation, 30, 81–82, 268 gunpowder, 21–24, 267 Guth, Alan, 257 habitable zone, 122, 124–26, 130–31, 132, 188, 241, 246, 277–78, 286, 291 defined, 124 Hadfield, Chris, 142 hair, Aboriginal, 8 “Halfway to Pluto” (Pettit), 273 Hanson, Robin, 247 haptic technology, 178 Harbisson, Neil, 205, 288 Harvard Medical School, 90 Hawking, Stephen, 88, 93, 198, 259 HD 10180 (star), 127 Heinlein, Robert, 177 Heisenberg compensator, 229 Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle, 229–30 heliocentrism, 19 helium, 68 helium 3, 161–62 Herschel, William, 163 Higgs particle, 256 High Frontier, 146–47 Hilton, Paris, 88, 101–2 Hilton hotels, 145 Hinduism, 20 Hiroshima, 222 Hitler, Adolf, 32, 34 Hope, Dennis M., 145, 147 Horowitz, Paul, 237–38 hot Jupiters, 127–28, 130 Hubble Space Telescope, 56–57, 65, 218, 225 Huffington, Arianna, 92 human beings: as adaptable to challenging environments, 118–22 as alien simulations, 260–61, 260 creative spirit of, 73, 248 early global migration of, 5–12, 9, 11, 15, 19, 118, 120, 186, 202, 218, 262, 265 Earth as perfectly suited for, 118–22, 121 exploration intrinsic to nature of, 7–12, 109, 218, 261–63 first appearance of, 5, 15, 172, 234 impact of evolutionary divergence on, 201–4 as isolated species, 241–42 as lone intelligent life, 241, 243 merger of machines and, see cyborgs minimal viable population in, 201–2, 251 off-Earth, 203–4, 215, 250–52 requirements of habitability for, 122, 124–26, 129, 130–31 sense of self of, 232, 261 space as inhospitable to, 53–54, 114–17, 121, 123 space exploration by robots vs., 53–57, 66, 98, 133, 161, 177–79, 179, 208, 224–28 space travel as profound and sublime experience for, 45, 53, 117, 122 speculation on future of, 93, 94, 204, 207–8, 215, 244–47, 248–63, 249 surpassed by technology, 258–59 threats to survival of, 94, 207–8, 244–47, 250, 259–62, 286, 293 timeline for past and future of, 248–50, 249 transforming moment for, 258–59 Huntsville, Ala., US Space and Rocket Center in, 48 Huygens, Christiaan, 163 Huygens probe, 53 hybrid cars, 96 hydrogen, 110, 156, 159, 161, 187, 219, 222 hydrogen bomb, 36 hydrosphere, 173 hyperloop aviation concept, 95 hypothermia, 251 hypothetical scenarios, 15–16 IBM, 213 Icarus Interstellar, 224 ice: on Europa, 125 on Mars, 163–65, 227 on Moon, 159–60 ice ages, 7–8 ice-penetrating robot, 98 IKAROS spacecraft, 184 imagination, 10, 14, 20 exploration and, 261–63 immortality, 259 implants, 206–7 inbreeding, 201–3 India, 159, 161 inflatable modules, 101–2 inflation theory, 255–57, 255 information, processing and storage of, 257–60 infrared telescopes, 190 Inspiration Mars, 170–71 Institute for Advanced Concepts, 280 insurance, for space travel, 106–7 International Academy of Astronautics, 152 International Geophysical Year (1957–1958), 37 International Institute of Air and Space Law, 199 International MicroSpace, 90 International Scientific Lunar Observatory, 157 International Space Station, 55, 64–65, 64, 71, 75, 91, 96, 100, 102, 142, 143, 144, 151, 153, 154, 159, 178–79, 179, 185, 272, 275 living conditions on, 116–17 as staging point, 148 supply runs to, 100–101, 104 International Space University, 90 International Traffic in Arms Regulation (ITAR), 105–6, 144 Internet: Congressional legislation on, 78, 144 development of, 76–77, 77, 94, 95, 271 erroneous predictions about, 213–14 limitations of, 66–67 robotics and, 206 space travel compared to, 76–80, 77, 80 Internet Service Providers (ISPs), 78 interstellar travel, 215–18 energy technology for, 219–24 four approaches to, 251–52 scale model for, 219 Intrepid rovers, 165 Inuit people, 120 Io, 53, 177 property rights on, 145 “iron curtain,” 35 Iron Man, 95 isolation, psychological impact of, 169–70 Jacob’s Ladder, 149 Jade Rabbit (“Yutu”), 139, 143, 161 Japan, 161, 273 Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), 184 Jefferson, Thomas, 224 Jemison, Mae, 224 jet engines, 69–70 Jet Propulsion Laboratory, 141 Johnson, Lyndon, 38, 42, 45, 158, 269 Johnson Space Center, 76, 104, 179, 206, 229, 269 see also Mission Control Jones, Stephanie Tubbs, 74 Joules per kilogram (MJ/kg), 219–20, 222 Journalist in Space program, 74 “junk” DNA, 10, 266 Juno probe, 228 Jupiter, 126, 127, 177, 217, 270 distance from Earth to, 50 moons of, 97, 125, 125 probes to, 51–52, 228 as uninhabitable, 125 Justin (robot), 178 Kaku, Michio, 253 Karash, Yuri, 65 Kardashev, Nikolai, 253 Kardashev scale, 253, 254, 258 Kármán line, 70, 70, 101 Kennedy, John F., 41–43, 45 Kepler, Johannes, 183 Kepler’s law, 127 Kepler spacecraft and telescope, 128, 128, 129–31, 218, 278 Khrushchev, Nikita, 42, 47 Kickstarter, 184 Killian, James, 38 Kline, Nathan, 205 Knight, Pete, 71 Komarov, Vladimir, 43, 108 Korean War, 141 Korolev, Sergei, 35, 37 Kraft, Norbert, 200 Krikalev, Sergei, 115 Kunza language, 119 Kurzweil, Ray, 94, 207, 259 Laika (dog), 47, 65, 269 Laliberté, Guy, 75 landings, challenges of, 51, 84–85, 170 Lang, Fritz, 28, 268 language: of cryptography, 291 emergence of, 15, 16 of Orcas, 190 in reasoning, 13 Lansdorp, Bas, 170–71, 198–99, 282 lasers, 223, 224, 225–26, 239 pulsed, 190, 243 last common ancestor, 6, 123, 265 Late Heavy Bombardment, 172 latency, 178 lava tubes, 160 legislation, on space, 39, 78, 90, 144, 145–47, 198–200 Le Guin, Ursula K., 236–37 Leonov, Alexey, 55 L’Garde Inc., 284 Licancabur volcano, 119 Licklider, Joseph Carl Robnett “Lick,” 76–78 life: appearance and evolution on Earth of, 172 artificial, 258 detection of, 216–18 extension of, 26, 207–8, 250–51, 259 extraterrestrial, see aliens, extraterrestrial intelligent, 190, 235, 241, 243, 258 requirements of habitability for, 122–26, 125, 129, 131–33, 241, 256–57 lifetime factor (L), 234–335 lift, in flight, 68–70, 83 lift-to-drag ratio, 83 light: from binary stars, 126 as biomarker, 217 Doppler shift of, 127 momentum and energy from, 183 speed of, 178, 228–29, 250, 251 waves, 66 Lindbergh, Charles, 30, 81–82, 90–91, 268 “living off the land,” 166, 200 logic, 14, 18 Long March, 141 Long March rockets, 113, 142, 143 Long Now Foundation, 293 Los Alamos, N.

Fool's Gold: How the Bold Dream of a Small Tribe at J.P. Morgan Was Corrupted by Wall Street Greed and Unleashed a Catastrophe
by Gillian Tett
Published 11 May 2009

So many clients responded that the event was standing room only. By October 1999, the official volume of credit derivatives deals in the market was estimated at $229 billion, six times the level just two years earlier. J.P. Morgan alone accounted for almost half of the total. The bank had not just kick-started the business; it virtually was the market. The J.P. Morgan clients, investors, and rivals packed into the Cipriani ballroom that day were eager to find out what the young derivatives Turks were planning next. As the audience filed into the Cipriani, they were given a hefty, seventy-three-page tome decorated with a blurred picture of orange and white squares on a black background, not unlike a piece of artwork by Mark Rothko.

…

Some of that was due to the banks’ traditional businesses of equity market underwriting, share trading, and merger advice recovering from the internet crash, but a key component of the growth was the credit boom. Between 2003 and 2004, the total market capitalization of major global banks rose by $900 billion to $5.4 trillion, a record high. Amid this heady bonanza, however, one bank was notably not celebrating: JPMorgan Chase. By 2004, the bank that had kick-started the credit investment boom was, ironically, lagging badly behind the new pack of players, in large part because the J.P. Morgan management had opted out of the mortgage-based CDO and CDS business. Analysts were unimpressed with the bank’s results, and the stock price was languishing. An injection of new energy was urgently needed, and the bank was about to get quite a shock to the system

Trick Mirror: Reflections on Self-Delusion
by Jia Tolentino
Published 5 Aug 2019

It came after the advent of reality TV and Facebook, which drew on the renewable natural resource of our narcissism to create a world where our selves, our relationships, and our personalities were not just monetizable but actively in need of monetization. It came after college tuition skyrocketed only to send graduates into low-wage contract work and world-historical economic inequality. It came, finally, after the 2008 financial crisis, the event that arguably kick-started the millennial-era understanding that the quickest way to win is to scam. The Crash In 1988, twenty-seven-year-old Michael Lewis quit his job at Salomon Brothers, the investment bank that sold the world’s first mortgage-backed security, and wrote a book called Liar’s Poker. It was a portrait of Wall Street in the years following federal deregulation, a time when the industry blossomed with savvy, cynical, lucky actors who stumbled into a world of extreme manipulation and profit.

…

The Facebook idiom now dominates our culture, with the most troubling structural changes of the era surfacing in isolated, deceptive specks of emotional virality. We see the dismantling of workplace protections in a celebratory blog post about a Lyft driver who continued to pick up passengers while she was in labor. We see the madness of privatized healthcare in the forced positivity of a stranger’s chemotherapy Kickstarter campaign. On Facebook, our basic humanity is reframed as an exploitable viral asset. Our social potential is compressed to our ability to command public attention, which is then made inextricable from economic survival. Instead of fair wages and benefits, we have our personalities and stories and relationships, and we’d better learn to package them well for the internet in case we ever get in an accident while uninsured.

My Life as a Goddess: A Memoir Through (Un)Popular Culture
by Guy Branum
Published 29 Jul 2018

You would have to choose to learn about Canada, and no one does that. Let us begin at the beginning of white people. You’re probably like, “But Guy, the REAL story is the native peoples of Canada; their narrative is forgotten.” To that I would like to say, “Please, get to work unforgetting them. I will donate to any Kickstarter you kick-start.” But you see, you had no interest in exploring the stories of First Nations Canada until you wanted to tell me I was telling a story of Canada wrong. This is the resilient power of Canadian boringness to keep us from discussing them. You will try to train on a more progressive, more relevant story and, in the end, keep knowing nothing about Canada.

Winners Take All: The Elite Charade of Changing the World
by Anand Giridharadas
Published 27 Aug 2018

“It seems pretty egocentric while we still have malaria and TB for rich people to fund things so they can live longer,” Bill Gates has said. * * * — Perhaps the most unlikely featured speaker at Summit at Sea was Edward Snowden, American whistleblower, scourge of the National Security Agency. He was in Russia, coming to the ship via video. His interviewer was Chris Sacca, a wildly successful VC (Instagram, Kickstarter, Twitter, Uber). One of the founders of Summit walked onstage and said, “We need truth-tellers and thought leaders like Chris Sacca.” Two truth-tellers for the price of one. Sacca, taking the stage, praised Summit for becoming what he called “a platform for entrepreneurship, for justice.”

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The trio batted around ideas for addressing this problem, and at last alighted on the vision of creating a parallel capitalist infrastructure, next to the traditional one, in which companies could be more responsible and conscious, and nonetheless raise money from capital markets and comply with the law. Thus was born the B Corporation, or benefit corporation, as it is also known. The three men started a nonprofit called B Lab, which gives better-behaved businesses a certification based on a rigorous analysis of their social and environmental practices. Kickstarter, King Arthur Flour, Ben & Jerry’s, and the Brazilian cosmetics company Natura are all B corps. Kassoy and his cofounders wanted to make the world a better place, and they found a way of doing so in line with MarketWorld values. They made it easier for companies that were willing to do good, while all but ignoring the companies that wanted to do harm.

The Truth Machine: The Blockchain and the Future of Everything
by Paul Vigna and Michael J. Casey
Published 27 Feb 2018

The startups behind this ICO trend are touting a host of new decentralized applications that could disrupt everything from online advertising to medical research. Integral to those services are special tokens that are pre-sold to the public as a way to both raise money and build a network of users—kind of like Kickstarter, but in which contributors have the potential to make quick money in secondary trading markets. At the time of writing, the highest amount raised by one of these pre-sale ICOs was $257 million by Protocol Labs, which sold a token called Filecoin that’s designed to incentivize people to provide hard-drive space for a new decentralized Web.

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Inter-American Development Bank Interledger Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) Internet of Things (IoT) Internet of Value Internet 3.0 Interplanetary File System (IPFS) IOTA IPFS. See Interplanetary File System (IPFS) Islamic State Israel Ito, Joichi Ivancheglo, Sergey J.P. Morgan Jagers, Chris Japan Jasanoff, Sheila JavaScript Jordan Juniper Research K320 (digital currency) Kalanick, Travis Kickstarter. See also crowdfunding know-your-customer (KYC) know-your-machine Larimer, Daniel ledger-keeping and Bitcoin double-entry bookkeeping history of triple-entry bookkeeping value of Lehman Brothers Lemieux, Victoria L. Leondrino Exchange Lessig, Lawrence Levine, Matt Lewis, Michael Lightning Network Linux Foundation Litecoin Llanos, Juan Lloyd’s of London LO3 Energy Lovejoy, James Loyyal Lubin, Joseph Ludwin, Adam Lyft Lykke Madoff, Bernie Maidsafe Malaysian Airlines flight MH370 Marshall, George C.

Rebooting India: Realizing a Billion Aspirations
by Nandan Nilekani
Published 4 Feb 2016

Given the fact that the commercial prospects of a new programming language at the point of conception are almost nil in today’s world unless it is backed by a large company such as Google, Apple or Microsoft, it was unlikely that any investor would choose to invest in such a project. However, open-source contributions and government funding kick-started the project and have led to its maturity, to a point where universities around the world now teach Julia in classrooms, and companies use it extensively. While government funding has been a key component of technological innovation, some of the resulting discoveries have ended up posing an unexpected challenge to government itself.

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‘Finance ministry wants taxman not to harass taxpayers’. Times of India. http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/business/india-business/Finance-ministry-wants-taxman-not-to-harass-taxpayers/articleshow/38346860.cms 7. Mahalingam, T.V. 6 July 2014. ‘Budget 2014: What India’s five manufacturing hubs expect from Modi government to kick-start growth’. Economic Times. http://articles.economictimes.indiatimes.com/2014-07-06/news/51107986_1_manufacturing-sector-world-manufacturing-hubs 8. ‘The World Bank Indicators’. http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/GC.TAX.TOTL.GD.ZS. 9. July 2004. ‘Report of the Task Force on Implementation of the Fiscal Responsibility and Budget Management Act, 2003’.

Ghost Road: Beyond the Driverless Car
by Anthony M. Townsend
Published 15 Jun 2020

One option is to farm it out to industry. Companies like Via—which operate dozens of microtransit lines in New York, Austin, Chicago, and Washington, DC—already have rider-verification systems in place. It’s easy to imagine Via licensing its tools to participating organizations or local transit agencies that want to kick-start line-sharing efforts. The challenge would be making sure there’s a way to onboard disadvantaged people who don’t or won’t use a mobile device—and making sure everyone’s data is kept private and secure. The second challenge is coordinating those transfers, because driverless shuttles won’t always run on schedules, and many won’t stick to fixed routes.

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See, for example, Andrés Rodríguez-Pose and Michael Storper, “Housing, Urban Growth and Inequalities: The Limits to Deregulation and Upzoning in Reducing Economic and Spatial Inequality,” Urban Studies (September 2019), https://doi.org/10.1177/0042098019859458. 9Wrestling with Regulation The right to have access to every building in the city by private motorcar in an age when everyone possesses such a vehicle is actually the right to destroy the city. —Lewis Mumford, 1964 Mayors may have the hardest job in the self-driving future. After the designers, developers, and engineers are long gone, they’ll have to pick up the pieces. Yet today, we focus mainly on the national reforms needed to kick-start AV innovation. The real challenge of regulating the impacts of AVs will fall on local governments—as it did in the motor age. The sweeping scope of opportunities and threats posed by self-driving technology is catching most cities by surprise. But many are now assessing what’s in store and their options near and far.

We Are Electric: Inside the 200-Year Hunt for Our Body's Bioelectric Code, and What the Future Holds
by Sally Adee
Published 27 Feb 2023

This research soon gave scientists a full index of all the ion channels—sodium channels, calcium channels, chloride channels, potassium channels. Never mind the transparent curtain—it was these proteins that decided which ion was allowed to go where, when. How did they make these complicated decisions? That puzzle was solved in 1991—the same year Neher and Sakmann got their Nobel for kick-starting this avalanche of research—by the biophysicist Roderick MacKinnon. Many complex metaphors have been used to describe the incredibly complicated system MacKinnon uncovered. But I like to think of ion channels as shape sorters—you know, the toy you give a baby so it can shove different-shaped pegs into a wooden box through matching holes.

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Then Ai-Sun Tseng, who at the time was part of Levin’s lab, manipulated the membrane voltages with ion-channel tweaks, and now we were cooking with gas. She and Levin had been kicking around an idea—instead of micromanaging the process of regeneration, could it be possible to tweak the bioelectrics to kickstart the development processes that had built these appendages in the first place? Tseng started looking for ion channels that might be amenable to tweaking. She discovered one kind of sodium channel that was crucial to regeneration. Better yet, an ion-channel drug had already been developed that could act on these.

Tunnel 29
by Helena Merriman
Published 24 Aug 2021

In West Berlin, all down the Ku’damm, along Bernauer Strasse, across the whole city, people stop walking, stop talking and they are still. Traffic stops. VW Beetles and lorries sit awkwardly in the middle of the road. As people stand there, statues dotted around the city, the sudden departure from normal life kick-starts their emotions: grown men cry, elderly couples cling to each other, children curl into their parent’s arms. But as the seconds tick on, despair turns into something else. Anger. Anger that their collective response to one year of the Wall is simply this. Silence. At 12.01, someone somewhere beeps their horn.

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And so the message bounces from phone, to walkie-talkie, to phone, eventually reaching Harry Thoess, the NBC cameraman in the building high above the Wall, who reaches for the white sheet, and flings it out of the window, hoping that Ellen is somewhere below and that she’ll see it and remember what it means. Ellen She sees it. A flash of white tumbling out of the window, the outline of a figure behind it. The sheet kick-starts Ellen’s memory and the map flashes up in her mind, her fear lifting, replaced by the strong sense that she knows exactly what to do. Walk straight ahead. Turn right. Cross the road. Right again. Following the lines in her head, Ellen steers herself through the streets effortlessly, confident at each turning that she’s remembered it right.

Grow Green: Tips and Advice for Gardening With Intention
by Jen Chillingsworth
Published 31 Mar 2021

YOU WILL NEED » Seed potting compost » Bucket » Water » Trowel » Containers (for small seeds use a seed tray and for larger seeds use individual pots) » Seeds » Spray bottle filled with water » Plant labels Place the seed potting compost in the bucket. Add a little water and mix it into the compost with the trowel. Moistening the compost before sowing seeds helps the mix to retain water and kickstart germination. Fill your chosen container with moist seed compost. For small seeds, sow thinly and cover lightly with potting compost. For large seeds, drop two or three seeds in each container and cover lightly with potting compost. Lightly spray the surface with water and place on a sunny windowsill.

Pocket Stockholm Travel Guide
by Lonely Planet

Swedes drink more coffee than people in any other country except Finland (something to do with the weather?). The range of coffee drinks has vastly increased in recent years, as has the variety of places to enjoy them. Don’t forget to include a sweet – Stockholm's cafes do seriously good cakes and pastries. JULIE MAYFENG/SHUTTERSTOCK © yTop Tips AFor Stockholmers, coffee isn't just a breakfast kick-starter. The caffeine flows freely here at any tick of the clock: locals are just as likely to enjoy a cup of the black stuff at 10pm as they are a beer. Best Coffee Shops Sturekatten Cute labyrinthine coffee shop with antique furniture and delicious cakes. In Östermalm. All very dignified. Bianchi Cafe & Cycles Perfect espresso in a bicycle-themed Italian cafe in Norrmalm.

Layered Money: From Gold and Dollars to Bitcoin and Central Bank Digital Currencies
by Nik Bhatia
Published 18 Jan 2021

The Federal Reserve was bound by a legislated minimum gold-coverage which limited the amount of credit the Fed made available to the system. Gold’s disciplinary constraint received an outcry of blame for the economy’s inability to recover and led to dramatic and sweeping changes to the dollar pyramid during the 1930s. These events should be seen as the major catalyst that kickstarted gold’s departure from the world’s monetary landscape. No Gold for You President Franklin Roosevelt issued Executive Order 6102 on April 5, 1933 which instructed all “gold coin, gold bullion, and certificates to be delivered to the government.” The order was effectively a forced sale of gold in exchange for Federal Reserve notes (cash) by all United States citizens and outrightly eliminated the people’s access to first-layer money.11 This brazen declaration made the possession of and trafficking in first-layer money illegal and punishable by up to ten years in prison, reminiscent of the Bank of Amsterdam’s mandate for all cashiers to surrender precious metal coins in exchange for BoA deposits upon its creation in 1609.

More Plants Less Waste: Plant-Based Recipes + Zero Waste Life Hacks With Purpose
by Max La Manna
Published 21 Aug 2019

Like all plants, bananas contain important nutrients and can be planted in your back garden to help support plant and soil health. Recycling the peels back into your gardens returns essential nutrients to the soil where they can benefit other plants. banana peels Chop your banana peels into 2.5cm segments. By chopping them, you kickstart the compost process and release some of the beneficial vitamins and minerals in the peels. Dig holes about 15–30cm deep and plant your banana peels around your garden, preferably near other plants or trees to provide the most beneficial results. MORE PLANTS LESS WASTE 21-DAY CHALLENGE We all need to start somewhere.

The Life of a Song: The Fascinating Stories Behind 50 of the World’s Best-Loved Songs
by David Cheal and Jan Dalley
Published 20 Sep 2017

In 2016 a tribute album (on Alligator Records) was released featuring artists such as Tom Waits, Derek Trucks and Maria McKee performing 11 of Johnson’s songs. The album, God Don’t Never Change: The Songs of Blind Willie Johnson, was an eight-year labour of love for its producer, Jeffrey Gaskill, a long-time Johnson devotee. As well as setting up a Kickstarter campaign to fund the album, Gaskill went back to what remains of a house where Johnson lived in Marlin, Texas, and, with permission, salvaged three wooden boards that had fallen from the structure. These lengths of yellow pine were crafted by a luthier into ten ‘cigar-box’ (i.e. rectangular) guitars, which were sold to raise more funds.

Cyprus - Culture Smart!: The Essential Guide to Customs & Culture
by Constantine Buhayer
Published 24 Feb 2022

Since the 1990s they have migrated as skilled professionals. As they settled, Greek Cypriots established local Greek Orthodox churches, then opened Greek Saturday schools for their children. Most parishes function as Cypriot villages that run their own earthly affairs. For the older women, many of whom kickstarted their diaspora families by working as seamstresses, the church is a second home in a changing world. The old country matters dearly. The Limassol-born British Cypriot magnate Theo Paphitis stated that “in the Diaspora, Cyprus has a second Cyprus abroad.” His friend, Famagusta-born Touker Suleiman, entrepreneur and fellow TV personality, is keenly attached to his Cypriot roots.

Portland Like a Local
by DK

After a few sips of a flavor-packed saison or wild ale you’ll wonder why Upright’s newly upgraded taproom still feels like a secret – but why ruin a good thing by blabbing about it on social? Drink | Breweries Leafy Lone Fir Cemetery (649 SE 26th Avenue) is home to the little-visited tomb of George Frederic Bottler, a brewer who helped kick-start the city’s beer movement in the mid-19th century. Legend has it that he smuggled some of the first hop strains into the Northwest, before Oregon was even a state. g Breweries g Contents Google Map RUSE BREWING Map 6; 4784 SE 17th Avenue, Brooklyn; ///elbow.wanted.before; www.rusebrewing.com It’s true: Ruse is a magnet for IPA diehards, who come to sip on the brewery’s juicy hazies and fervently discuss grain builds.

Berlin Like a Local
by Dk Eyewitness

Food-wise it’s all about colourful plates of fluffy falafel, crunchy kibbeh and unctuous hummus, all washed down with a lip-smackingly delicious glass of freshly squeezed orange juice. g Sustainable Dining g Contents Google Map NOBELHART & SCHMUTZIG Map 4; Friedrichstrasse 218, Mitte; ///clinked.blocks.used; www.nobelhartundschmutzig.com “Brutally local” is the name of the game here – yes, the literal game served up. Kick-starting Berlin’s sustainable food movement, this fine dining spot was the first to seek out and showcase regional farmers; in short, if an ingredient – from the meat down to the salt – can’t be produced in Berlin or its surrounds, it won’t be used. Each seasonal dish (part of a fixed ten-course menu) is served with a story, too, so you’ll leave feeling like you know the hunter behind that deer rump or farmer who harvested that kohlrabi.

New York City Like a Local
by Dk Eyewitness

g EAT g Contents Special Occasion THE DUTCH ABCV BEAUTY & ESSEX MANHATTA ALTA LAFAYETTE SARAGHINA UNION SQUARE CAFÉ g Special Occasion g Contents Google Map THE DUTCH Map 1; 131 Sullivan Street, Soho; ///camp.cowboy.slower; www.thedutchnyc.com The Dutch feels fancy enough to celebrate a birthday or promotion without feeling like you’re totally out of your league. Join elegant professionals who populate the bar area for after-work drinks before migrating to a table to tuck into a seafood feast. Even if you don’t stay for a full meal, kick-start your celebration with oysters and cocktails at this perennially crowded restaurant. You deserve it. g Special Occasion g Contents Google Map ABCV Map 1; 38 East 19th Street, Flatiron District; ///factor.mouse.struck; www.jean-georges.com Housing a haute-cuisine restaurant inside a home-goods store sounds odd, but acclaimed French chef Jean-Georges Vongerichten has made a habit of it, and with great success.

Vancouver Like a Local
by Jacqueline Salomé

On a sunny day, it’s a quintessential Vancouver experience – just watch out for hungry seagulls. » Don’t leave without checking out nearby Granville Island Public Market, a gastronomic wonderland of local produce. g Seafood Spots g Contents Google Map THE FISH COUNTER Map 4; 3825 Main Street, Mount Pleasant; ///less.insist.observe; www.thefishcounter.com All hail chef Robert Clark, a local hero who basically kick-started the West Coast sustainable seafood movement and cofounded this top-notch fish market. Vancouverites show their gratitude by flocking here on weekends for fish and chips, crab-and-shrimp baguettes, and dairy-free clam chowder. Find a quiet corner under the wooden beams inside, or join the locals on a shared bench out front.

San Francisco Like a Local: By the People Who Call It Home
by Dk Eyewitness
Published 5 Apr 2023

Here, warehouses once busy with shipbuilding and repairs are now jammed with galleries and design collectives. This afternoon amble takes you through the best of Dogpatch’s arts scene within just a few short blocks. Route map 1. Begin at MINNESOTA STREET PROJECT 1275 Minnesota Street, Dogpatch; www.minnesotastreetproject.com ///mostly.drank.motor Kick-start your afternoon by spending a couple of hours browsing the 13 indie galleries inside this warehouse complex. 2. Chow down at JUST FOR YOU 732 22nd Street, Dogpatch; www.justforyoucafe.com ///caller.cover.vast Refuel with a fresh-squeezed lemonade and sandwich, made from homebaked bread, at this local favorite, which is lined with vintage travel and theater posters. 3.

Living in a Material World: The Commodity Connection
by Kevin Morrison
Published 15 Jul 2008

Concerns about global warming went from being an environmental niche to a mainstream issue, further enhancing the perception of ethanol as a clean energy. Ethanol had become even more political: Bush beat the energy independence drum as hard as he could with the support of a patriotic America, reeling from the tragic terrorist attacks in 2001, and together they kick-started the biggest ethanol expansion in US history. Its knock-on effects for agriculture were global. President Bush (ordinarily a teetotaller) appeared intoxicated with the alcohol at his State of the Union address in January 2007. He called for a mandate of 35 billion gallons by 2017; a target that raised eyebrows and caused even some of the most ardent supporters of biofuels to doubt whether this could be achieved.

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Water from desalination is about five times the cost per cubic metre of water from groundwater. Given the amount of water required, this implies that the cost of production will rise, underpinning higher copper prices – prices do not fall below the cost of production for long. The need for water has also pushed up the value of permits to extract water from aquifers and kickstarted a water exploration industry – water exploration companies play a similar role to the small mineral exploration companies. Added to this, Chile is not endowed with bountiful energy resources; it imports about two-thirds of its energy requirements, compared with less than half in 1990. The importation of fuels for power generation is therefore particularly important for the copper industry (Poniachik, 2006).

Europe old and new: transnationalism, belonging, xenophobia
by Ray Taras
Published 15 Dec 2009

Commonplace Terms Used to Describe Europe “The discourse of Europeanization is dominated by superficial metaphors suggesting a teleological project legitimated by grand EU narratives, such as ‘widening’ and ‘deepening’ or ‘ever closer union’; vague, if not inaccurate, sociological terms, such as ‘integration’ and ‘inclusion,’ and morphological metaphors such as ‘multi-leveled’ governance.” Source: Gerard Delanty and Chris Rumford, Rethinking Europe: Social Theory and the Implications of Europeanization (London: Routledge, 2005), 3. No systematic theory about Europeanization has been developed. No doubt Europeanization was kick-started by a set of practical imperatives that initially spurred cooperation among western European states. Cooperation among economically advanced countries was regarded as a process to end all wars—a self-evident proposition but by no means a historically inevitable development. Few historians would contest that the Yalta and Potsdam treaties of 1945, concluded by wartime allies Britain, the United States, and the USSR, had countenanced a Soviet sphere of influence in eastern Europe.

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In 2005, national elections in Poland brought a conservative Catholic, Lech Kaczyński, to the presidency. Simultaneously, his twin brother Jarosław was leader of the party that won the most seats in the legislature and shortly afterwards he became prime minister. For the next two years, the Kaczyńskis turned Poland into Europe’s lightning rod on any number of issues. They kickstarted their controversial administration by abolishing the post of minister for women’s interests, making Poland a rare European country not having this portfolio. Gay pride marches were banned, not just in Warsaw but also in various Polish cities. The exceptionalism of Poland was not confined to sociocultural issues— or to the Kaczyńskis’ interlude.

Augmented: Life in the Smart Lane
by Brett King
Published 5 May 2016

This allows the system to adapt in accordance with the degree with which a user’s SWS is impaired.”10 Soon, you’ll be able to put on headphones to go to sleep and enter an SWS state that will improve your brain, ability to learn, memory and ability to get to and/or maintain a healthy weight. By using this method, you may also need less sleep each night. Imagine what you could do with 2 or 3 hours of less sleep each night, but still wake up in better shape than you do today? Quantified Calorie Intake A new device launched recently on a Kickstarter campaign gives you the ability to scan food in front of you and get an estimate of the number of calories you are about to consume. The portable scanner harnesses the power of physics and chemistry to figure out everything from the sugar content of a given apple to whether or not that drink you left on the bar has been drugged.

