Princeton professor Ed Felten, expressing little faith in the Uniflow 5’s ability to suppress all thoughtcrime, quips, “Prediction: will be buggy, hilarity will ensue.”
Category: News and Views
Vanity Plates, the First Amendment, and a Judge on the Rise
Vermont has issued plates such as CARP DM, PEACE2U, LIVFREE, and BPOSTIV, among others – provided the philosophies, beliefs, and values express a secular perspective. Those who wish to express a personal philosophy, belief, or value that reflects, even only subjectively, a religious view – e.g., PRAY, ONEGOD, SEEKGOD – have been prohibited from doing so.
Small Business Bill HR 5297 | An Overview
HR 5297 passed the Senate last week. It will rush through the house and likely be signed into law by President Obama as early as Friday of this week. This bill will have a huge impact on business. Here, courtesy of Jack Kykendahl and Tom Yuhas is a quick run down of the bill:
Continue reading “Small Business Bill HR 5297 | An Overview”
Boomers’ Shrunken 401(k)s Spark Interest in Reverse Mortgages – BusinessWeek
Our friend and client, quoted in Bloomberg Businessweek:
Jim Heitman, an independent, fee-only financial adviser in Alta Loma, Calif., has seen a big jump in client interest in reverse mortgages in recent years. “When I introduce the topic, I need to do a lot less educating as to what that is than I used to,” he says.
Apple Logo Is an Agnostic’s Crucifix, Star of David: Study | Fast Company
“Brands are a signal of self-worth,” said Gavan Fitzsimons, professor of marketing and psychology at Duke. “We’re signaling to others that we care about ourselves and that we feel good about ourselves and that we matter in this world. It’s more than ‘I’m hip or cool’…I’m a worthwhile person, and I matter, and you should respect me and think that I’m a good person, because I’ve got the D&G on my glasses.”
Start-up lessons learned the hard way – latimes.com
New entrepreneurs make many of the same mistakes, said Ethan Mollick, a professor who specializes in entrepreneurship at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School. They fail to fully develop a business plan. They neglect important market research. They get into trouble by making poor hiring choices.
Y Combinator, TechStars: Investor Mentorship and Leverage Outweigh Capital | Fast Company
“You’re starting to see a trend of investors having to work harder to convince founders that they should be able to invest in that company,” he explains. “There is very much early-stage capital available for startups–many are getting involved in angel investing, and lots of traditional VCs are too. Founders are now asking investors, What are you going to do? Why should I take your money over the other angels? On a day-to-day basis, why is having you in my company going to be a good thing? These are questions that people never asked before.”
The Most Detailed Forensic Analysis Of The Flash Crash To Date (And Likely Ever) | zero hedge
Technical, demanding and breathtaking. Understand the flash crash of May 6th where the market dropped 1000 points in a few minutes.
Is the market manipulated or just out of control? Either answer sucks. If you think about equities, just remember, you are the hunted.
Taste the rainbow!
The Seven Deadly Sins of Social Media | Fast Company
Posting on someone’s wall with a seven-line signature, mass-inviting people to every event (even if the event is local and the person is not even in the same country), to tagging people in articles that they are not even mentioned in just to get them to read it. There is a special vein in my forehead that you can clearly see when these things occur.
Small Business Dashboard | U.S. Department of Energy – Office of Economic Impact and Diversity
Transparency, Accuracy, and the Small Business Dashboard
With small businesses creating two out of every three net new jobs, holding more patents than the largest corporations and universities combined, and employing half of all working Americans, we can’t afford to ignore opportunities to improve and advance federal contracting opportunities to small businesses.
Today President Obama’s Interagency Task Force on Federal Contracting Opportunities for Small Businesses put forward thirteen recommendations to:
- Develop clearer and more comprehensive small business contracting policies;
- Provide for a better workforce and hold agencies accountable for meeting small business goals; and
- Leverage technology to enhance transparency, increase federal procurement accessibility for small businesses, and improve data quality.
Transparency, Accuracy, and the Small Business Dashboard
Read the Executive Summary here.
Small business contracting goals, started in 1978, help agencies map out the percentage of annual prime contract spending that should be awarded to small businesses every year. The thirteen recommendations that the Interagency Task Force put forward today will address the gap between the annual government-wide goal for contracting and the actual annual prime contract spending. While the Department of Energy received an “A” grade for FY 2009 achievement from the Small Business Administration, we are fully committed to improving government-wide small business contracting.
The brand-new Small Business Dashboard is a reflection of this commitment. On the Small Business Dashboard visitors can see government-wide goaling information, design their own data feeds from small business data, perform detailed searches on government contractors, view top types of contracts used and states by vendor locations, and learn more about the contracts at each Federal agency.
Visit the Small Business Dashboard here.
The Department of Energy’s Office of Small and Disadvantaged Business Utilization is looking forward to working with the Task Force as we implement the recommendations put forward today and evaluate progress. We hope resources like the Small Business Dashboard prove useful to your small business, and we welcome the opportunity to continue talking with you.
