[physics/0506213] From old wars to new wars and global terrorism

Reading this gruesome study into fragmentation of ‘attack units’ in modern warfare, that Kottke linked to, it is clear that this is the mathematical model that should be used to examine niches in the ‘Long Tail’ debate.

I.E. The change in power law coefficient over time and its trend compared with G-7 terrorism or non G7-terrorism could be applied to standard co-efficients for low inventory mass market retail, bricks and mortar, vs unlimited inventory, niche market retail, the Internet.

I wonder what the standard power law coefficients are for these.

I still have a hunch that there are some non-linear affects and that fractals play a role in revealing the same pattern for niches within niches etc.

Niall Kennedy has a fair idea that Microsoft may be about to launch RSS search.

If I were Steve Jobs…

I would use the Gillette model (free fancy handle, pay for the blades) to sell value-add products like iPhoto on top of a free OS.

I would make power PC and the Intel version of OSX which has been worked on for a while - free.

Particularly in light of this:
Everyone wants ‘free’ Windows… | CNET News.com

Number of households in US: 101 million.

Local Services market value: $600 billion annual.

Household services: $180 billion annual.

Amount spent on local offline advertising by contracting and real estate businesses: $25 billion annual.

Dotcom investment in 10 online services during boom: $250 million [they were keen but too early]

Amount spent on advertising local services to households: anywhere between $50 -$90 billion annual [this is the biggest untapped revenue opportunity for search]

Largest category of services posting on Craigslist (taken by looking at a sample 2 days of postings): Sex services, 40% [i.e. Craiglist not a player yet, outside of jobs and real estate]

Largest category of Yellow pages advertiser: Attorneys, $856 million in 2001.

Largest single event resulting in Yellow Pages use: eldest daughter gets married [personalized search and user profiles will be important]

Number of Overture searches that explicitly have a city in the search: 4%

Number of Overture searches that have a term such as ‘lawyer’ or ‘doctor’: 8-11%

Years that Dex (the largest online version of offline Yellow Pages) have had search: 1 [the existing Yellow Pages providers are incumbents]

US Yellow pages advertising revenue: $13 billion annual
Local advertising budget in US: $22 billion

Total size of paid search marketplace: < $10 billion annual [i.e. less than existing Yellow Pages market]

This is why the battleground for search will be over Yellow Pages. It is now clear what the product will look like, and maps will play a big part.

Google ups ante in mapping rivalry | CNET News.com

I wonder if this Slate article, Are Subway Searches Legal? - The rules for searching bags. By Daniel Engber was written by someone that :

thought he had a point then realised that his argument was flawed;

added the paragraph at the bottom marked ‘bonus explainer’ which tries and fails to defend against the flawed logic in the main piece;

ran the story anyway.

There are very real civil liberty concerns post 911, they highlight the fact that democracy is built from a peaceful society. But cummon, screening bags for bombs before travelling is not one of them. There is nothing that takes away your liberty more than being blown to pieces.

Summary - piece highlights a claim that searching subway bags is ‘unconstitutional’, realizes that could be argued that is no diff from air travel searches. Tries to say that air travel is different because:

1. You have other travel options when flying vs taking the subway. (In fact it is more likely that you have more travel options when using the subway, as people from Hawaii).

2. Airline searches search everyone and where some people are singled out it is not at discretion of the security personnel (Er - bullshit).