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However, by 2030 with robotics, drone delivery and the like, you will have the ability to have your groceries and shopping delivered automatically from a smart kitchen initiated order. It’s also likely that we’ll continue to automate cooking in the kitchen. While a Star Trek-style replicator is decades away, a 3D printer that prints a burger or a pizza will be viable by 2030, if not earlier. Natural Machines launched a kickstarter campaign in 2014 for its 3D “Foodini” printer, which will be capable of printing various foods like pasta, cookies, crackers, bread, snacks, etc. A robotic chef (shown below) like the one Morley Robotics is working on is also a distinct possibility within the next 10 to 15 years. Figure 8.9: A robotic chef (Credit: Morley Robotics) The smart bathroom is sure to incorporate not only smarts into the bathroom mirror, but smarts into other appliances.

The Industries of the Future
by Alec Ross
Published 2 Feb 2016

Uber, the mobile app that connects passengers with drivers for hire, has turned the taxi market on its ear. But what happens when that market is challenged by robots? Uber has already built a robotics research lab stuffed with scientists to “kickstart autonomous taxi fleet development” so they can go driverless. At last count, there were 162,037 active drivers in the Uber fleet who would be kickstarted into obsolescence. In the United States and many other countries, taxi drivers are often immigrants or others hustling their way up the socioeconomic ladder. It’s also a job with tremendous amounts of human interaction.

Paper Promises
by Philip Coggan
Published 1 Dec 2011

One early Virginia planter swore that ‘he would no more be caught going into a bank than into a house of ill fame’.16 A key political battle in the early history of the Republic was that between Thomas Jefferson, the third President, and Alexander Hamilton, the Secretary of the Treasury and founder of the Federalist party. Hamilton wanted to establish a sound banking system as a way of expanding trade within the former colonies; he opted to repay soldiers’ IOUs at par, even though many had been acquired by speculators. Hamilton kick-started the process of turning the US dollar into the world’s most acceptable credit. ‘There is scarcely any point in the economy of national affairs of greater moment than the uniform presentation of the monetary unit,’ he declared. ‘On this, the security and steady value of property essentially depend.’17 But the development of the US monetary system was far from smooth.

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The arrival of steamships in the mid-nineteenth century opened up the possibility of exporting wheat from the US and meat from Argentina to the hungry European markets. The result was an agricultural depression in Britain. But by shifting workers from relatively unproductive farming into manufacturing, it gave a kick-start to European growth. In the words of Keynes, The inhabitant of London could order by telephone, sipping his morning tea in bed, the various products of the whole earth . . . he could at the same time and by the same means adventure his wealth in the natural resources and new enterprise of any quarter of the world . . . he could secure forthwith, if he wished, cheap and comfortable means of transit to any country or climate without passport or other formality.4 This system tied countries closely together in economic terms.

Women Talk Money: Breaking the Taboo
by Rebecca Walker
Published 15 Mar 2022

* * * In November 2014, I was assigned to review Amanda Palmer’s book The Art of Asking for the website Refinery29. The memoir, among other things, details her many approaches to crowdfunding—from her roots performing as a living statue in a wedding dress, to sleeping on fans’ couches while touring, to ultimately launching the world’s most successful Kickstarter. I concluded my essayistic review by describing my own experiences with crowdfunding and the aftermath—a few unfortunate encounters with strangers and friends in the months after, where they criticized my social media posts whenever it appeared as if I had money. (New boots: were they designer?

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Three years later, Marillion inspired “the father of crowdfunding,” Brian Camelio, to launch ArtistShare—the first crowdfunding platform for artists. The platform ended up mainly backing musical projects, including ten Grammy-winning albums. It wasn’t until 2009 that our modern-day crowdfunding giants, Indiegogo and Kickstarter, collectively launched around half a million projects. Yet even today, the disdain my trolls have for me as a writer is mild compared to the disdain they have for my crowdfund. One Reddit thread that pulled my name as a potential “fake chronically ill person” (they singled out many women with chronic illness, until chronically ill activists pushed them to delete it), featured irate posts about me “financially profiting off of illness.”

Einstein's Fridge: How the Difference Between Hot and Cold Explains the Universe
by Paul Sen
Published 16 Mar 2021

Then a hand reaches in and opens the door. Heat starts to flow. The hand disappears but the door remains open. A small proportion of the heat flow is turned into the mechanical work needed to keep it so. The mysterious hand is equivalent to the spark needed to initially ignite the coal. This energy needed to kick-start a reaction is usually termed the activation energy. But once the coal is burning, ample heat is generated for the process to continue. We don’t observe carbon dioxide being unburned for the same reason that we don’t observe heat flowing spontaneously from the cold to the warm room. Neither process would contravene the first law of thermodynamics—no energy would be destroyed or created—but they would reduce the entropy of the universe, which is forbidden by the second law.

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That raises the question of what created the pattern of morphogen concentrations in the first place. Turing’s theory, by contrast, easily enables the formation of similar but nonidentical patterns across individual members of a species. Fruit fly larvae Remember, as with the formation of sand dunes, that a tiny initial difference is all that’s needed to kick-start pattern formation. This can be caused by the random wobbling of molecules that occurs all the time or indeed by a nonrandom trigger that’s coded in the genes. Turing’s equations predict that although the patterns created in this way will be remarkably similar, they will never be identical. That’s because the tiny “jiggles” that start the process are themselves never identical, and so the pattern they eventually produce is never identical either.

Empire of the Sum: The Rise and Reign of the Pocket Calculator
by Keith Houston
Published 22 Aug 2023

In the West, an art historian might point to the end of the nineteenth century, when artists began to make art and literature inspired by human experience rather than the whims of rich patrons. Modernism was the result.1 For historians, the fall of Constantinople in 1453 is a handy bookmark for the start of what they call the Early Modern Era.2 A scientist could cite the publication in 1543 of Nicolaus Copernicus’s De revolutionibus orbium coelestium as kick-starting the Scientific Revolution.3 For mathematicians, the transition from before to after is not so much a point as an arc, described by a series of innovations in the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries. In Brittany, François Viète pioneered symbolic equations, where one can write, for example, ax2 + bx + c = 0 without having to specify exact values for a, b or c.* Thomas Fincke, a Dane, and others began to explore trigonometric relationships that made it easier to solve geometric problems.4 In Flanders, Simon Stevin promoted decimal fractions—that is, using the same notation after the decimal point as in front of it, rather than the traditional (and perplexing) system of switching to sexagesimal fractions.5 Ludolph van Ceulen, a German emigrant to Holland, started with a regular pentadecagon (a fifteen-sided shape) and laboriously subdivided it thirty-seven times to come up with a thirty-five-digit approximation for π.6 All these and more contributed to a sense that something was afoot in the world of mathematics.

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In accordance with traditional Japanese business etiquette, Sasaki followed the majority view.34 Yet Sasaki could not shake the feeling that Murakami had been right. Why build chips tied forever to their initial circuit designs when one could reprogram and rearrange a collection of general-purpose building blocks into whatever configuration one needed? Accordingly, he says, he “gave” Murakami’s chipset concept to Busicom and Intel to kick-start their new business relationship. Not only that, but he also claimed to have funneled around ¥40 million, or around $111,000, of Sharp’s money to Busicom to fund the development of the new chips.35 Did Tadashi Tanba come up with the idea of a general-purpose chipset? Or Masatoshi Shima? Or the unjustly ignored Ms.

Among the Braves: Hope, Struggle, and Exile in the Battle for Hong Kong and the Future of Global Democracy
by Shibani Mahtani and Timothy McLaughlin
Published 7 Nov 2023

Standing in front of the Hong Kong and Chinese flags, the latter always larger than the former, Xi warned that “any attempt to endanger China’s sovereignty and security, challenge the power of the Central Government” or “use Hong Kong to carry out infiltration and sabotage against the mainland is an act that crosses the red line.”2 China analysts pored over Xi’s thirty-minute speech, attempting to decode not just the contents but everything from his facial expression to how he walked as he descended from the stage. What might happen if China perceived Hong Kong had crossed the “redline” would become clearer over the next years, when the frustrations of a long-suppressed territory at the periphery of this powerful yet insecure authoritarian state collided with the ambitions of its paramount leader. Lam kick-started this unraveling. Since 1997, pundits and journalists had made a parlor game of foretelling the death of Hong Kong, bracing for the definitive moment when the freewheeling territory could no longer claim to be autonomous. Some predicted it would come if China’s rule over Hong Kong materialized as military force, laying waste to the concept of “one country, two systems.”

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At the Atlantic, Timothy’s former editor, Prashant Rao, as well as Yoni Appelbaum and Jeffrey Goldberg, never questioned the importance of the Hong Kong story and Hong Kongers, and gave prominence to deeply reported work. Mark Robinson, formerly of Wired magazine, commissioned and helped shape Timothy’s ambitious pieces for the outlet. Others deserve a special thanks for helping us kick-start our careers and teaching us what it means to be dogged yet empathetic journalists. For Shibani, that was Sandy Padwe at Columbia Journalism School, who, simply put, epitomizes every right value in our profession, and Patrick Barta at the Wall Street Journal, whose humor and fondness for llamas masks a quiet brilliance.

Filterworld: How Algorithms Flattened Culture
by Kyle Chayka
Published 15 Jan 2024

Kardashian-style reality television ushered in a new class of influencer who moved smoothly between the small screen and the even smaller one of phones: You could watch Kim on TV and then follow her on Instagram, where she now has 349 million followers, the population of a dispersed nation of fans. Unlike Janelle’s case, Instagram wasn’t the source of Kardashian fame so much as just another container for it. Preexisting fame is the best way to kick-start algorithmic promotion, which further enhances it. While the early promise of social media was to connect users to their actual friends, over time inauthenticity became something to embrace. In 2016, Trevor McFedries and Sara DeCou, cofounders of a technology company called Brud, created an Instagram account named @lilmiquela (Little Miquela).

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The various other tools and platforms that popped up were quickly crowded out by Facebook and Google. Twitter created the short-form video site Vine in 2013, but mismanagement shut it down in 2017. Google’s own social network Google Plus was incomprehensible from its launch in 2011 until it quietly disappeared in 2019. Crowdfunding services, like Kickstarter and Patreon, offered hope for more niche cultural projects by allowing supporters to pay directly for what they wanted to see, but they didn’t achieve the kind of momentum that Snapchat and TikTok—the only real competitors to Facebook’s social dominance—later did. Soon the next threat to Facebook emerged: instant messaging.

Cuba Travel Guide
by Lonely Planet

Granma Province Granma Province Highlights Bayamo Around Bayamo Gran Parque Nacional Sierra Maestra Manzanillo Niquero Alegria del Pio Parque Nacional Desembarco del Granma Pilón Marea del Portillo Granma Province 23 / pop 836,400 Why Go? Few parts of the world get named after yachts, which helps explain why in Granma (christened for the boat in which Fidel Castro and his bedraggled revolutionaries clambered ashore to kickstart the overthrowing of the Batista regime in earnest in 1956) Cuba’s viva la Revolución spirit burns most fiercely. This land is where José Martí died and where Granma native Carlos Manuel de Céspedes freed his slaves and formally declared Cuban independence for the first time in 1868. The alluringly isolated countryside helped the Revolutionary cause.

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Three days later a third exhausted band of eight soldiers – including Che Guevara and Camilo Cienfuegos – turned up, swelling the rebel army to an abject 15. ‘We can win this war,’ proclaimed an ebullient Fidel to his small band of not-so-merry men. ‘We have just begun the fight.’ Top of Chapter Bayamo pop 166,200 Predating both Havana and Santiago, and cast for time immemorial as the city that kick-started Cuban independence, Bayamo has every right to feel self-important. Yet somehow it doesn’t. The city’s affectionate name-tag, ciudad de los coches ( coches means horsecarts) is a far more telling appraisal of its ambience: an easygoing, slow-paced, trapped-in-time place that is less about industrial drive and more about, well, horses.

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Santiago de Cuba Top Sights 1 Cuartel Moncada D3 2 Museo de la Lucha Clandestina B5 Sights 3 Bacardí Rum Factory B3 4 Casa del Caribe H3 5 Casa Museo de Frank y Josué País C3 6 Clock Tower A4 7Fidel Castro HouseB5 8Fountain of Martí and Abel SantamaríaD3 9Moncada MuseumD3 10 Museo de la Imagen G4 11Museo-Casa Natal de Antonio MaceoB3 12 Padre Pico steps B5 13 Palacio de Justicia D3 14 Palacio de Pioneros G3 15 Parque Alameda A4 16 Parque Histórico Abel Santamaría D3 Activities, Courses Tours 17 Ballet Folklórico Cutumba D5 18 Casa del Caribe H3 Sleeping 19 Caridad Leyna Martínez H4 20 Casa Colonial 'Maruchi' C3 21 Casa Lola B3 22 Casa Marcos E3 23 Hotel las Américas F3 24 Meliá Santiago de Cuba F3 25 Villa Gaviota H3 Eating 26 El Barracón E4 27 Jardín de los Enramadas B4 28 La Arboleda D4 29 La Fortaleza G3 30 Madrileño G4 31 Municipal Market B4 32 Paladar Salón Tropical G5 33 Restaurante España D4 34 Restaurante Zunzún G3 Ristorante Italiano la Fontana (see 24) Drinking Nightlife Barrita de Ron Havana Club (see 3) 35 Club Nautico A4 Entertainment Ballet Folklórico Cutumba (see 17) 36 Casa de las Tradiciones B5 37 Departamento de Focos Culturales de la Dirección Municipal de Cuba C3 38Estadio de Béisbol Guillermón MoncadaF2 39 Foco Cultural el Tivolí B5 40 Foco Cultural Tumba Francesa C3 Santiago Café (see 24) 41 Teatro José María Heredia E1 42 Teatro Martí C3 43 Wamby Bolera F4 Shopping 44Centro de Negocios AlamedaA4 45 La Maison G4 Sights 1 Casco Histórico Parque Céspedes PARK OFFLINE MAP GOOGLE MAP If there’s an archetype for romantic Cuban street life, Parque Céspedes is it. A throbbing kaleidoscope of walking, talking, hustling, flirting, guitar-strumming humanity, this most ebullient of city squares, with the bronze bust of Carlos Manuel de Céspedes , the man who kick-started Cuban independence in 1868, at its heart, is a sight to behold any time of day or night. Old ladies gossip on shady park benches, a guy in a panama hat drags his dilapidated double bass over toward the Casa de la Trova, and sultry señoritas in skin-tight lycra flutter their eyelashes at the male tourists on the terrace of the Hotel Casa Granda.

Kill All Normies: Online Culture Wars From 4Chan and Tumblr to Trump and the Alt-Right
by Angela Nagle
Published 6 Jun 2017

Pornographic images of her being raped by video game characters were created and one offended male gamer even created a video game in which players could punch Anita’s face until it was bloodied and bruised, and her eyes blackened and swollen. If you look up Anita today on YouTube you’ll find countless videos devoted to hating her and obsessively trying to destroy her reputation and career. This was largely based on the fact that she ran a Kickstarter campaign that made more money than initially planned precisely because of the harassment. All of this was done, remember, to prove that sexism was definitely not, as she had so outrageously claimed, an issue in the ‘gaming community’. Tactics such as DDoS and doxxing (exposing the person’s personal details to enable their mass harassment) used by 4chan and originating in Usenet culture became central to attacks by the anti-feminist gamers.

The Serious Guide to Joke Writing: How to Say Something Funny About Anything
by Sally Holloway
Published 2 Nov 2010

Andrea Samuelson for endless support and ‘power chats’. Sue Middleton for being so supportive always. Dan Evans, whose comments on my manuscript were so insightful that this book is better for him having read it. Joe Gregory for redrawing my cartoons so wonderfully. Steve Amos and SATC for kick-starting my comedy courses in Hastings. Finally, I am very grateful to Tim Vine, Jason John Whitehead and Tiernan Dooyab for letting me use their beautifully crafted jokes as examples in this book. Introduction The Difference Between Being Funny With Your Mates And Writing Jokes For A Living ‘Who here is funny with their mates?’

The Curse of Bigness: Antitrust in the New Gilded Age
by Tim Wu
Published 14 Jun 2018

It has become clear that the IBM case decisively influenced the computing industry that is now a centerpiece of the American and world economy. First and most importantly, IBM dropped its practice of bundling (or tying) its software with hardware. That is broadly understood, even by IBM’s own people, to have kickstarted the birth of an independent software industry. Second, the IBM litigation also affected the development of the personal computer industry in the late 1970s and early 1980s. The IBM PC, developed while the lawsuit was still pending, was antitrust proof: IBM went with an extremely open design and declined to buy or exert excessive control over the firms who made the components, including Intel, Seagate, and Microsoft, among others.

San Francisco Like a Local
by DK Eyewitness
Published 4 Oct 2021

Here, warehouses once busy with shipbuilding and repairs are now jammed with galleries and design collectives. This afternoon amble takes you through the best of Dogpatch’s arts scene within just a few short blocks. Route map n Double-tap image to read the labels 1. Begin at MINNESOTA STREET PROJECT 1275 Minnesota Street, Dogpatch; www.minnesotastreetproject.com ///mostly.drank.motor Kick-start your afternoon by spending a couple of hours browsing the 13 indie galleries inside this warehouse complex. 2. Chow down at JUST FOR YOU 732 22nd Street, Dogpatch; www.justforyoucafe.com ///caller.cover.vast Refuel with a fresh-squeezed lemonade and sandwich, made from homebaked bread, at this local favorite, which is lined with vintage travel and theater posters. 3.

Dublin Like a Local
by Dk Eyewitness

A fierce feeling of loyalty and pride, as well as a wicked sense of humour. This is a place where everyone you meet wants to stop and chat, whether you’re popping to the shop or nipping out for a coffee. It’s also a place that’s had more than its fair share of hard times, but new ideas abound when times are tough – after all, the 2008 recession kick-started some of the most innovative cafés and bars that still thrive to this day. If ever there were a city that could charm your socks off, it’s Dublin. There’s a palpable sense of charisma to the place that ensnares anyone who visits – a cheeky sense of “divilment” that makes you feel like an adventure is always just around the corner.

The End of Power: From Boardrooms to Battlefields and Churches to States, Why Being in Charge Isn’t What It Used to Be
by Moises Naim
Published 5 Mar 2013

Still, the model allows anyone with an Internet connection and a few spare dollars to support, say, the conversion of taxis in Bolivia to natural gas, student loans in Paraguay, or a garment business in Cambodia (to cite some recent examples from Kiva). Short-route philanthropy has yet to reach the volumes of money that large foundations or, for that matter, government agencies churn out, but it has become a new paradigm for giving. Individual fundraising for projects of all sorts is possible through services like Kickstarter, which enables would-be recipients to promote their project for a period and receive funds only if they raise the target amount of commitments during that time. A measure of the appeal of this approach is its adoption—and use as a marketing tool—by corporate philanthropy, as firms like American Express, Target, JPMorgan Chase, and Pepsico hold contests where Internet voters decide which among competing projects the company will support.

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See also Jihadi movement; Muslims Israel, 89, 93–94, 107, 121, 199 Israeli-Palestinian issues, 51, 150 Israel Democracy Institute, 93 Italy, 22, 50, 63, 79, 95, 96, 144, 201, 215, 240 Mani Pulite in, 98–99 Northern League in, 89 James, William, 39 Japan, 7, 22, 37, 45, 63, 86, 145, 164, 165 Chongryon in, 153–154 Ministry of Industry in, 36 Jarvis, Michael, 209 Jean, Wyclef, 210 Jihadi movement, 127–128 Jharkand, 97 John Paul II (Pope), 84 Johnson, David E., 124 Johnson, Simon, 49 Joint IED Defeat Organization, 120 Jolie, Angelina, 8 Jordan, 147 JPMorgan Chase, 161–162, 191, 209, 219 Judaism, 199 Judiciaries, 77, 98, 99–100, 244 K Pop, 149 Kagan, Robert, 140 Kahn, Jeremy, 161 Kane, Paul, 95 Kaplan, Robert, 121, 122 Kaplan, Steven, 6 Karlsson, Per-Ola, 164 Karman, Tawakkol, 80 Kay, John, 166 Kaza, Greg 33 Kazakhstan, 131 Kenig, Ofer, 93 Kennedy, Joe, 154 Kennedy, John F., 45 Kennedy, Paul, 139 Kenny, Charles, 54–55 Kenya, 9, 100, 195 Kharas, Homi, 56, 210, 211 Kickstarter, 209 Kidnappings, 126 Kim Jong-Un, 154 Kim, Rose, 166 Kindleberger, Charles, 136 Kinsley, Michael, 214 Kiva, 209, 210 Kleenex, 169 Klein, Naomi, 49 Knee, Jonathan A. 213 Knights of Labor 201 Koch, David and Charles, 92 Kodak, 159, 162, 165, 169 Kohlberg Kravis Roberts, 189 Kony 2012 video, 134 Korbel, Joseph, 153 Kosovo, 189 Kraus, Clifford, 187 Kroc, Joan, 210 Krupp, 37 Kuala Lumpur, 12 Kupchan, Charles, 235 Kurlantzick, Joshua, 148 Kuwait, 65 Kwak, James, 49 Kyoto Protocol, 156 Labor, 9, 39, 47, 59, 60, 193, 194, 200–205.

The Art of Monitoring
by James Turnbull
Published 1 Dec 2014

He began in Linux systems administration in 1999, while earning a Bachelors in Computer Science, so knows just enough theory of computation to be dangerous in his field. He contributed a chapter on monitoring to the Google SRE Book. He lives with his family in Sydney, Australia. Editor Sid Orlando is a writer and editor (among other things), currently word-nerding out as Managing Editor at Kickstarter. Since starting work on more tech-focused projects, she may or may not be having recurring dreams about organizing her closet with dreamscape Docker containers. Author James is an author and open-source geek. His most recent books were The Docker Book about the open-source container virtualization technology and The LogStash Book about the popular open-source logging tool.

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His most recent books were The Docker Book about the open-source container virtualization technology and The LogStash Book about the popular open-source logging tool. James also authored two books about Puppet (Pro Puppet and the earlier book about Puppet). He is the author of three other books, including Pro Linux System Administration, Pro Nagios 2.0, and Hardening Linux. For a real job, James is CTO at Kickstarter. He was formerly at Docker as VP of Services and Support, Venmo as VP of Engineering, and Puppet as VP of Technical Operations. He likes food, wine, books, photography, and cats. He is not overly keen on long walks on the beach or holding hands. Conventions in the book This is an inline code statement.

The Diet Myth: The Real Science Behind What We Eat
by Tim Spector
Published 13 May 2015

High-sugar-content drinks like Lucozade were heavily promoted (despite there being no proof) as aiding recovery from illness (and more recently from sports injuries), each bottle containing over 12 spoonfuls of therapeutic sugar. Breakfast cereals consisting nearly entirely of sugar (more sugar than puff, in fact) were also promoted as a great way for kids to kick-start the day. Apart from the minor irritation of causing tooth decay, it looked like cheap sugar was a great source of natural energy with no real downsides, if you were healthy, that is. So my new ‘healthy’ breakfast got me off to a flying start with 10 to 15 spoonfuls of totally fat-free sugar, equivalent to two cans of Coke or Pepsi.

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The bad news was, after nearly a whole year my weight hadn’t shifted dramatically – although the good news was my guts for the first time in fifteen years seemed normal. I went to the loo only once a day, not ten times, which was fantastic.’ Although feeling healthier, Karen repeated her varied prebiotic twenty-item diet, but this time after a kick-start by clearing out her colon with laxatives. She lost another five kilograms, and I then suggested longer-term intermittent fasting as a way of changing her microbes and losing weight. After three months, she lost a further five kilos, so she is now ten kilos lighter and, more importantly, she feels a lot better.

Remix
by John Courtenay Grimwood
Published 15 Nov 2001

Chapter Twenty-Three Heart of Glass What saved Fixx was a bio-augmentation he didn’t even remember having fitted. But had he ever bothered to read the subframes of his now long-cancelled contract he’d have realized the bioAug was standard. A fingernail-sized generator stapled to his left collarbone kick-started his heart. It did so by firing a single electric shock along a thin wire that led from the defibrillator down a vein and into the chambers of his heart. When the sensor buried in the heart muscle failed to detect sufficient movement from the first shock, the tiny generator fired up again and then shut down as the heart resumed its beat.

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She was being murdered and there was nothing she could do to stop it happening. Nothing conscious. Nothing human. “He means it.” LizAlec never knew exactly what woke her, but whatever it was she jerked awake to gulp down a breath that sank like melt water into her burning lungs. She could feel her heart kick-start into a steady reassuring beat as its right ventricle pumped sluggish blood to her lungs, where the blood took up oxygen and returned heartwards, haemoglobin-red, to be pumped through her arteries, releasing the gathered oxygen. It was a beautiful, simple, inherently efficient system — and she was impressed.

Rummage: A History of the Things We Have Reused, Recycled and Refused To Let Go
by Emily Cockayne
Published 15 Aug 2020

Two auctions, each of 80 tons of paper, ‘Writing, Brown, Strawboard, Surface Colour, Enamelled, Embossed, Tissue, Nonpareil, Morocco, Flints and other Paper’, some of which was ‘but slightly damaged’, must surely have been too irresistible for him to ignore.95 This was the perfect material with which to kick-start another business cheaply. For six years from 1880 Viëtor was included in trade directories under many headings: papermaker, pianoforte marker and ‘Pianoforte Small Work Manufacturer’, paper merchant and also ‘Manufacturer of pianos and Bois Durci ornaments’.96 It was while in these premises that Viëtor made the samples that impressed W.

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Sir Thomas Chaloner, whose father had purchased Gisborough Priory in north Yorkshire after the Dissolution, rather conveniently believed that shale found locally was especially suited to making alum. In 1607 he obtained a monopoly for thirty-one years, arguing that the business would create jobs, not only in manufacture but also in shipping coals, urine and alum. Continental manufacturers were brought over to kick-start the business and train employees.71 Chaloner himself was eased out of control in 1609, when James I proclaimed alum a royal monopoly. Tons of barrelled urine were delivered to the works to be fermented to make lant (aged urine), to be used in industrial processes. Some urine came from the countryside, some from London.

Men Who Hate Women: From Incels to Pickup Artists, the Truth About Extreme Misogyny and How It Affects Us All
by Laura Bates
Published 2 Sep 2020

The author later suggests that there are ‘perhaps some similarities between MRAs and feminists’, and the article uncritically cites Jaye’s quote that ‘there are a lot of mirror opposites going on with these movements’. It ends with a plug for the documentary.23 But what the article completely fails to mention is that Jaye’s film was almost entirely funded by MRAs, after her Kickstarter campaign attracted massive support from Elam, AVFM and alt-right, anti-feminist provocateur Milo Yiannopoulos, who boasted in the alt-right, anti-feminist media outlet Breitbart that thousands of MRAs had backed the film in a matter of hours, after its report about Jaye’s funding struggles was shared ‘thousands of times on social media’.24 Spoiler alert: Jaye takes the red pill, sees the light and denounces her wicked feminist ways.

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Kposowa, ‘Divorce and suicide risk’, Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health, Volume 57, Issue 12 (2003) 21 Skepchick (21 February 2019), op. cit. 22 ‘Male Supremacy’, Southern Poverty Law Center 23 ‘How this feminist found herself sympathising with the men’s rights movement’, BBC, 8 March 2017 24 ‘Dear Cassie Jaye, Sorry For Manspreading Your “Red Pill” Kickstarter’, Breitbart, 29 October 2015 25 ‘An Anti-Feminist Party Is Standing In The General Election’, BuzzFeed, 14 January 2015 26 ‘ “There’s going to be civil war”: Inside men’s rights meeting’, news.com.au, 31 August 2018 27 ‘Jordan Peterson: It’s ideology vs. science in psychology’s war on boys and men’, National Post, 1 February 2019 5.

Chokepoint Capitalism
by Rebecca Giblin and Cory Doctorow
Published 26 Sep 2022

Social media gave artists the ability to reach their fans directly for the first time, opening up any number of new ways to generate revenue, like direct sales of albums, tickets, and merch. It also opened up access to capital, enabling artists to finance ambitious albums and videos outside the label system. Fans have now contributed more than a quarter billion dollars toward music projects on Kickstarter alone. The major labels still controlled radio airplay and physical distribution into stores, but that didn’t matter nearly so much once artists could break through without either. Once artists had genuine alternatives to the major label system, the chokepoint began to balloon out. Today’s labels are no longer the boogeymen of decades past—not because they saw the error of their ways, but because the shift in power dynamics brought about by the open internet forced them to change.

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Despite paying higher rates, because Resonate’s costs are lower, and because listeners consume music more mindfully, the overall cost to listeners ends up being similar to a traditional monthly subscription.24 Resonate has found a successful niche, but there are plenty left for others to fill. Even with first listens priced at under a penny, some music listeners will find the “mental transaction costs” too much to bear and eschew new artists. Just as Kickstarter spawned a group of crowdfunding competitors with slightly different models suited to different causes, someone might come along and offer a Resonate competitor that gives listeners their first listen for free. Or even their first three listens. There’s no single right way to distribute and pay for music, or for musicians and audiences to find one another.

Spineless: The Science of Jellyfish and the Art of Growing a Backbone
by Juli Berwald
Published 14 May 2017

Sure enough, when I opened my front door, I found a small cardboard box holding a container with nine pounds of water and a few grams of gelatinous pets. After my trip to San Francisco, when I met Alex Andon of Jellyfish Art, I had ordered my own jellyfish tank from the company’s hugely successful Kickstarter campaign. I was one of the supporters who helped raise almost $600,000 from preorders. It had taken more than a year, but I’d finally received my elegant Danish-style acrylic tank. I had added seawater and gravel, as instructed, and turned on the circulating motor. The white sound of water bubbling harmonized with the hums of the refrigerator in the kitchen and the whoosh of the air-conditioning in the dining room.

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What made the jellyfish contract at all? How was it moving? Back in 1874, a young English biologist by the name of George John Romanes had been spending a lot of time watching the contractions of damaged jellyfish bells himself. However, he didn’t come to them through the purchase of a few moon jellies and a Kickstarter aquarium. When he was just two years old, George’s family inherited a large sum of money, propelling them from a modest Canadian lifestyle into one more similar to that of the Crawleys of Downton Abbey. His parents only sporadically sent George and his siblings to school, instead letting them discover what interested them in the museums, beaches, and fields of England and Europe.

