theprodigy

I agree with the overall premise of the blog.

But for many, I believe "being your own boss" is just another way to say you want more control of your destiny and want to capture more up side of your hard work.

It's called humblebragging. Without the millions of people looking to find unique experiences to "humble brag" about Facebook would be very boring and wouldn't be as successful.

I think Facebook home won't be disruptive. There is so much more that goes into marketing and selling consumer products.

Home is a good win-win deal for facebook and HTC. Facebook can collect valuable social data from mobile devices and optimize ad delivery for users of that phone. HTC has the ability to use Home as a way to differentiate its phone in a very crowded market where the average consumer sees little differentiation between different smart phones outside of the iphone.

Start talking to recruiters to see what opportunities and salary you can get.

You can be amazing, but if you can't communicate your value and what you have done then people will undervalue you.

Honestly, I think your salary is average.

I would be curious to read the applications of the people who got in.

It's a classic. I believe the updated version with 50Cent is more relevant today.It's called 50th Law.

I love reading Vice. Truth is stranger than fiction.

I believe your dropbox needs to be secure as your email account because it deals with storing your personal data.So offering 2 factor authentication is a step in the right direction, like what gmail has.

Other than that dropbox can't do much about people using the same passwords for different sites or social engineering attacks. You can educate and warn people about it, but it's ultimately up to the user to follow through.

It would be hilarious if you could provide internet meme consulting to corporate marketing groups.

A lot of the older marketing execs are out of touch with internet culture and could just hire a consulting group to prevent future gaffes.

You can thank slave labor for the good life during these times. I am not talking about sweat shops, I'm talking about real slavery. It wasn't uncommon for the military to enslave people and take their land. If you had a problem making bread for 15 hrs a day or having the empire use your land to grow wheat without paying you, then you can just be killed. Most of the time it was done publicly.

Production of products back then wasn't too advanced. Many of the slaves had the experience and skills to contribute to a specific value chain of these empires. Using bread as an example, in their culture the slaves had experience baking and farming. The only difference is they aregoing to do it for free and the stuff they produce will go to their rulers. Any problems with that, you can get murdered.

You can watch this type of behavior in abundance on the show Big Bang Theory.

The stuff you mentioned is common knowledge.

Once Facebook finds a way to make use of all that unstructured data that each user creates their targeting will get so much better.

Put some armor on this thing and some sniper detection systems it will map out all the enemies locations who shoot at it or put a soflam on it and it can run through the mountains marking hidden targets for a drone or AC-130 overhead.

But there are so many technologies that you can integrate together on the Alpha dog (platform) to create so many military capabilities.

It's true that FB hasn't found a way to convert the time spent on it to revenue the way google has, but facebook will still make a lot of money selling targeted display ads in the short term. They'll do this while stealing market share from content companies like Yahoo, AOL, etc.

The money from display ads will give facebook a lot of money and time to come up with a better way to market using the social data they have.

I doubt Apple will want cash reserves that high. Investors criticize companies that have too much cash and just sit on it, ie microsoft and now apple.

The reason is the company should be using some of that cash to invest in growth opportunities or their future, either acquisitions, R&D or new projects. If they don't do anything with the cash and just sits on it, this action is a signaling mechanism that essentially says that Apple doesn't see any growth opportunity worth investing in. Traders will sell the stock because there is no recognizble opportunity to grow revenue and they are not investing in their future so they can be vulnerable to competition in the future.

The majority of PCs sold run in the world runs windows. They are pretty much complementary. So the amount of PC sold should be similar to the amount of OS sold.

If they are not similar then you got to look at substitute OS that these PC users are using, ie linux, pirated software, etc. I highly doubt these Chinese consumers know anything about Linux being a viable option. Linux hasn’t even deeply penetrated the desktop OS market here in America. There could be higher density of usage in areas like the Silicon Valley, but as a whole the average joe shmo American who are more enlightened consumers than the Chinese won’t be using Linux as a alternative in mass.

So what are these PCs running on? It’s pirated copies of different distributions of Windows.

This is because the IP laws aren’t being enforced, Chinese consumers don’t see the value of buying the real windows version (ie: updates) or the consumer is not educated and doesn’t know if they are buying real or a pirated copy of windows.

Microsoft is getting jipped in china because they should be getting $ on almost every PC sold in that country.

There is no need to worry. America knows how to fight conventional enemies and units. It knows how to get air superiority and prevent their enemies from getting it.

The US military and the intelligence community have mapped out the majority of air strips and storage locations for their jets. If there were ever a conflict America can shoot off cruise missles, use stealth fighters to bomb these targets with ease.

They also have the resources to disrupt the paki's entire war fighting capabilities, including its jets, by disrupting its network. With the navy they can block off all resources being sent in their country (like energy and metals),and bomb energy and communication assets with relative ease. Basically making their units useless.

All of what china gives pakistan is a gesture of good will for future economic gain.

People should try the sensory deprivation tank. It is a really great experience. You'll have to try the tank many times and just let your mind go before you start tripping. The tank is the best way to get your creative muscles going without actually using drugs.

