A fine piece about Daylife by Gillian Reagan in the New York Observer:
Perhaps RoboCop “writers” building information aggregators will be all that’s left in media’s post-apocalyptic future. Or maybe they just need to be armed with the latest technology artillery to fight for a better future.
A panorama shot of an amazing work in Dumbo.
In the spirit of my last PaidContent column, this piece in the NYT:
At Harvard and other top business schools, there has been an explosion of interest in ethics courses and in student activities — clubs, lectures, conferences — about personal and corporate responsibility and on how to view business as more than a money-making enterprise, but part of a large social community.
However, it seems only 20% of the graduating class has taken an oath to act responsibly, ethically and refrain from advancing their “own narrow ambitions” at the expense of others.
And the other 80%? Seems a worthwhile interview question next time I interview a Harvard MBA.
From the New York Times Magazine, The Case for Working With Your Hands:
A good job requires a field of action where you can put your best capacities to work and see an effect in the world. Nor can big business or big government — those idols of the right and the left — reliably secure such work for us. Everyone is rightly concerned about economic growth on the one hand or unemployment and wages on the other, but the character of work doesn’t figure much in political debate. Labor unions address important concerns like workplace safety and family leave, and management looks for greater efficiency, but on the nature of the job itself, the dominant political and economic paradigms are mute. Yet work forms us, and deforms us, with broad public consequences. Column number two up on PaidContent.
A short column (by me) on PaidContent (thanks to PC for the opportunity).
Reconceiving value creation depends on new ideals. Ideals shape what we wish to achieve in the first place: freedom, peace, fairness, justice – all are ideals vastly more powerful than mere business models. That’s because they are what ensure the value we are creating is authentic, deep, meaningful value – not just the shabby, threadbare illusion of value.
Some time back I posited that every site will be a news publisher. If it’s as easy to add “news” to your site as it is to add AdSense, then every site, being about something, will add relevant news. (And think of news in the broadest sense of the term – fresh content, whether it’s hard news of the day or news about diabetes, archaeology or Sussex spaniels. For example, Purina and its Petcharts site).
Looking at our client list today (including those not yet live/announced) – only a fraction are traditional newspaper or magazine companies. Another fraction are traditional media companies, but not specifically print or news. The majority are services that purely online or non-news. Including sites as varied as financial services companies, e-commerce sites, and NGOs. And this ratio is even more true of the companies in our near-term pipeline.
While Daylife still isn’t as easy (or as free :), as AdSense – it’s getting there. We’ve seen portals of thousands of pages built using Daylife in one day (thanks to Daylife Select). Stay tuned.
(Cross posted to the Daylife Blog)
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Upendra,
I’m intrigued with your Daylife service and considering using it.
Could you please post the algorithm that the Daylife platform uses?
Thanks.
-Ambrose
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Image by Getty Images via Daylife
A lot of excitement over the Kindle 2. I’m not a Kindle user, but as an avid book reader and book buyer (more buying than reading these days), I find it hard not to be excited about the convenience and superpowers the Kindle bestows. (Not to mention access to Kindle-only books!)
However, what becomes of libraries, research, and the sharing of books? Libraries (and just simple act of being able to lend a book) did more to democratize knowledge than arguably anything in history. (I will not rush to coronate the web, it hasn’t been around for even one generation yet). Will libraries be permitted to “lend” in an era when books are digital only, and DRM’d or locked in a device? What happens to access to books for the poor and those in less developed countries? Will economically-distressed book publishers embrace enabling sharing for their electronic books, or will they go the way of the RIAA and the recording and movie industry, and use their new found digital IP powers and fight tooth and nail to keep the dissemination of their books tightly controlled? Will sharing books be “illegal?”
Thoughts? Has there been any comment by Amazon or the book industry on digital books, libraries, and person-to-person sharing?
I think Google’s response would be: “we’ve scanned all the books from some of the world’s most extensive libraries and those are available to all.” So, if you accept this as an answer to “what happens to libraries”, the question becomes: what devices are ubiquitously available to the poor; the disenfranchised; and those living in developing nations that enable them to access this new digital library? The rising generation of smart cell phones is one answer. Mass-distributed Kindles could be another. And the rising generation of “cloud” laptops yet another. For those who can’t afford to buy any of these devices, centers, such as libraries, can be a place where laptops, for instance, are located and available for free use. It’s not as awesome as carrying a dog-eared novel from the local library on the subway or into your favorite cafe, but it’s a start.
Google certainly covers a segment of literature. And that may be part of the answer. Assuming we as a society are comfortable being reliant on the charity of a single private company for providing that service. Given the longevity of companies, particularly tech companies, I don’t think that’s an answer. We’d be better with libraries as public institutions or with the diversity of several benefactors starting libraries, as did the robber barons of old.
But those books aside.. how do one borrow Stephen King’s Kindle-only book? Or trade it. Or even buy it for a dollar second-hand?
Bill Gates at TED: 
The market does not drive scientists, thinkers, or governments to do the right things. Only by paying attention and making people care can we make as much progress as we need to.
A worthwhile question, indeed.
On the bright side, the 20% make me feel less alone in the world.