Practical Ext JS Projects With Gears
by Frank Zammetti
Published 7 Jul 2009

The Markup The index.htm file is the customary place to kick off the application, and as in past projects there’s not a whole lot in it, as you can see for yourself: <html> <head> <title>Local Business Search</title> <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="ext/resources/css/ext-all.css"> <script type="text/javascript" src="ext/adapter/ext/ext-base.js"></script> <script type="text/javascript" src="ext/ext-all.js"></script> <script src="js/gears_init.js"></script> <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="css/styles.css"> <script type="text/javascript" src="js/LocalBusinessSearch.js"></script> <script type="text/javascript" src="js/StoresAndRecords.js"></script> <script type="text/javascript" src="js/DAO.js"></script> <script type="text/javascript" src="js/Viewport.js"></script> <script type="text/javascript" src="js/Search.js"></script> <script type="text/javascript" src="js/Favorites.js"></script> <script type="text/javascript" src="js/Details.js"></script> <script type="text/javascript" src="js/Header.js"></script> <script>Ext.onReady(LocalBusinessSearch.init);</script> </head> 323 324 Ch apt er 6 ■ W heN the YeL L OW p a G eS J U S t I S N ’ t C O O L e N O U G h : LO C a L B U S I N e S S S e a r C h <body> <div id="divSource" class="cssSource"></div> <div id="dialogPrint" class="x-hidden"> <div class="x-window-header">Local Business Search Ext</div> <div class="x-window-body" style="background-color:#ffffff;padding:10px;"> <br> Title:&nbsp;<span id="print_title"></span> <br><br> <img id="print_map"> <br><br> Longitude:&nbsp;<span id="print_longitude"></span><br> Latitude:&nbsp;<span id="print_latitude"></span><br> Distance:&nbsp;<span id="print_distance"></span><br> Phone:&nbsp;<span id="print_phone"></span><br> Rating:&nbsp;<span id="print_rating"></span><br> Address:&nbsp;<span id="print_address"></span><br> City:&nbsp;<span id="print_city"></span><br> State:&nbsp;<span id="print_state"></span><br> Business Web Site:&nbsp;<span id="print_businessurl"></span><br> </div> </div> </body> </html> We have the usual Ext JS imports, plus the Gears initialization JavaScript file. Following that is the import of the application style sheet and all the JavaScript files that make up the application itself. We again see Ext.onReady() being used to call the init() method of the LocalBusinessSearch object to kick-start the application. The actual markup begins with the <div> that we’ve by now become used to, the source of our Window animations. Following that is some plain-old HTML that, based on the style classes that are applied, we can surmise is used to form a Window at some point. As it happens, this is the only Window in the application, and it is the one you see when you want to print a business, both its details and the currently showing map.

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Next up are the imports of the resources specific to this application: <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="css/styles.css"> <script type="text/javascript" src="js/SQLWorkbench.js"></script> <script type="text/javascript" src="js/StoresAndRecords.js"></script> <script type="text/javascript" src="js/CreateTableWindow.js"></script> <script type="text/javascript" src="js/DatabasesWindow.js"></script> <script type="text/javascript" src="js/TableDetailsWindow.js"></script> <script type="text/javascript" src="js/TablesWindow.js"></script> <script type="text/javascript" src="js/QueryToolWindow.js"></script> <script type="text/javascript" src="js/Help.js"></script> <script>Ext.onReady(SQLWorkbench.init);</script> </head> C ha p ter 7 ■ YOU r Da D h a D a W O r K B e N C h , N O W S O D O Y O U : S Q L W O r K B e N C h No surprises there either! Ext.onReady() kick-starts the application by calling the init() method of the SQLWorkbench class—we’ll get to that soon. ■Note In fact, SQLWorkbench is a namespace created on our behalf by a call to Ext.namespace(), as we’ve already seen. Since a namespace is nothing but a JavaScript function, which is how namespacing of code is generally achieved in JavaScript, it’s quite natural to refer to a namespace as a class or even an object.

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We then call the handlePlayerDrop() method, passing it the index of the action card that was dropped on, which is a number from 0 to 5. We’ll look at this method later, but in short, it will determine if the drop was valid and do all the work necessary in that situation (or if it wasn’t a valid drop). The last two lines of the init() method initialize the computer opponent and then kickstart the title sequence, both of which are coming soon! preloading Images As I previously mentioned, preloading images is something you have to do when writing a web-based game. Preloading is an old web development optimization in general as people tend to be more forgiving of startup delays than they are of constant little delays while using an application.

New Localism and Regeneration Management
by Jon Coaffee
Published 1 Mar 2005

Too often those local officers who are innovative have had to choose between their loyalties to communities and to their employer authority. The National Audit Office[3] reported that nearly 50 per cent of all public bodies demonstrated cultures where managers and staff were risk-averse. Even programmes such as the health action zones given the task of driving mainstream change in health failed to really kick-start a serious change process inside the health service or in local government. The fact remains that there are confidence, prejudice and motivation problems in the public sector. And a lack of “know how” among manager about how to motivate staff to work with communities in order to find solutions instead of perpetuating the myth that disadvantaged communities create problems.

The Icon Handbook
by Jon Hicks
Published 23 Jun 2011

For similar localisation problems, it’s worth avoiding depictions of body parts. Thumbs up may generally be a positive sign, but in Iran it’s considered an obscene gesture! Again, it depends on the context. It’s better to consider more universally understandable options first, and I find the best way to kickstart the thinking process for a new icon metaphor is drawing a mind map. There’s often more than one way of representing something, and a mind map is a way of exploring that. Starting with the icon name in the centre, write down anything that comes to mind, no matter how abstract or seemingly worthless at the time.

You're a Horrible Person, but I Like You: The Believer Book of Advice
by The Believer
Published 15 Mar 2010

Zach … Dear Zach: I have a job that leaves me passionless and empty. It stimulates neither mind nor soul. How can I successfully draw on my creative juices to do something meaningful? Best, Charles Address withheld Dear Charles: Are you an accountant at a cardboard box factory? Boredom is a killer. There are so many things you can do to kick-start a satisfying life. I will give you a few suggestions to get the juices flowing: 1) Start reading Teen People. 2) Rent a stretch Hummer to go see Noam Chomsky speak. 3) Model your life after the movie Sideways, but instead of wine make your passion Mountain Dew. 4) Ask a state trooper where the closest gay bar is. 5) Have a Super Bowl party with no television.

Insight Guides Pocket Turkey (Travel Guide eBook)
by Insight Guides
Published 31 Jul 2019

They are equipped with kitchens, tastefully furnished and set in beautiful gardens; a gardener tends to your private patch of greenery and the management stocks your fridge before you arrive. Ürgüp Esbelli Evi $$$ Dolay Sok. 8, 50400 Ürgüp, tel: 0384-341 3395, www.esbelli.com.tr. The cave-hotel that kick-started the restoration and conversion movement in Cappadocia is still among the very best, with ten enormous suites, a vaulted, Ottoman-style lounge perfect for having a drink with new friends, and an array of pretty gardens or courtyards. Owner Suha Ersoz prides himself on offering a home-from-home service to guests.

Lonely Planet France
by Lonely Planet Publications
Published 31 Mar 2013

Basques love cakes, especially gâteau basque (layer cake filled with cream or cherry jam). Then there’s Bayonne chocolate… HOW TO EAT & DRINK LIKE A LOCAL It pays to know what and how much to eat, and when – adopting the local culinary pace is key to savouring every last exquisite moment of the French day. When to Eat » Petit déjeuner (breakfast) The French kick-start the day with a tartine (slice of baguette smeared with unsalted butter and jam) and un café (espresso), long milky café au lait or – especially kids – hot chocolate. In hotels you get a real cup but in French homes, coffee and hot chocolate are drunk from a cereal bowl – perfect bread-dunking terrain.

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Louis XIV, also known as the Sun King, ascended the throne in 1643 at the age of five and ruled until 1715, virtually emptying the national coffers with his ambitious building and battling. His greatest legacy is the palace at Versailles. The excesses of Louis XVI and his queen, Marie Antoinette, in part led to an uprising of Parisians on 14 July 1789 and the storming of the Bastille prison – kick-starting the French Revolution. Emperor Napoleon III ‘modernised’ Paris, installing wide boulevards, sculpted parks and a modern sewer system, but he also became involved in a costly and unsuccessful war with Prussia in 1870. When Parisians heard of their emperor’s capture, they demanded a republic. Despite its bloody beginnings, the Third Republic ushered in the glittering, highly creative belle époque (beautiful age), celebrated for its graceful art nouveau architecture and advances in the arts and sciences.

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The Alsatians dine with French finesse and drink with German gusto, and every corner leads to mouth-watering surprises: shops doing a brisk trade in homemade foie gras, gingerbread and macarons; entire regions dedicated to cheese; mile upon glorious mile of country lanes given over to the life-sweetening pleasures of wine and chocolate. So take the lead of locals: go forth and indulge! Kick-start your gourmet adventure by visiting www.tourisme-alsace.com and www.gastronomie.vins.tourisme-alsace.com. Local tourist boards can help you fine-tune your visit, be it a stay on a working dairy farm, a chocolate-tasting road trip or a dégustation (tasting) of grand cru (the official designation for superior or highest grade French wines) wines.

Galactic North
by Alastair Reynolds
Published 14 Feb 2006

Clavain had traveled with the corpse, marveling at the idea that this solid chunk of man-shaped ice -- tainted, admittedly, with a few vital impurities -- would soon be a breathing, thinking, human being with memories and feelings. To him it seemed astonishing that this was possible; that so much latent structure had been preserved across the decades. Even more astonishing was that the infusions of tiny machines that the Conjoiners were brewing would be able to stitch together damaged cells and kick-start them back to life. And out of that inert loom of frozen brain structure - - a thing that was at this moment nothing more than a fixed geometric entity, like a finely eroded piece of rock -- something as malleable as consciousness would emerge. But the Conjoiners were blase at the prospect, viewing Iverson the way expert picture-restorers might view a damaged old master.

…

Iverson lifted a hand from beneath the bedsheets, examining his palm and the pattern of veins and tendons on the rear. “This is the same body I went under with? You haven't stuck me in a robot or cloned me or hooked up my disembodied brain to a virtual-reality generator?” “None of those things, no. Just mopped up some cell damage, fixed a few things here and there and -- um -- kick-started you back to the land of the living.” Iverson nodded, but Clavain could tell he was far from convinced. Which was unsurprising: Clavain, after all, had already told a small lie. “So how long was I under?” “About a century, Andrew. We're an expedition from back home. We came by starship.” Iverson nodded again, as if this were mere, incidental detail.

The Gang That Wouldn't Write Straight: Wolfe, Thompson, Didion, Capote, and the New Journalism Revolution
by Marc Weingarten
Published 12 Dec 2006

He used part of that money to rent an office on 625 Third Street in the warehouse district. He called the magazine Rolling Stone, which had a triple echo effect—it was the name of one of blues musician Muddy Waters’s greatest songs, a name that had been appropriated by Wenner’s favorite British band. His hero Bob Dylan had also kick-started his electric phase with a song called “Like a Rolling Stone.” Like Harold Hayes at Esquire and Clay Felker at New York, Wenner valued great writing more than political dogma; Rolling Stone was unapologetic about presenting itself as a “rock and roll newspaper” that framed its music coverage within the proper cultural context.

…

Gonzo posesses had parallels to my dad,” said Marco Acosta. “He wasn’t Samoan, of course, but in the Samoan culture, the men tend to be large, and Hunter was trying to invoke my dad’s dominant physical presence. There are many aspects of him that you don’t see, but Hunter’s goal was to be funny first and foremost.” Thompson wasted little time kick-starting his story into motion. From Fear and Loathing’s very first line, Thompson and Acosta are on the move, in search of … well, who knows what. We were somewhere around Barstow on the edge of the desert when the drugs began to take hold. I remember saying something like “I feel a bit lightheaded, maybe you should drive….”

Dawn of the New Everything: Encounters With Reality and Virtual Reality
by Jaron Lanier
Published 21 Nov 2017

Margaret Minsky (Marvin’s daughter) worked at VPL in the mid-1980s for a while on a project we cooked up for erotic wearables. Very Pleasurable Lingerie, it was called. The idea was that the lingerie would emit musical chords when touched, and chord progressions when stroked. The chord progressions would resolve to the tonic only in, um, certain places. I believe I saw this idea rediscovered on Kickstarter or similar recently. Hope whoever is doing it now completes the project. Very worth it. There was also a vibrator terminating with a MIDI connection (the type of cable used to control music synthesizers) lying on a table in the reception room, apparently to perturb visitors. I’m not sure if it did anything, or who put it together.

…

VR and avatar and robots doing work of as source of value specialness of working with real Human Use of Human Beings, The (Wiener) Huxley, Aldous Hyneman, Jamie hypercubes hypertext hypnosis IBM Iconic Mathematics (Bricken) icons icosahedrons idealism II Cybernetic Frontiers (Brand) illusions improvisation Inception (film) India industrial applications infinity, perception of information biasing of “free” vs. traceable to origin Information Age inner life input Inside Out (film) interactive screen technology interactivity Internet Gore and extremism on flaws in design of interpreters inversion inversion of human body investigative journalists invisible hand iPhone Ito, Teiji Izadi, Shahram Jackson, Michael Jacobson, Linda Japan Jaws (film) jazz Jeopardy (TV show) jobs Jobs, Steve Johnson, Lyndon B. Joy, Bill juggling Kalman filter Kapor, Mitch karate Kay, Alan Kelly, Kevin Kemp, Jack Khan, Ali Akbar Kickstarter Kim, David Kim, Scott Kinect Kinect Hacks King, Stephen kitchen design Klein Bottle Knitting Factory Knuth, Don Kollin, Joel Kotik, Gordy Krueger, Myron Kuiper Belt Kurzweil, Ray Kyoto Prize LaBerge, Stephen Langer, Susanne language translation Lanier, Ellery (father) death of death of Lilly and dome and mysticism and PhD studies and science writing and teaching career and Lanier, first wife divorce from Lanier, Lena Lanier, Lilibell (daughter,) Lanier, Lilly (mother) death of laser procedure on retina lasers Lasko, Ann latency Lawnmower Man, The (film) Learning Company Leary, Timothy Lectiones Mathematicae LEEP Lennon, John Lennon, Sean Leonard, Brett Levitt, David Levy, Steven libertarians licensing light pen lightweight optics limerence links, one- vs. two-way Linn, Roger LISP Lissajous patterns “Little Albert” experiment lobster avatar Los Alamos Los Angeles LSD Lucas, George lucid dreaming Lumière brothers Macedonians machine learning “Machine Stops, The” (Forster) machine vision Macintosh computers operating system MacIntyre, Blair Macromedia Macromind magazine stands magic magical thinking magicians magic window magnetic fields malware Manchurian Candidate, The (film) Mandala mapping marijuana markets Mars Marxism mass media Mateevitsi, Victor mathematics video games and Mathews, Max Matrix films Matsushita Mattel MAX design tool MAX visual programming tool McDowall, Ian McFerrin, Bobby McGreevy, Mike McGrew, Dale McLuhan, Marshall McLuhan ramp McMillen, Keith MDMA (Ecstasy) measurement medicine.

Disaster Capitalism: Making a Killing Out of Catastrophe
by Antony Loewenstein
Published 1 Sep 2015

For example, it ran a Welfare to Work program on behalf of the Department for Work and Pensions. On its website it claimed to represent “a unique opportunity to transform lives and communities across the UK; an opportunity not only to support people into secure and lasting employment, but to make enormous inroads into eradicating child poverty and kick-starting social mobility.” That was the spin, but the reality had more to do with punishment and coercion. The Conservative government established this G4S plan to assist the long-term unemployed, but activists in Sheffield explained to me how it had exacerbated poverty and disillusionment. Numbers of food banks and welfare recipients were soaring.

…

World Bank figures estimate that 97 percent of Afghanistan’s $15.7 billion GDP comes from foreign sources. 62The Afghan ambassador to Australia told the ABC in 2011 that his country had no choice but to exploit its mineral wealth, and that it wanted to approach Australian firms such as BHP and Rio Tinto to invest. Stan Correy, “Afghanistan Wants Help to Kick-Start Mining Boom,” ABC’s Background Briefing, December 19, 2011. 63“Afghanistan’s Mineral Deposits,” Money Morning, June 15, 2012. 64Maria Abi-Habib, “Iranians Build Up Afghan Clout,” Wall Street Journal, October 25, 2012. 65“Afghanistan Aid Boost Welcome, Checks Needed on Support for Mining Industry,” Greens Senator Lee Rhiannon, press release, July 9, 2012.

The Rough Guide to Toronto
by Helen Lovekin and Phil Lee
Published 29 Apr 2006

Surprising as it seems today, when such architectural designs DOWNTOWN TORON TO | The Eaton Centre are fairly commonplace, Revell won all sorts of awards for this project, which was considered the last word in 1960s dynamism – though its weather-stained blocks now look rather dejected. In its creation, however, the square became a catalyst for change. Named after its sponsor, Nathan Phillips, Toronto’s first Jewish mayor, the space suddenly provided the kind of public gathering place the city so sorely lacked, kick-starting the process by which the private Toronto of the 1950s became the extrovert metropolis of today. Standing in the southwest corner of Nathan Phillips Square, a statue of Winston Churchill (1874–1965) recalls Toronto’s British connection. Inscribed upon the statue are five famous quotations, one of which is drawn from the speech Churchill delivered to the Canadian House of Commons on December 30, 1941 in the dark days of World War II: “[The losing French] generals advised France’s divided cabinet ‘In three weeks, the English will have their necks wrung like a chicken’.

…

Today, the Elgin specializes in dramatic and musical productions, as well as Gala screenings of the Toronto International Film Festival; the Winter Garden uses its more intimate setting to host special events. Harbourfront Theatre Centre 231 Queens Quay West T416/973-4000. LRT: Queens Quay. Hosts a wonderful variety of international dancers, musicians and theatrical productions. Hummingbird Centre 1 Front St E, at Yonge St T416/872-2262. Subway: Union Station. The Hummingbird kick-started the thenmoribund Toronto theatre scene when it opened its neo-Expressionist doors in 1960. At 3200 seats, it’s too large for intimate drama, so instead it’s the Downtown venue of choice for family-oriented productions. For the past four decades, it has also been home to the Canadian Opera Company and the National Ballet, though both tenants are moving in summer 2006 to the newly built Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts.

Bank 3.0: Why Banking Is No Longer Somewhere You Go but Something You Do
by Brett King
Published 26 Dec 2012

So banks started to freeze loan books, aggressively pursue those accounts that were having problems meeting their repayment schedules, and basically stopped all lending to those that needed it—small businesses and individuals. Small business activity and retail consumption are two critical levers in kick-starting an economy after a recession, thus bank policy on credit adversely affected the recovery cycle. In the meantime, as regulators got tougher on banks and investment firms, institutions sought to maximise fee and margin on lending products out of fear that regulation would restrict future options in this regard.

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. $50,000 pre-approved Add Pre-approved Credit Options to left-hand navigation ATM Rich-media ad playing during idle time “You have been pre-approved” message for existing customers on close of transaction—call-back request option Promotion on coupon for selected segments: “It takes less time to get a loan approved than it took to get your cash . . .” SMS/MMS Personalised message or notification with web/app link; “Mr King, HSBC has pre-approved you for a personal loan—interested?” Social Media Facebook integration of a student loan application that uses Facebook profile data to kick-start KYC Advertising travel loans or travel insurance on Pinterest, Instagram or Facebook when an individual posts something about a travel destination they’d like to visit Mobile App New button/in-app banner—“Pre-approved Credit Line” For existing customers, just two fields—term, amount (preset drop-down list for options) Call back with approval and compliance procedure notice Branch Banner stands as per themes, TV and poster board promos?

Wilding: The Return of Nature to a British Farm
by Isabella Tree
Published 2 May 2018

Some of these bees, now rare in the UK, need large patches of open ground in which to burrow and, in the absence of wild-boar disturbance, resort to farm gateways where heavy traffic and bottlenecks of livestock have the same earth-churning effect. In winter, wrens, dunnocks and robins trailed in the wake of the pigs, picking for insects in the furrows. Ants began to use the clods of earth turned over by the pigs to kick-start anthills that have grown, in some places, over a foot in eight years – their colonies thriving in micro-climates of sun-warmed, aerated soil. The anthills, in turn, attract mistle thrushes and wheatears, and especially green woodpeckers, whose diet, particularly in winter, can consist of as much as 80 per cent grassland ants.

…

It is wonderful to imagine, in the great landscapes of the distant past, herds of aurochs and bison trailing in the wake of herds of tarpan. The effect of this European version of rewilding is clear: the right number of the right species of grazing animals introduced into even a relatively small, isolated area can have an exponential impact on biodiversity. They can provide that initial impetus to kick-start natural processes, like a plane pulling a glider into the air. Bison are, unfortunately, out of the running for Knepp – another of our original aspirations we have been forced to shelve for the time being. As ever, the concern is dog-walkers. Kraansvlak, with its simple, three-strand electric cattle fence, demonstrates how safe these animals are.

Entangled Life: How Fungi Make Our Worlds, Change Our Minds & Shape Our Futures
by Merlin Sheldrake
Published 11 May 2020

The McKennas were not the first to cultivate psilocybin mushrooms, but they were the first to publish a reliable method for growing large quantities of mushrooms without specialist laboratory equipment. The Grower’s Guide was a runaway success and went on to sell more than a hundred thousand copies in the five years following its release. It kick-started a new field of DIY mycology and influenced a young mycologist named Paul Stamets, the discoverer of four new species of psilocybin mushroom and author of a guidebook to psilocybin mushroom identification. Stamets was already working on new ways to cultivate a range of “gourmet and medicinal” mushrooms, and in 1983, he published The Mushroom Cultivator, which simplified growing techniques even further.

…

As he explains in his book Radical Mycology—a hybrid of fungal manifesto, guidebook, and grower’s guide—his goal is to create a “people’s mycological movement” versed in “the cultivation of fungi and the applications of mycology.” Radical Mycology is part of a larger movement of DIY mycology, which emerged from the psychedelic mushroom-growing scene kickstarted in the 1970s by Terence McKenna and Paul Stamets. The movement took on its modern form as it grew together with hackerspaces, crowdsourced science projects, and online forums. Although its center of gravity remains on the West Coast of North America, grassroots mycological organizations are rapidly spreading to other countries and continents.

The Job: The Future of Work in the Modern Era
by Ellen Ruppel Shell
Published 22 Oct 2018

Some years ago, designer Dan Provost used a 3-D printer to prototype two devices he designed in collaboration with his partner, Tom Gerhardt: the “Glif,” a tripod mount for cell phones, and the “Cosmonant,” a wide-grip stylus for touchscreens. Both gizmos were aimed at a niche market and were funded via a Kickstarter campaign. Useful and beautifully designed, they sold far beyond Provost’s expectations and eventually became the foundation for a design company focused on the “small batch” production of a variety of carefully crafted objects. Provost’s company, Studio Neat, is based in Austin, Texas, and its products are manufactured at Premier Source, a small firm based in Brookings, South Dakota.

…

Provost’s company, Studio Neat, is based in Austin, Texas, and its products are manufactured at Premier Source, a small firm based in Brookings, South Dakota. “Just because Apple makes their stuff in Shenzhen doesn’t mean we have to,” Provost told me. Provost said two friends discouraged him from even considering a foreign manufacturer. The friends, both designers, also launched a product on Kickstarter, a stainless-steel writing implement called “Pen Type A.” They then hired—and fired—two different Chinese manufacturers, neither of which met their quality standards. They moved on to a Vermont manufacturer who shared their vision. “Manufacturing is hard,” they wrote in a note to Provost. “There are no shortcuts.

Moon Shot: The Inside Story of America's Apollo Moon Landings
by Jay Barbree , Howard Benedict , Alan Shepard , Deke Slayton and Neil Armstrong
Published 1 Jan 1994

“Who let a Russian in here?” she mocked him. “Nah. We’ll beat those guys.” “Keep thinking that way.” She hugged him tighter. “Thinking, hell. I’m going to push for an early trip. We had a great flight with the Redstone and Mercury capsule last month. They don’t need to fly that damn chimp. If we drop that flight, we’ll kick-start the program and in a couple months I’ll be in space.” In the weeks to come, the heavy layer of silence about the selections conspired against Shepard. A couple of astronauts went all out to overrule Gilruth’s decision. They wanted Glenn to lead the way, and they emphasized the wild antics for which Shepard was justly infamous.

…

He was hearing the Concert of Freedom Seven, a strange and unexpected company to remain with him as he hurtled through the soundlessness of space. “Welcome sounds,” he smiled. They meant things were working, doing, pushing, and repeating. They were the new age sounds of life. Weightlessness was still new, refreshing, exciting, but this was a romance kick-started by a great rocket. Shepard took to zero-g with fierce pleasure, bonding not only naturally but eagerly with this new world without weight. He felt Freedom Seven initiate its slow turnaround. Still more new sounds! Of course, the attitude control jets firing in vacuum. But within Freedom Seven’s contained atmosphere they exerted pressure, and that pressure came to him as thuds, dimmed bangs carrying wonderful satisfaction.

Build: An Unorthodox Guide to Making Things Worth Making
by Tony Fadell
Published 2 May 2022

But that was impossible. They were asking us to predict the future with near 100 percent confidence. They were asking for proof that a baby could run a marathon before it had even learned to walk. These guys didn’t know much about babies. They knew even less about how to create a new business. That’s why so many Kickstarter projects have failed. They thought, “If I build it for $50 and sell it for $200, then I’ll make money. My company will be a success.” But that’s not how companies work. That $150 profit gets sucked away with every new office chair and dependent on your employees’ insurance, with every customer support call and Instagram ad.

…

See also General Magic; iPhone; iPod; Nest Labs; Nest Learning Thermostat; Nest Protect; Philips Nino; Philips Strategy and Ventures Group; Philips Velo at Apple, xviii, 19, 55, 69, 78, 80, 81, 82, 84–86, 91, 93, 96, 117, 136, 163, 237, 303, 320, 374 Apple computer of, xv–xvi biography of, xiv–xix, 294 career of, xiv–xix failures of, xix, 3–4, 181 family of, 163, 175, 176 at Future Shape, xix as mentor, xi–xiv, xix–xx mentors of, xi, xii, 164 passion of, 68–69 at Philips, xvii, 18, 36–37, 45–46, 58, 61, 77, 81, 88, 89, 96, 125, 129–30, 209, 374 programming experience in school, xiv–xv at Quality Computers, xv startups of, xiv, xv–xix, 2, 6, 7, 46, 164, 181, 199 failure analysis of, 135 learning from, 5–6, 7, 9, 10, 13, 19, 119, 223, 253, 264, 329 startups and, 199 finance acquisitions and, 315, 316, 318, 353 product management and, 281, 285, 287 role of, 48 startups and, 182, 210 financial products, 202 Flint, Peter, 107n Free, 199 Frog, 283 Fuse Systems, xviii, 88–92, 89, 208 Future Shape, xix, 365, 374 GAP, 341 Gelsinger, Pat, 321–22 General Magic Bill Atkinson and, 2–3, 12, 27, 165 culture of, 46 Tony Fadell as engineer at, xvi–xvii, 2–3, 6, 7, 10–11, 13, 21, 24, 27, 35, 96, 129–30, 208, 327, 374 failure of, 3, 13, 18, 24, 37, 58, 90, 373 Andy Hertzfeld and, 2–3, 12, 27 launch of, 11–12 Magic CAP, 15 Pierre Omidyar and, 188 Philips as partner and investor in, 36, 37 Pocket Crystal, 1, 2, 12 private network system of, 12 problems with products of, 15 smartphone of, 130 Sony Magic Link, 12–13, 12, 15, 24, 31, 35–36, 58, 139–40 structure of, 10–11, 13 target customer of, 35–36, 58, 130 technology focus of, 15 TeleScript, 15 time constraints for, 139–40 General Magic Movie, 2n Glengarry Glen Ross (film), 296 goals of meetings, 255 moving forward with, 7, 19, 33 product development and, 128 team’s goals powering company goals, 237 Google Ads, 314, 346 all-hands meetings of, 255, 360 Alphabet created by, xix, 314 Android acquisition, 328 culture of, 313, 346, 349, 351–52, 359 disruption and, 123 individual contributors recognized by, 47 job applications with, 23 Nest acquisition of, xix, 304, 310–17, 338, 345–52, 354–55, 359–61, 371 Nest reabsorbed by, 319–20 Nest sold by, 317–19, 367 perks at, 358–59, 362 product managers and, 284 profitability of, 160 project rhythms of, 146 restructuring of, 314 review cycles of, 51 Search, 284, 314, 346 target customer of, 205 Google Facilities, 315 Google Fiber, 314 Google Glass, 16, 119 Google Nest, 55, 80, 278, 313, 314–17, 354–55 Google Store, 312, 317 Google Ventures (GV), 314, 349 Google X, 314 Grove, Andy, 322 Guenette, Isabel, 230 Gurley, Bill, 21 habituation, 262, 262n heroes, connections with, 20–25, 27 Hertzfeld, Andy, 2–3, 12, 20, 27 Hodge, Andy, 92 Hololens, 124 Home Depot, 160, 202 home stereo systems, 87 home theaters, 88, 90 honesty, in management, 44, 51 Honeywell, 117, 124–25, 164, 303–4 human resources (HR) breakpoints and, 255–56 dealing with assholes and, 72–73, 74 hiring and, 29, 215–17, 229–41 interviews and, 21, 258 legal team and, 302, 305 meetings of, 254 quitting and, 76, 81, 85, 86 startups and, 89, 182, 184, 210 team meetings and, 240, 241 team size and, 247 HVAC technicians, 124–25, 166 IBM, 121, 148 ideas chasing process, 171, 172, 173–77, 179, 373 elements of, 171 as painkillers, not vitamins, 172 problems solved by, 171, 172 research on, 171–72, 173, 174, 178 spotting great ideas, 124, 171–79, 180, 182, 327, 328 storytelling and, 172, 174, 177–78 vision for, 178 IDEO, 261, 283 IKEA, 106, 288 imposter syndrome, 37, 50 individual contributors (ICs) crisis and, 220 leadership of, 47 management contrasted with, 43 as managers, 238, 248, 251–53 perspective of, 26–27, 28, 29, 30, 31–33, 48, 58, 331 reverting to, 366 as stars, 47 trajectory in organizations, 47, 251–53 information gathering, 21 Instagram, 156, 205 Intel, 148, 189, 322 intellectual property (IP), 305, 306 internal customers, 30, 32, 233, 325 Inventec, 92 investors and investment angel investors, 173, 189–90, 192, 198–99, 200 board members and, 335, 337, 340–41 cyclical nature of, 90, 190–91 in Nest Labs, 164, 165–66, 177, 178 relationships and, 189–90, 192, 193–98, 199, 200 in Silicon Valley, 90, 192 startups and, 169, 181, 184, 189–200 storytelling and, 111, 178 iPad, 163 iPhone development of, xiv, xviii, 1, 15, 93, 122, 128, 132–33, 140–42, 142, 156, 163, 169, 175, 176, 283, 327–29, 343 glass front face of, 110, 329 launch of, 108–10, 117, 203 profitability of, 156 size of, 130, 131, 132 team of, 234 time constraints on, 140–41 touchscreen keyboard for, 110, 128–33 value of, 156, 176 iPod customer personas for, 287 defining feature of, 120, 140 design of, 263, 267–68 development of, xiv, xviii, 19, 24, 54, 55, 91–92, 91, 119–21, 133–35, 163, 165, 167, 169, 187, 202, 208–9, 268–69, 286, 347 full battery of, 269 iPod-phone model, 141 launch of, 84, 92–93, 92, 96, 108, 117, 133–34, 213 profitability of, 155 tagline “1000 songs in your pocket,” 87, 92, 112–13, 286–87 team of, 234 iPod Nano, 286–87 iPod Touch, 163 Isaacson, Walter, Steve Jobs, 84 iTunes, 119–20, 303 Ive, Jony, 267 Jobs, Steve on analogies, 112–13 on battery life, 121, 287 board of directors meetings and, 334, 339 design thinking and, 267 iPhone development, 15, 128–29, 130, 132, 133, 156 iPhone launch, 108–9 iPod development, 92, 120, 133–35, 187, 208–9, 268–69, 347 on lawsuits, 303 leadership style of, xii, 79, 82, 85, 203, 348, 358 level of detail expected by, 49 on MacWorld conferences, 147–48 on management consulting, 17 on marketing, 271, 277 Not Invented Here Syndrome, 327 as parent CEO, 329 passion of, 69, 70 on processors, 148 respect for, 329–30 Andy Rubin and, 327–28 Wendell Sander and, 24 on “staying a beginner,” 268 storytelling of, 177, 286 vacations of, 207–8 walking of, 214 Joswiak, Greg, 286–87 JPMorgan Chase, 321 Kahneman, Daniel, 171 Kare, Susan, 12 Kelley, David, 261, 283 Kickstarter, 158 Kindle, 118 Kleiner Perkins, 164 Kodak, 122–23, 327 Komisar, Randy, 164, 339–40 lawsuits, 117–18, 300, 302, 303–4 leadership characteristics of, 14, 326–27 crisis and, 221–22 decisions and, 61, 62–63 of individual contributors, 47 of Steve Jobs, xii, 79, 82, 85, 203, 348, 358 mentors and, 257 micromanagement contrasted with, 45 percentage of psychopathic traits in, 65 perspective of, 32 sitting on your idea, 63 for startups, 183 style of, 53 of teams, 37–41, 45, 46, 247 trust of, 62, 64, 330 vision for, 18 legal team contracts and, 300, 302, 305 lawsuits and, 117–18, 300, 302, 303–4 marketing and, 276, 306 outside law firms and, 300–302, 305 product management and, 287, 288, 306 role of, 24, 302–8 sales and, 295 startups and, 227 Le Guen, Sophie, 289 Letterman, David, 311 life, as process of elimination, 238, 253 limited partners (LPs), 189, 192, 198 Linux servers, 201 Lovinsky, Dina, xx Lowe’s, 160 Lutton, Chip, 117, 303, 306, 308 Macintosh, 3, 91, 108, 121, 133–34, 148, 208 McKinsey, 17 MacWorld conferences, 147 MagicBus, 24 Magic CAP, 15 Magic Leap, 16 management.

