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A journal from John B. Roberts

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Entries Tagged as 'Measurement'

Intelligence gives way to wisdom

February 23rd, 2007 · No Comments

Paul Graham has another essay posted: “Is It Worth Being Wise?” The path to wisdom is through discipline, and the path to intelligence through carefully selected self-indulgence. When I was competing as an athlete over a decade ago, I was pursuing “intelligence,” in Graham’s definiton of being able to do very few things exceptionally well. [...]

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Tags: Everything · Measurement

Lies, damn lies, and…

January 19th, 2007 · No Comments

Fascinating 22 minute video of statistician Peter Donnelly at TED explaining the impact of our general inability to interpret uncertainty. Logic doesn’t work here. I got his first example wrong, as he says most do. What about you?

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Tags: Analytics · Data · Everything · Measurement · Video

Saturday links

October 14th, 2006 · 1 Comment

These aren’t new, but it is Saturday, and I’m sick of staring at them in my inbox. +++ I thought all The Economist content was invisible on the web, but not this September 7, 2006 opinion piece, “Welcome aboard,” which asks “In-flight announcements are not entirely truthful. What might an honest one sound like?” An [...]

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Tags: Books · Everything · Maps · Measurement

Measure Map is terribly slow, so FeedBurner buys BlogBeat

July 17th, 2006 · 1 Comment

(I’m making the connection in the headline, even if no one else would.) The blog measurement service Measure Map craaawwwwllllssss. I know… I’ve been using it for months, even before Google acquired the project from Adaptive Path. Today, I read that FeedBurner bought BlogBeat, expressly to beef up their analytics. And I say to myself… [...]

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Tags: Analytics · Blog management · Everything · Measurement

BBC News offers live stats

June 13th, 2006 · No Comments

Good for the BBC: BBC News live stats At CNET News.com, What’s Hot is updated with data hourly, and when new stories are published. Some of the Most Popular data is updated in near-real-time, though most is daily. For so-close-to-real-time it becomes useless (but still interesting), try Digg Spy. Showing usage back to the users… [...]

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Tags: Measurement · Media · Visualization

Movie: Crash

March 12th, 2006 · 2 Comments

It’s hard to see a movie after it’s reached the level of hype and acclaim that comes with being named Best Picture. Crash couldn’t (and didn’t) match up to such expectations. Some vignettes stand out, but the weaving of different lives into a single message (race is still an issue in America, with no easy [...]

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Tags: Measurement · Movies

Data is gold, so we need better shovels

March 10th, 2006 · No Comments

The “old saw” is that the way to get rich during a gold rush is selling shovels. David Hornik avoids leaning on that analogy (good for him). Still, Points On The Curve made me think that in a world where data is gold, we all need better shovels. I suppose measurement is a recent theme [...]

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Tags: Measurement

Measuring web traffic still leaves everyone unsatisfied

March 1st, 2006 · No Comments

Paul Boutin’s Slate article Slate Has 8 Million Readers, Honest has the sub-title “Or maybe it’s 4 million. Which should you believe?” The point? The web offers a level of measurement media has never seen before, and it’s still not complete or agreed upon. Perhaps because the measurements could possibly be so accurate and comparable [...]

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Tags: Measurement · Media

TrackBack, the dream lives

February 22nd, 2006 · 4 Comments

I hope Byrne Reese and the others at Six Apart can lift TrackBack up a level via Submitting TrackBack as an Internet Standard. Ever since November, 2004, CNET News.com has supported TrackBack. Heck, we even put out a press release about it 13 months ago. Results are mixed. A few gems, but lots of spam [...]

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Tags: Measurement · Media · Tech

Will blog analytics disrupt the measurement marketplace?

February 22nd, 2006 · 5 Comments

I run Measure Map on clock to stay somewhat apprised of who’s reading what on this blog. I’m an alpha customer, so I paid attention last week when Google purchased the company from Adaptive Path. I don’t pretend to know Google’s strategy on analytics, but I am curious, personally, to know what the long-term cost [...]

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Tags: Blog management · Measurement · Tech