Month: May 2010

NYT discovers mass customization

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Mass customization of clothing is at least 10 years old – even Levis does it. (The concept goes back to a book written in 1987, Future Perfect.) The NYT just wrote about it  – the wrinkle is that it’s now called “customer design.”

Still, the article is nice because it shows how low the barriers to entry are. It also has a good description of how the company learns rapidly from customers, with real time chats and phone calls.

Since last Halloween, when the company’s dress shirt design application made its debut at http://www.blank-label.com, Mr. Bi and his three partners — ages 19, 22 and 30 — have joined a small but growing co-creation movement that uses the Internet to let consumers have a hand in making the products they buy. Web ventures have already popped up that allow shoppers to customize granola MeAndGoji.com, jewelry gemvara.com, chocolate CreateMyChocolate.com, handbags LaudiVidni.com and clothing for girls ages 6 to 12 FashionPlaytes.com. There are also online competitors selling design-your-own shirts, while Brooks Brothers is one major retailer that offers the service on its Web site.

via Prototype – Putting Customers in Charge of Designing Shirts – NYTimes.com.

The worst graph in a decade?

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The back page of IEEE Spectrum this month has, hands down, the worst graph I can remember ever. It takes information on media spending in different countries, and transforms it into a totally confusing picture.

Worst graph in a decade?

Worst graph in a decade?

  • The horizontal axis should be country, while color should be different media. They have it exactly backwards. As it is now, the stacking renders comparisons impossible. Continue reading →

Scientists Seeking NSF Funding Will Soon Be Required to Submit Data Management Plans – US National Science Foundation NSF

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NSF pushes for more data sharing on funded projects.  Good – let’s hope NSF starts a race with NIH. The culture of data privacy is (superficially) good for individual researchers, but hard to defend for society and for taxpayers. One area in which the wide push for “stronger Intellectual Property (sic) Rights” is going the other way.

Scientists Seeking NSF Funding Will Soon Be Required to Submit Data Management Plans.  Government-wide emphasis on community access to data supports substantive push toward more open sharing of research data …  In particular, on or around October, 2010, NSF is planning to require that all proposals include a data management plan in the form of a two-page supplementary document. The research community will be informed of the specifics of the anticipated changes and the agency’s expectations for the data management plans.

via nsf.gov – National Science Foundation NSF News – Scientists Seeking NSF Funding Will Soon Be Required to Submit Data Management Plans – US National Science Foundation NSF.

The real reason why Steve Jobs hates Flash – Charlie’s Diary

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From Charles Stross’ blog. I agree that the PC is fast becoming a commodity – this time for real, and even for laptops. I’m thinking about replacing my MacBook Pro, and asking if I really want to spend $1700 when I could get equivalent hardware from HP for $500 less. (Answer: Yes. I value my time!)  His speculation on what comes next is provocative – he seems to think Apple has a better shot at making the shift than anyone else.

The App Store and the iTunes Store have taught Steve Jobs that ownership of the sales channel is vital. Even if he’s reduced to giving the machines away, as long as he can charge rent for access to data or apps he’s got a business model. He can also maintain quality whatever that is, exclude malware, and beat off rivals. A well-cultivated app store is actually a customer draw. It’s also a powerful tool for promoting the operating system the apps run on. Operating system, hardware platform, and apps define an ecosystem.Apple are trying desperately to force the growth of a new ecosystem — one that rivals the 26-year-old Macintosh environment — to maturity in five years flat. That’s the time scale in which they expect the cloud computing revolution to flatten the existing PC industry. Unless they can turn themselves into an entirely different kind of corporation by 2015 Apple is doomed to the same irrelevance as the rest of the PC industry — interchangable suppliers of commodity equipment assembled on a shoestring budget with negligable profit……

Here’s his conclusion.

This is why there’s a stench of panic hanging over silicon valley. this is why Apple have turned into paranoid security Nazis, why HP have just ditched Microsoft from a forthcoming major platform and splurged a billion-plus on buying up a near-failure; it’s why everyone is terrified of Google:

The PC revolution is almost coming to an end, and everyone’s trying to work out a strategy for surviving the aftermath.

via The real reason why Steve Jobs hates Flash – Charlie’s Diary.