Lonely Planet Cyprus
by Lonely Planet , Jessica Lee , Joe Bindloss and Josephine Quintero
Published 1 Feb 2018

During Lent, traditional fare includes spanakopita (spinach and egg wrapped in filo pastry); the main dish at Easter is souvla (barbecued meat), along with flaounes (savoury cakes) made with cheese, eggs, spices and herbs. Summer (July–September) Figs, mangoes, peaches, pears, plums: there’s plenty of fresh fruit around, and in September, the Lemesos Wine Festival is an appropriate toast to autumn. Autumn & Winter (October–December) Kick-start this serious foodie season with the Kyrenia Olive Festival, then look for freshly harvested wild mushrooms, artichokes and winter greens. Closer to Christmas, bakeries overflow with kourabies and melomakarona (almond and honey cakes), while on Christmas day, families traditionally make and smoke their own loukanika (sausages made from lamb and pork).

…

One week later, in May, the Republic of Cyprus joins the EU. 2013 Veteran centre-right politician Nicos Anastasiades is elected president in the Republic. In March the Republic's financial crash causes banks to close for 12 days while a €10-billion bailout deal is struck. 2015–17 Mustafa Akinci wins Northern Cyprus' elections in April 2015, kick-starting the latest round of talks to reunify the island. Anastasiades and Akinci hold meetings throughout 2015–2017. The Cypriot Way of Life Cypriot culture is a unique blend of Mediterranean and Middle Eastern; it has been moulded by centuries of rule by different nations that have coveted, fought over and possessed the island.

Hadoop: The Definitive Guide
by Tom White
Published 29 May 2009

Alternatively, if you would like to use RPMs or Debian packages for managing your Hadoop installation, then you might want to start with Cloudera’s Distribution, described in Appendix B. To ease the burden of installing and maintaining the same software on each node, it is normal to use an automated installation method like Red Hat Linux’s Kickstart or Debian’s Fully Automatic Installation. These tools allow you to automate the operating system installation by recording the answers to questions that are asked during the installation process (such as the disk partition layout), as well as which packages to install. Crucially, they also provide hooks to run scripts at the end of the process, which are invaluable for doing final system tweaks and customization that is not covered by the standard installer.

…

For small clusters, it is easy to write a small script to copy hadoop-env.sh from the master to all of the worker nodes. For larger clusters, tools like dsh can do the copies in parallel. Alternatively, a suitable hadoop-env.sh can be created as a part of the automated installation script (such as Kickstart). When starting a large cluster with rsyncing enabled, the worker nodes can overwhelm the master node with rsync requests since the workers start at around the same time. To avoid this, set the HADOOP_SLAVE_SLEEP setting to a small number of seconds, such as 0.1, for one-tenth of a second. When running commands on all nodes of the cluster, the master will sleep for this period between invoking the command on each worker machine in turn.

…

Cloudera makes the distribution available in a number of different formats: source and binary tar files, RPMs, Debian packages, VMware images, and scripts for running CDH in the cloud. CDH is free, released under the Apache 2.0 license and available at http://www.cloudera.com/hadoop/. To simplify deployment, Cloudera hosts packages on public yum and apt repositories. CDH enables you to install and configure Hadoop on each machine using a single command. Kickstart users can commission entire Hadoop clusters without manual intervention. CDH manages cross-component versions and provides a stable platform with a compatible set of packages that work together. As of CDH3, the following packages are included, many of which are covered elsewhere in this book: HDFS – Self-healing distributed file system MapReduce – Powerful, parallel data processing framework Hadoop Common – A set of utilities that support the Hadoop subprojects HBase – Hadoop database for random read/write access Hive – SQL-like queries and tables on large datasets Pig – Dataflow language and compiler Oozie – Workflow for interdependent Hadoop jobs Sqoop – Integrate databases and data warehouses with Hadoop Flume – Highly reliable, configurable streaming data collection ZooKeeper – Coordination service for distributed applications Hue – User interface framework and SDK for visual Hadoop applications To download CDH, visit http://www.cloudera.com/downloads/.

Pulling Strings With Puppet: Configuration Management Made Easy
by James Turnbull
Published 1 Jan 2007

Now that you’ve installed the required prerequisites, I am going to demonstrate how to install Puppet. You can install Puppet via source, from a package on some platforms, and using a Ruby Gem. I’ll demonstrate how to use all methods. Tip ➡ If you build your servers with tools like Jumpstart or Kickstart, you can also include the Puppet client (and its prerequisites) as part of your default build. That’ll help you to quickly add nodes to your Puppet environment. Installing from Source The latest source package for Puppet is available from the Reductive Labs site at http://reductivelabs.com/trac/puppet/wiki/DownloadingPuppet.

What We Need to Do Now: A Green Deal to Ensure a Habitable Earth
by Chris Goodall
Published 30 Jan 2020

Elected at a moment of intense economic depression, he pursued a group of policies that he called the New Deal. Their purposes were varied. Some were intended to provide employment and others to improve business profitability, to create better housing and transport infrastructure and increased availability of electricity. Although the New Deal did use government spending to kick-start the American economy, one of Roosevelt’s aims was to encourage private capital to begin making investments again. Paralysed by the economic crisis of the Great Depression, banks had sharply cut their lending. His administration put in place measures that helped mortgages and loans grow rapidly.

Bit by Bit: How P2P Is Freeing the World
by Jeffrey Tucker
Published 7 Jan 2015

Lending services have been one of the biggest surprises. Prosper allows people who need extra cash to find someone with spare cash to lend. The Lending Tree looks up parties to lending transactions too. The Funding Circle helps restructure student debt. Many crowd-sourced platforms such as Indiegogo and Kickstarter provide a meeting spot for entrepreneurs and investors. Ten years ago, there was an emerging hysteria about how “quants” — super-smart number crunchers with private knowledge — were ruling the financial space, rigging the game and grabbing all available profits for themselves. Today, the same and better knowledge is being democratized with such services as Kensho, which is bringing quant-style power to every investor and institution, essentially running a Google-style search feature for investments, giving the information it gets based on real-time experience.

The Choice Factory: 25 Behavioural Biases That Influence What We Buy
by Richard Shotton
Published 12 Feb 2018

Conclusion Do you remember the story of Kitty Genovese I mentioned in the Introduction and Bias 24? She was the 28-year-old who was murdered while none of the 37 (or 38) witnesses intervened. It was a brutal incident – but some good came from it. It inspired Latané and Darley to begin their research into the bystander effect and it even kick-started the establishment of a single number, 911, for calling the police. But you may be surprised to learn that these important consequences were in fact based on a lie. Yes, Winston Moseley murdered Genovese in 1964, but the apathy that so enraged the New York Times was grossly exaggerated. Nearly fifty years after the stabbing, the New York Post published evidence from Kevin Cook that discredited the original press reports.

Socialism Sucks: Two Economists Drink Their Way Through the Unfree World
by Robert Lawson and Benjamin Powell
Published 29 Jul 2019

When it was my turn, I toasted Kakha Bendukidze. Kakha’s exuberance for economic freedom was matched only by his love of food and drink. A lifetime of excesses led to his death in London in 2014 during a heart operation. By the time of his death, he and Saakashvili had moved to Ukraine to try to kick-start free-market economic reforms there. I still mourn his loss, not only as a champion for freedom, but also as someone who became my friend during my many visits to his country. Kakha Bendukidze’s name and legacy live on, however, in the form of the Bendukidze Free Market Center in Kiev. We can only hope that the center that carries his name will bring Ukraine the same level of economic freedom and ultimate prosperity that his reforms are bringing to Georgia.

Pocket Rough Guide Lisbon (Travel Guide eBook)
by Rough Guides
Published 1 Mar 2019

The 1494 Treaty of Tordesillas gives Spain and Portugal trading rights to much of the globe. 1498 Vasco da Gama returns to Belém with spices from India, which helps fund the building of the monastery of Jerónimos. 1581 Victorious after the battle of Alcántara, Philip II of Spain becomes Filipe I of Portugal, and Portugal loses its independence. 1640 Portuguese conspirators storm the palace in Lisbon and install the Duke of Bragança as João IV, ending Spanish rule. 1706–50 Under João V, gold and diamonds from Brazil kick-start a second golden age; lavish building programmes include the Aqueduto das Águas Livres. 1755 The Great Earthquake flattens much of Lisbon. The Baixa is rebuilt in “Pombaline” style, named after the Marquês de Pombal. 1800s Maria II (1843–53) rules with German consort, Fernando II, and establishes the palaces at Ajuda and Pena in Sintra.

Blood, Iron, and Gold: How the Railways Transformed the World
by Christian Wolmar
Published 1 Mar 2010

By enabling the plantation owners to continue to grow sugar profitably, they helped perpetuate the slave system which might otherwise have collapsed as a result of its economic inefficiency. Moreover, oddly, the railways exacerbated regional differences between prosperous and poor areas. That was because the railways in Cuba were built to tap those boom areas with flourishing sugar estates; no railway promoter aimed to lay down a railway in the hope of kick-starting a backward region. Moreover, the government declined to provide any such subsidy in the less-developed regions, with the result that the railways were mainly concentrated in the western half of the island, while in the east just a couple of lines served the few sugar plantations. As the historians of the Cuban railways put it, ‘The railroad development of the first decades lacked the long-term perspective that would permit the growth of a national grid.’ 13 Despite mild support from the Spanish government, a plan to build an east–west line through the spine of the country, that would have provided an efficient transport network for most of the population, was shelved because of the lack of promoters.

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With the British railway network almost complete, contractors and labourers were looking for work and therefore were willing to travel to the far end of the Pacific in search of riches. Inevitably there were delays caused by all the usual problems – construction difficulties, manpower shortages, finance and industrial disputes – but within five years 316 miles had been built and the programme was in full swing. Vogel had kickstarted New Zealand into the railway age and it never looked back. Neill Atkinson, the author of the history of New Zealand’s railways, explains: In the 1870s, iron and steel rails welded cities and towns to their hinterlands, connected farms, forests and mines to markets and ports, and widened New Zealanders’ physical and cultural horizons.

In Spite of the Gods: The Rise of Modern India
by Edward Luce
Published 23 Aug 2006

The idea, which combined India’s critique of the imperial economic system with a widespread global distrust of free trade following the disasters that had resulted in Europe and elsewhere during the “hungry thirties,” was to give the state a primary role in an economy aiming for self-reliance, or swadeshi—the second most important rallying cry of India’s freedom movement after swaraj, or self-rule. Of great importance in kick-starting this model were a series of large projects that stimulated further economic activity—much as the widely admired Tennessee Valley Authority had in the United States. Nehru liked to call such projects “temples of concrete.” Nehru’s plans for a closed economy dominated by the state also came with the blessings of Britain’s postwar Labour government, which had agreed to Indian independence, and which carried out its own nationalization of private sector industries to a far greater degree than did Nehru’s India.

…

During my time in India I have often been amused by the foreign executives I have met who spend years occupying the same hotel rooms while they await the green light for their company to invest in India so that they can set up a permanent office. The fact that they are prepared to wait so long is an indication of how important the Indian market is to the global strategy of most U.S. and European corporations. In 2005 GE, which kick-started India’s offshore boom in the late 1980s when it set up its first Indian call center near Delhi, launched an Indian bank. GE said it anticipated “indefinite” double-digit growth in the Indian banking market over the coming decades. No one blinked. The fact that India has so far to travel makes it an especially attractive long-term prospect to many foreign investors.

Producing Open Source Software: How to Run a Successful Free Software Project
by Karl Fogel
Published 13 Oct 2005

Crowdfunding campaigns are usually either "all or nothing", meaning that each funder pledges money toward a total threshold and the pledges are collected only if the threshold is met, or "keep it all", which is essentially traditional donation: funds go immediately to the recipient whether or not a stated goal amount is ever met. Goteo.org and Kickstarter.com are probably the best-known examples of all-or-nothing crowdfunding services, though there are many others (I like Goteo because their platform is itself free software, and because it is meant specifically for freely-licensed projects, whereas Kickstarter does not take a position on restrictiveness of licensing). There are also sites like Indiegogo that support both models[57] Bounties are one-time rewards for completing specific tasks, such as fixing a bug or implementing a new feature.

Concretopia: A Journey Around the Rebuilding of Postwar Britain
by John Grindrod
Published 2 Nov 2013

After all, here is a tale of Blitz reconstruction right in the heart of the burned-out city, with plans drawn up in the fifties, building commenced in the sixties, and residential communities flowering in the seventies. The origins of the National Theatre are even older. A National Shakespeare Theatre was first dreamt of in the mid-nineteenth century, yet it was Patrick Abercrombie’s wartime suggestion that arts centres should be central to the regeneration of the derelict south bank of the Thames that kick-started work in earnest. So why end up here? Well, the buildings seem to me a last push to create exciting and experimental public spaces, before responsibility for these kind of projects shifted decisively away from public and into private hands. Also, I love both of these places: they feel epic, imaginative and alive.

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I am lucky to have seen and scaled and explored some of the most exciting places ever built in Britain, from the Post Office Tower to Coventry Cathedral, New Ash Green to Cumbernauld. I’ve tried to see them on their own terms, not with the baggage of received wisdom and hindsight. I thought I might hate what I saw, and what I found out. In some cases, of course, I did. But on the whole I have returned full of admiration for the people who kick-started this revolution, and the pioneers who gave living and working in these new environments their best shot. And rather to my surprise I find that, far from having become sated and disillusioned, I’m even more in love with the world, this ‘Concretopia’, they tried – and in many cases failed – to build.

Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind
by Yuval Noah Harari
Published 1 Jan 2011

The story of organisms is called biology. About 70,000 years ago, organisms belonging to the species Homo sapiens started to form even more elaborate structures called cultures. The subsequent development of these human cultures is called history. Three important revolutions shaped the course of history: the Cognitive Revolution kick-started history about 70,000 years ago. The Agricultural Revolution sped it up about 12,000 years ago. The Scientific Revolution, which got under way only 500 years ago, may well end history and start something completely different. This book tells the story of how these three revolutions have affected humans and their fellow organisms.

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Assyrians, Persians, Macedonians, Romans, Arabs, Mameluks, Turks and British occupied it – and its society always remained patriarchal. Egypt was governed by pharaonic law, Greek law, Roman law, Muslim law, Ottoman law and British law – and they all discriminated against people who were not ‘real men’. Since patriarchy is so universal, it cannot be the product of some vicious circle that was kick-started by a chance occurrence. It is particularly noteworthy that even before 1492, most societies in both America and Afro-Asia were patriarchal, even though they had been out of contact for thousands of years. If patriarchy in Afro-Asia resulted from some chance occurrence, why were the Aztecs and Incas patriarchal?

The Book: A Cover-To-Cover Exploration of the Most Powerful Object of Our Time
by Keith Houston
Published 21 Aug 2016

Upon reaching the city of Talas, a battle commenced that has since passed into legend: Salih is said to have comprehensively defeated the Chinese army encamped there, with 50,000 enemy soldiers slain upon the field of battle and a further 20,000 taken prisoner. Among those captured was a small cadre of conscripted Chinese papermakers who, according to tradition, instigated the practice of papermaking at Samarqand and so kick-started its diffusion throughout the Arab world.15 The stirring details of this anecdote—stupendous armies locked in a noble struggle; prisoners privy to a hitherto forbidden art—are, as might be guessed, a little too neat. The story of the battle at Talas was first set down some three hundred years after the fact in the Lata’if al-ma‘arif—“The Book of Curious and Entertaining Information”—by a poet and writer named Abu Mansur al-Tha‘alibi.16 As the title of his book suggests, al-Tha‘alibi was not interested in the general sweep of history: medieval Muslim writers saw the past as a heroic epic, a series of explosive conjunctions of portentous events, notable individuals, and famous places.

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Sure enough, Dunhuang was overrun in 1035—only the invaders were not Muslims but Buddhists, hailing from the Xi Xia Empire to the east.46 As important as the Dunhuang library has turned out to be for modern scholars, however, its loss in the eleventh century would have been of little consequence to China at large. By then, woodblock printing had thoroughly permeated Chinese life. The man credited with kick-starting China’s woodcut printing renaissance was a slippery tenth-century politician named Feng Dao. Born only a few years after the printing of the Diamond Sutra, Feng rose from lowly stock to become a senior adviser to seven successive emperors. Contemporary Chinese historians cast him as a silver-tongued flatterer of deplorably plastic morals.47 In 932, Feng announced the printing of the entire set of Confucian “classics,” the canon of China’s other ancient religion, amounting to 150 volumes in all.

Slowdown: The End of the Great Acceleration―and Why It’s Good for the Planet, the Economy, and Our Lives
by Danny Dorling and Kirsten McClure
Published 18 May 2020

In the few years that I have spent working at the University of Oxford, I have met more affluent young master’s students convinced that they will become successful entrepreneurs than in all the rest of my adult years combined. As you might have gathered by now, I am a bit of a skeptic. I don’t think these young people are especially creative. I do think that an unusually high proportion of the postgraduate students at the University of Oxford come from families with sufficient money to kick-start their children’s dreams, which leads them to seek more funding for schemes that mostly, inevitably, will fail. We rarely realize that for every idea that worked, millions of others were tried and failed. We also often fail to recognize how frequently amazing and complex collaborative inventions, such as languages, now die.

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Forster and the origins of humanism, offers a valuable insight into the impact, at the beginning of the twentieth century, of a world in which so much was changing so quickly for so many—at first in places like the British Isles, but soon everywhere. The turn of the century was a time of frenzied advance and rapid rural development. Queen Victoria had just died, kick-starting our modern propensity for progress, and machines had begun to dominate industry and culture. As Forster writes in Howards End, “month by month the roads smelt more strongly of petrol, and were more difficult to cross, and human beings heard each other speak with greater difficulty, breathed less of the air, and saw less of the sky.”

The Contrarian: Peter Thiel and Silicon Valley's Pursuit of Power
by Max Chafkin
Published 14 Sep 2021

Thiel was pleased enough with Johnson’s brand of activism to provide him with financial support. After Johnson was banned from Twitter for suggesting that he was going to raise money for a project aimed at “taking out” DeRay Mckesson, the Black Lives Matter organizer, he started WeSearchr, a crowdfunding company that, unlike Kickstarter, promoted itself as unregulated and, as a result, was open to alt-right content. (Johnson told me he was speaking metaphorically about Mckesson; he said he was planning on publishing a story about the activist.) Around this time, Thiel gave him a check between $100,000 and $200,000. It was a gift, according to Johnson, not an investment, but it would prove awkward for Thiel.

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Olin Foundation, 42 Johnson, Charles, 197–204, 225–26, 229, 231–33, 239, 242–43, 268, 269, 278–79, 281, 285, 289, 296–97, 318, 333 Jones, Paul, 243 Jordan, David Starr, 13–14, 33, 94, 144 Jordan, Jeff, 89–90 JPMorgan, 118–19, 215, 216 Jungle, The (Sinclair), 14 Juul, 77 Justice Department, 274 Kaczynski, Ted, 252–53 Kalanick, Travis, 76, 77 Karp, Alex, 114–18, 150–52, 154–55, 215–19, 235, 258–59, 264, 283, 287, 311, 312, 317, 319 on Silicon Valley, 317–18 Kasich, John, 224, 236 kayfabe, 262, 282 Kelly, April, 89 Kennedy, Anthony, 33, 39 Kennedy, Donald, 26 Kennedy, Gregory, 33, 39 Kesey, Ken, 162 Kester, Scott, 97 Key, John, 208, 210 Kickstarter, 202 King, Martin Luther, Jr., 178, 303 Kleiner Perkins, 115 Kobach, Kris, 139, 266, 286, 314–15, 328 Koch, Charles, 140 Kogan, Alexander, 220 Köppel, Roger, 328 Kosinski, Michal, 219, 220 Kothanek, John, 78–79 Kotlyar, Grisha, 22 Kratsios, Michael, 248, 255–56, 283 Kristol, William, 42 Krzanich, Brian, 236, 264 Ku Klux Klan, 31 Kushner, Jared, 249, 257, 303, 304 Kvamme, Floyd, 93 Kyl, Jon, 83 Lambert, Hal, 225 Langham, Wallace, 159 Lapham, Lewis, 176 Lashinsky, Adam, 275 Last Ringbearer, The, 175 Law Review, 33 Lean In (Sandberg), viii, 298 Lehman Brothers, 131–33 Less Than Zero (Ellis), 25 Levandowski, Anthony, 328 Levchin, Max, 48–51, 53, 54, 56, 58–59, 67, 70–72, 78–80, 85, 86, 92, 98, 112, 151, 164, 171, 233, 274, 331 Lewinsky, Monica, 47 Lewis, Geoff, 269 Lewis, Michael, 132 libertarianism, 82, 94, 114, 140, 161, 175, 182, 184, 186, 250, 287 competitive government and, 140 seasteading and, 136–38, 169, 192, 229 of Thiel, xiv, 52, 80, 83, 94, 112, 122, 140–41, 209, 250 Thiel Fellowship and, 161, 166, 167 Liberty Defined (Paul), 178 Libra, 302 Lief, Adam, 21, 22 life extension, 23, 325–27, 335 cryonics, 23, 101 Halcyon Molecular, 138, 167–68 Methuselah Foundation, 101, 138 parabiosis, 325–27, 329, 330, 335 SENS Research Foundation, 138, 326–27 LinkedIn, xiii, 105, 107 Linn, Nathan, 33, 53, 101 Lockheed Martin, 147 Lonsdale, Jeff, 136 Lonsdale, Joe, 101, 105, 113, 114, 117, 118, 131, 289–90 Lord of the Rings trilogy (Tolkien), 8, 10, 113, 154, 175, 176, 285 Los Angeles riots, 178 Los Angeles Times, 26 Lotus, 97 Louden, Greg, 16 Lucent Technologies, 223 Luckey, Palmer, 285, 296, 309 Luminar, 271 Lyft, xiii, 189, 190, 269 Lythcott-Haims, Julie, 19 Mac, Ryan, 230 MacNeil/Lehrer Newshour, 26 Majority Report, 287 Manafort, Paul, 237 Mandela, Nelson, 176 marijuana, 179 Markoff, John, 145 Marshall, Roger, 314, 315 Martin, Paul, 53, 67, 70 Marxism, 15 Massie, Thomas, 186 Massyn, Pierre, 5 Mast, Lucas, 99 Masters, Blake, 170–71, 190, 201, 256, 265, 314, 319, 332–33 Matthies, Dennis, 34–35 Mattis, Jim, 283 Maxwell, Megan, 16, 18–19, 32 Mayer, Marissa, 123 McCain, John, 135, 236 McConnell, Mitch, 242 McCormack, Andrew, 97, 98, 209–10 McHugh, John, 216 McHugh, Katie, 204 Mckesson, DeRay, 202 McMaster, H.

Work: A History of How We Spend Our Time
by James Suzman
Published 2 Sep 2020

But it was not until around 540 million years ago during the Cambrian explosion that animal life really started to flourish. The fossil record for this period shows evidence of creatures representing all the major contemporary phyla – branches on the tree of life – that populate our world today. Additional energy from increasing atmospheric and marine oxygen certainly played a role in kick-starting the Cambrian explosion. But what likely played a more important role was that evolution began to positively select in favour of some life forms that harvested their energy from a novel, much richer source of free energy than oxygen: they consumed other living things which had already gone to the trouble of collecting and concentrating energy and vital nutrients in their flesh, organs, shells and bones.

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Other skills that leave no obvious archaeological traces must also have played a role in increasing the efficiency of our ancestors in their food quest. And arguably the most important of all these skills was the one that not only helped provide the nutrition necessary to feed their big brains but that also kick-started the most important and far-reaching energy revolution in human history: mastery of fire. 3 Tools and Skills 4 Fire’s Other Gifts For the Ju/’hoansi fire is the great transformer. It is generated by the gods through lightning, but can be made by anyone with two dry sticks or a flint once they know how.

Surveillance Valley: The Rise of the Military-Digital Complex
by Yasha Levine
Published 6 Feb 2018

Also key were the good people of the New York Public Library, who gave me a quiet spot in the Frederick Lewis Allen Room in the middle of Manhattan to finish my research and writing. Last but not least, I want to make a big bow to all the people who supported this book on Kickstarter when it was still just an idea back in the winter of 2014. Surveillance Valley would not have happened without their support and trust. Special thanks goes out to Kickstarter backers Carlo Trevisan, Ivor Crotty, Benjamin O’Connor, Michael Oneill of Baycloud Systems, and John Heisel. Yasha Levine is a Russian-born American investigative journalist and a founding editor of The eXiled.

Who Owns England?: How We Lost Our Green and Pleasant Land, and How to Take It Back
by Guy Shrubsole
Published 1 May 2019

And while various historical studies have now been done using the National Farm Survey, the records remain on paper only, stored in the National Archives. A 2006 report made the case for digitisation of all the maps, but so far, no funder has been found. What of the languishing Land Registry? Since its foundation in 1862 it had proved an embarrassing failure, and despite several further Acts intended to kickstart it – as well as the missed opportunity of 1909 – its progress remained glacial. Registration of land upon point of sale finally became compulsory after 1925, leading to an increase in activity. All information on who owned land, however, remained tightly guarded. Incredibly, not even the police were allowed to access Land Registry records without the landowner’s permission, thanks to Section 112 of the 1925 Land Registration Act.

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Some potentially had an even darker motive: purchasing property in England or Wales as a means for kleptocratic regimes or corrupt businessmen to launder money, and to get a healthy return on their ill-gotten gains in the process. This was information which clearly ought to be out in the open, with a huge public interest case for doing so. And yet the government had sat on it for years. The political ramifications of Private Eye’s revelations were profound. They kickstarted a process of opening up information on land ownership that, though far slower and less complete than many would have liked, has nevertheless transformed our understanding of what companies own. No more than a day after Private Eye published its offshore property map, the Land Registry – caught on the back foot by the public interest in its ‘accidental’ data release – decided to make a virtue of necessity, and announced the publication of its own ‘official’ database of overseas-owned properties, though without the means to map their locations properly.

The Future Is Asian
by Parag Khanna
Published 5 Feb 2019

Almaty, Kazakhstan’s commercial hub located near the borders of Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, and China, has become a melting pot for regional merchants and traders. This is a reminder that many Asians welcome China’s infrastructural forays in Asia because they provide cover to pursue their own commercial agendas—not China’s. Were China not taking the risk to kick-start a new modernization phase for the former Soviet republics, commentators would lament that those countries are risky backwaters no sane investor should dare enter. But now China is the biggest investor in Kazakhstan’s railways and pipelines, Uzbekistan’s energy and transport infrastructure, Turkmenistan’s gas fields, Kyrgyzstan’s mineral sector, and Tajikistan’s hydropower plants.

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The reason is that China’s projects have inspired an infrastructural arms race by which India, Japan, Turkey, South Korea, and others are also making major contributions to building Asian connectivity. From Afghanistan to Myanmar, China finances and builds heavy infrastructure, while India and Japan train manpower. Taken together, all these investments help Asians deepen their ties to one another as much as to China. China is thus kick-starting the process by which Asians will come out from under its shadow. In the long run, both China and India’s preferred corridors will emerge, overlap, and even reinforce each other, ensuring that inner-Asian goods will make it to the Indian Ocean, deepening intra-Asian connectivity for Asians’ greater benefit.

Masters of Management: How the Business Gurus and Their Ideas Have Changed the World—for Better and for Worse
by Adrian Wooldridge
Published 29 Nov 2011

Israel has the highest ratio of PhD’s per capita in the world, the highest ratio of engineers and scientists, and some of the world’s best research universities, notably Technicon. Israel’s native talent was also supplemented by the arrival of 100,000 well-educated Jewish refugees from the former Soviet empire. In 1993, with high-tech talent flooding into the country, the government kick-started a domestic venture capital industry by establishing a $100 million venture capital fund, Yozma, which matched private money with public. But Israel’s biggest advantage in embracing entrepreneurialism was more idiosyncratic: its status as an embattled Jewish state in a sea of Arab hostility. The Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) not only help to keep the country on the cutting edge of technology; they also train young Israelis (who are conscripted at age eighteen) in the virtues of both teamwork and improvisation.

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Everywhere you go in India you are confronted by would-be Bilgays: budding entrepreneurs who have swapped the country’s traditional fatalism for can-do optimism. India has drawn heavily on its expat population, particularly the 250,000 Indians who live in California and 500,000 who live in the United States as a whole, to kick-start its entrepreneurial economy. Rajiv Gupta, a former head of McKinsey, helped to create the Indian Business School in Hyderabad. Ravi Deshpande, who sold his company, Cascade Communications, to Ascend for $3.7 billion, is a ubiquitous cheerleader for entrepreneurialism. Draper International, which became, in 1995, the first foreign venture fund to invest in India, relied on money from Silicon Valley’s Indian community.

Open: The Story of Human Progress
by Johan Norberg
Published 14 Sep 2020

The melting pot The Dutch example would become important to the Industrial Revolution and global economy, since others imitated its successful policy of tolerance. Despite the discrimination of Catholics, Britain became a remarkably open country, especially after the Glorious Revolution of 1688 put the Dutch leader William of Orange on the British throne. Many of the skilled artisans and financial experts who kick-started the Industrial Revolution were immigrants, Huguenots and Jews. The union between Scotland and England in 1707 made for a productive cross-fertilization of ideas and technologies. The colonies in America took this openness one step further, after they broke free from Britain in 1776, to become not just a nation full of immigrants but a nation of immigrants.

…

Yet, even when he killed crews who did not create hits (it’s difficult to think of a stronger incentive), the Juche movie industry just didn’t take off – not for a lack of incentives, but because it lacked openness to diversity, experimentation and competition. (In desperation, Kim kidnapped a leading South Korean director and actor to kick-start the industry.)49 When communist planners realized workers behaved according to the ‘we pretend to work and they pretend to pay us’ principle, they created bonuses and public recognition for those who worked hard. Mostly this just led to people putting in time and producing more shoddy and unwanted goods.

