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Showing posts from January, 2019

Special Counsel Disputes BuzzFeed Report That Alleged Trump Directed Cohen to Lie to Congress - WSJ

Special Counsel Disputes BuzzFeed Report That Alleged Trump Directed Cohen to Lie to Congress - WSJ : The special counsel’s office issued a rare statement late Friday disputing a BuzzFeed report that said President Trump directed his former lawyer, Michael Cohen, to lie to Congress about the president’s involvement in a real-estate deal with Russia during the 2016 campaign.
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Kad sportisti okončaju karijeru: Grade stanove, otvaraju kafiće, pekare... | Sport i biznis | Al Jazeera Balkans

Kad sportisti okončaju karijeru: Grade stanove, otvaraju kafiće, pekare... | Sport i biznis | Al Jazeera Balkans : Već su dobro poznati poslovni promašaji hrvatskih tenisera Gorana Ivaniševića u građevinskom biznisu, Brune Orešara u privatizaciji hrvatskih kompanija i Ive Majoli u biznisu s�nekretninama.
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Tesco effect: How big firms quietly own little brands - BBC News

Tesco effect: How big firms quietly own little brands - BBC News : "Large global brands realise there is a generic dislike of super brands, so they often like to appear smaller than they are to avoid negative publicity," says Stuart Roper, a corporate reputation expert at Manchester Business School. Ben and Jerry's ice cream (Unilever), Innocent Smoothies (Coca Cola), Green and Black's chocolate (Cadbury/Kraft) and Copella apple juice (Tropicana/Pepsi) are among the many formerly independent brands now owned by large corporations. But what seems to have irked anti-corporate coffee lovers about Harris and Hoole is that Tesco has not bought into an existing brand, but is instead attempting to build one from scratch. "Our main objection is that they are masquerading as a little, independent shop. They are a wolf in sheep's clothing," says Brian Hitcham, of Save Whitstable Shops. Hitcham has campaigned to stop a Harris and Hoole opening in his town.
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Craig Federighi was recruited to Apple in 2009 to serve as vice president of OS X engineering, working under senior vice president Bertrand Serlet. However, Federighi and Serlet had started working together 15 years earlier at Steve Jobs' NeXT, and both joined Apple in 1996 when Jobs returned to the company he founded.
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It’s Easier Than Ever to Log Your Kid’s Data—But Should You? | WIRED

It’s Easier Than Ever to Log Your Kid’s Data—But Should You? | WIRED : “I already have,” I told him, but it was too late. Before I knew it, I was standing on a platform with a pair of headphones guided over my ears. “Your baby is now as big as a plum,” a solemn voice told me, as I rotated the tiny body on an iPad screen. I'd seen this all before, but still—I was transfixed.
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Population Projections for Japan : 2016-2065 |National Institute of Population and Social Security Research

Population Projections for Japan : 2016-2065 |National Institute of Population and Social Security Research : Population Size and Growth According to the 2015 Population Census, which serves as the base year for these projections, the total population of Japan in that year was 127.09 million (total population including non-Japanese residents). Based on the results of the medium-fertility projection, Japan is expected to enter a long period of population decline. The population is expected to decrease to around 110.92 million by 2040, fall below 100 million to 99.24 million by 2053, and drop to 88.08 million by 2065 (see Table 1-1 and Figure 1-1). Based on the results of the high-fertility projection, the total population is expected to drop below the 100 million mark to 99.52 million by 2059, and to decrease further to 94.90 million by 2065 (see Table 1-2 and Figure 1-1). Conversely, based on the low-fertility projection, the total population is expected to fall below 100 millio...
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This is how Google will collapse – Hacker Noon

This is how Google will collapse – Hacker Noon : Google’s ability to acknowledge the coming trend and still fail to land in front of it reminded many observers of its catastrophic failures in the booming industries of social media and instant messaging.
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Judith Rich Harris: 1938 - 2018 | Edge.org

Judith Rich Harris: 1938 - 2018 | Edge.org : The null hypothesis is the hypothesis that a putative "cause" has no effect, and it's supposed to be the starting point for scientific inquiry. For instance, when a new drug is being tested, the researchers are expected to start out with the hypothesis that the drug is no better than a placebo. If they find that the patients who received the drug are more likely to recover than the ones who got the placebo, then they can reject the null hypothesis at some level of confidence, some probability level. This comes as a surprise to most people, but psychologists have still not managed to collect evidence of a sort that would enable them to reject the null hypothesis of zero parental influence. In the absence of such evidence, the only scientifically sound position is the one I've taken. BROCKMAN: But you can't prove that parents have zero influence, can you? HARRIS: No. But why should I have to? Shouldn't the burde...
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Murad Mahmudov: The Ultimate Bitcoin Argument – Anthony Pompliano – Medium