This guy is definitely correct.

Information Awareness Office http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Information_Awareness_Office

I am pretty sure something similar to this exists now. The new threat to america are not from soverign nation states, but from non state actors. Solving the data fragmentation problem by combining sources of personal information about behavior and life will make it easier for the gov to stop attacks or catch a person. Combining sources like your facebook, financial transactions, credit card bills, websites you visit (by using facebook connect), travel history (past plane tickets that are linked to your credit cards) can all be combined together and a predictive analytical tool can be developed for automated red flag for things that are deemed suspicious.

Facebook can do the same thing but use the information to predict who you are as a consumer, who you influence, how popular you are, etc to deliver targeted ads, etc.

I love these vintage interviews from back in the day.

Can one conclude from this interview that Steve Jobs is an example of a non technical founder or probably the most successful non technical founder?

I was definitely going to bring up Ali G's ice cream glove the investor reactions were hilarious. At the end one investor was interested in it.

If you think about it most of them have sacrificed so much of their life to be successful they want to prolong their life so they can enjoy spoils of success. Most successful people are good with the delayed gratification. The really rich do some weird things.

Some things these rich people are doing besides yoga. - Isoloation/Float tanks- totally relaxes them and releases them from stress. Also creates a great environment to be creative. Shuts off all sensory input and it is just you and your mind.

- office treadmills: they have treadmills that go for 1 mile per hour. people can walk and work at the same time.Rupert murdoch son is known to use it. There is this theory where people are unhealthy and have heart problems because they sit around all day. The body is meant to move. Constant movement not only creates a higher metabolism, but it also makes you feel better becasue of endorphins. There is also a belief that good physiology = good psychology.

I think there is a lot of people who just lurk around and read everything, that is ok, but if you participate in discussion I think you will definitely learn a lot more.

Google cone of learning.

Here is a good blog about three different marketing strategies and customer types the groupon model attracts

http://blogs.hbr.org/cs/2010/12/groupon_is_google_making_a_6...

I think Caius is overreacting. Just tell them politely that you are not interested and that you don't want to be contacted in the future.

I have friends that have worked in the recruiting industry for a long time and one has to realize that though there are some bad recruiters out there, a lot of recruiters are subject to their companies internal performance metrics, incentives, policy and company culture. So some recruiters behave a certain way because they have to.

My friend has worked in recruiting agencies that have call and email quotas. If you did not meet them you were let go. The company was strucutred and functioned as a dialing for dollars call center. So this creates a condidtion for the recruiters to spam peple like you or suffer the consequences. The companies philosophy was quantity over quality relationship building. This created the overall way the recruiter behaved.

Also, some mismanaged recruiting firms put undue pressure on the recruiter to come up with a candidate for an opportunity that is very hard to fill or can't be filled. So they are forced to make calls to people who are not a fit or have a certain key word on the resume which doesn't fit the overall context of the resume. Remember, people are just trying to make a living.

I see threads like this all the time. Someone here needs to see that this is an opportunity for entrepreneurs.The overall recruting market will exist because technical folks are getting scarce and there is more demand for them. This coupled with the majority of people having bad experience with recruiters tells me that there is an opportunity to create a better way.

Companies like LinkedIn, jobvite is providing their solution what is yours?

If you are intersted in reading more about the neuroscience behind innovative thinker read Iconoclast. It is a fun read.

http://www.amazon.com/Iconoclast-Neuroscientist-Reveals-Thin...

Yeah I don't get why rowing is seen as significant. What this article is trying to point out is the top firms are looking for people like the winklevoss twins(harvard, olympic rowers, connected family, etc).

Journaling is very good for the mind. I have a lot of random thoughts and theories about business, life, politics, science,etc that I love to document. Writing it down forces you to think out my ideas into something coherent.It's fun to look back in your jounal and see what you were right or wrong about. And for some reason it is an emotional release.

I use a livescribe pen to jounal. Stores everything I write down digitally.

The transaction is very clear for linkedin, not so much for facebook.

LinkedIn gives recruiters in various companies and consulting industries a way to find passive candidates that they will not be able to find on a job board like dice, mosnter, career builder, etc.

Passive candidates are ones that are not really looking, they have the skills that the recruiter is looking for, but candidate needs to be convinced to take another job.Passive recruting tools is a huge need right now, especially for areas and industries with labor and talent shortages, ie high level tech jobs that is being talked about now.

So think of how large websites like career builder, monster, the ladders, etc are.They for the most part offer actively looking candidates. Linkedin is the only player offering a database of passive candidates that you can get in contact with, build a relationship with and track.

LinkedIn is in control of a segment of a very large market, with a very definsible competitive advantage. They won't be a game changer or the next google, but they will be positioned to make a lot of money in the future. LinkedIn provides a legitimate solution to a legitmate demand and the demand is huge.

Also, a lot of the high level tech people i've spoken to do want to keep work and personal life seperate or keep facebook life and linkedin seperate.

This trend will definitely continue. Facebook will dominate display ads because they give the best targeting platform and people are spending more time on social networks.