Ways of Being: Beyond Human Intelligence
by James Bridle
Published 6 Apr 2022

Together, the pair came up with a resonant new phrase to describe the mycorrhizal networks, which became the headline on the cover of that issue of Nature: ‘The Wood Wide Web’.13 Back in the 1960s, when the nascent internet started to thread its filaments across the planet, it did so primarily through university departments. It was the development of hypertext and the invention of the World Wide Web by Tim Berners-Lee at CERN in 1989 (specifically to facilitate the sharing of academic documents) which kick-started its wider adoption and understanding. But the gift of the Web wasn’t only informational: by its very existence it gave us new tools to identify and understand networks themselves. Before the Web’s arrival, scientists lacked the tools needed to understand how networks functioned in the real world.

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The Wide-Field Infrared Survey Telescope (WFIRST), another project on the drawing board which had been struggling for years to get funding, was designed to measure the effects of dark energy on the formation of the Universe, as well as the consistency of general relativity and the curvature of space–time. The sudden availability of the NRO satellites kick-started the programme, which now has a launch date in 2027. The shortness of the satellites – nicknamed ‘Stubby Hubbles’ – and their resulting wide depth of field, are actually an improvement on NASA’s planned designs. With the addition of a device called a coronagraph, which blocks direct stellar light, the new observatory will also search for exoplanets: new worlds formed around distant stars.

Lonely Planet Barcelona
by Isabella Noble and Regis St Louis
Published 15 Nov 2022

Charlot CafèCAFE€ map Google map (%93 451 15 65; www.facebook.com/CHARLOTCAFEBCN; Carrer d’Aribau 67; dishes €6-14; h8.30am-10pm Mon-Thu, to 3am Fri, 7pm-3am Sat; Wv; mUniversitat, dFGC Provença) Movie stills and posters, from Breakfast at Tiffany’s to Pulp Fiction, line the walls at Charlot. Get a morning kick-start with a truffled tortilla (Spanish omelette) or eggs baked in Iberian ham, or drop by for lunch (sautéed quinoa salad; burgers with hand-cut fries) or dinner (duck with blackberry sauce). Craft beers and cocktails like burnt-pineapple caipirinhas go all day long. oPepaTAPAS€€ map Google map (%93 611 18 85; www.pepapla.cat; Carrer d’Aribau 41; sharing plates €7-18; h5-11pm Sun-Thu, 1-11.30pm Fri & Sat, closed 2 weeks Aug; v; mUniversitat) S An old bookshop graced by original check-tiled floors and exposed-brick walls is the setting for this outstanding venture from the team behind El Born’s beloved Bar del Pla.

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Madrid pressured them into accepting unitary Spanish statehood, but after the leftist Popular Front victory in the February 1936 national elections, Catalonia briefly won genuine autonomy, with Companys as president. But things were racing out of control. The left and the right across Spain were shaping up for a showdown. Civil War Erupts On 17 July 1936, an army uprising in Morocco, led by General Francisco Franco and other rebels, kick-started the Spanish Civil War. The main players in the conflict were the Nationalists and the Republicans. The Nationalists were allied with conservatives (and the Church). Angry at the new leftist direction in which Spain was heading, they staged a coup and quickly gained the following of most of the army.

Saveur New American Comfort Food
by James Oseland
Published 20 Apr 2011

I’d previously dismissed tropical cocktails as slushy umbrella drinks, but the Tiki-Ti’s came with an impressive pedigree: many of them were invented at the country’s first tiki bar, Don the Beachcomber (opened in the mid-1930s), where Ray Buhen, a native of the Philippines, was one of the original bartenders. The Beachcomber attracted a Hollywood crowd and kick-started the midcentury Polynesian craze. Ray Buhen spent the golden age of tiki honing his craft behind some 60 different bars. In 1961, Ray; his wife, Geraldine; and son Michael (pictured) opened a place of their own. Ray died in 1999, but his spirit lives on at the Tiki-Ti. —Jeff Berry Hot Buttered Rum This drink is a holdover from the colonial period in America, when the harsh edges of old-style rums were softened with the addition of warm butter, dark sugar, and spices.

Presentation Zen Design: Simple Design Principles and Techniques to Enhance Your Presentations
by Garr Reynolds
Published 14 Aug 2010

Aisyah Saad Abdul Rahim Lecturer in Pharmaceutical Chemistry School of Pharmaceutical Sciences Universiti Sains Malaysia www.pha.usm.my/pharmacy/Aisyah2006.htm The 1PZ VIoxx slides were used in an introductory lecture for NSAIDs (painkillers) in the Central Nervous System course. “Normally, lecturers would start with the common painkillers, e.g., aspirin or paracetamol,” says Dr. Saad. But she starts with the end in mind. A sensational preamble of Vioxx helps kick-start the main story about the medicinal chemistry of aspirin and other NSAIDs. She then moves on to the design of COX-2 inhibitors. “In both slide examples, the Presentation Zen approach gives me the freedom to express my thoughts without hanging so strongly to text,” Dr. Saad said. “Yes, I do have notes tucked away from the audience (students) in presenter’s view, but once my lectures start the notes disappear and the story starts to flow, with the pictures/diagrams as illustrations of my story.”

Monadic Design Patterns for the Web
by L.G. Meredith

eBook <www.wowebook.com> Acknowledgments Many people have contributed to this book and to the material it covers. We are grateful to all of them. i want to acknowledge my family for their patience and support while i have been writing this book. We are especially grateful to all our backers from the Kickstarter Project Lucian Wischik Nick Partridge Michael Uhlenberg Bjarte Stien Karlsen Sylvain HENRY Richard Dallaway Tobias Ahlers Eckart Seth Tisue Lally Singh Tuple23 John Kodumal Steve Pierce Colin Bullock Tyler Weir e.e d3si9n Binil Thomas Nilanjan Raychaudhuri Adrian King Odd Möller Daryoush Mehr chilang Thomas Lockney Yuan Wang Sébastien Bocq Christopher Hawkins Bent Rasmussen Andrei Formiga Patrick Martini Logan Johnson Ross McDonald Simon Weijgers Jarle Stabell Alvaro Carrasco Alexi Polenur Michael Fortson Ryan Burrows siryc David Waern Janne Mäki Spyros Komninos Rowan Limb Harold Mills Johan Prinsloo Volker Heinisch Christos KK Loverdos Patrick Roemer Markus Joschko Florian Hars Alexandre Bertails Dominik Gruntz Eric Jonathan Ferguson Alan Hardy Andrei Dolganov Alexis Agahi Gabriel Kastenbaum jherber Karl Tietze Martin Weber Valeria de Paiva Heikki Hulkko Ted Leung Andrew O’Malley Arnaud Bailly Rob Wills Philippe Jean Tupshin Harper Dave Fayram Aaron Valade contextfree Yousef Ourabi Jon-Anders Teigen David Christiansen Francois michael holzer slmusk Martin Ellis Gavin Bierman Teemu Antti-Poika JR Boyens Brad Fritz Egon Nijns Scott Parker Lieven Lemiengre Florian Heinisch Scott Smith Brian KimJohnson daniel kroeni Mirko Stocker Lukas Joni Freeman Kris Nuttycombe Michael Bridgen Danielle Hulton didierd Igor Rumiha Daniel Proudfoot Eugene Wagner Lutz Wrage hamjad Johannes Rudolph Eric J.

Start Small, Stay Small: A Developer's Guide to Launching a Startup
by Rob Walling
Published 15 Jan 2010

Tell them the day and time they will receive the email. Step 4: Launch Day On launch day, email your list. Almost immediately, sales will start rolling in. You’re going to have the best sales day you will see for a while. Conversion rates on targeted mailings can be 20%+. A few hundred sales of your $19/month SaaS application is not a bad way to kick-start your startup. Step 5: Thirty Six Hours After Launch Send your list a final email informing them that the deal will end in 12 hours. You will receive another few sales before you close down your special pricing. There are more complex variations to this, but it’s a simple, proven approach to increasing your launch-day sales by ten-fold.

Python Web Penetration Testing Cookbook
by Cameron Buchanan , Terry Ip , Andrew Mabbitt , Benjamin May and Dave Mound
Published 28 Jun 2015

Chapter 9, Reporting, covers scripts that focus to make the reporting of vulnerabilities easier and a less painful process. What you need for this book You will need a laptop, Python 2.7, an Internet connection for most recipes and a good sense of humor. Who this book is for This book is for testers looking for quick access to powerful, modern tools and customizable scripts to kick-start the creation of their own Python web penetration testing toolbox. Sections In this book, you will find several headings that appear frequently (Getting ready, How to do it, How it works, There's more, and See also). To give clear instructions on how to complete a recipe, we use these sections as follows: Getting ready This section tells you what to expect in the recipe, and describes how to set up any software or any preliminary settings required for the recipe.

Infinity in the Palm of Your Hand: Fifty Wonders That Reveal an Extraordinary Universe
by Marcus Chown
Published 22 Apr 2019

To stop this, they must be propped open by stuff with repulsive gravity—stuff that blows rather than sucks. Remarkably, such “exotic matter” exists. In fact, it is the major mass component of the universe, accounting for about two thirds of the mass-energy of the cosmos. In 1998, astronomers found that the expansion of the universe—which had been kick-started by the Big Bang and should, after 13.82 billion years, be running out of steam—was not running out of steam. It was speeding up. To explain this anomalous cosmic acceleration, they were forced to postulate the existence of dark energy, which was mentioned in Chapter 34. We know it is invisible, fills all of space, and has repulsive gravity.

Bike Snob
by BikeSnobNYC
Published 5 May 2010

Hipsters also occasionally embrace certain motorized forms of transport, such as Vespa scooters, vintage mopeds, and café racer—style motorcycles. However, those too keep the hipster localized, as they are seldom reliable. When they are actually running, hipsters opt to travel as far on them as they can, and it’s not worth the forty-five minutes it can sometimes take to kick-start a recalcitrant Triumph Bonneville simply to ride to a bar the next neighborhood over. They can also require considerable expense to maintain. And as far as cars go, those are generally graduation presents, and hipsters usually return those to their parents when they realize they can’t afford to pay their parking tickets.

The Driver in the Driverless Car: How Our Technology Choices Will Create the Future
by Vivek Wadhwa and Alex Salkever
Published 2 Apr 2017

Jonathan Vanian, “7-Eleven Just Used a Drone to Deliver a Chicken Sandwich and Slurpees,” Fortune 22 July 2016, http://fortune.com/2016/07/22/7-eleven-drone-flirtey-slurpee (accessed 21 October 2016). 2. Mary Meeker, “Internet Trends 2015—Code Conference,” Kleiner Perkins Caulfield & Byers, http://www.kpcb.com/blog/2015-internet-trends. 3. Chris Anderson, “How I accidentally kickstarted the domestic drone boom,” WIRED 22 June 2012, http://www.wired.com/2012/06/ff_drones (accessed 21 October 2016). 4. “Malawi tests first unmanned aerial vehicle flights for HIV early infant diagnosis,” UNICEF 14 March 2016, http://www.unicef.org/media/media_90462.html (accessed 21 October 2016). 5.

AngularJS
by Brad Green and Shyam Seshadri
Published 15 Mar 2013

These are the Config and the Run blocks (or phases): The Config block AngularJS hooks up and registers all the providers in this phase. Because of this, only providers and constants can be injected into Config blocks. Services that may or may not have been initialized cannot be injected. The Run block Run blocks are used to kickstart your application, and start executing after the injector is finished creating. To prevent further system configuration from happening from this point onwards, only instances and constants can be injected into Run blocks. The Run block is the closest you are going to find to a main method in AngularJS.

100 Things We've Lost to the Internet
by Pamela Paul
Published 14 Oct 2021

I couldn’t think beyond the disappointment I would have endured if he’d said no. “These illustrations will make people think your book is fun,” one of my children observed. Here’s my view: These illustrations make this book. Thank you, Nishant, for saying yes. Thanks to the incomparable Honor Jones, who got this whole thing kick-started editing my op-ed on boredom. Thanks to the poor souls who read early drafts and made clear everything that was terribly wrong: Bob Gottlieb, Sarah Lyall, Susan Dominus, Debra Stern, and Ericka Tullis. Thank you to the many friends who got me through 2020; you know who you are, but in particular, Ericka, Sue, Sarah, Alysia Abbott, Jen Senior, and my loyal Brown crew.

Attack of the 50 Foot Blockchain: Bitcoin, Blockchain, Ethereum & Smart Contracts
by David Gerard
Published 23 Jul 2017

(Mullins was also famous for his anti-Semitism; every time Mullins said “banker” he meant “Jew,” but this mostly isn’t consciously the case amongst Bitcoiners, who only occasionally rant about Zionists.) These ideas had also been propagated in the mainstream by Ron Paul in the wake of the 2008 credit crunch and the quantitative easing (just printing money, to kick-start the economy) that followed. Though Paul isn’t a fan of Bitcoin – he wants a return to actual gold after he abolishes the Fed.19 Old ideologies come back when they fill a present desire and there’s an opening for them. So these claims, somewhere between incorrect and nonsensical, showed up full-blown in Bitcoin discussion, proponents straight-facedly repeating earlier conspiracy theories as if this was all actually proper economics.

Pocket Rough Guide Barcelona (Travel Guide eBook)
by Rough Guides
Published 1 Mar 2019

Meanwhile, around the corner are several other cafés, while the narrow Carrer del Bonsuccés, Carrer Sitges and Carrer dels Tallers house a concentrated selection of the city’s best independent music stores, and urban- and streetwear shops. The beat from the street The Barcelona sound – mestiza – is a cross-cultural musical fusion whose heartland is the immigrant melting-pot of the Raval. Parisian-born Barcelona resident Manu Chao kick-started the whole genre, but check out the Carrer dels Tallers music stores for the other flag-bearers – Cheb Balowski (Algerian–Catalan fusion), Ojos de Brujo (Catalan flamenco and rumba), GoLem System (dub/reggae) and Macaco (rumba, raga, hip-hop). El Gato del Raval Chris Christoforou Hospital de la Santa Creu MAP Entrances on C/del Carme and C/de l’Hospital Liceu 935 537 801, santpaubarcelona.org.

Ireland (Lonely Planet, 9th Edition)
by Fionn Davenport
Published 15 Jan 2010

Rossinver Organic Centre (Rossinver, County Leitrim;) has courses on organic horticulture and sustainable living. TOP IRISH FICTION Getting stuck into some fiction is the best way to gain insight into Irish issues and culture, for there’s no greater truth in Ireland than the story that’s been made up. Here are the essentials to kick-start a lifelong passion; for more information, Click here. Dubliners (1914) by James Joyce The Book of Evidence (1989) by John Banville The Butcher Boy (1992) by Patrick McCabe Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha (1993) by Roddy Doyle The Ballroom of Romance & Other Stories (1972) by William Trevor The Third Policeman (1967) by Flann O’Brien Amongst Women (1990) by John McGahern All the Names Have Been Changed (2009) by Claire Kilroy Brooklyn (2009) by Colm Toibin Angela’s Ashes (1996) by Frank McCourt MUST-SEE IRISH MOVIES Predeparture planning is always more fun if it includes a few flicks to get you in the mood.

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In 1972 the Republic (along with Northern Ireland) became a member of the European Economic Community (EEC), which brought an increased measure of prosperity thanks to the benefits of the Common Agricultural Policy, which set fixed prices and guaranteed quotas for Irish farming produce. Nevertheless, the broader global depression, provoked by the oil crisis of 1973, forced the country into yet another slump and emigration figures rose again, reaching a peak in the mid-1980s. Nevertheless, European aid was to prove instrumental in kick-starting the Irish economy in the early 1990s. Huge sums of money were invested in education and physical infrastructure, while the renewal of Lemass’ industrial policy of incentivising foreign investment through tax breaks and the provision of subsidies made Ireland very attractive to high-tech businesses looking for a door into EU markets.

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Cultural Centres Alliance Française (Map; 676 1732; www.alliance-francaise.ie; 1 Kildare St) British Council (Map; 676 4088; www.britishcouncil.org; Newmount House, 22-24 Lower Mount St) Goethe Institute (Map; 661 1155; www.goethe.de; 37 North Merrion Sq) Instituto Cervantes (Map; 631 1500; http://dublin.cervantes.es; Lincoln House, Lincoln Pl) Italian Cultural Institute (Map; 662 0509; www.iicdublino.esteri.it; 11 Fitzwilliam Sq East) * * * DUBLIN IN… Two Days Kick-start your day the right way with breakfast at Honest to Goodness Click here in the wonderful George’s St Arcade Click here – and when you’re done have a ramble through the arcade’s collection of stalls and funky stores. A stone’s throw away is Trinity College Click here, where the walking tour includes entry to the Book of Kells (see the boxed text, Click here).

Computer: A History of the Information Machine
by Martin Campbell-Kelly and Nathan Ensmenger
Published 29 Jul 2013

Initially, cardholders were affluent businessmen; they could present their Diners Club card (actually a cardboard booklet) as payment for meals, travel tickets, rental cars, and so on. Diners Club users were billed monthly, and full payment was required monthly. Gas station and department store “charge cards” had been around for decades, but Diners Club and the credit and debit cards that followed kick-started a revolution in cashless and checkless payments. Before ATMs, banks developed machines that dispensed cash and nothing more. The first such efforts—in Japan, Sweden, and Great Britain—took place independently at around the same time in the late 1960s. For example, Barclays, the first British bank to launch a computer center (in 1961), contracted with De La Rue (originally a banknote printing firm founded in 1821), which had developed secure fuel-dispensing machines at unattended depots for Royal Dutch Shell in the late 1950s.

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Video games were made possible by the advent of microchips. The hugely successful Space Invaders was introduced as an arcade game in 1978. A domestic version was produced by Atari two years later, establishing one of the most popular videogame genres. COURTESY OF STANFORD UNIVERSITY LIBRARIES. In the early 1980s the French government kick-started a national information network by distributing millions of Minitel terminals free to telephone users. As well as directory inquiries, Minitel offered services such as chat rooms, entertainment, and mail order. Minitel finally yielded to the global Internet in 2012, when the service was decommissioned.

One Less Car: Bicycling and the Politics of Automobility
by Zack Furness and Zachary Mooradian Furness
Published 28 Mar 2010

Evidence from a Malaria prevention Experiment,” Brookings Global Economy and Development Working Paper, no. 11 (2007); Michael Kremer and Edward Miguel, “The illusion of Sustainability,” Quarterly Journal of Economics 122, no. 3 (2007): 1007–1065; Christopher Shea, “a Handout, not a Hand Up: a popular approach to ‘Sustainable Development’ Doesn’t Work, Critics Say,” Boston Globe, november 11, 2007. Martin Fisher, of Kickstart, says, “The disadvantage to giving things away is that it’s not really fair. How do you decide who is going to get one of these things and who isn’t going to get one of these things. . . . you really don’t appreciate it in the same way as something that you buy. . . . [W]hen you give things away you’re really just creating dependency and people are hanging out waiting for more handouts.” “african Farmers Try Kickstarting Their Farms,” national public radio, July 22, 2006. nancy rose Hunt, A Colonial Lexicon of Birth Ritual, Medicalization, and Mobility in the Congo (Durham, nC: Duke University press, 1999), 176.

Cooked: A Natural History of Transformation
by Michael Pollan
Published 22 Apr 2013

And water was the key. I had read about techniques for “presoaking” flours—part of the traditional culture of whole-grain baking that we have lost—and now I understood the logic behind them: to trick the crushed seed into thinking it was time to germinate. So I embarked on a set of experiments to kick-start the enzymatic activity in my dough even before fermentation got under way. I began mixing my flour and water in the evening, at the same time I started my leaven. Not until the next morning, however, would I introduce the one to the other. By the time the sourdough culture began to work on the presoaked flour, it would find all the nutrients it could want: plenty of sugars, amino acids, and minerals.

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This new metabolic pathway is a less efficient way to generate energy—the alcohol produced by it still has plenty left to burn—yet it has the considerable advantage of expanding the yeast’s habitat and poisoning its competition—not to mention endearing itself to some of the higher animals, notably including ourselves.* Because aerobic metabolism gives the yeast the maximum amount of energy from its food, oxygenating the liquid in question is a good way to kick-start a fermentation. So I started a new batch of mead, diluting the honey with four parts water and leaving it out on the kitchen counter for several days, uncovered. I had read that mead was often flavored with various herbs and spices, in order to contribute a bit of acidity, some tannins, and nutrients for the yeasts, so I added a bay leaf, some cardamom seeds, a star anise, and a few tablespoons of black tea.

Barcelona
by Damien Simonis
Published 9 Dec 2010

Eight years later, Damien turned up in a Rambla-side pensión on assignment for Lonely Planet. And that old magic started doing its work again. A chat with a fellow in a bar and he had a room in a top-floor flat in Gran Via. Barcelona was for years a second home for Damien and is now our restless correspondent’s main base. DAMIEN’S TOP BARCELONA DAY A great way to kick-start the day is with every-one else, leaning up against a bar over a cafèamb llet (coffee with milk), an orange juice and a pastry (preferably something nice and creamy like a canya). A quick read of the paper to find out where we stand on the latest round of squabbling over Catalan autonomy, ETA, the bishops’ spat with the Socialists and FC Barcelona’s results and it’s time to hit the streets

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Companys, its president, carried out land reforms and planned an alternative Barcelona Olympics to the official 1936 games in Nazi Berlin. But things were racing out of control. The left and the right across Spain were shaping up for a showdown. Return to beginning of chapter THE CIVIL WAR On 17 July 1936, an army uprising in Morocco kick-started the Spanish Civil War. Barcelona’s army garrison attempted to take the city for General Franco but was defeated by anarchists and police loyal to the government. Franco’s Nationalist forces quickly took hold of most of southern and western Spain; Galicia and Navarra in the north were also his.

The Rational Optimist: How Prosperity Evolves
by Matt Ridley
Published 17 May 2010

The Amazon rainforest is in a state of constant perturbation: from tree falls to fires and floods, its diversity requires it to be constantly changing. There is no equilibrium in nature; there is only constant dynamism. As Heraclitus put it, ‘Nothing endures but change.’ Innovation is like a bush fire To explain the modern global economy, then, you have to explain where this perpetual innovation machine came from. What kick-started the increasing returns? They were not planned, directed or ordered: they emerged, evolved, bottom-up, from specialisation and exchange. The accelerated exchange of ideas and people made possible by technology fuelled the accelerating growth of wealth that has characterised the past century. Politicians, capitalists and officials are flotsam bobbing upriver on the tidal bore of invention.

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Some African leaders are so disenchanted with government aid that they even embraced the recommendations of the Zambian economist Dambisa Moyo who concludes, bleakly, ‘aid doesn’t work, hasn’t worked, and won’t work ... no longer part of the potential solution, it’s part of the problem – in fact, aid is the problem.’ Moreover, in recent years much aid has been granted on condition of free-market economic reform, which far from kick-starting economic growth, frequently proves damaging to local traditions, undermining the very mechanisms that get enrichment started. As William Easterly puts it while criticising the shock therapy that did such harm in both the Soviet bloc and Africa, ‘you can’t plan a market’. The top-down imposition of a bottom-up system is bound to fail.

European Spring: Why Our Economies and Politics Are in a Mess - and How to Put Them Right
by Philippe Legrain
Published 22 Apr 2014

Jumpstarting investment Because Britain’s broken banks have kept zombie companies alive while failing to lend to promising ones, the recovery has been stifled, seemingly justifying their caution. Meanwhile, even companies with piles of cash have not invested, for fear that demand would remain weak. Instead of trying to kickstart the economy onto a healthy growth path, the government dug a bigger hole by slashing public investment too. As a result, for several years the economy got stuck in a rut where weak demand led to low investment and hence to weak growth, which in turn seemed to justify low investment. What was needed was a jolt to jumpstart the economy.

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Britain and France still controlled large global empires. The leaders of France, Italy, Belgium, Netherlands and Luxembourg were starting to bury the hatchet with West Germany, tying their economies together and building common institutions with the aim of making war between them unthinkable. Kickstarted by Marshall Plan aid from America and burgeoning trade, western Europe was booming. But class divisions were rife. The middle classes had knocked the upper classes off their pedestal. Bolstered by the fear of communism, the working classes had gained much more clout too: unions were in the ascendant, working conditions had improved and welfare provision was expanding.

Lonely Planet Florence & Tuscany
by Lonely Planet , Virginia Maxwell and Nicola Williams
Published 1 Dec 2013

His story is visually narrated in great detail in the stunning fresco series (1497–1505) by Il Sodoma and Luca Signorelli in the Great Cloister at the Abbazia di Monte Oliveto Maggiore, near Siena. One early Benedictine monastery, San Pietro in Valle, was built in neighbouring Umbria by order of the Longobard duke of Spoleto, Faroaldo II. It kick-started a craze for the blend of Lombard and Roman styles known as Romanesque, and many local ecclesiastical structures were built in this style. The basic template was simple: a stark nave stripped of extra columns ending in a domed apse, surrounded by chapels usually donated by wealthy patrons. In the 11th century the Romanesque style acquired a distinctly Tuscan twist in Pisa, when the coloured marble banding and veneering of the city’s duomo (cathedral) set a new gold standard for architectural decoration.

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A Stop on the Grand Tour A ‘Grand Tour’ of Italy became an obligatory display of culture and class status by the 18th century, and Tuscany was a key stop on the itinerary. German and English artists enraptured with Michelangelo, Perugino and other early High Renaissance painters took the inspiration home, kick-starting a neoclassicist craze. Conversely, trends from northern Europe (impressionism, plein-air painting and romanticism) became trendy among Italian artists, as witnessed in the collection at Florence’s Galleria d’Arte Moderna in the Palazzo Pitti, which is dominated by late-19th- century works by artists of the Tuscan Macchiaioli school (the local equivalent of impressionism).

Countdown to Zero Day: Stuxnet and the Launch of the World's First Digital Weapon
by Kim Zetter
Published 11 Nov 2014

This process gets repeated until gas containing the desired concentration of U-235 isotopes is achieved.24 In 1987, after Iran revived its nuclear program, officials there contacted a German engineer-turned-black-marketeer, who was a key supplier of equipment for Pakistan’s illicit nuclear program. He helped arrange a secret meeting in Dubai between Iranian officials and other members of the Khan supply network. In exchange for $10 million, the Iranians walked away with two large suitcases and two briefcases filled with everything they needed to kick-start a uranium enrichment program—technical designs for making centrifuges, a couple of disassembled centrifuge prototypes, and a drawing for the layout of a small centrifuge plant containing six cascades.25 Apparently as a bonus, the marketeers threw in a fifteen-page document describing how to turn enriched uranium into uranium metal and cast it into “hemispheres,” the core component of nuclear bombs.26 Khan later told Pakistani television that he helped Iran develop its nuclear program because he thought if both Pakistan and Iran became nuclear powers, they would “neutralize Israel’s power” in the region.27 The disassembled centrifuges the Iranians received were based on one of the designs Khan stole from Urenco.

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He based this in part on the fact that Resource 207 found in the 2009 version of Stuxnet—which contained the Autorun code and the wallpaper exploit—looked a lot like an early version of Flame’s main module. Flame would have already existed as a basic espionage tool by 2007, and when it came time to write the missile portion of Stuxnet in 2009, it appeared that the team behind Flame shared source code for Resource 207 with the Stuxnet crew, essentially kick-starting the creation of the missile code. The payload was already created by then, and the attackers just needed something to deliver it. “Probably there was some kind of urgency to get [Stuxnet] out the door, so that’s why they took this already mature plug-in from Flame and used it in Stuxnet,” Raiu says.

SuperBetter: The Power of Living Gamefully
by Jane McGonigal
Published 14 Sep 2015

Staying in shape is important for cancer, especially with multiple myeloma, because I need to keep my bones strong. If the bones in my legs become brittle, I can have problems walking, I can break my legs very easily. I haven’t been doing as much to keep my legs strong as I should. The photography quest helped me kick-start this whole other area of my health and well-being.” The upward spiral continued with each daily quest. Weeks later Phillip reported: “Every day I’m feeling more confident about what I’m learning. I’m understanding photography better, self-portraiture better, my camera better—I realized I hadn’t even used all the features before.

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On day ninety, he shared the following reflection: “This has been amazing. I’m not feeling depressed anymore. I have more energy. I’ve seen real improvement in my photography. I’ve used SuperBetter to understand my world better and, through that, to understand myself. It was just what I needed to kick-start my life again and to focus on remaining positive, happy, and living each day to the fullest.” Phillip continues to fight cancer creatively today. Approximately one year after reaching his goal of ninety creative self-portraits, he received a new and experimental treatment for multiple myeloma.

Money: 5,000 Years of Debt and Power
by Michel Aglietta
Published 23 Oct 2018

Finance itself produced the devastating contagion that was now spreading unopposed. Everything was unfolding as if the counterfactual horizon of the future had disappeared. Financial agents were exclusively driven by immediacy, which is to say, by the exclusive search for money – not in order to kick-start spending, but in order to protect themselves. This is the reason why finance was saved only through the coordinated action of the central banks, or in other words, by money. Economies nonetheless fell into a deep recession, which could be overcome only through an expansionary fiscal policy coordinated at the G20 level, and thus through the power of the state seeking to reconstruct a future at the level of the world economy.

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Central banks are the only public authorities to have taken reactive measures, but this cannot compensate for the negligence of the political authorities, particularly in Europe. The central banks’ ‘non-conventional’ policies, involving the massive creation of liquidity by buying mostly public equities on the secondary markets, have only had very limited success in the attempt to revive effective demand and kickstart growth. This is because the process of transmitting monetary policy through the purchase of pre-existing financial assets does not directly create any new income. It has only an indirect and uncertain effect on the behaviour of private actors, coming as it does after the trauma of the crisis. And even this is vulnerable to serious losses along the way.

We Are the Nerds: The Birth and Tumultuous Life of Reddit, the Internet's Culture Laboratory
by Christine Lagorio-Chafkin
Published 1 Oct 2018

In 2009 he’d encountered a thread that had morphed from a silly idea to a full-fledged crowdfunding effort—and a contest. It read, “Anyone else remember that JetBlue $600 for a month deal? What if we sponsor some unemployed redditor to travel around and do stuff for us, like courier packages, or do requests for us as compensation?” It was actually happening: One of the first campaigns on the crowdfunding website Kickstarter was already under way to accept donations to buy at least one “All You Can Jet Deal” ticket. McComas felt a tiny pang of remorse for being too old, and, well, too employed to volunteer himself. He’d long grown out of his punk past and was settling into middle age. He’d married, had a couple little kids, and let some extra pounds accumulate on his already large frame.

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Later, Ohanian explained the decision that came from Huffman to stop devoting Reddit’s resources to traditional media. “It came down to the question: What is Reddit going to be?” Reddit needed to hire engineers and to ship product. These departments Ohanian had created were not core to that vision. So Huffman shut them down. Another project did work. Within months of his return, Huffman kick-started an initiative to upgrade Reddit’s mobile app. After six months of development, on April 6, 2016, a Facebook post teased, “Reddit for your thumbs. Coming soon to iOS and Android.” Some users complained that the app was a tidied-up, simplified Reddit—and sure, it was. Images on the official app, which is just called Reddit, are displayed in-line, so the appearance is initially just an up-to-the-minute meme reader.

The Mission: A True Story
by David W. Brown
Published 26 Jan 2021

Alan had been looking closely at the books and realized that if he brought the Mars program in line and simultaneously imposed some serious fiscal discipline on the wider planetary science division, he could find two-point-one billion dollars—not to study more mission concepts, or to get things kickstarted and hope for funding down the line. No, for two-point-one billion, he could launch an outer planets flagship. Better still, the European Space Agency had offered to help; it wanted to get in on the science, too. So, although the Quad Studies were intended to take four potential missions and settle on a single destination, Stern directed a second round, reducing the competitors to two: a Europa mission (doing as much of the Ganymede mission science as possible) and a Titan mission (doing as much Enceladus science as it could).

