Author Archives: Joe

UK Government Data Release – much ado about nothing?

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Back in January the UK Government opened a web site up that was described as “a one-stop shop for developers hoping to find inventive new ways of using government data”.   The site, http://data.gov.uk/, aims to pull together government generated data sets in a form that application developers can use to create ‘mashups’ of data from different sources of public and private data, create map based information from the data, etc.  In other words, the idea if to open up public data for private use.

I was pretty excited; professionally I’ve used some public data in the past and acquiring it is usually quite hard going.  Even if you know where to find the data, it’s not easy to just grab and download, and then it comes in various formats that need pre-processing to make useful.  So, I was pretty excited when I heard about this project.  I wouldn’t go so far as to say that my nipples were pinging with excitement, but there was definite anticipation.

So….my thoughts.  Bottom line for me at the moment is ‘Sorry chaps, sort of getting there but there’s a long trail a-winding before you reach your goal’.  Now, this may sound rather churlish of me, but allow me to explain….

Nature of data

First of all, a lot of the data on the site has been available in other places before now – however it is at least now under one roof, so to say.  The data is also available in disparate formats, like CSV files, etc.   The data is also pre-processed / sanitised – depending upon how you want to view it.  In some cases the data is in the form of Spreadsheets that are great for humans but dire for automated processing in to mashups.  The datasets are not always as up to date as one might expect; for example, on digging through to the Scottish Government data, I found nothing more recent than 2007.

Use of SPARQL and RDF

Although the SPARQL query language has been implemented to allow machine based searching of the site to be done, the data available via this interface seems to be pretty thin on the ground AND, to be honest, I’m not sure that the format is the best for the job.  SPARQL is a means of querying data that is represented in the RDF format to search what’s called the ‘Semantic Net’ – a way of representing data on teh Internet that is more easily made meaningful to search tools. But for a lot of statistical data, this isn’t necessarily the best way to search for data,  and the SPARQL language is not widely used or understood by developers.

No API

There’s no API available such as a Web Service to get at the data.  The site acknowledges this and states :

“The W3C guidance on opening up government datasuggests that data should be published in its original raw format so that it’s available for re-use as soon as possible. Over time, we will covert datasets to use Linked Data standards, including access through a SPARQL end-point; this will provide an API for easy re-use.”

I think this is a rather facile argument.  Apart from the data not being that up to date, one can surely publish the contentof the data raw – i.e. no numerical alterations – whilst still making it available via a SOAP, JSON or other similar API that more developers might have experience of and access to.   As it stands it just seems that some of the time spent on this project could have been spent in getting the data in to a format that could be served up in a consistent format to a wider range of developers.

This current interface – wait for the heresy, people – may be wonderful for the Semantic Web geeks amongst us BUT for people wishing to make widescale, real use of the data it’s NOT the best format to allow the majority of non bleeding-edge developers to start making use of the data available.

Summary

This is an early stage operation – it is labelled ‘Beta’ in the top right of the screen, and as such I guess we can wait for improvements.  But right now it just seems to be geared too much towards providing a sop for the ‘Open Data’ people rather than providing a widely usable and up to date resource.

Google Buzz and Google’s incursion in to Social Networking

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GoogleMany years ago there was a joke in techy circles that likened Microsoft to the Star Trek aliens ‘The Borg’.  It appeared at the time (mid 1990s) that Microosft were indeed determined to assimilate everything they encountered and absorb the technology of other companies in to their own.  Well, like the Borg in Trek, Microsoft finally found that they couldn’t assimilate everything.  But today there’s a new Borg Queen on the block, in teh form of Google.

Google Buzz was launched as an adjunct to Gmail, and Google got themselves in to hot water at the launch by having the system automatically follow everyone in your Gmail contacts list.  This was regarded as pretty heavy handed on Google’s part – and Google obviously concurred to some degree as they introduced changes to this part of the system.  The problem for Google is that they have a lousy history of handling privacy issues in both their Search tools and Gmail, and I guess starting a new product off with a similar disregard for the perceptions of their users was not a sound move.

