Long Tails, Fortunes and Pyramids

Both of these books provide well-articulated frameworks for "how to think about problems."


The Long Tail - good summary of how the networked economy changes aspects of marketing, inventory, and reach. Highly recommended, pretty quick read with little slogging. I'm starting my second pass on it today.

The Fortune At The Bottom Of The Pyramid - Valuable collection of case studies and derived principles. Among other things, it has me thinking about reverse engineering offshore innovations to bring back to the states. Wonky but worth it.

NY Times On Venture Ecosystem

It Pays to Have Pals in Silicon Valley examines the aspects of personal networks.... persistent personal networks.... pervasive persistent personal networks. NY Times registration will be needed.

I keep seeing people praying to buildings rather than listening to markets and customers.... Didn't bad things happen to old civilizations obsessed with buildings rather than substance?

This amends the "Silicon Valley" piece a while back on venture capital.

Southern Illinois - Perspectives

Peter Gregory's Blogging about Carbondale - from the Daily Egyptian

after my own heart.....

NPR TOTN On Childhood Cancer and Long Term Recovery

"A recent study, published in The New England Journal of Medicine, reports that more than 1/3 of childhood cancer survivors can expect to have a life-threatening illness or serious chronic disease by the age of 45."

The Talk of the Nation Interview is here. What's interesting to me is that the theme involved here has such broad implications for health care generally.

From the New England Journal of Medicine:

"Chronic Health Conditions in Adult Survivors of Childhood CancerOeffinger K. C., Mertens A. C., Sklar C. A., Kawashima T., Hudson M. M., Meadows A. T., Friedman D. L., Marina N., Hobbie W., Kadan-Lottick N. S., Schwartz C. L., Leisenring W., Robison L. L., the Childhood Cancer Survivor Study Abstract Full Text PDF N Engl J Med 2006; 355:1572-1582, Oct 12, 2006. "

Alternate Fuels - From Wired Blog

Wired's notes inspired by the recent St. Louis renewable energy conference.

I'm also rather curious about the effects of subsidies on all sides of the equation.

Policy can shape manufacturer and consumer behavior (think Federal Highway System versus Railroads or tariffs on Brazilian ethanol) with flaming unintended consequences.