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,” Ask an Astronomer (Astronomy Department, Cornell University), last modified June 27, 2015, http://curious.astro.cornell.edu/physics/109-the-universe/cosmology-and-the-big-bang/inflation/664-how-can-the-universe-expand-faster-than-the-speed-of-light-during-inflation-advanced. See also M. Strassler, “Inflation,” Of Particular Significance, last modified March 17, 2017, https://profmattstrassler.com/articles-and-posts/relativity-space-astronomy-and-cosmology/history-of-the-universe/inflation. See also K. Tate, “Cosmic Inflation: How It Gave the Universe the Ultimate Kickstart,” Space.com, last modified March 17, 2014, https://www.space.com/25075-cosmic-inflation-universe-expansion-big-bang-infographic.html. See also “The Origins of the Universe: Inflation,” University of Cambridge, Stephen Hawking Centre for Theoretical Cosmology online, accessed October 14, 2019, http://www.ctc.cam.ac.uk/outreach/origins/inflation_zero.php. 28.W.

The Asian Financial Crisis 1995–98: Birth of the Age of Debt
by Russell Napier
Published 19 Jul 2021

Let’s take a look at Asia as it exists in real life rather than on our pictorial version of how Asia looks to the equity investor. Just a few minutes pondering the difference may produce serious strategy consequences for those investors who believe the collapse of Indonesia will undermine the whole of the Asian investment story. Some of the greatest economic success stories in Asia were kick-started by wars in the other Asian nations. The sourcing of materials for the Korean war from Japan certainly resulted in the acceleration of Japan’s post-war recovery. The Vietnam war provided further boosts to the economies of those Asian nations which managed to escape associated political problems.

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New record high valuations were to be justified by a conclusion that new record low risks were on offer. There was a problem in Greenwich, Connecticut, and a solution brewing to that problem at the headquarters of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York that would transform investors' perception of risk and kick-start the age of debt. The decomposing composers 24 September 1998, Global There appear to have been some problems at Mr Meriwether’s Long-Term Capital Management (LTCM). According to the newswires, emergency credit lines have had to be extended. LTCM is no ordinary fund management company.

Fodor's Oregon
by Fodor's Travel Guides
Published 13 Jun 2023

Wineries That Define Oregon’s Willamette Valley KING ESTATE WINERY King Estate immediately stands out from the smaller-scale outfits clustered along Territorial Highway, the main touring route in the quieter southern stretches of the valley, and it’s easy to spend an entire day here touring the winery complex. THE EYRIE VINEYARDS David and Diana Lett defied conventional wisdom when they founded the Eyrie Vineyards in 1965, helping to kick-start a Pinot Noir frenzy that’s shaped the valley’s vino reputation. Today, David’s son, Jason Lett, oversees operations and continues to turn out top Pinot Noir, Pinot Gris, and other varieties. PENNER-ASH WINE CELLARS Wine critics of the caliber of Robert Parker consider the women-led team at Penner-Ash Wine Cellars among the nation’s top producers of Pinot Noir—considerable praise in a region where that’s the top grape.

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But the best part is that most of the hottest chef-driven spots around the state offer meals that cost a fraction of what you’d pay for comparable cuisine in San Francisco or even Seattle. DRINKING Oregon is beyond merely beer obsessed, although craft ales are clearly at the forefront of the state’s assiduous attention to beverages. Portland is well regarded for longtime breweries like Widmer that helped kick-start the local industry, but you’re more likely to find serious fans hanging out at newer spots like Breakside Brewery and Ecliptic Brewing. There are many acclaimed beer makers outside the Portland area—consider Rogue in Newport, pFriem in Hood River, Deschutes Brewery in Bend, Yachats Brewing in Yachats, Ninkasi in Eugene, and Terminal Gravity in Enterprise.

After Steve: How Apple Became a Trillion-Dollar Company and Lost Its Soul
by Tripp Mickle
Published 2 May 2022

In many ways, the iPad was the least taxing and most rewarding product they made. They had been toying with the idea of making a tablet before they made the iPhone, and Jobs had resurrected work on it before his transplant. The iPhone would inform the design of the tablet, which would use the same software. The biggest question was: What size should it be? Ive kick-started the evaluation by making twenty models in various sizes with rounded corners. He invited Jobs to the studio, where he laid them out for review. They went from model to model, evaluating each one’s look and feel. They settled on a nine-by-seven-inch rectangle that sat flat on the table like a legal pad.

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He told his longtime friend: Interview with Clive Grinyer; Parker, “The Shape of Things to Come.” In May 2009, Jony Ive arrived: Isaacson, Steve Jobs. Representatives of Ive said he hadn’t spoken with Isaacson about that important episode. Isaacson didn’t provide Jobs’s response or detail who had provided Ive’s quotes in this exchange. Ive kick-started the evaluation: Isaacson, Steve Jobs. Accompanied by Heather: “Apple Design Chief Jonathan Ive Is Knighted” (video), BBC, May 23, 2012, https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-18171093; Yukari Kane, Haunted Empire. Later that day, Ive shed: Interview and photographs provided by event organizer Tracy Breeze.

Lonely Planet Belgium & Luxembourg
by Lonely Planet

RoskamBAR (map Google map; %02-503 51 54; www.cafe-roskam.be; Rue de Flandre 9; h4pm-2am, to 4am Fri; mSte-Catherine) Navy tiles and a stylised horse-head sign identify this bar and music venue, a small and welcoming neighbourhood place that hosts great Sunday-night jazz concerts. Bar des AmisBAR (map Google map; www.bardesamis.be; Rue Ste-Catherine 30; h5pm-late Sun-Thu, 3pm-late Fri & Sat; W; mSte-Catherine) A great bar to kick-start a night out, right in the centre of the vibrant Ste-Catherine area. The cosy atmosphere is enhanced by vintage items on the walls. Club des HallesCLUB (map Google map; %02-289 26 60; www.cafedeshalles.be; Pl St-Géry 1; h10am-midnight; jBourse) Popular city-centre club in the vaulted cellars beneath the buzzing Café des Halles.

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Moules-frites | NITO / SHUTTERSTOCK © History The current nation states of Belgium and Luxembourg first appeared on the political map of Europe rather haphazardly in the 19th century. Little Luxembourg only emerged from under the Dutch umbrella due to a quirk in royal inheritance rules. And when an opera kick-started Belgium’s independence in 1830, nobody thought that the country would last. Some still doubt that it will. However, the fascinatingly tangled history of the ‘Low Countries’ goes back way before such shenanigans. Overview The region had a rich Roman history but really came to prominence in the 13th and 14th centuries, when the cloth trade brought Bruges, Ghent and Ypres international stature.

Fodor's Essential Belgium
by Fodor's Travel Guides
Published 23 Aug 2022

Monsel HATS & GLOVES | Something of an old stager, this traditional umbrella shop and milliners has a wide choice of caps and hats. It has also been going for generations (since 1847) and was one of the original shops in the Galeries Royales St-Hubert. EGalerie du Roi 5, Lower Town P02/511–4133 wwww.monsel.be mMetro: De Brouckère. Stijl MIXED CLOTHING | Often credited with kickstarting the boutique rush on rue Antoine Dansaert, Stijl has been knocking around since the 1980s yet still retains its couture chops, championing a wide range of Belgian avant-garde designers for women. It also has a men’s branch on place du Nouveau Marche aux Grains. ERue Antoine Dansaert 74, Lower Town P02/512–0313 wwww.stijl.be mMetro: Ste-Catherine.

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Musée international du Carnaval et du Masque (Museum of International Carnivals and Masks) HISTORY MUSEUM | The city’s carnival museum, set within a sprawling former Augustinian college opposite the church, offers colorful context for February’s festivities and even captures their atmosphere a little. It goes into great detail on the carnival’s history, costumes, and preparation—planning begins six months in advance and, judging from the photo display, requires a few beers to kickstart—and it looks at similar carnivals from Wallonia and the rest of the world. The star attractions, however, are the private cinema, which shows nonstop films of the day’s festivities, and the VR headsets that drop you right into the day’s action. Downstairs, temporary exhibitions usually focus on masks from around the world.

Material World: A Substantial Story of Our Past and Future
by Ed Conway
Published 15 Jun 2023

Presumably, it was discovered in the dunes of the Sahara, a little like the yellow desert glass in Tutankhamen’s necklace.3 The ancient Hittites, who occupied the area now covered by Turkey and Syria, seem to have worked out how to smelt iron and create steel weapons around 1400 BC , and over the following years the skills spread throughout much of Asia and Europe, kickstarting what anthropologists like to call the Iron Age. But it wasn’t until the fifth century BC that the Chinese developed the first blast furnaces, and it wasn’t until the medieval period that they spread to Europe. There were furnaces producing pig iron in Sussex around 1500 and here in South Wales not long afterwards.

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These students of the earth have come to sea because here at the centre of the ocean is where new land forms. It is happening right now: the North American tectonic plate is, as you read this, slowly parting ways from the Eurasian plate at a rate of about an inch a year: a gradual, inexorable process that kickstarted the break-up of the supercontinent Pangea 200 million years ago. And as these two continents part, all sorts of exciting geological activity steps in to fill the void: volcanoes, pillow lava, hot smoking towers of rock bubbling up from the depths. The vast majority of this happens out of sight but for a sense of what we’re talking about, note that Iceland, land of volcanoes and lava and geysers, is one of the few terrestrial parts of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge.

France (Lonely Planet, 8th Edition)
by Nicola Williams
Published 14 Oct 2010

Return to beginning of chapter ROADS LESS TRAVELLED OUTDOOR ACTION Two Weeks / Chamonix to Cauterets * * * This highly energetic 1500km tour from the French Alps to the Pyrenees will leave you breathless, especially if you take a few days out to indulge in an adrenaline rush of outdoor activity up, down or on the mountain slopes. * * * Kick-start your Alpine adventure in Chamonix at the foot of Europe’s highest peak: ride a cable car to the Aiguille du Midi and Le Brévent or a train to the Mer de Glace. Skiing the legendary Vallée Blanche and paragliding are daredevil choices. For the truly Alpine-dedicated there are the Vanoise and Écrins national parks to explore.

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Louis XIV, also known as the Sun King, ascended the throne in 1643 at the age of five and ruled until 1715, virtually emptying the national coffers with his ambitious building and battling. His greatest legacy is the palace at Versailles, 21km southwest of Paris. The excesses of Louis XVI and his queen, Marie-Antoinette, in part led to an uprising of Parisians on 14 July 1789 and the storming of the Bastille prison – kick-starting the French Revolution. At first the Revolution was in the hands of moderates, but within a few years the so-called Reign of Terror, during which even the original patriots were guillotined, was in full swing. The unstable post-Revolutionary government was consolidated in 1799 under a young Corsican general named Napoleon Bonaparte, who declared himself First Consul.

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Cobbled rue Mercière, rue des Marronniers and the northern side of place Antonin Poncet – all in the 2nd arrondissement (metro Bellecour) – are chock-a-block with eating options, pavement terraces overflowing in summer. Near the opera house, rue Verdi, 1er, is likewise table-filled. * * * GO LOCAL A bouchon might be a ‘bottle stopper’ or ‘traffic jam’ elsewhere in France, but in Lyon it’s a small, friendly bistro that cooks up traditional city cuisine. Kick-start what will surely be a memorable gastronomic experience with a communard, an aperitif of red Beaujolais wine and crème de cassis (blackcurrant liqueur), named after the supporters of the Paris Commune killed in 1871. Blood-red in colour, the mix is considered criminal elsewhere in France. When ordering wine, don’t ask for a wine list.

Rough Guide to San Francisco and the Bay Area
by Nick Edwards and Mark Ellwood
Published 2 Jan 2009

At Columbus’s intersection with Broadway, you’ll find, among the many strip joints, the sites of many bars and comedy clubs from the 1950s – among them the Hungry I and the Purple Onion, where many of the era’s politically conscious comedians, from Mort Sahl and Dick Gregory to Lenny Bruce, once performed.The strip clubs and porno stores that dominate this part of town first arrived with the Beats’ exodus, and gained considerable steam with the topless waitress phenomenon kick-started by Carol Doda (see box, p.72) at the Condor Club (300 Columbus St at Broadway) in 1964. For years, a notorious pair of neon nipples were set on the wall outside, but the iconic items were eventually auctioned off to a nostalgic bidder. A few pieces of memorabilia from the club’s topless heyday remain intact inside the building, including its piano suspended from the ceiling.

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They made North Beach the nexus of the Beat Generation in the 1950s, which in turn helped make San Francisco a beacon for counterculturalists in the ensuing decades, from flower children in Haight-Ashbury in the late 1960s, to gays in the Castro in the 1970s and warehouse-dwelling ravers in SoMa in the 1990s. 71 Carol Doda and topless waitressing North Be ach an d the hi l l s | North Beach 72 Carol Doda is an unsung pioneer of the Sexual Revolution. Like the feminists that followed her, she proudly burned her bra, albeit for very different reasons. Knowing that she’d make bigger tips by baring her best assets, the North Beach cocktail waitress kick-started topless waitressing on June 19, 1964, creating a trend that at one point led to almost thirty different topless bars clustered together around the intersection of Columbus and Broadway. Doda’s bra-doffing was much less impromptu than legend has it. The original idea didn’t come from Doda, but rather, a bouncer at the Condor Club.

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The robust menu includes cod in smoky broth and the namesake, ratatouille-esque stew, while the warm | North Beach and the hills Southeast Asian e ati ng San Francisco has enjoyed a recent proliferation of locally based “microroasters” that offer particularly strong cups of joe. Listed below are a few espresso bars to seek out if you’re looking for a robust kickstart any time of day. You won’t find any grande eggnog lattes at these places, but you can expect to get a cup of fresh coffee for a mere $1.50–2.25. Blue Bottle Coffee 315 Linden St at Gough, Hayes Valley t415/252-7535. Located down an alley off a main thoroughfare, this quirky spot offers excellent breakfast and dessert items, but it’s the own-roasted coffee that has taken San Francisco by storm.

The River Cottage Fish Book: The Definitive Guide to Sourcing and Cooking Sustainable Fish and Shellfish
by Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall
Published 19 Nov 2007

There are some other, more localized labeling initiatives that we applaud too; the South West Handline Fishermen’s Association, for instance, tags all its line-caught pollock and bass so that consumers can find out when and by whom it was caught. But there is scope for far more extensive and informative labeling of fish. We don’t think it’s overstating the case to say that it could deliver a monumental boost to fish conservation all around the world. The time is right to kick-start a virtuous circle: the more positive choices, with ecological upsides, that can be offered to the consumer, the better. More friends of fish The MSC is not the only nongovernment organization blazing a trail for sustainable fishing. The Marine Conservation Society (MCS), for instance, is a UK charity dedicated to the conservation of our seas and seashores.

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As their numbers tumble, the wily dogfish seem ever on hand to fill the gaps. In places where there was once a huge diversity of species, now you’ll often find only a few stragglers—and endless dogfish. Around January and February, before the sea has started to warm up and grow the algae and plankton that kickstart the food chain, most species migrate to deeper, more southerly waters. But the dogfish sticks around to pick up the pieces. In the absence of others, whatever food is around is theirs for the taking. So in tough times these fish don’t just survive, they thrive. Sadly, this isn’t the case for the dogfish’s larger cousins, such as the bull huss, spurdog, and smooth hound.

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Because squid live fast and die young, a squid fishery can fluctuate wildly from year to year, as numbers depend largely on the success or failure of each individual breeding season. We’re lucky to have a reliable seasonal opportunity to catch squid ourselves on rod and line. It’s a winter-afternoon affair, kick-started by the drop in water temperature and shortening days some time around mid-November. This is when the squid migrate close inshore, around Weymouth and Portland harbors, in search of easy food. We often catch them in no more than 12 to 18 feet (4 to 6m) of water, just as the day fades and the night sucks up the light.

One Pan, Two Plates: More Than 70 Complete Weeknight Meals for Two
by Carla Snyder Snyder
Published 5 Mar 2013

SEE ALSO ZUCCHINI Flank Steak with Chimichurri and Summer Squash Hash Lamb Kebabs with Harissa, Chickpeas, and Summer Squash Summer Rolls with Shrimp, Cucumber, and Mango SWEET POTATOES Barley Risotto with Sweet Potato and Andouille Sausage Cornflake-Crusted Chicken Fingers with Rosemary–Sweet Potato Pan Fries and Chutney Dipping Sauce Herb-Rubbed Pork with Honey-Lime Roasted Sweet Potatoes, Cauliflower, and Major Grey’s Chutney Pan-Roasted Chicken Leg Quarters with Thyme, Sweet Potatoes, and Pineapple Sautéed Pork Chops with Sweet Potato, Apple, and Mustard Sauce t Tacos, Catfish, with Chipotle Slaw Thai Red Curry Chicken with Bell Peppers and Broccoli Tips TOMATOES Chicken Stew with Tomatoes, Oranges, and Olives Citrus-Marinated Salmon with Heirloom Tomato Concassé and Goat’s-Milk Feta Fresh Summer Pasta with Tomatoes, Garlic, Basil, and Buttery Croutons Fried Green Tomato Sandwiches with Bacon and Chutney Herbed Chicken Paillards with Zucchini Pancakes and Cherry Tomato Pan Sauce Jambalaya with Chicken, Shrimp, and Andouille Sausage Panko-Fried Crab Cakes with Heirloom Tomato, Nectarine, and Avocado Salad TORTILLAS Catfish Tacos with Chipotle Slaw Skirt Steak Fajitas with Pico de Gallo and Avocado TUNA Fresh Pepper Linguine with Olive Oil–Packed Tuna, Capers, and Golden Raisins Salade Niçoise Tuna Burgers with Wasabi Mayo and Quick Cucumber Pickle TURKEY Balsamic Turkey with Artichokes and Eggplant Caponata Turkey Chili with Poblano and Queso Fresco Turkey Tonkatsu with Cabbage, Portobellos, and Pickled Ginger Turnips, One-Pan Roast Deviled Chicken with Carrots, Parsnips, and v VEAL Veal Piccata with Brussels Sprout Hash and Apples Veal Rolls with Currants, Pine Nuts, and Parmesan Polenta Stacks Veal Saltimbocca with Asparagus, Lemon, and Israeli Couscous w Wild Rice, Braised Chicken Thighs with Walnuts, Grapes, and z Zesting ZUCCHINI Baked Halibut with Warm Fennel-Zucchini Chopped Salad Citrus-Marinated Salmon with Heirloom Tomato Concassé and Goat’s-Milk Feta Herbed Chicken Paillards with Zucchini Pancakes and Cherry Tomato Pan Sauce acknowledgments I’d like to give thanks to my dad, Eugene Lewis Ferguson, who loved to tickle his taste buds. He unwittingly guided me into the culinary arts, first with the genetic gift of his palate and later with his 1970s Gourmet magazines, which kick-started my culinary life. Thank you to the extraordinary people at Chronicle Books for creating the most beautiful cookbooks in the business. I send much gratitude to my editor, Bill LeBlond, for his vision of this book and the encouragement to write it my way; to editor Amy Treadwell for her expert eye and unerring advice; to managing editors Doug Ogan and Claire Fletcher for cleaning and polishing the manuscript till it sparkled; and to copyeditor Carrie Bradley Neves for her tireless attention to detail.

Rough Guide Directions Bruges & Ghent
by Phil Lee
Published 20 Apr 2008

Nonetheless, obvious highlights include the paintings of the Symbolists, amongst whom Fernand Khnopff (1858–1921) is represented by Secret Reflections, not one of his better paintings perhaps, but interesting in so far as its lower panel, showing St Janshospitaal (see p.70) reflected in a canal, confirms one of the Symbolists’ favourite conceits: “Bruges the dead city”. This was inspired by Georges Rodenbach’s novel Bruges la Morte, a highly stylized musing on love and obsession first published in 1892. The book kickstarted the craze for visiting Bruges, the “dead city”, where the action unfolds. The upper panel of Khnopff ’s painting is a play on appearance and desire, but it’s really rather feeble, unlike his later attempts, in which he painted his sister, Marguerite, again and again, using her refined, almost plastic beauty to stir a vague sense of passion – for she’s desirable and utterly unobtainable in equal measure.

Startup Communities: Building an Entrepreneurial Ecosystem in Your City
by Brad Feld
Published 8 Oct 2012

Venture capital need not be located in your city for it to find opportunities to invest in. We operate in an increasingly flat and mobile world, one where investors quickly hear about interesting opportunities, no matter where they are located. They can find and even invest in deals online and from afar, through services like Angellist (http://startuprev.com/b3) and Kickstarter (http://startuprev.com/e1). Even if venture capitalists miss a good deal, there is nothing like having missed one to convince investors to pay more attention in the future. Communities should spend more time showing investors what they’ve missed, and less time complaining that investors won’t buy into promises of future gains.

Age of Context: Mobile, Sensors, Data and the Future of Privacy
by Robert Scoble and Shel Israel
Published 4 Sep 2013

It is an open platform—the company hopes growth will come from adding not only its own apps, but new functionality from third-party sources. Austin-based WigWag, a similar household PCA, is even younger than SmartThings. When we talked with founder-CEO Ed Hemphill in July 2013, he was raising funds on Kickstarter, the popular crowd-funding site. WigWag is also an open platform that performs tasks similar to those done by SmartThings. What differentiates WigWag are the sensor packs that you set up in each room. The sensors detect unexpected changes, such as patio motion or garden frost, and alert you via text message.

China's Future
by David Shambaugh
Published 11 Mar 2016

The remaining members of the Standing Committee, though, were still tainted by Tiananmen and held very conservative outlooks. This included Premier Li Peng, internal security czar Qiao Shi, and military supremo Liu Huaqing. Thus, although Deng had succeeded in slightly shifting the balance in the leadership and had managed to kick-start economic reforms again (triggering four straight years of double-digit GDP growth), the political atmosphere remained very constrained and harshly repressive. Jiang Zemin’s power was not yet consolidated and China’s leaders remained traumatized from their Party’s own near-death experience and having just witnessed the disintegration and collapse of the Soviet Union and East European communist party-states.

The Second Curve: Thoughts on Reinventing Society
by Charles Handy
Published 12 Mar 2015

The good news is the power that individuals now have, with which they can use those bypasses to manage their own lives. It is becoming a do-it-yourself economy. We can not only buy books online, we can publish our own, should we wish to write any. We need no longer go anywhere near a physical bank; we can even start our own by creating a crowd-funding site. Kickstarter, one of the leading sites, began in 2009 and opened in Britain in 2012. You can, should you wish to take the risk, start your own currency. Bitcoin, Peercoin and Primecoin already exist as internet currencies with a defined amount whose value varies according to the demand, although the risk quickly overtook a couple of the early Britcoin exchanges.

The Misadventures of Awkward Black Girl
by Issa Rae
Published 10 Feb 2015

A Jack-of-all-trades but master-of-none, this black is still figuring everything out in his attempt to find a place in this world. THE APPROACH: Encourage this black to find a focus, but show your support along the way. KEY PHRASES: “Sure, we can do lunch”; “Yes, I’ll listen to your new idea”; “Fine, I’ll donate to your Kickstarter.” The Insecure Black: Constantly concerned with how race plays a factor in their everyday life, these blacks get really uncomfortable when race is brought up, fearing that all eyes will be on them. Does everything have to be about race? they ask. They don’t offer opinions about Obama for fear of appearing biased.

Learning Ansible 2 - Second Edition
by Fabio Alessandro Locati
Published 21 Nov 2016

This means, having a single language for all components and all people within your IT, and this will allow people to understand better how the company IT works as well as working more closely with each other. Ansible Galaxy Ansible Galaxy is a free site from where you can download Ansible roles developed by the community and kick-start your automation within minutes. You can share or review community roles so that others can easily find the most trusted roles on Ansible Galaxy. You can start using Ansible Galaxy by simply signing up with social media applications such as Twitter, Google, and GitHub or by creating a new account on the Ansible Galaxy website at https://galaxy.ansible.com/ and downloading the required roles using the ansible-galaxy command, which ships with Ansible version 1.4.2 and higher.

Digital Transformation at Scale: Why the Strategy Is Delivery
by Andrew Greenway,Ben Terrett,Mike Bracken,Tom Loosemore
Published 18 Jun 2018

There’s no rule that says that a government website has to look worse than a website for Apple, just because it’s ‘good enough for government’. Some of the best and most loved designs in history come from public sector projects: the 1970s’ NASA identity guidelines were released as a hugely popular Kickstarter project. A digital organisation working in any sector should have high design ambitions. As well as using design differently, you’ll need a different type of designer. Good designers work side by side with user researchers and with developers. Good designers can code. Good designers are involved at every stage of a service, not just coming in at the beginning or the end.

The Interior Design Handbook
by Frida Ramstedt
Published 27 Oct 2020

You can expect to spend some time circling around ideas before you finally home in on what you really like and want. 2. Exterior Is there anything about the exterior of the house and its architecture that will help advance your interiors project? The color of the facade, the materials, the style, the history—anything at all that could kick-start your project? 3. Styles Once you’ve been through a huge number of photographs of interiors, the type and style of interior that speaks to you will begin to emerge. The challenge now is to find the courage to sort through everything and to be selective so that your vision becomes clearer in your own mind.

England
by David Else
Published 14 Oct 2010

The first artist with a truly English style and sensibility was arguably William Hogarth, whose riotous (and deeply rude) canvases exposed the vice and corruption of 18th-century London. His most celebrated work is A Rake’s Progress, displayed today at Sir John Soane’s Museum Click here in London, kick-starting a long tradition of British caricatures that can be traced right through to the work of modern-day cartoonists such as Gerald Scarfe and Steve Bell. While Hogarth was busy satirising society, other artists were hard at work showing it in its best light. The leading figures of 18th-century English portraiture are Sir Joshua Reynolds; his rival, Thomas Gainsborough; the Cumbrian-born George Romney; and George Stubbs, known for his intricate studies of animal anatomy (particularly horses).

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Another worthwhile trip from Lechlade is Buscot Park (NT; 01367-240786; www.buscot-park.com; adult/child £7.50/3.75, grounds only £5/2.50; 2-6pm Wed-Fri, grounds only Mon & Tue Apr-Sep & selected weekends), an ornate, Italianate country house set in gardens designed by Harold Peto. The house is now home to the Faringdon art collection, which includes paintings by Rembrandt, Reynolds, Rubens, Van Dyck and Murillo. The house is 2¾ miles southeast of Lechlade on the Faringdon road (A417). * * * SOMETHING FOR THE WEEKEND Kick-start your weekend by checking into the seductively stylish Cotswold House Hotel Click here in Chipping Campden, and take a sunset stroll around the village before dining at Juliana’s or Hick’s Brasserie. First thing the following morning, blow away the cobwebs with a short stroll and magnificent views at Broadway Tower Click here and then head south to Winchcombe Click here, where you can loll about the lovely village or take in some history at the Tudor pile Sudeley Castle Click here.

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It’s also become a magnet for stunt artists and suicides; in 1885 Sarah Ann Hedley jumped from the bridge after a lovers’ tiff, but her voluminous petticoats parachuted her safely to earth and she lived to be 85. * * * HUMAN CARGO It’s a sobering thought that some of Bristol’s 18th-century wealth and splendour was fuelled by brutality and human exploitation. In the late 1600s, the first slave ship set sail from Bristol harbour, kick-starting the city’s connections with the so-called ‘triangular trade’. Africans were kidnapped from their homes, shipped across the Atlantic to America and the Caribbean and sold into a life of slavery. Conditions on the boats were unimaginably horrific; it was expected that one in 10 of those captured would die en route – in reality, many more did.

Coastal California Travel Guide
by Lonely Planet

Creative Culture From the mid-19th-century gold rush to the dot-com bubble, California has survived extreme booms and busts, often getting by on its wits. Today Hollywood still makes most of the world’s movies and TV shows, fed by a vibrant performing-arts scene on stages across the state. In California the hottest trends are usually kick-started not by moguls in offices, but by motley crowds of surfers, artists and coastal dreamers concocting the out-there ideas behind everything from skateboarding to biotechnology. If you linger long enough, you might actually see the future evolving here. Surfing in San Diego | SEBASTIEN BUREL / SHUTTERSTOCK © Why I Love Coastal California By Sara Benson, Writer Like almost half of the people who live here, California wasn't where I was born, but it's where I've chosen to make my home.

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French Bakery CafeBAKERY, CAFE$ ( MAP GOOGLE MAP ; %760-729-2241; www.carlsbadfrenchpastrycafe.com/; 1005 Carlsbad Village Dr; mains $6; h7am-7pm Mon-Sat, 7.30am-5pm Sun; W) Its location may be in a drab-looking shopping center just off I-5, but it’s the real deal for croissants and brioches (baked daily) and kick-start espresso, plus omelets, salads and sandwiches. Pizza PortPIZZA$$ ( MAP GOOGLE MAP ; %760-720-7007; www.pizzaport.com; 571 Carlsbad Village Dr; pizzas $7-24; h11am-10pm Mon-Thu, to midnight Fri & Sat, 10am-11pm Sun; c) Rockin’ and raucous local brewpub chain with surf art, rock music and ‘anti-wimpy’ pizzas to go with the signature Sharkbite Red Ale.

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But since the 1960s, Californians have trailblazed another, ‘greener’ way by choosing more sustainable foods and low-impact lifestyles, preserving old-growth forests with tree-sitting activism, declaring urban nuclear-free zones, pushing for environmentally progressive legislation and establishing the biggest US market for hybrid vehicles. Over 60% of Californians admit that, yes, they’ve actually hugged a tree. That shouldn’t really come as a surprise. It was Californians who helped kick-start the world’s conservation movement in the midst of the 19th-century industrial revolution, with laws curbing industrial dumping, swaths of prime real estate set aside as urban green space, and pristine wilderness protected by national and state parks. Today, even conservative California politicians may prioritize environmental issues on their agendas – at least as much as the state’s economic recovery and several recent years of severe drought allow.

The One-Minute Workout
by Martin Gibala
Published 5 Jan 2017

Peak Intensity • 3 Duration • 30 minutes The Evidence • Walking is the best medicine, according to many doctors. It’s easy, convenient, and cheap. The problem is that some people’s pace may not be fast enough to increase their physical fitness. So a group out of Japan’s Shinshu University pioneered interval walking for older people who don’t do much physical activity, kick-starting a whole series of studies on the topic. In general, these protocols involve speeding up the pace for around three minutes, easing off for about the same amount of time, and then pushing up the pace again. Compared with walking at a steady pace, the interval-based routine has been shown to result in much larger improvements in cardiorespiratory fitness and much larger decreases in blood pressure for those who are out of shape.

Beer Money: A Memoir of Privilege and Loss
by Frances Stroh
Published 2 May 2016

Then Trevor and I arranged a theory seminar for the MA program, inviting all the top theorists in London. Suddenly I had access to people I’d only read about in the States. These luminaries came out to the pub with us after class and, later, to my dinner parties. I had finally landed exactly where I needed to be, it seemed. The change of longitude acted as a kick-starter for my art. I worked feverishly day and night to keep up with the intense flow of ideas, making small installations in my studio as sketches for larger pieces. I spent hours each day slicing up Dennis Cooper’s Frisk, line by line, just as Cooper’s protagonist sliced up his victims’ bodies. I relabeled beer bottles with the dismembered text and sold them as art objects at a pub on the King’s Road.

The Docker Book
by James Turnbull
Published 13 Jul 2014

His most recent book was The LogStash Book (http://www.logstashbook.com) about the popular open source logging tool. James also authored two books about Puppet (Pro Puppet and the earlier book about Puppet). He is the author of three other books, including Pro Linux System Administration, Pro Nagios 2.0, and Hardening Linux. For a real job, James is CTO at Kickstarter. He was formerly at Docker as VP of Services and Support, Venmo as VP of Engineering and Puppet Labs as VP of Technical Operations. He likes food, wine, books, photography, and cats. He is not overly keen on long walks on the beach and holding hands. Conventions in the book This is an inline code statement.