So, how relevant is this move by Google?  I have to say that I’m not convinced that Google will actually represent major competition to Facebook or Twitter with Buzz (or, for that matter, with Wave).  The lock in to Google’s infrastructure of Buzz is something that Facebook doesn’t have, for instance.  I don’t have to have a Facebook email account, and I don’t do my searching through Facebook.  And therein lies the problem for me – and it all comes back to Google’s database of intentions that I’ve mentioned before in this blog.  The more Google can derive about the way in which people use Search, who they interact with, what ‘clusters’ of interests people have – even anonymously – the more value Google’s database of intention is.  You might want to take a look at some of my previous articles about Google – Google and The Dead Past, The importance of Real Time Search and Google seeks browser dominance – to get a feel for my views on Google.   Google’s strategic moves have been consistently to get Google’s search into everything we do.  Gmail was their first crack at this with personal communications, and now with Wave and Buzz they have the tools to map social networks, and the search behaviours of people on those social networks, especially if people remain logged in to Google accounts whilst the do their searching.

Let’s pretend…..you are logged in to your Buzz account and you search for something.  Google can link your search interests to those of the people in your social network, and vice versa.  They can thus add the collective behaviour of your searches to their database of intentions – remember what I said about the Borg? 🙂  And we’re not even thinking about the additional data provided by Google Apps…

 Google are also purchasing a ‘Social Search’ tool that allows people to ask questions of their social groups; I think we can safely assume that the responses will be squirreled away somewhere for future use.

Even when anonymised, this sort of information builds in to a very valuable commodity that Google can sell to future ‘partners’.  Google’s behaviour at the moment seems to be to develop or acquire a series of discrete elements of Social Networking technology that they’re bringing together under the existing account system of Gmail / Google Accounts, which makes perfect sense.  At one time Microsoft filled in some of the gaps in their various offerings in a similar way to allow them access to market segments that they were still trying to penetrate.  Perhaps Google have learnt from the software behemoth.

But they have a way to go – here are what I consider Google’s biggest challenges.

  1. The attitude of the public towards Google is not entirely positive, and whilst Facebook have had numerous privacy problems their defined market presence in Social Networking and not in Social Networking, Search, Email, Productivity tools, kitchen sink manufacture, etc.  
  2. Facebook may easily lose market share to a good competing service; their constant re-vamping of User Interface and buggy code upsets users but at the moment there is no viable competation for most people as Facebook is where their social network is.  Google would have to get people to migrate en-masse and over a short period of time to get the sort of success FB show.
  3. Wave is certainly buggy; Gmail and Buzz are designed to not run on IE6 and it’s debatable how long Google will support other Microsoft Browsers – I wonder how many people would want themselves tied in to Google at the level of software as well as applications?  Like I said earlier – Facebook doesn’t require me to have a Facebook email address.
  4. What’s Google’s target market; Wave seemed to be a solution looking for a problem; Buzz seems to be a similar ‘half way house’ affair that in some ways would have been best placed in Wave. Twitter and Facebook tend to provide specific groups of users with a defined user experience and functionality.  Quite what Buzz and Wave and Gmail together provide that isn’t available elsewhere is not clear to me.

So….my thoughts?  If this is Google’s attempt to park their tanks on Facebook’s lawn, then they’ve invoked the ‘Fail Whale’.

Espresso Entrepreneurs and Cargo Cult Capitalism

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moneyAn item caught my attention recently – so much so that I actually replied to the other blog!  It suggests that in order to succeed as a startup you actually need to be in Silicon Valley or a similar place.  My reply is below:

“Bit of tough luck for us Europeans, heh?

Most start-up entrepreneurs need a good dose of reality, I’m afraid. It’s quite likely that 99% of us will NEVER create a ‘winner takes most of it’ let alone a ‘winner takes all’ business.

For most people, moving to SV or it’s environs simply makes you think you’re doing something of value to the startup – the money spent and disruption experienced could be better spent on achievement within the business.

In the film industry there’s what are called ‘Cappucino Producers’ – people in Hollywood or London who are in the right place, at the right time, with the right ideas, meeting lots of people, but who never actually manage to get a project off the ground because they’re distracted with the lifestyle.

