Why #Inventors Misjudge… Their Creations http://www.wired.com/2014/10/technological-innovation-oversights Their Blind spots (in hindsight), eg creating a phonograph w/o playback!
I just want to add to the chorus…. I find it rather upsetting that this great integration feature no longer works!
https://discussion.evernote.com/topic/73733-eye-fi-is-decommissioning-evernote-support
Why So Few Blockbuster #Drugs Invented Today? (Eroom’s law) http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/16/magazine/why-are-there-so-few-new-drugs-invented-today.html Short answer: use of genomics v traditional pharmacology
QT:{{"
“If you read them now, the claims made for genomics in the 1990s sound
a bit like predictions made in the 1950s for flying cars and
anti-gravity devices,” Jack Scannell, an industry analyst, told me.
But rather than speeding drug development, genomics may have slowed it
down. So far it has produced fewer returns on greater investments.
Scannell and Brian Warrington, who worked for 40 years inventing drugs
for pharmaceutical companies, published a grim paper in 2012 that
showed the plummeting efficiency of the pharmaceutical industry. They
found that for every billion dollars spent on research and development
since 1950, the number of new drugs approved has fallen by half
roughly every nine years, meaning a total decline by a factor of 80.
They called this Eroom’s Law, because it resembled an inversion of
Moore’s Law (the observation, first made by the Intel co-founder
Gorden E. Moore in 1965, that the number of transistors in an
integrated circuit doubles approximately about every two years).
That’s not to say that target-based drug discovery, informed by
genomics, hasn’t had its share of spectacular successes. Gleevec, used
since 2001 to treat chronic myelogenous leukemia (C.M.L.) and a
variety of other cancers, is often pointed to as one of the great
gene-to-medicine success stories. Its design followed logically from
the identification of an abnormal protein caused by a genetic glitch
found in almost every cancer cell of patients with C.M.L.
Many of the drugs developed through target-based discovery, however,
work for only single-mutation diseases affecting a tiny number of
people. Seventy percent of new drugs approved by the F.D.A. last year
were so-called specialty drugs used by no more than 1 percent of the
population. The drug Kalydeco, for instance, was approved in 2012 for
people with a particular genetic mutation that causes cystic fibrosis.
But only about 1,200 people in the United States have the mutation it
corrects.
"}}
http://appadvice.com/appguides/show/space-war
the spirit of Bushnell
QT:{{”
If you want to play the original, look no further than the Atari Classic app. The graphics, sound, and retro experience are all here. Currently the control mechanism is not the most intuitive thing, but if you can get good at the controls this is a fantastic notable option. The app is free to download and included one game, Mission Control. You’ll need to purchase each of the other titles after that. The other games, such as Space War, will be $.99 apiece; though of course there are package deals you can purchase if you’re a die-hard retro Atari fan.
“}}
Do Data From #Wearables Belong In The Medical Record? by @dshaywitz
http://www.forbes.com/sites/davidshaywitz/2014/09/07/do-data-from-wearables-belong-in-the-medical-record/ The dichotomy: High-quality morsels v messy gobs
QT:{{”
I suspect that the routine use of wearable data by the medical establishment will closely parallel that of genomic data: everyone will agree that it’s interesting, and represents an area that should be followed closely, but relatively few pioneers will actually jump in, and really start collecting data and figuring out how all this works; the return on investment will be hard to define, the
uncertainty viewed as too high.
It wouldn’t surprise me if many of the same innovators that are early adopters of genomics (e.g. pursue whole genome sequencing on an ambitious scale) will be also be the earliest adopters of data from wearables, with the idea that the combination of rich genotype plus rich phenotype is likely to be an important source of insight (again, keep in mind that I work at a genomic data company). Within pharma, I’d suspect many of the largest companies (playing not to lose) will pursue lightly-resourced exploratory projects in this area, while companies I’ve called mid-size disruptors are more likely to take a real run at this, as part of a more confident and aggressive strategy of playing to win.
I’m obviously a passionate and long-time believer in the value of collecting and colliding large volumes of data, but I also recognize that this remains largely an unproven proposition, and I can understand why anxious administrators, prudent physicians, cautious corporations, and sensible investigators might prefer to place their bets elsewhere at the moment, deciding it’s still too early to jump in.
“}}
Doesn’t attach but very compact
Breaking the Plastic Bag Habit http://cen.acs.org/articles/92/i37/Breaking-Plastic-Bag-Habit.html It’s not #plastic v paper but v reusables, which may, however, have a "bacteria issue"
The Disruption Myth
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2014/10/the-disruption-myth/379348 Term’s evolution from #Kuhn to Foster to Christensen. Does it still apply in the business world?
BUSINESS OCTOBER 2014
The Disruption Myth
The idea that businesses are more vulnerable to upstarts than ever is out-of-date—and that’s a big problem.
QT:{{”
After several years of research, and a close reading of Thomas Kuhn’s The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (which introduced the concept of the paradigm shift), Foster came up with an explanation. What threatened these well-run market leaders were what he called “technological discontinuities”—moments when the dominant technology in a market abruptly shifted, and the expertise and scale that the companies had built up suddenly didn’t count for much. One example: when electronic cash registers went from 10 percent of the market in 1972 to 90 percent just four years later, NCR, long the leading maker of cash registers, was caught unprepared, resulting in big losses and mass layoffs.
Foster’s 1986 book, Innovation: The Attacker’s Advantage, described this phenomenon, offered tips for surviving it (just being aware of the possibility of a technological shift was the first step), and predicted that there was much more to come as giant waves of innovation in electronics, software, and biotechnology buffeted the economy. “The Age of Discontinuity,” Foster called it, borrowing the line from the management guru Peter Drucker.
The book did well, but the expression didn’t stick. “I will forever rue the day I didn’t call it ‘disruption,’ ” Foster now says. That was left instead to Clayton Christensen, a consultant and an entrepreneur who headed to Harvard Business School for a mid-career doctorate in 1989 and started teaching there three years later. For his
dissertation….
“}}
The Dark Market for Personal Data
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/17/opinion/the-dark-market-for-personal-data.html We’re all “judged by a #bigdata Star Chamber of unaccountable decision makers”
QT:{{”
We need regulation to help consumers recognize the perils of the new information landscape without being overwhelmed with data. The right to be notified about the use of one’s data and the right to challenge and correct errors is fundamental. Without these protections, we’ll continue to be judged by a big-data Star Chamber of unaccountable decision makers using questionable sources.
“}}