Attention Factory: The Story of TikTok and China's ByteDance
by Matthew Brennan
Published 9 Oct 2020

Given how Douyin and TikTok were separate networks, there was much scope for beneficial exchanges between the operations teams. When something became popular in China, the teams would judge if it was suitable to introduce into other markets. Vise-versa, something trending on TikTok, may be brought into Douyin. Videos imported from Douyin and other regions could be used to kickstart a new region’s content pool. These were essential “teaching materials” to guide and inspire. The videos had been verified as enjoyable and reproducible, allowing users to imitate them easily. Above: Search was global, while each region drew from their isolated local pool of videos to display a personalized ‘For You’ feed.

Under a White Sky: The Nature of the Future
by Elizabeth Kolbert
Published 15 Mar 2021

“The start of the switchover from control of climate by nature to control by humans occurred several thousand years ago,” William Ruddiman, a professor emeritus at the University of Virginia and the most prominent proponent of an “early Anthropocene,” has written. According to a second, more widely held view, the switchover only really started in the late-eighteenth century, after the Scottish engineer James Watt designed a new kind of steam engine. Watt’s engine, it’s often said, anachronistically, “kick-started” the Industrial Revolution. As water power gave way to steam power, CO2 emissions began to rise, at first slowly, then vertiginously. In 1776, the first year Watt marketed his invention, humans emitted some fifteen million tons of CO2. By 1800, that figure had risen to thirty million tons. By 1850 it had increased to two hundred million tons a year and by 1900 to almost two billion.

Technically Wrong: Sexist Apps, Biased Algorithms, and Other Threats of Toxic Tech
by Sara Wachter-Boettcher
Published 9 Oct 2017

In fact, most of the recruiters didn’t even want to see her résumé. They would avoid looking her in the eye. Or tell her to go online and apply. Or turn away to talk to someone else. And so she felt invisible—erased from an event that, she thought, was designed for people like her: young women aiming to kick-start their technical careers. Thomas had good reason to think Grace Hopper would lead to internship opportunities, too. These companies talk endlessly about how hard it is to find enough programmers to fill their positions. Other women told her they’d left the event swimming in job offers to choose from.

Big Bucks: The Explosion of the Art Market in the 21st Century
by Georgina Adam
Published 14 Jun 2014

And at the end of 2013 the city’s new profile as an art destination was boosted by the opening of the Pérez Art Museum Miami (PAMM), in a landmark Herzog & De Meuron-designed building on the waters of Biscayne Bay. National pride is also involved, and hosting an art fair is a way of putting a country on the world’s cultural map. So particularly in the Gulf, where states are feverishly competing to build museums and kick-start an art scene, fairs may be partly state-funded. Dubai’s art fair is part owned by the Dubai International Finance Centre, and Abu Dhabi Art is wholly created by the emirate’s cultural arm. Many question the logic of organising and funding an art fair in Abu Dhabi, a country with essentially just one major buyer, in the form of the royal family.

Life in the Universe: A Beginner's Guide
by Lewis Dartnell
Published 1 Mar 2007

The solar wind would generally be strong enough to blow aside the cloud without any ill effect but an especially dense section of cloud would overpower the Sun’s protective bubble and flood into the solar system. The dust would gravitate towards the planets and settle in the upper atmosphere, blocking out the sunlight for around 200,000 years while the solar system passes through the cloud. At the least, this could shut down photosynthesis, at the worst, it could kick-start global glaciation. So, the spiral arms pose three main dangers – supernovae, close shaves with other stars and interstellar dust clouds. It is difficult to calculate exactly the Sun’s path around the galaxy but some researchers have attempted it, finding that several mass extinctions do indeed correspond with previous crossings of spiral arms.

Blockchain Chicken Farm: And Other Stories of Tech in China's Countryside
by Xiaowei Wang
Published 12 Oct 2020

Curated Instagram campaigns, featuring prominent influencers, are launched by a vast landscape of small, new “lifestyle brands”—companies based outside China that source directly from AliExpress. Manufacturers on AliExpress also move with lightning speed in customizing designs. Many crowdfunded products made on Kickstarter are produced by these small manufacturers as well. Wish.com, with headquarters based in Menlo Park, is a peculiar version of Amazon with half a billion users. It is a drop-shipper, sourcing from AliExpress, but its customer base is in the Midwest, Texas, and Florida. Its diverse users range from those who frequent flea markets and swap meets to racists who post on 4chan about the “cheap chink gear” available.

The Great Economists Ten Economists whose thinking changed the way we live-FT Publishing International (2014)
by Phil Thornton
Published 7 May 2014

Since aggregate growth is made up of consumer spending, business investment and government expenditure – plus the difference between imports and exports – if the first two are declining only the intervention of the third can stop the rot. But Keynes was not an advocate of Marx – he was in fact contemptuous of Das Kapital. Instead he believed the state should ‘prime the pump’, using its economic weight to kick-start a recovery, by encouraging spending and investment that would not otherwise take place. Spending by the state would lead to greater spending by people and thus by businesses, ultimately leading to more people finding a job. In one of the most-cited passages of The General Theory, Keynes says that if the Treasury were to ‘fill old bottles with banknotes [and then] bury them at suitable depths in disused coal mines which are then filled up to the surface with Chapter 5 • John Maynard Keynes103 town rubbish, and leave it to private enterprise on well-tried principles of laissez-faire to dig the notes up again … there need be no more unemployment and … the real income of the community and its capital wealth also would probably become a good deal greater than it actually is’.

The Passenger: Paris
by AA.VV.
Published 26 Jun 2021

In short, when I talk about a city, I can approach it from any number of angles and express my love for it or – perhaps more likely – my hate. What’s more, as Baudelaire wrote of the Paris of his day – and it still holds true – ‘the shape of a city changes faster, alas, than the heart of a mortal’. Sometimes all it takes is a property operation with a well-planned strategy to kick-start the gentrification of a whole neighbourhood. A city is a complex organism, living and evolving, and Paris is no exception. Go away for a while, come back again and, like a friend you haven’t seen for a long time, you recognise them immediately while noting the lines that have deepened on their face or their new hair-do.

Why Nations Fail: The Origins of Power, Prosperity, and Poverty
by Daron Acemoglu and James Robinson
Published 20 Mar 2012

The Chinese experience does raise several interesting questions about the future of Chinese growth and, more important, the desirability and viability of authoritarian growth. Such growth has become a popular alternative to the “Washington consensus,” which emphasizes the importance of market and trade liberalization and certain forms of institutional reform for kick-starting economic growth in many less developed parts of the world. While part of the appeal of authoritarian growth comes as a reaction to the Washington consensus, perhaps its greater charm—certainly to the rulers presiding over extractive institutions—is that it gives them free rein in maintaining and even strengthening their hold on power and legitimizes their extraction.

…

Instead, corrupt politics, patronage networks, and conflict persisted in Venezuela, and in part as a result, when voters went to the polls, they were even willing to support potential despots such as Hugo Chávez, most likely because they thought he alone could stand up to the established elites of Venezuela. In consequence, Venezuela still languishes under extractive institutions, while Brazil broke the mold. WHAT CAN BE DONE to kick-start or perhaps just facilitate the process of empowerment and thus the development of inclusive political institutions? The honest answer of course is that there is no recipe for building such institutions. Naturally there are some obvious factors that would make the process of empowerment more likely to get off the ground.

Alcohol: A History
by Rod Phillips
Published 14 Oct 2014

By the beginning of the Christian era, Romans had sponsored the planting of vineyards in many of the best-known modern wine regions in France (including Bordeaux, the Rhône Valley, and Burgundy), as well as in England and many parts of central and eastern Europe. At first, vineyards were owned by Romans, but in time, non-Roman inhabitants of the empire were given rights of ownership. With due recognition to Greek influence in the south and Etruscan winemakers in the north of Italy, the modern European wine industry was kick-started by the growth of Rome and its enormous demand for wine. It is possible that what became a massive wine market in Rome resulted from a shift in diet. For centuries, Romans consumed cereal in the form of gruel or porridge, known as puls, and bread was a relative latecomer to the Roman diet. Bread might have been baked in private homes, but the first public bakeries were set up between 171 and 168 BC.19 The shift from a wet food (puls) to a dry one (bread) required liquid to wash it down, and wine was the chosen beverage.

…

Be that as it may, it is clear that the production and consumption of spirits did increase dramatically in some parts of England (especially in London) during the first half of the eighteenth century, and that this must have had implications for the health and well-being of many individuals and for the social order more generally. It is difficult, however, to assess the scale of the phenomenon and its consequences and to understand why they provoked a moral panic. The popularity of gin in England was kick-started by a shortage of brandy, which by the late seventeenth century was being imported from France in substantial volumes: 2 million gallons a year by the 1680s. These imports were interrupted when William of Orange, a Protestant Dutch prince, became king of England in 1688, causing a rupture in England’s relations with the aggressively Catholic king of France, Louis XIV.

Hands-On Machine Learning With Scikit-Learn and TensorFlow: Concepts, Tools, and Techniques to Build Intelligent Systems
by Aurélien Géron
Published 13 Mar 2017

Not only does this hierarchical architecture help DNNs converge faster to a good solution, it also improves their ability to generalize to new datasets. For example, if you have already trained a model to recognize faces in pictures, and you now want to train a new neural network to recognize hairstyles, then you can kickstart training by reusing the lower layers of the first network. Instead of randomly initializing the weights and biases of the first few layers of the new neural network, you can initialize them to the value of the weights and biases of the lower layers of the first network. This way the network will not have to learn from scratch all the low-level structures that occur in most pictures; it will only have to learn the higher-level structures (e.g., hairstyles).

…

Such an RBM stack is called a deep belief net (DBN). Yee-Whye Teh, one of Geoffrey Hinton’s students, observed that it was possible to train DBNs one layer at a time using Contrastive Divergence, starting with the lower layers and then gradually moving up to the top layers. This led to the groundbreaking article that kickstarted the Deep Learning tsunami in 2006.2 Just like RBMs, DBNs learn to reproduce the probability distribution of their inputs, without any supervision. However, they are much better at it, for the same reason that deep neural networks are more powerful than shallow ones: real-world data is often organized in hierarchical patterns, and DBNs take advantage of that.

The Enemy Within
by Seumas Milne
Published 1 Dec 1994

Copeland had made repeated attempts to track down the miners’ leader, even calling the NUM’s barrister, John Hendy QC, at his Lincoln’s Inn chambers in London, to leave an urgent message. Now he explained why. The former CIA man warned Scargill and Heathfield – who listened in to the discussion on a conference phone – that he had reliable information that both the domestic security service, MI5, and the CIA had been closely involved in kick-starting the media campaign. They had, Copeland said, in different ways helped to frame the corruption allegations against the miners’ leadership. However, he refused to expand on his remarks and promptly disappeared into the ether. Copeland was well known to have maintained close connections with the CIA’s powerful London station after his retirement.

…

I wasn’t sure about it myself.” ’ Windsor’s habit of setting officials and staff against each other is attested to by almost everybody who worked with him at the NUM head office – though Windsor himself blames Scargill.23 One early example – and a taste of things to come – took place in the first couple of months of the 1984–5 strike, long before Libya, when Windsor’s star was still very much in the ascendant. Peter McNestry, leader of the pit deputies’ union NACODS, had laboriously set up a three-way exchange of letters between himself, the NUM and the Coal Board with a view to kick-starting negotiations. When a phrase from the NUM letter was quoted on a radio news broadcast, neither Scargill nor Heathfield – who were driving along different motorways at the time – recognized it. Both stopped at the nearest service station and angrily rang the union’s Sheffield head office to find out what was going on.

Buyology
by Martin Lindstrom
Published 14 Jul 2008

In other words, eventually I believe sex in advertising will go underground. Sexual ads in the future will get sneakier, subtler. They’ll suggest, but they won’t complete. They’ll flirt, but take it no further than that. They’ll propose, then leave the rest up to our imaginations. In short, you could say that the future of sex in ads will be to kick-start a journey into our own heads. Now it’s time to let your brain take over. 11 08/08/2009 10:45 71 of 83 file:///D:/000004/Buy__ology.html CONCLUSION Brand New Day IN THIS BOOK, YOU’VE witnessed an historic meeting between science and marketing. A union of apparent opposites that, I hope, has shed new light on how you make decisions about what you buy—everything from food, to cell phones, to cigarettes, even to political candidates—and why.

Pity the Billionaire: The Unexpected Resurgence of the American Right
by Thomas Frank
Published 16 Aug 2011

Most responsible accounts of the Crash of 2008 emphasize the role of deregulation, incentives, and the free-market faith in the building of the bubble. I repeat all these well-known tales here for this reason: according to the logic of hard times—according to logic tout court—the Crash of ’08 should have kick-started the hard-times scenario in the same way the events of 1929–32 did. And for a while it seemed as though matters were moving inexorably down those Depression-era tracks. The financial heroes of previous years became objects of public wrath almost immediately. We turned on the politicians who bailed out their friends.

Thinking in Systems: A Primer
by Meadows. Donella and Diana Wright
Published 3 Dec 2008

It’s not that parameters aren’t important—they can be, especially in the short term and to the individual who’s standing directly in the flow. People care deeply about such variables as taxes and the minimum wage, and so fight fierce battles over them. But changing these variables rarely changes the behavior of the national economy system. If the system is chronically stagnant, parameter changes rarely kick-start it. If it’s wildly variable, they usually don’t stabilize it. If it’s growing out of control, they don’t slow it down. Whatever cap we put on campaign contributions, it doesn’t clean up politics. The Fed’s fiddling with the interest rate hasn’t made business cycles go away. (We always forget that during upturns, and are shocked, shocked by the downturns.)

Travel While You Work: The Ultimate Guide to Running a Business From Anywhere
by Mish Slade
Published 13 Aug 2015

The beauty of this solution is that it doesn't rely on any kind of data connection at all – so even with no wifi and a $5 pay-as-you-go SIM with no data plan, you can receive your calls. For outgoing calls, there's also a "web callback" feature that works out cheaper than Skype in most cases. You will need an internet connection for it, but only to kickstart the call; after that it all happens through your phone (so it still comes in handy if you have an unreliable connection that might drop in and out during Skype calls). Aaand done! The Didlogic website is a bit of a mess – and thoroughly useless in helping you get started – so Rob's recorded a quick screencast with an overview of how to set everything up.

Blueprint for Revolution: How to Use Rice Pudding, Lego Men, and Other Nonviolent Techniques to Galvanize Communities, Overthrow Dictators, or Simply Change the World
by Srdja Popovic and Matthew Miller
Published 3 Feb 2015

, on a wall in Belgrade, Serbia, during the autumn of 1998. 1.2 The logo of former Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez’s TV show, Aló Presidente. 1.3 An Egyptian woman displaying the logo of the April 6th movement. (Mohamed Abd El Ghany, Reuters) 2.1 “The people of Libya are united.” 2.2 Tel Aviv Pride: A family day in Israel, 2011. (Nina Jean Grant) 3.1 Using rice pudding to kickstart a revolution. Lonuziyaaraiy Kolhu, Maldives. (Munshid Mohamed) 3.2 A child in Moscow, May 2012. (Julia Ioffe) 4.1 The pillars of Yemen’s power, 2011. (Khaled Abdullah Ali Al Mahdi, Reuters) 4.2 The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., after delivering his “I Have a Dream” speech in Washington, D.C., August 28, 1963. 5.1 “A Dime for Change”: a dilemma action organized by Otpor!

Utopia for Realists: The Case for a Universal Basic Income, Open Borders, and a 15-Hour Workweek
by Rutger Bregman
Published 13 Sep 2014

.” – Richard Wilkinson, co-author of The Spirit Level: Why More Equal Societies Almost Always Do Better “Rutger Bregman makes a compelling case for Universal Basic Income with a wealth of data and rooted in a keen understanding of the political and intellectual history of capitalism. He shows the many ways in which human progress has turned a Utopia into a Eutopia – a positive future that we can achieve with the right policies.” – Albert Wenger, entrepreneur and partner at Union Square Ventures, early backers of Twitter, Tumblr, Foursquare, Etsy, and Kickstarter “Learning from history and from up-to-date social science can shatter crippling illusions. It can turn allegedly utopian proposals into plain common sense. It can enable us to face the future with unprecedented enthusiasm. To see how, read this superbly written, upbeat, insightful book.” – Philippe van Parijs, Harvard University professor and cofounder of the Basic Income Earth Network “A wonderful call to utopian thinking around incomes and the workweek, and a welcome antidote to the pessimism surrounding robots taking our jobs.” – Charles Kenny, senior fellow at the Center for Global Development and author of The Upside of Down: Why the Rise of the Rest is Great for the West “A bold call for utopian thinking and a world without work – something needed more than ever in an era of defeatism and lack of ambition.

Ours to Hack and to Own: The Rise of Platform Cooperativism, a New Vision for the Future of Work and a Fairer Internet
by Trebor Scholz and Nathan Schneider
Published 14 Aug 2017

Financially, the organization is bootstrapped with a small pool of funding from the community and is committed to forgoing traditional investment in favor of voluntary funding from the network. In May 2015, the ERS was just an idea born out of frustration with fundraising and income inequality, but under the mentorship of Gary Chou at Orbital NYC we were able to validate some early assumptions and raise money via Kickstarter to bring together a seed community for the Weird Economics Summit in NYC in November 2015. In 2016, we hope to develop a minimum viable product of the platform and pilot it in partnership with like-minded organizations. Project Name: Data Commons Cooperative Completed by: Noemi Giszpenc Location: Massachusetts URL: datacommons.coop The Data Commons Cooperative brings together cooperative, solidarity, social, generative, “new” economy organizations that are cataloging or mapping some slice of that space.

Symmetry and the Monster
by Ronan, Mark
Published 14 Sep 2006

It is an intriguing list, but it shows there were no new surprises to be had in this direction. There was another big surprise to come – and Fischer found it – but let us first talk about Aschbacher. The ‘Classification project’ – the project to find a complete list of symmetry atoms and show that the list is complete – had been kick-started by the great theorem of Feit and Thompson, and then moved forward by Thompson’s own work. After him, the second most important contributor was Aschbacher, whose work really took off in the early 1970s. He went straight for the real problems underlying the project, churning out one result after another, and sweeping aside some of the cross-section problems that others had been planning to work on.

Puzzling People: The Labyrinth of the Psychopath
by Thomas Sheridan
Published 1 Mar 2011

You may want to cut your own heart out to get rid of the pain. It may feel like your thoughts are thinking you, that you are losing your mind… this is because you are detoxing. You’ve experienced a surge of dopamine rushing through your brain stimulating a cascade of shimmering pleasure. Norepinephrine kick-started the production of adrenaline that made your heart pound. The payoff of a phenethylamine-flooded nervous system was bliss. The primary sexual arousal hormone oxytocin mimicked the buildup of orgasm and subsequent feelings of emotional attachment. This chemical cocktail overcame critical faculties and left you defenceless to your emotional-high drug pusher.

Getting Better: Why Global Development Is Succeeding--And How We Can Improve the World Even More
by Charles Kenny
Published 31 Jan 2011

In tandem with these developments in economic theory, the 1980s saw the evolution of a set of development policy recommendations that came to be known as the Washington Consensus. It was “Washington” because it was spearheaded by US economists and policy wonks, and supported by the World Bank and International Monetary Fund headquartered in the American capital. And a “Consensus” because nearly everyone in Washington agreed about what the developing world should do to kick-start economic development. Among the policies linked with the consensus were devaluation, reduction of budget deficits, liberalization of prices and interest rates, and privatization. What connected these policies was a belief that governments had played an overactive role in promoting development, taking on tasks best left to the private sector and abusing powers best left unused.

House of Debt: How They (And You) Caused the Great Recession, and How We Can Prevent It From Happening Again
by Atif Mian and Amir Sufi
Published 11 May 2014

For example, during the Great Recession and afterward, the Federal Reserve aggressively purchased mortgage-backed securities in order to push down mortgage interest rates facing households. The belief was that cheaper rates on outstanding mortgages and other loans through which households would spend would kick-start the economy. However, households that normally have the highest marginal propensity to consume out of loans either cannot or do not want to borrow more. Remember, in a levered-losses episode, borrowers experience a massive shock to their wealth. Many of them are underwater on their homes or have very low credit scores as a result of default.

How We Got Here: A Slightly Irreverent History of Technology and Markets
by Andy Kessler
Published 13 Jun 2005

After yet another bank run Roosevelt declared an 8-day banking holiday after which confidence in banks returned and deposits flowed back in. Later in 1933, the U.S. dropped the gold standard, following England, which dropped it in 1931. Unshackled, money supply could now increase and replenish banks. After a yearlong recession in 1938, New Deal spending kick-started the economy. A world war kept it going. MODERN GOLD 167 *** Meanwhile, the Germans were stuck paying WW I reparations. In 1921, the victors presented a bill for 132 billion gold marks. With a crippled industrial base and dependency on imports for raw materials, the Germans were forced to print money to pay back debts.

Every Nation for Itself: Winners and Losers in a G-Zero World
by Ian Bremmer
Published 30 Apr 2012

Spiraling deficits became a defining feature of U.S. foreign policy. Barack Obama, who inherited both wars and an economy in free fall, spent much of his time and attention during his first year in office on the passage of health care reform rather than on much-needed changes to international financial market rules or on policies to kick-start long-term economic growth. But the problem didn’t begin with George W. Bush or Barack Obama. In 1980, the United States was the world’s largest creditor nation. By 1987, it was the world’s largest debtor nation, with a trade imbalance that soared to $170 billion. Republicans will blame the Democratic Congress of that period.

A History of the World in 6 Glasses
by Tom Standage
Published 1 Jan 2005

Jean Barbot, a French trader, observed on visiting the west coast of Africa in 1679 that he found "a great alteration: the French brandy, whereof I had always had a good quantity abroad, being much less demanded, by reason that a great quantity of spirits and rum had been bought on that coast." By 1721 one English trader reported that rum had become the "chief barter" on the slave coast of Africa, even for gold. Rum also took over from brandy as the currency in which canoemen and guards were paid. Brandy helped to kick-start the transatlantic trade in sugar and slaves, but rum made it self-fueling and far more profitable. Unlike beer, which was usually produced and consumed locally, and wine, which was usually made and traded within a specific region, rum was the result of the convergence of materials, people, and technologies from around the world, and the product of several intersecting historical forces.

The Best Interface Is No Interface: The Simple Path to Brilliant Technology (Voices That Matter)
by Golden Krishna
Published 10 Feb 2015

Their app didn’t thrive off PVS or addiction—it created customer satisfaction by keeping your smartphone in your pocket. * The first Lockitron did have near-field communication (NFC) capabilities, but unfortunately the market share for NFC was nearly nonexistent at the time. This second-generation Lockitron raised $2.2 million on the crowd-funding site Kickstarter from potential customers.36 An impressive amount for a door lock. There are lessons to be learned from Lockitron’s approach to its second- generation product. If we embrace our typical processes instead of graphic user interfaces, we can start to discover elegant solutions. All it takes is a little observation, empathy, and understanding.

The Simpsons and Their Mathematical Secrets
by Simon Singh
Published 29 Oct 2013

Fortunately, a company named Pacific Data Images (PDI) volunteered its services, because it realized that The Simpsons would provide a global platform for showcasing its technology. Indeed, PDI signed a deal with DreamWorks later that year which led directly to the production of Antz and Shrek, thereby kick-starting a revolution in film animation. When Homer approaches a signpost indicating the x, y, and z axes in his new three-dimensional universe, he alludes to the fact that he is standing within the most sophisticated animated scene ever to have appeared on television: “Man, this place looks expensive.

The Nation City: Why Mayors Are Now Running the World
by Rahm Emanuel
Published 25 Feb 2020

One of LaHood’s prerogatives when he became the transportation secretary was to revive something known as the Transportation Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Act (TIFIA), which provided low-interest loans for infrastructure projects of “regional or national significance.” These loans were designed to kick-start projects and to be used as leverage to raise more investment monies. The act had been passed in 1998, but it had essentially gone dormant, as so many federal acts do. That left, in essence, billions of dollars sitting there with nowhere to go. LaHood wanted to get that money working again, and I wanted to help him do just that, but only in Chicago.

The Age of Illusions: How America Squandered Its Cold War Victory
by Andrew J. Bacevich
Published 7 Jan 2020

Things related and not.”20 None of this is to suggest that Bush served as a mere mouthpiece or puppet. He was, by his own account, fully in charge. As he once put it, “I’m the decider, and I decide what’s best.”21 Yet had Bush chosen to look elsewhere for counsel—to his more circumspect father, for example—things might have gone differently. As it was, to kick-start his war, the decider decided to invade Afghanistan in the fall of 2001 and then Iraq in the spring of 2003. The immediate aim of the former, known as Operation Enduring Freedom, was to overthrow the Taliban, guilty of having provided sanctuary to Osama bin Laden and members of al-Qaeda. The immediate purpose of the latter, known as Operation Iraqi Freedom, was to topple Saddam Hussein, accused of possessing weapons of mass destruction and being in cahoots with bin Laden.

Drink?: The New Science of Alcohol and Your Health
by David Nutt
Published 9 Jan 2020

NHS advice says if you stop drinking for two weeks, you can reverse fatty liver disease (after this, you need to carry on drinking within the guidelines, of course).9 But the time it takes to recover will depend on the severity of your condition, among other factors, especially being overweight. 2) Alcoholic hepatitis Most of the alcohol you drink is broken down in the liver, into energy plus acetaldehyde, which at one carbon atom longer than formaldehyde (used to preserve Damien Hirst’s sharks and cows) is even more of a toxic pickling agent than alcohol. This poison also kick-starts the process of inflammation. If you go on a significant binge – maybe half to a whole bottle of spirits or ten units in the course of an evening – you can get acute alcoholic hepatitis. Your liver will become inflamed by the vast amount of alcohol you have taken. Occasionally people die of a very fatty liver that becomes inflamed.

Team Topologies: Organizing Business and Technology Teams for Fast Flow
by Matthew Skelton and Manuel Pais
Published 16 Sep 2019

Even though many people see DevOps as fundamentally addressing technological aspects of automation and tooling, only organizations that also address fundamental misalignments between teams are able to achieve the full potential benefits from adopting DevOps. DevOps Topologies The DevOps Topologies catalog, originally created by Matthew Skelton in 2013 and later expanded by Manuel Pais, is an online collection of team design and interactions patterns and anti-patterns that work well for kick-starting conversations around team responsibilities, interfaces, and collaboration between technology teams.6 Crucially, successful patterns are strongly dependent on contextual aspects, like organization and product size, engineering maturity, and shared goals. The topologies became an effective reference of team structures for enterprise software delivery; however, they were never meant to be static structures, but rather a depiction of a moment in time influenced by multiple factors, like the type of products delivered, technical leadership, and operational experience.

The Longing for Less: Living With Minimalism
by Kyle Chayka
Published 21 Jan 2020

The tactic has been adopted everywhere from Denver and Athens to Abu Dhabi, Leipzig, and the Japanese island of Naoshima. Each place tries to lure money like bees to flowers by installing an extravagant array of art in equally extravagant surroundings—part art museum, part intentional tourist trap. Marfa has either thrived or suffered under the same theory, depending on your perspective. Kickstarted by Judd, the town is now a hipster oasis. It features in lifestyle photo shoots and literary novels alike. Ben Lerner’s 2014 novel30 10:04 evoked Marfa as the locus of artist residencies, late-night parties, and accidental ketamine ingestion. While researching there I stayed at an inn that was operated entirely on Airbnb.

Protecting Pollinators
by Jodi Helmer
Published 15 Nov 2019

Exploding development means less pollinator habitat and longer distances between available habitats. By planting “pollinator patches” in Charlotte—and throughout North Carolina—Hjarding hoped to provide a network for fragile populations to congregate. She recruited fifty households in five neighborhoods to kick-start the North Carolina Butterfly Highway in 2015. The project has grown to include 1,700 patches of habitat at parks, government buildings, community centers, and residential yards. (Around the same time when Hjarding launched the North Carolina Butterfly Highway, former Charlotte mayor Jennifer Roberts signed the Mayor’s Monarch Pledge, creating a new landscape ordinance that required at least 50 percent of all new trees, shrubs, and ground cover planted as part of city projects in Charlotte to be native plants.)

Insanely Great: The Life and Times of Macintosh, the Computer That Changed Everything
by Steven Levy
Published 2 Feb 1994

At the time, though, word of the performance did not spread to the world at large, to whom the revolution was directed. Engelbart's project had a single major patron: the Advanced Research Project Agency of the United States Department of Defense. Unbeknownst to Timothy Leary when he attempted to levitate the evil Pentagon in 1967, this little-known branch of Defense was quietly kick-starting the computer revolution that would result in the Macintosh. I don't want to pretty this up too much now: the interest of the Defense Department was of course the development of systems that could toast the flesh of opposing soldiers and noisome bystanders. But from the start, ARPA's leadership was enlightened: the very first person in charge of the Information Processing Techniques Office was J. c.

HWFG: Here We F**king Go
by Chris McQueer
Published 8 Nov 2018

‘You can do better. He’s a bam.’ ‘He’s a fitbaw player! Plays for Rangers! Jesus Christ, Karen.’ ‘Och, calm down,’ Karen said, walking ahead. ‘You had no chance, anyway.’ ‘Aw, is that right, aye?’ Brenda muttered to herself. She would see to it she would get her own back. That night kickstarted their animosity. They remained pals to outdo each other, and were always looking for new ways to get one over. Karen got into Glasgow Uni so Brenda had to make sure she did too. In second year, Brenda took up marine biology, as did Karen. Before they knew it they were the best underwater team, not just in Scotland, but in the world.

Built for Growth: How Builder Personality Shapes Your Business, Your Team, and Your Ability to Win
by Chris Kuenne and John Danner
Published 5 Jun 2017

With experts in place and early demand for a better way to source parts in a fast-growing industry, Lidow told us, “iSuppli benefited from many unfair competitive advantages: my good reputation in the tech community, my direct knowledge of what was valuable yet not being done well in the market, and my personal financial ability to kick-start development.” However, these things rarely align perfectly by chance. Rather, they are evidence of this Explorer’s gifts of systematic problem solving, anchored in the confidence he can create a better way. It was a call from the company’s largest customer that galvanized iSuppli. Lidow remembers the customer’s ultimatum: “Throw out all you have been working on and deliver one million Tantalum Capacitors next month!

Squid Empire: The Rise and Fall of the Cephalopods
by Danna Staaf
Published 14 Apr 2017

Finally, we’ll bring ourselves up to date with the human-dominated Anthropocene, settling into the contemporary shape of the world as we look around us at the results of the past 500 million years. Return from the Deep After an initial warm spell following the end-Cretaceous extinction, continental drift and enthusiastic plant growth cooled the planet and kick-started a global ocean circulation pattern that would maintain itself up to the present day. Perhaps facilitated by these changes, deep-water coleoids reinvaded shallow water, developing and honing their eyesight, camouflage, and behavior along the way. The “warm spell” was really more of a “hot spot.”

Woolly: The True Story of the Quest to Revive History's Most Iconic Extinct Creature
by Ben Mezrich
Published 3 Jul 2017

The harvested eggs from the dogs in the operating room were placed in a Petri dish. A pipette was used to remove the eggs’ DNA, and then the DNA from another dog—usually, from a living skin cell—was inserted, through a process called “somatic cell nuclear transfer.” The egg was then stimulated with an electrical charge, forcing it to divide, essentially kick-starting its growth into a functioning embryo. Then the sample was brought back into the operating theater and carefully placed into another dog’s healthy uterus. Life from life, Minh thought, as he moved past the implantation table and headed toward a pair of double doors in the back of the operating theater.

