Seed’s Daily Zeitgeist: 4/1/2008

• Credit where credit's due
  Respect the man who made the science metaphor. Plus, watch a video about David Miller's Higgs analogy.
• The Illusion of Streaks
  He's not on fire. Nope.
• Men misperceive sexual interest in women
  A new study may indicate why.
• Edison...Wasn't He the Guy Who Invented Everything?
  Behind every great inventor is a great rival...who probably invented the same machine.
• Covariation and causality
  This cartoon gets to the heart of the difference. (via boing boing)

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5 things we love about WordPress 2.5

I spent some time this weekend updating my personal blog to WordPress 2.5 which was released Saturday. I've been a WordPress user for a while now, and it's worth noting that version 2.5 is one of the biggest updates since the release of version 2.0 back in late 2005. There's a huge list of upgrades on the official WordPress blog, but I thought I'd go over a few of my personal favorites so far:

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4 reasons why DoubleClickers should ditch Google

We've been hearing that impending layoffs have DoubleClick employees fearing for their jobs after Google finishes its takeover. Why? Working there sucks. Ask any Googler. Below, four reasons why DoubleClickers should welcome their liberation from the Googleplex:

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Six Months In, And 600 Posts Later . . . The Worlds Of Blogging and Journalism Collide (In My Brain)

Blink, and six months go by. Ever since I made the move from Time Inc. to TechCrunch, my life has become a whirlwind of nonstop blog posting, little sleep, and a growing addiction to news feeds, Techmeme, and my Blackberry. Last week, I wrote my 600th post (this one is No. 617). The boxes I brought over from my previous career are still stacked, unopened, in my TechCrunch office. A lone painting from my three-year-old son adorns the wall. I have not had time to unpack or even buy a bookshelf to put things on. Fourteen years worth of stuff, and it still amazes me I don’t need any of it.

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Computer vs. Realtor: Computer Wins. Twice.

Seattle based Redfin, a service that you use in lieu of a buyers broker or agent when buying a house.

We explained their model in detail when they launched in mid 2006. A year later the company was interviewed on 60 Minutes. And all along the way there have been lawsuits and litigation threats against the Redfin model - a home buyer replaces uses the Redfin service instead of a broker or agent. Redfin then refunds 2/3 of the buy side fees back to you. The average reimbursement has been $10,520.

Now, though, based on a report being released by the company tomorrow (the report is embedded at the end of this post), Redfin is able to get a second financial benefit to its buyers. Statistics show that Redfin buyers negotiate a much lower price than their broker competitors. They looked at two markets, San Francisco and Seattle, and gathered data from February 6, 2007 to February 5, 2008.

The data, says Redfin, shows that Redfin buyers paid an average of 1.015% below homes’ asking price, while brokerage customers paid .087%. Translated into dollars, the average Redfin buyer spent $5,048 less to buy a house that they probably would have without Redfin behind them.

So adding those two benefits together, a home buyer will save $10,520 + $5,048, or $15,568.

Digging a little deeper into the data they’ve supplied me, it seems that there are pockets of highly aggressive buyers that are a perfect fit with Redfin. In Santa Clara country the negotiating advantage was $16,107. Redfin also says that their business model, which keeps agents on staff for customer service purposes, are not paid commissions based on sales. They receive bonuses based on customer satisfaction surveys. That means they have to treat their customers well, and make sure they get a good deal.

The model seems to be working. Redfin has been involved in over 1,500 transactions (as of 1/31/08) and had reimbursed around $12 million to very happy home buyers.

As an aside, if anyone remembers a little rant I had last month comparing the working environments in Seattle and Silicon Valley, it was the CEO of Redfin, Glenn Kelman, that I was debating against.

Crunch Network: MobileCrunch Mobile Gadgets and Applications, Delivered Daily.

Mixx’s New Feature Aims To Get Breaking News To Home Page Faster Than Digg

Mixx, a Digg-like site that ranks news stories based on reader voting, will launch a new “breaking news” feature later today that should get real news onto the home page very, very fast. More on that below.

Since launching just last September, Mixx has been on a tear to release new products. Groups came in December, followed by private mail in Februrary. Also in February they released a clustering feature that I think would fix a big problem at Digg - duplicate stories describing the same event. With the new feature, other users could add different but related stories to the main news item. This removes the need for Duelling stories and it gives the reader more content on the stuff they just clicked on.

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The Secret To Google’s Success: Free Beer And Sushi

Google’s original chef Charlie Ayers claims in a new book that much of Google’s success comes from free beer and sushi.

In Eat Yourself Smart, he argues that Sushi made Google’s engineers work better: “The fat found in fish helps make the cell membranes round the brain more elastic and more able to absorb nutrients easily.”

In an interview with the Sydney Morning Herald, he explains how Google got top results out of it’s employees

[Ayers] started easing the computer engineers into the long hours culture with innovations including free beer and fortnightly “big-ass” barbecues. To introduce computer experts fresh out of university to early mornings, he developed breakfast specials, such as “French toast with coconut, macadamia and rum”. The rum, beer and barbecues provided perfect cover for converting the “googlers” to a diet that ensured they kept working after lunch, weaning them off pizzas and on to salads…..

My favorite quote (and reasonable enough thinking):

“He was hired by Sergey Brin and Larry Page, Google’s founders, in the belief that like a Napoleonic army, an internet giant marches on its stomach.”

(img credit: TropicalIsland)

Crunch Network: CrunchBoard because it’s time for you to find a new Job2.0

MetaCarta: Mapping the news

A Cambridge, Mass.-based company is launching a free Web site that maps news articles to their location on a map.

MetaCarta indexes more than 1,400 sources, including stories from the Associated Press, Reuters, and other news sites and blogs.

You can search for a place name or zoom into the map to a specific location, and articles related to that spot will be displayed. Repositioning the map refines the search. You can also browse by category, such as health, politics, sports, and world news.

The AP and Reuters stories are displayed in a window on the site, while clicking on other items sends you to the source site.

There are no ads right now, but eventually there may be classified listings and ads associated with businesses, says Rick Hutton, vice president of content at MetaCarta.

Is OpenID Being Exploited By The Big Internet Companies?

OpenID, a distributed single sign on solution that allows people to sign into different services with the same login credentials, gained significant momentum over the last year as Google, Microsoft, Yahoo and AOL all pledged their support for the initiative.

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Seed’s Daily Zeitgeist: 3/24/2008

• Orbiter Endeavor Launch
  Watch the March 11 launch from a dashboard-mounted computer. This is how astronauts act as they go into space. (via BA)
• Discussion on PZ Myers being expelled from Expelled
  Dawkins and PZ chat about the incident.
• Distinguishing Artificial From Natural Is Possible, for Now
  Our mimicry may get better, yet.
• The odds of dying from...
  Sure it's morbid, but it's also pretty interesting. (via Freakonomics)
• ITSNONAME
  How much would you spend for some fashionable chem-bling?

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