Nick Lewis: The Blog

Time and again, I get myself into conflicts by insisting that design makes or breaks a website. Often, those who disagree with me say things like, "well, we are an information site; our users don't care", or "maybe if we were going after an audience of teeny boppers, I'd agree -- but were aiming for an audience of busy professionals." I always knew they were dead wrong, and their decisions were going to harm the potential success of their websites -- but now I have studies to back up my argument.

Modern psychology has often drawn, I suspect, a caricature rather than a portrait of man. As a result it has introduced a grave gap between itself and the knowledge of men that observation gives us and from which investigation must start. Those who are not psychologists ... speak of such strange things as fair play, justice and unjustice, even of dignity and the need for freedom. ... Yet not only are these ideas excluded from scientific discussion; the conceptual schemes with which psychology works today hardly leave room for them.

Solomon E.

By David Ronfeldt | The Rand CorporationExcerpt from: A Long Look Ahead: NGOs, Networks, and Future Social Evolution(pdf)

The term netwar refers to an emerging mode of conflict (and crime) at societal levels, short of traditional military warfare, in which the protagonists use network forms of organization and related doctrines, strategies, and technologies attuned to the information age. These protagonists are likely to consist of dispersed organizations, groups, and individuals who communicate, coordinate, and conduct their campaigns via the Internet, often without a precise central command. Thus, netwar differs from modes of conflict and crime in which the protagonists prefer to develop formal, stand-alone, hierarchical organizations, doctrines, and strategies, as in past efforts, for example, to build centralized movements along Leninist lines. In short, netwar is about Mexico’s Zapatistas more than Cuba’s Fidelistas, Hamas more than the Palestine Liberation Organization, the American Christian Patriot movement more than the Ku Klux Klan, and the Asian Triads more than the Cosa Nostra....

From Slashdot:

RonMcMahon writes "Dr. Arnalls from Cardiff University has crunched the numbers and has precisely determined that Monday, January 24th will be the worst day of the year. For those of you who might be wondering, the formula to use when deciding what day to stay in bed is 1/8W+(D-d) 3/8xTQ MxNA. The fact that the 24th happens to land on a Monday is purely coincidental."