Don’t become an Espresso Entrepreneur. “

There’s nothing new in what I’m saying, and I’m the first to say that I doubt that I currently have the nous to put together a world-beating company that takes first place in a market place.  And I’ve failed on more than one occasion….but, hey – that gives me a different perspective. 🙂

My current business thinking in terms of getting my new baby off the ground has been very much influenced by the book ‘A good hard kick in the ass’ by Rob Adams, in which he disabuses several common myths about startups, and in that book is focus on what he calls becoming an ‘Execution Oriented’ company rather than an ‘Output Oriented’ company.  Execution orientation refers to the tasks and processes undertaken by the company that progress the business plan and actually get viable product closer to the market place – i.e. those things likely to make money.  ‘Output Orientation’ refers to the things done that are peripheral – e.g. doing lots of market research without using the results, focusing on office furnishings, etc.

My own thoughts are that a lot of folks seem to be buried in the minutiae of Output Orientation; involvement in tasks and activities that at first appear to be progressing the business but actually don’t add much to the execution of the business plan towards profitability.  It all looks good, you can get out and about and meet other entrepreneurs doing the same thing, and there’s a general whirl of activity – much of which will not help establish sound businesses.

I call this ‘Cargo Cult Capitalism’.  In the years immediately following World War 2 natives on Islands that had been occupied by the US or Japan started behaving very strangely; they started building mock-ups of air strips and all the associated paraphernalia to try and bring back the aircraft that had been supplying the troops on their islands (and hence giving them lots of stuff as a by-product).   These ‘Cargo Cults’ were basically an attempt at sympathetic magic; by mirroring what they’d seen the soldiers and airmen doing, they thought that they could induce aircraft to appear and land.  Cause and effect was something of a lost cause…

And so it is with lots of startups – folks involve mirror the public behaviour of what they feel are successful startups, whilst neglecting the behind the scenes private behaviours that actually deliver the goods.  So…perhaps it’s time to consider whether what you’re doing is actually output orientation or Cargo Cult Capitalism; and if so, just ditch the Espresso and get executing!  

 

Saying Sorry, Contrition, Repentance and the Scorpion

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Earlier this week I commented on the words of John Healey, the Housing Minister who said that repossession is not always a bad thing.  As has been pointed out, the 46,000 people repossessed in the last year would probably disagree, and would no doubt like a word of apology from him.  You know, the ‘s’ word.  Sorry.  And, I expect that they would want him to mean what he says – to be truly sorry for the hurt that his comments may have caused.

There have been other recent stories where saying Sorry may not yet be enough – John Terry and Ashley Cole, for example.  Of course, that’s a matter for them and their families, but the bottom line is that today saying ‘Sorry’ has been devalued.  People throw the word off when they get caught out and it’s hard for us to know whether they genuinely mean it or not.  Saying Sorry should be the external, communicable expression of that internal shift in attitude and behaviour that, as a Christian, I would call contrition and repentance.

An act of contrition is a prayer that expresses sorrow for sins committed.  Repentance is the next step –  it typically “includes an admission of guilt, a promise or resolve not to repeat the offense; an attempt to make restitution for the wrong, or in some way to reverse the harmful effects of the wrong where possible.” (Wikipedia)

When we hear the expression ‘Sorry’, can’t necessarily see whether someone is contrite or not, and but we can see whether someonehas been truly repentant – they change the behaviour that caused the problem and at least make a gesture towards righting the wrong.  I’ve dropped a few clangers in my time and hope that I’ve shown enough contrition and repentance for my behaviour – only people around me can tell me that.

Without contrition and repentance – even if you don’t have any religious beliefs – all that it means when you say ‘Sorry’ is that you’re sorry you’ve been caught, and the only Commandment you’re concerned about breaking is the mythical ‘Eleventh Commandment’ – ‘Thou Shalt Not Get Caught’.  To say Sorry without truly expressing contrition and repentance is like being a child making a promise with ‘crossed fingers’ – for those unaware of this particular bit of childhood culture, such a promise was held to be breakable at will.  What may be acceptable in a child is particularly sad and graceless in an adult.

Which brings us back to people in the public eye.  I’d genuinely like to believe that folks who get caught behaving badly see the light and that they will, after apologising to all concerned, will perform some little act of contrition and then prove their repentance by changing their behaviour.  After all, no one is perfect and, as they say ‘shit happens’ in the best regulated lives that may lead us in to the path of temptation.  But therein lies the mark of the man (or woman) – to be able to not repeat the errors of the past again.  

