AreaGuy

The Republicans don't trust Iran not to build a bomb.

Neither do the authors of this deal. The choices are:

(a) Do nothing and allow Iran to continue to be within 6-7 months of making a bomb, as they are now (b) Implement the deal and push that time out to 15+ years (c) Try even harder to negotiate a better solution (d) Stop them by force before they build it.

If you oppose choice (b), what other options do you propose?

Ah, no problem. Thanks for clarifying! I thought it might be some terminology I did not know.

What does 'prooves' mean?

By that logic, they never should have shut down Google Reader, though, right?

Reader was my top visited site daily by far. Nothing replaced it.

It's like an anthill in the middle of the Amazon saying "If there were life on Earth that is more intelligent than us, why can't we see their enormous anthills? Why haven't they tried to contact us yet?"

Incidentally, Malkiel is currently the Chief Investment Officer of Wealthfront.

The best way to do this is to create a more accurate credit prediction system. Underwriters rely on credit scores because they’re cheap, quick, and easy way to triage risk. Credit scores are riddled with inaccuracies, but because risk is difficult to model precisely to begin with, these companies are still in business because they work decently well even despite the many errors.

If you could create a system using publicly available data that is a statistically and meaningfully superior way of predicting risk, it would be immensely valuable to the asset owners that are buying mortgages, insurance products etc. that rely on credit scores. You’d have to get them to demand it enough to change their underwriting guidelines (a morass of bureaucracy), but once they do, you’d also gain some steady demand and a moat of competitive advantage.

$12k per year x 320M people = $3.84 trillion, which is 22.9% of annual GDP.

That's a pretty steep price tag for a thousand dollars a month.

Wow... and the last time it sold was for $34,000 in 1975.

That's a 10.4% annual return per year for 40 years.

That's better than the 8.2% returned by the S&P 500 over the same period.

What kind of crisis are you expecting that would prevent Norway from importing food from Sweden, the UK, or continental Europe, but would leave domestic food production intact?

Great question. I clear cookies after every session on my PC, but not my phone (yet), so maybe the changing mode of transmission may provide opportunities. Fingerprint scanning is also far more convenient than passwords.

Honestly, though, the news one reads is very personal. You're reading politics, gossip, salacious stories... I don't want people to know what I'm reading, and I don't think increasing advertiser's ability to track you is the answer.

There's no reason every consumer of media has to pay for media content though. It can be supported by the top 5% or 1% of subscribers.

For example, perhaps people would pay for a membership/donation model for a higher price point -- for $500 or $900 a year, the local newspaper provides unlimited print/digital/podcasts, as well as discounted/free conferences, parties, meet & greets, social networks etc. Newspapers also add great credibility, so if there's a way to demonstrate that they've independently verified something (i.e. a 'media audit') there may be a way to monetize that.

I would add Peter Singer to the list of advisors.

I'd be willing to bet it's more ease of access than price.

Both of my last jobs provided me with some subscriptions for free (i.e. Financial Times and some industry publications). Yet whenever I encountered their paywalls while browsing, I would always close the tab, since I didn't want to have to type in the password. It's embarrassing but true.