grave weaknesses in massive public spending project
My sources deep within the World Bank have leaked some explosive analysis by Greg Kisunko, Steve Knack and Colum Garrity of the World Bank’s Public Sector Governance Group. This isn’t just about small candy. It’s a revelation way, way, way bigger than the Halloween Documents. If this project gets canceled, and the analysis seems to [...]
more on distributing computing
Developing good social networking technology requires thinking about distributing computing between humans and computers. Way back in 2002, a human-computer interface designer discussed some problems with the then-trendy idea of context-aware computing: I suggest rather than trying to take humans out of the control loop, we keep them in the loop. Computational systems are good [...]
a case study in re-arranging economic rights
Book Review: Stephen F. Williams, Liberal Reform in an Illiberal Regime (Stanford: Hoover Institution Press, 2006). Understanding how to advance liberal democracy is crucial to the welfare of persons around the world. In Russia in 1906, a decree of the tsar gave peasants living in agricultural communes an opportunity to establish individual land titles and [...]
Tagged: agriculture, review
stop dragging your feet!
(Thanks to Rob Dolan for photo) More advice on change management from purple motes.
Not on speaker phone, on social mode!
Device design is a significant problem for a show-and-tell communicator. Designing a “phone” that integrates talking and showing would be a useful project for a design school class. Re-describing features is less costly than redesigning devices. Speaker phones are used for long, boring meetings. But a social mode is just what teenagers need. That’s right [...]
Tagged: telephones
will anyone know about “show and tell” communicators?
Attaching a camera to a mobile phone doesn’t seem to create much value. In rank order of occurrence of key Telco 2.0 events, 200 early respondents to the Telco 2.0 survey placed “voice revenue less than 20% of mobile operator total revenue” at “13/never.” Can you use your mobile to take a photo while talking [...]
Carnival of the Bureaucrats #5
Good bureaucrats recognize mistakes. And they try to rectify them with as little public notice as possible. Under Rule 6 of the Carnival of the Bureaucrats, submissions to this carnival may not include the term “stupid bureaucrat” and related epithets as defined therein. It has come to our attention that we have failed to recognize [...]