When I encounter the ‘serial offenders’ of the world who do something, apologise, claim to be contrite, publicly change their behaviour and then get caught in a similar situation a few months later I do start wondering whether there’s something more involved than just lack of will power.  Perhaps it’s character as well.  There’s a fablethat’s been repeated in many places, about a Scorpion who wants to cross a river.  He ponders this problem for a while when he sees a frog hopping along.  He asks the frog whether it would be possible to ride on his back whilst the frog swims the river. The frog points out that the scorpion is likely to sting him on the journey and kill him.  The scorpion replies that were he to do that, then he too would drown, as well as the frog.  The frog goes along with this, and the pair start the river crossing.  Half way across the scorpion stings the frog, and as they both drown the frog asks ‘Why?’  The scorpion sadly remarks ‘It’s in my nature.’  

Fortunately, most of us are civilised human beings of good character, and not toxic arachnids with an appetite for self-destruction who also destroy the lives of those around them.

A 21 hour working week? Earth calling nef….

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I don’t like to admit it in public, but I kind of like my work.  I’m self-employed, in IT.  I probably do around 35 hours a week ‘client facing’ work and probably about 10 hours a week grubbing up new work, invoicing, etc.  I’ll work longer hours when needs be, and slack when I can.  I don’t regard work as the be all and end all of my life – far from it.  But I have found that when I don’t work, bad things happen, usually presaged by letters from the people who hold my mortgage, my bank manger, the utilities companies, etc.  Because when I don’t work, the money doesn’t appear.

I have worked with people from the New Economics Foundation (nef) and have quite a bit of time for them, but this latest suggestion blows my mind, I’m afraid.  They suggest a working week of 21 hours.  Very early on in this piece they do admit that people would have a reduced income.  Yes, typically by about 40 to 50%, assuming a straight reduction.

Don’t get me wrong – I agree with this comment made by the report’s author, Anna Coote:

“So many of us live to work, work to earn, and earn to consume, and our consumption habits are squandering the earth’s natural resources.

“Spending less time in paid work could help us to break this pattern. We’d have more time to be better parents, better citizens, better carers and better neighbours.

“We could even become better employees – less stressed, more in control, happier in our jobs and more productive.

“It is time to break the power of the old industrial clock, take back our lives and work for a sustainable future.”

But I’m afraid that this approach is typical of the new left – legislate and push the impact of policy on to the people.  Changes in people’s habits come from the people themselves.  I consume less than I used to, spend more time being a better citizen, and am more productive in my working life not because I work less hours but because I manage the time I do spend working more effectively.  The idea of breaking the old industrial clock is another piece of left wing thinking.  Guys, don’t know how to tell you this, but the old industrial clock has already stopped and some of the biggest issues around working conditions today are not hours based but revolve around:

  1. When and where the hours are worked –  employers are inflexible, often insisting on the 9 to 5 regime sitting at a desk when it’s not actually necessary to get the job done.
  2. The nature of the job – many job types are fleeing the UK leaving us with skilled technical service work, the professions, retail, leisure and service sector.  Most of these jobs rely on people being there to deliver.  A 21 hour working week means that to cover time when people will want to do things, 2 people will need to be employed where one was before. 
  3. The fact that the cost of living has greatly increased – people are working the hours they work because they need to to keep a roof over their heads.

I’m not at all impressed by this report.  The report acknowledges a massive cultural shift – indeed it will be, making a MORE stressed workforce as people start wondering where the money to pay their bills is going to come from.  More people will have to be in the workforce; whilst we have 2 million unemployed, I doubt that that would cover the requirements of halving the working week for most people.  And the idea that everyone will join hands and walk happily in to tomorrow’s rainbow future of good parenting, good charitable works and a new worker’s paradise is rubbish.  Good parents are good parents because they want to be, irrespective of the hours they work.  People doing good works in the community – again, many of these do this not because they have time in abundance but because they make effective use of what time they have.

People are not necessarily going to go and do worthy things in their communities, no matter what we may wish to believe.  As a pragmatist, I look around me and see that what most people want to do with their time off is chill out, relax, consume and make full use of the recreation industries.  I doubt taht this would change if they were given more time to do it in.