Explaining Humans: What Science Can Teach Us About Life, Love and Relationships
by Camilla Pang
Published 12 Mar 2020

The people who don’t shout the loudest or push themselves to the front of the queue, but without whom a group can lose its balance and fall apart. Kinase proteins Once the signal hits the kinase protein (enzyme), things start to really happen. Kinases are the motivators of biochemistry. In simple terms, they catalyse the transfer of chemical energy groups to their downstream effectors and interactors, kick-starting all the necessary functions for a cell to respond to change. ‘You’re a bit of a kinase, aren’t you?’ I once said to a friend, not getting the approving reaction I had expected from a comment that was intended as complimentary and reassuring. Nor did she respond well when I followed up with a helpful explanation: ‘Kinases, they are one of the most promiscuous and popular proteins in a cell.’

The Rare Metals War
by Guillaume Pitron
Published 15 Feb 2020

‘At equal magnetic strength, a rare-earth magnet is 100 times smaller than a ferrite magnet,’ an industry expert explained. ‘This is about miniaturisation; rare earths make objects smaller.’6 It’s also about making electric engines powerful enough to challenge the dominance of internal-combustion engines. It gave the energy transition and digitalisation a formidable kickstart. This is also precisely where the trouble started. Rewind to the 1980s. Rare-earth magnets are all the rage, and have colonised manufacturing sectors the world over — giving Japan, and its electronics company Hitachi, which holds the patent, the unassailable lead in the industry. So much so, in fact, that ‘the Japanese banned the export of this technology to China’, Chen Zhanheng told me.7 Beijing wasn’t put off in the slightest by the embargo.

Die With Zero: Getting All You Can From Your Money and Your Life
by Bill Perkins
Published 27 Jul 2020

McCabe, and Kathleen Andereck, “Seniors’ Travel Constraints: Stepwise Logistic Regression Analysis,” Tourism Analysis 13 (2008): 341–54, https://asu.pure.elsevier.com/en/publications/seniors-travel-constraints-stepwise-logis​tic-regression-analysis. your interests gradually narrow: Robert M. Sapolsky, “Open Season,” New Yorker, March 30, 1998, https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/1998/03/30/open-season-2. worked hard to achieve: Rachel Honeyman, “Proof That 65 Is Never Too Late to Kickstart Your Fitness Journey,” GMB Fitness, November 20, 2016, https://gmb.io/stephen-v/. before-and-after pictures on the Internet: Valerie Cross, “Jaime and Matt Staples Win $150,000 Weight Loss Bet from Bill Perkins,” PokerNews, March 23, 2018, https://www.pokernews.com/news/2018/03/jaime-staples-set-to-collect-on-150k-weight-loss-prop-bet-30300.htm.

Dopamine Nation: Finding Balance in the Age of Indulgence
by Anna Lembke
Published 24 Aug 2021

“When people first started doing this work,” Rosenwasser told me, “it was assumed, mistakenly, that running wheels were a way to keep track of the animals’ spontaneous activity: rest versus movement. Somewhere along the way, people became sensitive to the fact that running wheels are not inert. They’re interesting in themselves. One of the kickstarters was adult hippocampal neurogenesis.” This refers to the discovery some decades ago that contrary to previous teaching, humans can generate new neurons in the brain into middle and late adulthood. “Once people accepted that new neurons are born and integrated into neural circuitry,” Rosenwasser continued, “one of the easiest ways to stimulate neurogenesis was with a running wheel, even more potent than enriched environments [complex mazes, for example].

Internet for the People: The Fight for Our Digital Future
by Ben Tarnoff
Published 13 Jun 2022

The act of prototyping products in a workshop could serve as a starting point for a broader conversation about what kinds of transformations would be needed to create a more equitable society. In the process of trying to solve their problems with technology, people came to realize that technology often fell short of solving their problems. Politics was needed. Along these lines, one of the Networks kick-started a campaign called “Right to Warmth” that involved organizing community energy efficiency initiatives, creating local energy cooperatives, and pressuring Margaret Thatcher’s government into putting more money toward energy conservation measures. What kind of campaigns might materialize today? If online malls are defined by their entanglements, then they can’t be dismantled without also unraveling the social phenomena they are entangled with.

A Grand and Bold Thing: An Extraordinary New Map of the Universe Ushering
by Ann K. Finkbeiner
Published 16 Aug 2010

He left the mountain for good and went back to Carnegie Mellon to do his science. Besides, he said, the only nonastronomical things to do while living in Apache Point were go to bars or ride the miniature trains in Alamogordo, and he didn’t have time to do either anyway. He was proud that he and his undergraduates had gotten the spectroscopic commissioning kick-started, but he knew the spectroscopic system was still held together by string; it was creaking, it wasn’t tuned. While Nichol was still at Apache Point, he had had the sense that Princeton wasn’t quite trusting him to do the spectroscopic commissioning because Jim Gunn had sent out his postdoc David Schlegel, who had no other obvious reason to be there.

An Elegant Puzzle: Systems of Engineering Management
by Will Larson
Published 19 May 2019

This is especially true early in your career, but it’s easy to work for a long time without building up a large personal network if you work in a smaller market or at a series of small companies. (One of the side benefits of working at a large company early in your career, beyond name recognition, is kickstarting your personal network.) The other issue is that folks tend to have relatively uniform networks, composed of the individuals they went to school with or worked with. By hiring within those circles, it’s easy to end up with a company whose employees think, believe, and sometimes even look similar. 6.3.1 Moving beyond your personal networks Many hiring managers freeze up when their referral network starts to dry up, or as they look to bring a wider set of backgrounds onto their teams.

Walled Culture: How Big Content Uses Technology and the Law to Lock Down Culture and Keep Creators Poor
by Glyn Moody
Published 26 Sep 2022

abstract_id=3639142 727 https://web.archive.org/web/20220519123413/http://ec.europa.eu/competition/publications/reports/kd0419345enn.pdf 728 https://web.archive.org/web/20220616103111/https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2019/10/adversarial-interoperability 729 https://web.archive.org/web/20220616103132/https://knightcolumbia.org/content/protocols-not-platforms-a-technological-approach-to-free-speech 730 https://web.archive.org/web/20220329191619/https://tobin.yale.edu/sites/default/files/Digital%20Regulation%20Project%20Papers/Digital%20Regulation%20Project%20-%20Equitable%20Interoperability%20-%20Discussion%20Paper%20No%204.pdf 731 https://web.archive.org/web/20220616103205/https://walledculture.org/interview-cory-doctorow-part-2-new-publishing-models-for-creators-amazon-as-a-frenemy-and-the-internet-archive-court-case/ 732 https://web.archive.org/web/20220817084624/https:/scholarship.law.tamu.edu/facscholar/1393/ 733 https://web.archive.org/web/20220830085146/https://walledculture.org/interview-mike-masnick/ 734 https://web.archive.org/web/20220616103248/https://walledculture.org/interview-rebecca-giblin-reversion-rights-out-of-print-books-and-how-to-fix-copyright/ 735 https://web.archive.org/web/20220616103248/https://walledculture.org/interview-rebecca-giblin-reversion-rights-out-of-print-books-and-how-to-fix-copyright/ 736 https://web.archive.org/web/20220616110320/https://bandcamp.com/ 737 https://web.archive.org/web/20220616113457/https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crowdfunding 738 https://web.archive.org/web/20220616110335/https://blog.bandcamp.com/2022/03/02/bandcamp-is-joining-epic/ 739 https://web.archive.org/web/20220616111850/https://get.bandcamp.help/hc/en-us/articles/360007802534-What-pricing-performs-best- 740 https://web.archive.org/web/20220616111909/https://walledculture.org/interview-evan-greer-lia-holland-rethinking-copyright-fighting-creative-monopolies-and-more/ 741 https://web.archive.org/web/20220616111928/https://kk.org/biography 742 https://web.archive.org/web/20220616111942/https://kk.org/thetechnium/1000-true-fans/ 743 https://web.archive.org/web/20220616111942/https://kk.org/thetechnium/1000-true-fans/ 744 https://web.archive.org/web/20220616111942/https://kk.org/thetechnium/1000-true-fans/ 745 https://web.archive.org/web/20220616111942/https://kk.org/thetechnium/1000-true-fans/ 746 https://web.archive.org/web/20220616113521/https://www.kickstarter.com/ 747 https://web.archive.org/web/20220616113541/https://locusmag.com/2021/03/cory-doctorow-free-markets/ 748 https://web.archive.org/web/20220616113541/https://locusmag.com/2021/03/cory-doctorow-free-markets/ 749 https://web.archive.org/web/20220701143901/https://www.atelierventures.co/team 750 https://web.archive.org/web/20220616114328/https://future.com/1000-true-fans-try-100/ 751 https://web.archive.org/web/20220616114347/https://walledculture.org/nfts-are-mostly-useless-or-worse-but-heres-one-important-way-they-could-help-creators/ 752 https://web.archive.org/web/20220830085146/https://walledculture.org/interview-mike-masnick/ 753 https://web.archive.org/web/20220616114406/https:/walledculture.org/interview-dr-andres-guadamuz-the-eu-copyright-directive-text-data-mining-web3-the-metaverse-nfts/ 754 https://web.archive.org/web/20220616114427/https://www.technollama.co.uk/can-copyright-teach-us-anything-about-nfts 755 https://web.archive.org/web/20220616114502/https://www.twitch.tv/ 756 https://web.archive.org/web/20220616114519/https://www.wired.com/story/twitch-turns-10-creator-economy/ 757 https://web.archive.org/web/20220713072402/https://www.businessofapps.com/data/twitch-statistics/ 758 https://web.archive.org/web/20220616114519/https://www.wired.com/story/twitch-turns-10-creator-economy 759 https://web.archive.org/web/20220713071951/https://www.vantagemarketresearch.com/industry-report/crowdfunding-market-1484 760 https://web.archive.org/web/20220616111909/https://walledculture.org/interview-evan-greer-lia-holland-rethinking-copyright-fighting-creative-monopolies-and-more/ 761 https://web.archive.org/web/20220616115428/https://www.wipo.int/edocs/mdocs/mdocs/en/wipo_ipr_ge_15/wipo_ipr_ge_15_t2.pdf 762 https://web.archive.org/web/20220616115440/https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fashion_design_copyright_in_the_United_States 763 https://web.archive.org/web/20220616115454/https://fashionunited.com/global-fashion-industry-statistics/ Acknowledgments As the hundreds of endnotes attest, this book builds on the work and ideas of many people.

Will It Make the Boat Go Faster?: Olympic-Winning Strategies for Everyday Success
by Ben Hunt-Davis and Harriet Beveridge
Published 15 Dec 2011

We were to go and to keep going, never being relaxed or being satisfied with the lead. We had to extend it with every stroke that we took. We would nail every single stroke. This was to be a five and a half minute sprint! The first 500 metres was to be the hardest, fastest 500 we’d ever done. The second 500 was going to be kick-started with a 35 stroke sprint; it would be harder and faster than the first 500m. The third 500 was to be faster again. As we hit the halfway mark we would lay down another devastating 35 stroke sprint. At 1,250 metres there would be another 35 stroke sprint. The last 500 we’d be on our knees, but we knew that we’d still have to build into the line.

Still Broke: Walmart's Remarkable Transformation and the Limits of Socially Conscious Capitalism
by Rick Wartzman
Published 15 Nov 2022

The unions weren’t about to roll over, though. Far from it. About six months after Tate’s provocation to Walmart managers, the UFCW and the Service Employees International Union both launched new campaigns against the company. Only this time, they were less about signing up workers and more about tearing down the company. The SEIU kickstarted things in late 2004 when it seeded a nonprofit called the Center for Community and Corporate Ethics, which, in turn, stood up an advocacy arm known as Five Stones—a reference to the rocks that David plucked out of a streambed to slay Goliath. The Goliath in this case was Walmart, and the campaign designed to bring the company to its knees was christened Walmart Watch.

More Money Than God: Hedge Funds and the Making of a New Elite
by Sebastian Mallaby
Published 9 Jun 2010

Soros had understood that nothing more substantial than slippery perceptions had driven up the dollar, and therefore that a trigger could set off a sudden reversal. Because he had grasped the system’s instability, he had understood the Plaza accord’s meaning faster than others. Plaza was the trigger, and it didn’t even matter that the details of the new policy had yet to be filled in. A political jolt had kick-started a new trend, which would now feed on itself and become self-sustaining. The rewards from the Plaza trade were astonishing. In the four months from August, Soros’s fund jumped by 35 percent, yielding a profit of $230 million. Convinced that the act of writing his diary had contributed to his performance, Soros joked that his profit represented the highest honorarium ever received by an author.32 When the diary was published two years later, as part of Soros’s book The Alchemy of Finance, reviewers mocked its dense prose.

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15 This was a better response than Swensen could possibly have wished for. He had found the integrity he sought: Fairman took her decency so seriously that she flew off the handle when you questioned it. In January 1990, Yale invested with Farallon. The university injected $300 million into Steyer’s fund, boosting his capital to a total of $900 million and kick-starting a gradual change in the social impact of hedge funds. SWENSEN’S PARTNERSHIP WITH STEYER BEGAN THE REPOSITIONING of Yale, ultimately affecting the investment style of nearly all endowments. Until the Farallon deal, Yale had a smattering of holdings in private equity and “real assets” such as real estate, but nothing in hedge funds.

The WikiLeaks Files: The World According to US Empire
by Wikileaks
Published 24 Aug 2015

Finance came to be understood as the true epitome of capitalism and was linked to the virtues of innovation, dynamism, and the allure of testosterone-driven aggression and risk-taking. With great risks, after all, came great rewards. And countries of the South were told that, if they opened their financial markets, the flows of “hot” cash would kick-start their slow economies. Such claims were pure myth-making: most of the movements of money in financial markets have nothing to do with kick-starting investment in the productive sector. They are bets—increasingly elaborate and risky gambling instruments, through which investors hope to make a royalty. And since that money does not materialize from nothing, by magic, it must come out of the revenues driven by productive investment.

Lonely Planet Andalucia: Chapter From Spain Travel Guide
by Lonely Planet
Published 31 May 2012

BAR Casa Lola Offline map Google map (Calle Granada 46; 11am-4pm & 7pm-midnight) Fronted by traditional blue-and-white tiles, this sophisticated spot specialises in vermouth on tap, served ice cold and costing just a couple of euros. Grab a pew on one of the tall stools and peruse the arty decor and clientele; an ideal spot to kickstart your night out on the town. CAFE La Tetería Offline map Google map (www.la-teteria.com; Calle San Agustín 9; speciality teas €2.50; 9am-midnight Mon-Sat) Serves heaps of aromatic and classic teas, herbal infusions, coffees and juices, with teas ranging from peppermint to ‘ antidepresivo’. Sit outside and marvel at the beautiful church opposite or stay inside to enjoy the wafting incense and background music.

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Contemporary architects have struggled to emulate the glories of the Moors, although modernist structures in cities such as Seville have grabbed 21st-century headlines for their un-orthodoxy and experimentalism. Islamic Architecture The period of Islam’s architectural dominance began with the Omayyads, the Moorish invaders who kick-started eight centuries of Islamic rule in 711 and ushered in an architectural era which bequeathed the region, more than anywhere else in Europe, with a strong whiff of the exotic. Elaborate monuments on an unprecedented scale – Granada’s Alhambra and Córdoba’s Mezquita, for example, which stand like bookends to Islam’s reign – were the means through which the Islamic rulers of Al-Andalus brought architectural sophistication to Europe.

Basic Income: A Radical Proposal for a Free Society and a Sane Economy
by Philippe van Parijs and Yannick Vanderborght
Published 20 Mar 2017

“Quantitative easing for the Â�people,” a direct lump-sum payment to all residents of the Eurozone, has been proposed by mainstream economists as a way of stimulating the economy by boosting consumer demand that could work more quickly and more effectively than the usual technique operating through interest rates and private banks.45 As a tool for kickstarting the economy, however, this egalitarian “heÂ�liÂ�copÂ�ter money” can only be of limited duration. Once the injection of purchasing power—in one go or in a short sequence of payments—Â�has done its job, it should be discontinued.46 Instead of relying on the creation of money, one could also think of funding basic income by taxing the circulation of money.

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Something resembling such an EU-Â�wide basic income was proposed as early as 1975, as an efficient alternative to EuÂ�roÂ�pean regional and agricultural policy, in a report to the EuÂ�roÂ�pean Parliament’s Economic and Monetary Affairs Committee by Brandon Rhys-Â�Williams, a rather eccentric conservative member of the EuÂ�roÂ�pean Parliament.43 At a more abstract level, it has been defended by phiÂ�losÂ�oÂ�pher Jean-Â�Marc Ferry as a central component of 235 BASIC INCOME EuÂ�roÂ�pean citizenship.44 More recently, it surfaced in the limited form of an occasional universal payment by the EuÂ�roÂ�pean Central Bank to all EuÂ�roÂ� peÂ�ans as a way of kickstarting the EuÂ�roÂ�pean economy (as discussed in chapter 6). Our own proposal consists in a eurodividend of 200 euros on average per month and per person (representing about 7.5 Â�percent of the GDP per capita of the EuÂ�roÂ�pean Union in 2015), with a higher amount in countries with high costs of living, and a lower one in countries with low costs of living.

Big Debt Crises
by Ray Dalio
Published 9 Sep 2018

Investors who were burned on their investments from the last cycle are reluctant to return, so it can take some time before capital inflows become strongly positive. But the price of domestic goods and domestic labor fell with the currency, so the country is an attractive destination for foreign investment and the capital starts to come back. Together, higher exports and foreign direct investment kickstart growth. If policy makers protect and recapitalize critical financial institutions, the domestic financial pipelines are in place to support a recovery. The country is back to the early part of the cycle and starts a new virtuous cycle where productive investment opportunities attract capital, and capital drives up growth and asset prices, which attracts more capital.

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Paulson Jr. that four major banks were planning to issue a new type of bond to aid the mortgage market did not stem the bank stocks’ slide. The sell-off only intensified in all three major indexes just after Mr. Paulson spoke.” –New York Times July 29, 2008 A New Tool Announced to Support Home Loans “The Treasury Department and the nation’s four biggest banks on Monday said they were ready to kick-start a market for a new tool to support home financing in the latest effort to spur a moribund housing market...The Treasury released a set of ‘best practices’ for institutions that issue so-called covered bonds, and Bank of America, Citigroup, JPMorgan Chase and Wells Fargo said they planned to begin issuing them.’

Power and Progress: Our Thousand-Year Struggle Over Technology and Prosperity
by Daron Acemoglu and Simon Johnson
Published 15 May 2023

Starting in the 1100s, windmills extended the reach of mechanical power, greatly expanding milling grain for bread and ale and fulling (preparing) cloth for wool processing. Windmills boosted economic activity in flat parts of the country with rich soils, such as East Anglia. From 1000 to 1300, water mills and windmills and other advances in agricultural technology roughly doubled yields per hectare. These innovations also helped kick-start English woolen cloth textiles, which later played a pivotal role in industrialization. Although it is difficult to determine exact numbers, agricultural productivity per person is estimated to have increased by 15 percent between 1100 and 1300. You might think that these technical and productivity advances would lead to higher real incomes.

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True, Chinese authorities did not encourage scientific inquiries after the Song Dynasty, and the shared vision of rigorous, empirical science that took root in Europe starting in the seventeenth century had no equivalent in China. Nevertheless, the absence of Chinese industrialization until the twentieth century shows that scientific advances by themselves were not enough to kick-start the Industrial Revolution. This assessment is not meant to downplay the role of science in industrialization. The Scientific Revolution provided three critical contributions. First, science prepared the ground for the mechanical skills of the ambitious entrepreneurs and tinkerers of the age. Some of the most important scientific breakthroughs—for example, those involving iron and steel—became part of the practical knowledge of the era and thus contributed to the base of useful facts upon which entrepreneurs built in designing new machines and production techniques.

Lonely Planet Switzerland
by Lonely Planet

Walensee | FEDOR SELIVANOV/SHUTTERSTOCK © Central Switzerland Lucerne Lake Lucerne Lake Uri Brunnen Schwyz Einsiedeln Engelberg Zug Andermatt Central Switzerland Pop 718,400 Why Go? To the Swiss, Central Switzerland – green, mountainous and soothingly beautiful – is the essence of ‘Swissness’. It was here that the pact that kick-started a nation was signed in 1291; here that hero William Tell gave a rebel yell against Habsburg rule. Geographically, politically, spiritually, this is the heartland. Nowhere does the flag fly higher. Locals swell with pride at Lake Lucerne: enigmatic in the cold mist of morning, molten gold in the dusky half-light.

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In December 2016, the environmentally friendly Gotthard Base Tunnel, the world’s longest tunnel at 57km, began operation, shifting the transport load through the Alps from road to rail, and with clever measures to ensure clean air, treat waste water and protect wildlife. Then in May 2017 plans were unveiled for 29 electric high-speed ‘Giruno’ trains, which will travel at up to 250km/h when they take to the tracks on the Basel–Milan line through the tunnel in 2019. Hot on the heels of such successes, the E-Grand Tour of Switzerland was kick-started in collaboration with Tesla in 2017 as the world’s first-ever road trip for electric vehicles, with 300 charging stations on a new 1600km route bringing together the country’s highlights. Swiss Federal Railways is piloting a new annual ‘Green Class’ rail pass that includes the use of an e-bike.

Sweden Travel Guide
by Lonely Planet

Målerås ( GOOGLE MAP ; %0481-314 00; www.maleras.se; Industrigatan 20, Malerås; h10am-6pm Mon-Fri, to 5pm Sat & Sun) About 8km northwest of Orrefors in Målerås, this brand is the collaboration of acclaimed glass-blower Mats Jonasson and four other talented artists. Try your hand blowing glass in the hot shop. Orrefors Park ( GOOGLE MAP ; %070-999 60 40; www.facebook.com/orreforspark/; Bruksområdet 1; h11am-6pm; p) Adjacent to the former factory, this kick-starter project is a first step at renewing the village. There's a museum, workshops and a garden with a dual purpose. Carlos R Pebaqué ( GOOGLE MAP ; %0481-321 17; www.carlosartglass.com; Glasblasarvärgen 8, Gullaskruv; h11am-6pm Mon-Fri, to 5pm Sat, to 4pm Sun) This Uruguayan-born artist creates extraordinary vases in his one-man studio, at Gullaskruv, located 6km northwest of Orrefors.

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The Norwegians object, and Swedish troops occupy most of the country, the forced union lasting until 1905. 1921 In the interwar period, a Social Democrat–Liberal coalition government takes control and introduces reforms, including an eight-hour working day and universal suffrage for adults aged over 23. 1943 Seventeen-year-old teenager Ingvar Kamprad founds IKEA, which becomes the world's most successful mass-market retailer. 1944 Diplomat Raoul Wallenberg rescues nearly 100,000 Hungarian Jews from the SS by hiding them in Swedish 'neutral houses' in Budapest. 1953 Dag Hammarskjöld is elected Secretary-General of the UN. Under his guidance, the UN resolves the 1956 Suez Crisis. 1974 ABBA triumphs in the Eurovision Song Contest in England, kick-starting a hugely successful pop career. 1994 The ferry Estonia sinks during a storm on the Baltic Sea, killing 852 passengers, including 551 Swedes. 1995 Reluctantly, Sweden joins the European Union. 2001 Parliament votes 260 to 48 against abolition of the monarchy, even though the monarch ceased to have any political power in 1974. 2009 Victoria, Crown Princess of Sweden, marries Daniel Westling, her personal trainer; she is the first Swedish royal to marry a commoner. 2011 Julian Assange of WikiLeaks, due for extradition to Sweden on sexual-assault charges, takes refuge in the Ecuador embassy in London.

I.O.U.: Why Everyone Owes Everyone and No One Can Pay
by John Lanchester
Published 14 Dec 2009

All these factors coincide to make the global bond market a huge, complicated, multiply overlapping and profoundly interwoven thing, with a colossal number of working parts and therefore immense opportunities for swapping and trading and exchanging of revenue streams. This is where, in 1981, swaps entered into the story.4 Swaps began life as a way of exchanging revenue between different types of bonds. The first deal, brokered by Salomon Brothers, was worth $210 million for ten years and kick-started a whole new field of finance. Companies would swap bonds and equivalent products, and in this way gain access to one other’s lines of business: it was a way for firms to spread their economic tentacles while not actually diverging from their own core business. In particular, swaps took off as a way of playing around with other firms’ interest rates and exposure to different currencies.

Personal Investing: The Missing Manual
by Bonnie Biafore , Amy E. Buttell and Carol Fabbri
Published 24 May 2010

For example, if an investment starts to nosedive, you want to get out before it hits the ground. Finally, you look for ways to improve your portfolio by, for example, looking for funds with lower expenses, higher returns, or less volatile performance. What’s Investment Portfolio Management? Portfolio management starts with planning. The financial goals you identified in Chapter 2 kick-start the process, because that’s where you determine how much money you need and when. After that, you figure out how you’re going to invest and keep an eye on your portfolio to make sure it stays on track. Here are the basic steps: 1. Identify your tolerance for risk, and understand the investment risks you face.

The End of Money: Counterfeiters, Preachers, Techies, Dreamers--And the Coming Cashless Society
by David Wolman
Published 14 Feb 2012

And they’re starving their people to death.”17 It’s one thing for North Korea to hurl missiles over our ally, Japan, sink a South Korean navy vessel and its crew, shun talks to promote peace, bomb a South Korean island, and point guns at our servicemen and women stationed on the southern edge of the Demilitarized Zone. But plagiarizing our money? That is just low. Yet how different is Kim Jong Il’s counterfeiting, really, from the decision to spend $700 billion in borrowed money to kick-start economic growth, from creating more than $1 trillion out of thin air to help clean up the housing bubble crisis?18 That may sound blasphemous, but Americans have a long tradition of skepticism about money creation, forgeries or otherwise. In 1837 John Quincy Adams said that the only thing separating counterfeiters from bank directors is that the former are more skilled and modest.

Time Management for System Administrators
by Thomas A.Limoncelli
Published 1 Jan 2005

Another example is automated OS installation. Setting up a system to automatically load the OS and related applications on a workstation can be complicated, but it has a huge payoff, especially if you reload machines often or purchase many new machines. Examples of this kind of thing include Microsoft RIS, Solaris JumpStart, Red Hat KickStart, and FreeBSD NetBoot. It can be much more cost efficient to pay someone to set up the system and teach you how to make maintenance modifications (adding new software, and so on) rather than struggle through the initial installation alone. This kind of consulting can be expensive and, therefore, it must be thought of during the budgeting process.

Thinking Machines: The Inside Story of Artificial Intelligence and Our Race to Build the Future
by Luke Dormehl
Published 10 Aug 2016

But if Kurzweil is wrong about some parts of the story, he’s not wrong about the bigger picture. Along with advances in Artificial Intelligence, parallel developments in nanotechnology, robotics and neuroscience is the reason why billions of dollars are currently flowing to support reverse-engineering the human brain. Like the 1956 Dartmouth conference which kick-started AI, this is resulting in some fascinating collaborations between disciplines. The Next Big Thing One such project is the Machine Intelligence from Cortical Networks project, also known as MICrONS. Funded by IARPA, the United States’ Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity department, the goal of MICrONS is to increase machine intelligence by building algorithms that function more like the human brain.

Financial Market Meltdown: Everything You Need to Know to Understand and Survive the Global Credit Crisis
by Kevin Mellyn
Published 30 Sep 2009

The United States, of course, could always ‘‘print dollars,’’ since the dollar had become the ‘‘new gold’’ under Bretton Woods. So, massive U.S. deficits and government borrowing could be inflated away at the expense of our trading partners and holders of U.S. bonds. The U.S. example spread to places like the U.K. that needed to kick-start sluggish economies. This was not a partisan political thing, either. Richard Nixon won power in 1968 and maintained high levels The Natural History of Financial Folly of spending on domestic programs and the Vietnam War. U.K. conservatives like Ted Heath were as addicted to spending as Labour Party governments.

Adrift: Seventy-Six Days Lost at Sea
by Steven Callahan
Published 16 Oct 2002

After about six months ashore my weight had returned to normal and I had rebuilt most of my muscles that starvation devoured. The telltale lines of starvation across my fingernails had grown out, and I was left to face the fact that my drift's only real physical cost was that it seemed to have kick-started middle age. I ate less and for the first time found I could pretty easily add some padding around the old midriff. In the mornings, wads of hair lay on my pillow, so that now I have joined the world of the follically challenged. As for serious long-term damage, who really knows? I wasn't about to have my liver or kidneys pulled out for inspection.

Food Trucks: Dispatches and Recipes From the Best Kitchens on Wheels
by Shouse, Heather
Published 19 Apr 2011

He set about the first order of business: coining the name “Potato Champion” in honor of Antoine-Augustin Parmentier, an eighteenth-century French chemist who managed to convince his countrymen that potatoes didn’t cause leprosy, as was widely believed, and that the spuds should be eaten instead of just tossed to hogs. With a name like that, there was no turning back; Mike found a little trailer on Craigslist and spent his days fixing it up into a frymobile and his nights perfecting the Belgian-style frites that kick-started his obsession. With only the lingering taste from his travels and a bit of pizzeria experience, he went through months of trial and error before arriving at the perfect result. Russets are his go-to potato (“they don’t brown up too much and they have the right sugar/starch content”), and he only fries in rice bran oil (“high smoke point, awesome flavor, a little expensive but lasts longer”).

Mars Rover Curiosity: An Inside Account From Curiosity's Chief Engineer
by Rob Manning and William L. Simon
Published 20 Oct 2014

If something runs amiss in the next few hours or so before landing, Keith has a pile of contingency procedure documents that he can pull out and begin calling orders. Each team member sits at his or her own display terminal, and I have, in addition, my own laptop containing detailed contingency plans for a bad day. If the worst should happen after landing, all eyes will turn to me, and I’ll start calling meetings and kick-starting analyses in the desperate hope that a bad situation can be corrected. This is a position I fervently did not want to find myself in. We won’t know of a problem until that 13.8 minutes after the bad has started. Any remedy I offered would take at least the same amount of time to transmit back to the lander, and by then it would probably be too late

Smartcuts: How Hackers, Innovators, and Icons Accelerate Success
by Shane Snow
Published 8 Sep 2014

This was at a time when social media managers at Fortune 500 companies typically had to brave a phalanx of corporate approvers to publish anything.* While building its content backlog, Oreo managed to get its tweet approval process down to a few minutes’ time—just enough time to say, “You can still dunk in the dark” before the Superdome lights came back on—and to grow a following among consumers and press that could kick-start momentum when the company needed it. And that is what won 360i its Cannes and Clios. PAUL VASQUEZ WASN’T TRYING to make a funny viral video when he filmed “Double Rainbow.” He hadn’t intended to become famous overnight. His video backlog consisted of random home videos of things he’d seen in his yard.

The End of the Suburbs: Where the American Dream Is Moving
by Leigh Gallagher
Published 26 Jun 2013

The automobile suddenly unhooked us from the need to keep communities compact, the freeways soon gave us unfettered access, and there was land as far as the eye could see. From 1921 to 1936, the “golden age of highway building” saw the construction of more than 420,000 miles of roads in the United States, opening up fresh stretches of land for suburbanization and kick-starting what you could call our first housing boom. Between 1923 and 1927, new homes were built at a pace of almost nine hundred thousand per year; from 1920 to 1930, according to Jackson in Crabgrass Frontier, the suburbs of the nation’s ninety-six largest cities grew twice as fast as the cities themselves.

Jerusalem: A Cookbook
by Yotam Ottolenghi and Sami Tamimi
Published 15 Oct 2012