Saturday, February 08, 2003

The New Post-Amazon Bookstore - Andrew Sullivan's Book Club This link will take you to Andrew Sullivan's Book Club. I wonder if this is the new post Amazon bookstore? Here is why I think this. Andrew enables us book nuts to have a club to talk about the books we like. He therefore extends the powerful reader review part of the Amazon site and creates a deeper community. If you buy the book from him linked to Amazon, he gets 15% but you don't pay any more. So Andrew becomes a power store for Amazon. Good for Andrew good for Jeff Bezos and good for me the reader who wants to participate in an informed forum. Andrew and Amazon make the book purchase very easy thus he and the reader piggy back on Amazon's system and logistics. He is a book store that has all the power of Amazon behind it and they pay him! Remember how long it took to get that copy and how much it cost from you friendly local bookseller? Let's go a bit deeper. Andrew's site is also like a book club. General Book clubs are OK for their owners but specialty book clubs - Military, Cooking etc - are exceptionally attractive. Lower overall volume but much more per member. Military buffs buy all the good books. This takes George Dafermos's ideas of the power of collaborative filtering to the next level as well. Maybe if Amazon is then a general book club - we can all then set up our own or join specialty clubs. Andrews is maybe too general right now. Anyone going to open a military club? Maybe I should? 5:35:27 PM    comment []

Breaking the Phalanx - Col Douglas MacGregor MacGregor is another of the young turks who is questioning the reliance of stuff rather than doctrine and a new view of how to organize to go to war.America goes to war with a sledge hammer. He thinks its needs a rapier. Why? How will America destroy Iraq by air and hope to set up a democratic new ally? In the end a soldier has to take the ground and only he can do it in a way that reduces the losses of the enemy and hence the hope for peace after victory. His new book Breaking the Phalanx is not perhaps for the layman but offers a very well thought out position on the scale of the new organization - more of Brigade size and how to link organizations by information 4:22:02 PM    comment []

A New Understanding of War - 4th Generation Warfare and its predecessors As we stand on the edge of war here is the first of a series of articles that showcase the best thinking that I have found on the future of war. This the first by 3 disciples of Boyd Chuck Spinney, John Sayen and Don Vandergriff. They paint a depressing view of how the US military has been captured by its past success, by bureaucracy and by the idea that technology on its own is the answer. They argue that it is the human aspect combined with all the tools that will be the key. They will explain to you what is meant by 4th generation war or Manoeuvre warfare. They argue that the US tradition of attrition warfare is as outdated as say IBM PC's taking on Dell. 4:02:57 PM    comment []

Boyd - The Man and His Ideas by Grant Hammond "Boyd begins with the premise that the business of life is life" "For Boyd, the concept of moral leverage is critical to one’s strategy of conflict. Without an understanding of how to minimize our friction and increase that of our adversary in a moral-mental-physical sense, we are not likely to be victorious and hence, survive and prosper. People must believe in the cause that they fight for, must affirm what it is they stand and die for, must seek to live for some higher good or goal than merely themselves. Knowing merely what they are against, the negative motivation of hate, revenge or retribution is insufficient to galvanize a society to win a compelling victory and institute a lasting peace. Such notions may be far removed from the considerations of many, but Boyd is philosopher as well as a tactician, a strategist with a conscience, whose view of conflict and war makes room for, indeed could not exist without, concern for moral leverage as well as physical force." Boyd has so many disciples who write well about him - here is Grant Hammond's introduction to his life and to his ideas - a good starting point if you want to know more 3:57:32 PM    comment []

Meat - Brain Food? Is a low protein diet a dumb diet? Evolutionary Biology is making a connection between the development of the brain and meat eating. Maybe here is more to Atkins than we thought? 3:41:08 PM    comment []

The Low Fat Myth - More from Richard Gayle's Blog Most of the public debate about diet continues to focus on the extremes of very high (Atkins' Plan) or very low (Ornish Plan) levels of proteins. Layman's plan falls within the protein range recently recommended by the National Academy of Sciences Food and Nutrition Board. The USDA Food Guide Pyramid falls at the low end of the accepted protein range. In Layman's study, both diet groups lost a similar amount of weight, about 16 pounds, but the study group lost more body fat and less muscle mass than the control group. Those who followed the moderately high protein diet lost two pounds more of body fat, yet maintained one pound more muscle mass than the control group. The study challenges the conventional wisdom about the role of low-fat foods in weight loss, Layman said. "Traditionally, people have built a diet around low-fat foods, instead of high quality protein foods. Study participants following the moderately high protein plan, which I call the 'Sensible Solution,' were twice as effective in maintaining lean muscle mass," he said. "Muscle helps burn calories, but is often compromised during weight loss." Nutrition experts have long debated the virtues of many of the high protein diets because of conventional concerns related to the consumption of saturated fat and cholesterol. However, Layman said, the opposite was true in his study. "The group following my diet lost fat, maintained muscle and had an improvement in total blood cholesterol level. Subjects found the eating plan easy to follow, allowing them to enjoy foods from all food groups." Additional findings showed that women in the study group were less hungry between meals than were those following the traditional diet. The study group also experienced more stable blood glucose levels and reduced insulin response following meals. Both groups had reductions in total blood cholesterol, but the study group also had decreased triglyceride levels. Layman plans a long-term study of his "Sensible Solution" diet to further investigate the role of leucine in metabolic control. From Richard Gayles's Blog 3:34:53 PM    comment []

Columbia - best article I have seen so far "Air Force imagery confirms Columbia wing damaged" [Daypop Top 40] If you want to learn so much more than the big media companies are telling you, read this. Aviation Week is always a good read. None of the hysteria or conspiracy stuff found on TV. Detailed and well-written, it provides, nonetheless, some every emotional facts. 'No other accident in aviation history has been seen by so many eyewitnesses than the loss of Columbia -- visible in five states.'It highlights just how dangerous space flight can be. Read it. [A Man with a Ph.D. - Richard Gayle's Weblog] I agree with Richard - great article. All the facts we have today with the context. Thanks Richard 3:26:32 PM    comment []

OODA - Boyd and the True Meaning of Customer focus and Innovation Chester Richards shows us how OODA really works in Business. He shows us the deeper meaning of being Customer Focused; of Innovation and Defending your Market. He shows how using OODA helps you see into the mindset aspect of these issues. How to become intertwined with your customer so that you know them as you know yourself. How to see Innovation not as a new product but as a method of taking the market initiative. How to see that the only good market defense is an offensive that destabilizes your opponent. 1:48:49 PM    comment []

John Boyd - The Best Review of the OODA Loop there is There is a lot available that will describe the OODA Loop - This is the outstanding review 9:40:16 AM    comment []

Open Source is Going Mainstream The trend is in - even Microsoft admit that they have a concern about the growing corporate acceptance of Open Source Software. If this is a reality then surely Communities of Interest such as those that have grown up at Macromedia will be become the essential process for staying current? 8:11:56 AM    comment []