Give people a 4 day weekend and I’m not sure that people will actually thank you for it.  Especially when the bills come in.  But Governments will love it – they get to reduce the unemployment figures at one fell stroke.  And it puts all of our finances on that much more of a knife edge – all the better to keep us in line.

We know where you’ve been on the Net, and we don’t need no steenkin’ cookies!

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searchglassI’m not overly paranoid about people knowing where I’ve been on the Internet; I’m aware that it’s pretty easy for a website to feed your browser ‘tracking cookies’ that can be used for marketing and advertising purposes, and these can then be picked up on other sites, thus providing a path of footsteps that you have followed online.

Which is why I clear my cookies regularly, and set my browsers to only accept cookies from sites that I want to accept cookies from.  But I can see that in some parts of the world, your browsing history might be of great interest to Government and Law Enforcement, and I’m sure that many of the larger online retailers would love to get their paws on a good, reliable and hard to circumvent method of looking at what common interests people have.  For example, even if you’re anonymous, it can be of great use to companies to know what sorts of sites you visit, because you can then use data mining techniques to derive information on what other sites or products you might be interested in.  For example, if you’re an Amazon user, you’ll be aware of the fact you get recommendations of the ‘We see you’re interested in x.  Other people interested in x also bought y and z’. 

Now…let’s take this a little further.  I was browsing around the other afternoon and came across this site.  Give it a try – it’s under the auspices of the Electronic Frontier Foundation.  I don’t know what it came back with for you, but my ‘fingerprint’ was pretty darn rare – I guess it’s inevitable because of the various things I have installed on this  computer for work.  The site looks at the information sent by your browser to the site, and uses it to derive a ‘uniqueness’ factor – a sort of tag.  For an out of the box installation of an Operating System then I’d expect that there would be quite a few people whose finger prints are essentially the same.  But the more you tweak and configure and install stuff on your PC, the more unique it gets….to a point at which it can identify your PC uniquely, with very few errors.

And all this without it ever putting a cookie anywhere near your PC.  Now, there are ways around this – there always are – but they’re not the sort of approaches that the average man or woman in the street would take.

So what sort of ‘advantage’ would such a technology offer online companies, Government and the Security Services?

Now, this is pure supposition – I have absolutely no evidence at all that this is happening or is likely to happen…but let’s pretend.  We’ll assume that a number of large online companies have collaborated on sharing this fingerprint data – basically you visit a site or even a page – or maybe even do searches for certain subjects – and your electronic fingerprint is tagged on to that fact.

Scenario 1.  You do a search for information on equipment to help you avoid speed cameras.  Later that day you go to buy car insurance.  The insurer does a quick check on your ‘fingerprint’ against topics of interest to it – including sites offering legal advice for people caught speeding and also sites that inform or advise on speed traps.  You show up – you’re declined.

Scenario 2.  You’re interested in computer hacking – maybe even researching a book.  You visit a number of sites of interest, look at books on Amazon and such.  A few weeks later a major ‘hack’ happens and the authorities look at the electronic fingerprints of everyone who may have researched the topic.  You will show up.  This fingerprint is then circulated around ISPs who note that it is one that is associated with your Internet account.

Scenario 3. You’re gay in a country run by a repressive regime.  You visit web sites where the fingerprinting is being done for commercial marketing reasons.  The security services of your country get hold of this data, either by buying it or stealing it, and run a check of those fingerprints against the ones that are on file with the ISPs of that country.  You will find yourself in major trouble.

There are ways around this technique – it’s easy to go through proxies, and possible to strip all this sort of identifying data off of the packets that go to web sites.  And people who’re genuinely worried (or have reason to avoid this sort of inspection) will no doubt be doing this.  But for the vast majority of people this simply would be yet another means of intrusion in to our private lives.

John Healey – Caring, sharing New Labour – repossessions can be good!

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Unsurprisingly, repossessions are at a 14 year high.  It would have been unthinkable for the recession to have had any other impact on householder finances, as is indicated by this report on the BBC website today.  So it was pretty useful for John Healey, the current housing minister, to be interviewed today on Radio 5.  I say ‘current’ housing minister because it’s quite possible that by the time you read this he will have either been fired or done the honourable thing and quit.