Murad Mahmudov: The Ultimate Bitcoin Argument – Anthony Pompliano – Medium : Murad: Proof of work is very important because it is the first workable, in my opinion, solution to the double-spending problem at scale. As we know, a lot of different alternative currencies and alternative money forms were created in the 90’s in the early 00’s. Unfortunately though, they didn’t work quite well, because most of them were centralized more often than not, of course.
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How a TV Sitcom Triggered the Downfall of Western Civilization

How a TV Sitcom Triggered the Downfall of Western Civilization : he show ended in 2004. The same year that Facebook began, the year that George W. Bush was re-elected to a second term, the year that reality television became a dominant force in pop culture, with American Idol starting an eight-year reign of terror as the No. 1 show in the U.S., the same year that Paris Hilton started her own “lifestyle brand” and released an autobiography. And Joey Tribbiani got a spin-off TV show. The year 2004 was when we completely gave up and embraced stupidity as a value. Just ask Green Day; their album American Idiot was released in 2004, and it won the Grammy for Best Rock Album. You can’t get more timely. The rejection of Ross marked the moment when much of America groaned, mid-sentence, at the voice of reason. Yes, my theory is that Friends may have triggered the downfall of western civilization. You might think I’m crazy. But to quote Ross: “Oh, am I? Am I? Am I out of my mind? Am I losing m...
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Mark Zuckerberg’s New Year’s Resolution: Talk more about the future - Recode

Mark Zuckerberg’s New Year’s Resolution: Talk more about the future - Recode : “My challenge for 2019 is to host a series of public discussions about the future of technology in society — the opportunities, the challenges, the hopes, and the anxieties,” he wrote on Tuesday. “Every few weeks I’ll talk with leaders, experts, and people in our community from different fields and I’ll try different formats to keep it interesting. These will all be public, either on my Facebook or Instagram pages or on other media.” There will be a lot of people who don’t care to hear from Zuckerberg right now. His company is at the center of virtually every major issue facing the internet today — from so-called fake news to hate speech to internet addiction. Facebook is the current poster child for digital privacy mishaps and creepy ad targeting.
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The Netflix Binge Factory

The Netflix Binge Factory : Mysterious though it may seem, Netflix operates by a simple logic, long understood by such tech behemoths as Facebook and Amazon: Growth begets more growth begets more growth. When Netflix adds more content, it lures new subscribers and gets existing ones to watch more hours of Netflix. As they spend more time watching, the company can collect more data on their viewing habits, allowing it to refine its bets about future programming. “More shows, more watching; more watching, more subs; more subs, more revenue; more revenue, more content,” explains Ted Sarandos, Netflix’s chief content officer. So far, it’s worked spectacularly well: Netflix has gone from around 33 million global subscribers before House of Cards premiered to over 125 million today. Wall Street analysts have predicted Netflix could flirt with 200 million subscribers by the end of 2020; by 2028, one Morgan Stanley analyst has said, 300 million is possible. “The thing that keeps me up at night...
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MANAGING WITH STYLE: THE EFFECT OF MANAGERS ON FIRM POLICIES

MANAGING WITH STYLE: THE EFFECT OF MANAGERS ON FIRM POLICIES* Marianne Bertrand and Antoinette Schoar This paper investigates whether and how individual managers affect corpo rate behavior and performance. We construct amanager-firm matched panel data set which enables us to track the top managers across different firms over time. We find that manager fixed effects matter for a wide range of corporate decisions. A significant extent of the heterogeneity in investment, financial, and organiza tional practices of firms can be explained by the presence of manager fixed effects. JOURNAL managers. to manager fixed I. Introduction I would have said it was capital, history, the name of the about the guy at the top. I am very much a process style is significantly related Moreover, fixed effects in performance higher compen management and that managers with higher performance sation and are more likely to be found in better governed firms. In a final step, we tie back these find...
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Fwd: Twenty-Five Useful Thinking Tools

Most people think being smart is about having more facts. Trivia-shows like  Jeopardy!  epitomize this view of knowledge. The smartest people are the people with the most names, dates and places stored away inside their mind. This is probably the least important and useful part of learning though. Instead of facts, I'd prefer to focus on knowledge that acts as tools. The more you have, the more ways you can approach different problems. Charlie Munger , Warren Buffet's long-time investing partner at Berkshire Hathaway, calls these mental models. More mental models means you have more ways to solve more problems. This is a topic that has been discussed a lot before, but I'd like to take a different angle at it. Twenty-Five Thinking Tools Below are twenty-five tools, I've abstracted from the profession I feel exemplifies them best. Reader's note: These are not intended to be full descriptions of every tool used by that profession. That would be silly. Instead, I wanted...
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