Meet the most famous inventor you’ve never heard of! Dr. NakaMats, the Man With 3300 Patents to His Name
Author: neil
Outlove [Idea]
Seth Godin iterates something that a lot of folks have said / or are saying about competition in business.
Shareholder Value Myth [Book Review]
Cornell University law professor Lynn Stout’s new book, The Shareholder Value Myth, examines how the maniacal quest to raise share prices is bad for everyone. Even Jank Welch, who was a proponent has called it “the dumbest idea in the world“. A HBR review of the book here & if you can read a few chapters for free here
Fears & Ideas [Interview]
Tom & David Kelley, of the design firm IDEO, talk about the Four Fears Blocking You from Great Ideas. Listen or read the transcript.
Essays [Links]
I read two essays over the last week. One was “Notes of a Native Son” written by James Baldwin in 1955, & the other called “The White Negro“, authored by Normal Mailer,1957. Both give an intensely personal account in a highly racist society. I have 3 more on the reading list, & will share if I find them worth reading.
Stick Dance Math Cooperative [Video]
Now if only it was as easy to get 6 year olds to do this!
Optical Illusion [Video]
There’s nothing that twists the mind quite like an optical illusion and this one is pretty great.
I will always be there with you [Letters of note]
On May 1st of 2003, just weeks after being deployed to Iraq, Army Pfc. Jesse A. Givens, of Springfield, Missouri was killed when his tank fell into the Euphrates river. He was 34-years-old. Shortly after his death, this letter was delivered to his bereaved wife, Melissa, and his 6-year-old stepson, Dakota (“Toad”). Melissa and Jesse’s unborn child, Carson (“Bean”), entered the world on the 29th of May, a few weeks after his father’s death.
Cameron & India’s Nero [Article]
The Guardian examines Why David Cameron is doing business with India’s ‘modern-day Nero’. This link provides some context to what happened during the Godhra riots in Gujarat in 2002. Warning: The image of the man begging for his life to be spared may disturb you deeply, as it did to me when it was published on the front page of every major newspaper in India the day after the riots erupted.
The Online Education Revolution [Essays]
MOOCs are big current news. But what do teachers think of it? This conversation began with teacher Alex Tabarrok concluding that online education works, expressing delight at the way it was able to leverage his 15 minute talk on TED, which was watched 700,000 times, which he works out to be equivalent to 175,000 student-hours of teaching offline. Kevin Carey (The Radical Implications of Online Education), Siva Vaidyanathan (The New Era of Unfounded Hyperbole) & Alan Ryan (Some skepticism about online education) weighed in with their views. Ends with Alex’s response to the participants. A quiet revolution is on-going in education, so this is a very pertinent read.