Basically, he’s reportedly said that “It can be the best thing for some people to be repossessed.”  Yup, that’s right – check out Guido Fawkes here.   Now, just in case you’re feeling confused that a member of the party that is purportedly ‘for the people’ is advocating that being evicted is acceptable for some, I will remind you which party he belongs to.  New Labour.  That’s right.  Not the Tories, but New Labour. 

Now, my initial thoughts were that he’d basically put his foot firmly in his mouth and what he’d really intended to say was ‘It’s never the best thing for people to be repossessed.’   That was a reasonable expectation of what to be expecting from a ‘socialist’, after all…but I did a Google search and…oh dear.

Unfortunately, this sort of caring approach to the property owning democracy is nothing new for Healey.  Take a look at his coments from last year where he lauded a fall in home ownership.  So it would appear to be more policy than slip of the tongue.  Which makes you wonder what the housing policy of this Government really is. 

  1. Housing policy is to push people out of owning their own houses back in to state or local authority owned housing, redolent of East Germany in the 1970s?
  2. Housing Policy is to remind anyone who owns a house that they cannot necessarily expect any help if they are threatened with repossession?
  3. Housing Policy is partially dictated by the banks who want to get some easy money back by repossessing a few more people.
  4. Housing Policy – like other policies – is to made so ludicrous that New Labour cannot possibly be re-elected and they’ll escape the consequences of their totally fucked-up handling of the economy.

You pays your money, and you takes your choice.

But if you’re one of his constituents – sack ‘im in May.  You know it makes sense.

BBC bias in favour of globalisation?

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As is my habit, I popped in to the BBC Website this morning to catch up on what’s been happening in the world and saw this article, with the link headline from the front page of ‘Why globalisation means you are less likely to be burgled’.  Hmmm, I thought – interesting.  As I expected, the article led on the fact that globalisation has driven down the price of consumer electronics such as DVD players and computers, and has indeed reduced the chances of being burgled.  After all, is it really worth running the risk of breaking and entering someone’s house to steal a DVD player that costs £20?  I think even the most desperate criminal would suggest not.

So far, so good – then the not so good news.  Apparently the same criminals are now taking to mugging and other crimes against the person. So, another headline that could have been drawn equally validly would be ‘Why globalisation means you are more likely to be mugged.’  I’m used to the more tabloid end of the media doing such biased headlines from stories, but to be honest this BBC selection of headlines from the story was breathtaking in it’s bias. 

The link headline at first glance looks like Globalisation good news; the conclusions being drawn from the story are only good news if you value a £20 DVD player as being more important than the physical and mental well being of someone being attacked in a personal mugging.  is this what a BBC sub-editor truly believes, that in the name of Globalisation material goods are more important than the well being of a person?

Of course, this IS the point of view adopted by many apologists for globalisation – after all, the cheap goods and services offered by globalisation is usually afforded at the cost of poor and frequently unsafe working and living conditions in the developing world.  To anyone unaware of what goes in to cheap goods, take a look at ‘No Logo’.   There is no doubt that globalisation has, over the last 20 years, created the consumer friendly, consumption oriented world we live in; after all, in order for large scale multi-national corporates to thrive we have to be encouraged to keep buying the crap they produce, whether we need it or not.  But we’re now beginning to see the wider cost of these cheap goods.

For most of this time the true cost of these goods and services has been hidden from us; unless you bothered to read books like No logo or study the reports of the impact of globalisation on local economies in other parts of the world, the only impact here in the UK was cheap stuff.  The cost to people’s lifestyles in the rest of the world was hidden from us.  But in this article, the research quoted has shown that there is now an emergent threat to our own lifestyles from globalisation – an increasing possibility of violent crime.

Not that you’d guess form that first BBC headline.

Social Search = global groupthink?

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GoogleA few days ago I came acrossthis item in Google’s blog – looking at what they call ‘Social Search.  This is a set of applications being developed by Google to allow image content that you and your social circle (as set up through your Google account) have posted on image sharing sites such as Flickr in searches returned by Google Images.    So the idea is that you do a search on particular images using Google Images, and prominently featured in the results set would be images that your friends have posted up on these other sites.  I assume that eventually this sort of thing will spread out to encompass other sites of user generated content – Facebook, MySpace, personal blogs, etc.  Of course, this would require some cooperation between the companies running these sites and clearly there would be financial issues involved, but technically it’s not that difficult.

At first glance social search looks like a very cool concept.  After all, we tend to ask our friends and colleagues for advice and guidance on where to buy things or find them online.  We take their advice on what web sites are reliable, we are likely to at least look at films or books recommended by people who know our tastes, and so on.  If it did become possible to pull together information about searches carried out by groups of friends, and include information posted or recommended by our friends in search results in a prioritised manner, then the results would probably be more immediately relevant to us, and would also be at least partially validated – rather than the results being the equivalent of a cold call, they’d be closer to a personal introduction.

However, it struck me that there’s a potential downside to this approach, especially the more integrated in to the overall search results the ‘personally linked’ social search results become.  There is a phenomenon well known in management consultancy circles called ‘Groupthink’.  It’s what happens when you get a group of people who’re closely linked in some way – members of the same close knit team or department, for example.  What can happen during decision making and problem solving sessions is that the group may come to decisions based upon internal politics and ‘norms’, rather than objective facts that are presented to them.  This effect has been seen to be responsible for poor decision making in a wide range of situations.  It struck me that there is a good chance of this effect becoming evident in search results should the ‘Social Search’ really take off. 

For example, if someone in a social grouping is particularly ‘active’ online then their comments and recommendations might turn out to have a larger impact than other folks who’re less active online but possibly more informed about issues.  The overall effect would therefore to bias such social network search results towards the people with the largest online profile rather than those results that are possibly more accurate.  Such individuals would thus become opinion leaders and formers in particular social groups, and advertisers could easily seek out these higher profile individuals to sell directly to them, working on the principle that they will sell to their circle of contacts either directly by recommendation or indirectly through the results of social search.

Slightly disturbing.  Whilst influencing small groups of people it’s not the end of the world, but how long before we get a situation similar to that in the Phillip Dick short story ‘The Mold of Yancy’, where the behaviour of a whole civilisation was influenced by the tastes and preferences of one man?  Far fetched?  Perhaps not.

Can money buy happiness?

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My answer to this question has always been ‘No, but it makes misery feel pretty good.’  However, according to a recent session at the World Economic Forum at Davos, the answer might be ‘Yes’…or then again it might be ‘No’.  I’m not entirely sure about the answer, partially because I know very few wealthy people at a level at which they’ll share their innermost secrets with me.  You know, the sort of things you worry about at 3am when you can’t sleep, when the ticking of the clock becomes the passing of your life and you wonder whether you’ll still be sane in the morning.  Of course, most of the time you do get to 7am in one piece.  I suppose that there is a part of me that really hopes that wealthy people are miserable on occasion – a quick burst of Schadenfreude on my part.

A similar story is that of the so called ‘King of the Chavs’, Michael Carroll, who won almost £10 millions on the UK national Lottery in teh early 2000s.  After a colourful story, Carroll is now broke again and claiming £42 a week dole.  From what he says it sounds like he enjoyed the money, spent it and will now enjoy being back on the dole.  I have to say that whilst I might not agree with his lifestyle, his rather laid back transition from rich to poor reminds me of the the joke ‘I spent most of the money on wine, women and song and wasted the rest.’

The main thing that seemed to emerge from the Davos session was that happiness is really hard to define, and given that it’s hard to measure something unless you know what it is, I guess that when even the richest and smartest folks on the planet  aren’t sure then any thoughts we have are just as valid. 

I’ve always wanted enough money to basically keep the bank manager off my back and have a secure environment for me and my family.  Not needing to worry about spending money is nice as well.  Exactly how much money makes you happy is, I guess, a relative thing; I can probably safely assume that I’d be happy with an awful lot less money than Bill Gates, for example!  Apart from personal security and comfort, the main thing that appeals to me about having extra money is what you can do with it to impact on the lives of those around me.  I’d love to have what is often called ‘Fuck You’ money – the amount of money that you feel you require to allow you to say ‘Fuck you’ to bank manager, employer or anyone else!

Whether I’ll ever get to having that amount of money available to me is debatable.  I may hit the jackpot with something I do – or, if I can ever be bothered to buy a ticket, I may win the lottery.  But until then I’ll just have to work on the principle that money may not buy me happiness, but it’s a better bet than being poor.