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Dan Goodman's plan B journal
Below are the 10 most recent journal entries recorded in the "dangoodman" journal: [<< Previous 10 entries]
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12:24 pm
[Link] | September 12, 2007
New Technology Could Help Target Political Ads
Media Post mentions a new technology "that can send individualized ads to cable boxes" which "could give candidates the ability to get into living rooms while altering their voice, appearance and policies to best suit each viewer. In other words, factors such as race, income, marital status and favorite brands might well determine exactly what individual voters learn about candidates while watching cable TV."
While the technology is not yet widely available, it should be within the next two years and could even impact the 2008 presidential race.
http://politicalwire.com/archives/2007/09/12/new_technology_could_help_target_political_ads.html
While the technology of "addressable advertising" is not yet widely available, some large cable operators are getting it ready with Comcast Corp., which plans to roll it out within two years. The system is already in place on some TVs, but Comcast won't say how many, so it is unknown what--if any--impact it might have in 2008. "In whatever medium we can, we want to talk to voters in as individualized a way as we can," says Mark Mellman, a Democratic pollster who worked on John Kerry's 2004 campaign. For instance, a candidate could emphasize a position on global warming to an environmental activist while giving health care plan information to people insurance. And it could also allow for adjustments to mannerisms, speech patterns and appearance.
( Read more... )
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10:07 pm
[Link] |
Never Lose Again?
"Drop Foreseen in Median Price of U.S. Homes
By DAVID LEONHARDT and VIKAS BAJAJ
"Many government officials and housing-industry executives had said that a nationwide decline would never happen."
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/26/business/26housing.html [Free subscription, or use http://bugmenot.com]
When experts say a market will never go down, there are two intelligent choices: get out of the market NOW, or be ready to get out on less than a day's notice. This is not nearly as safe to trust as "I don't have to check -- I know it's not loaded," "This battle will go exactly as we've planned it," or "He's my man/He wouldn't do me wrong."
At least a few of the optimistic experts know the history. They know previous "perpetual booms" have always gone bust. But this time, things will be different because...[new financial instruments, new technology, improved methods of sacrificing cabbage, etc.]
Here's what's different about politics; for one side to have a boom market, the other big company or oligarchy has to undergo a depression. So experts have to explain why one will rise forever and the other will fall forever.
In the first year I voted, conservative Republicanism was defeated forever. The only way Republicans could get back into power was to make sure they didn't nominate conservatives. This turned out not to be true. And what had been the solidly-Democratic South became hospitable toward Republicans.
More recently, liberalism was defeated forever -- in the 1972 Presidential election. Nixon had a run of bad luck, so liberalism had to be defeated forever a couple more times; the latest being the 2000 Presidential election.
It's highly likely a Democrat will win the 2008 election. Some experts will explain that she or he won only by seeming to be a conservative and a Republican; but the conventional wisdom will change. Within a few years, it will seem obvious that liberalism and the Democratic Party will never fall again.
And if you're a liberal Democrat, that's the time to start planning for the next time your people are out of power.
Crossposted to dsgood.insanejournal.com
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09:03 pm
[Link] | US Political Futures: as of May 3, 2007.
The Bush Administration is out of fashion. This happens in a President's second term; the only cure for it would be to repeal the two-term amendment. And this Administration has made itself more irrelevant than most have by this point.
Conservatism is going out of fashion.
The Republican Party is going out of fashion.
Tuesday November 4, 2008: The Democratic Presidential candidate is overwhelmingly likely to win. (However, if that candidate is extraordinarily incompetent and the Republican candidate extraordinarily competent, the Republican might just win.)
The Democratic Party will pick up seats in both Houses of Congress.
Thursday January 1, 2009: The new President will begin making it clear that she or he is very different from Bush. (Yes, even if the Republican nominee wins.)
If the Iraq war is still going, the President will make it clear that it was Bush's war.
Federal policies will be more gay-friendly and less Fundamentalist-friendly.
A number of Federal forms will be redesigned. New Administrations do this.
There will be investigations of the previous Administration.
Friday January 2, 2009: The first unanticipated problem for the new Administration will show up, if not before.
Tuesday November 2, 2010: Republicans take back some seats in the House and Senate.
Tuesday November 6, 2012: Democratic President probably re-elected. If she/he is unable to run, the Democratic candidate will be elected.
Tuesday November 8, 2016: Following recent patterns, this ought to be when a Republican is elected President again. My prediction: Democratic candidate wins, thanks to Republican infighting and a strong third-party candidate to the right of the Republican Party.
Tuesday November 3, 2020: Republican Presidential candidate wins. He (or barely possibly she) will be conservative (though regarded by some on the right as an Evil Leftist.) But it will be a version of conservatism that includes positions which in 2007 were liberal ones.
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09:15 pm
[Link] | http://specials.slate.com/futures/2008/
political futures: Betting on the election.
Why Vote When You Can Bet? /*Slate*'s/ guide to all the political markets.
The idea behind political prediction markets is simple. Lots of people wager on the outcome of political campaigns: Who's going to be the Democratic presidential nominee? Will the Republicans take back the House? And when the votes are counted, the winning bettors collect. The thrill of prediction markets for political junkies is that they harness "the wisdom of crowds <http://www.biz.uiowa.edu/iem/media/11_17_00.html>." A single person's bet on an election outcome isn't very good, but thousands of bets, with real stakes, are more likely to predict the correct result than even the best pundit. The Iowa Electronic Markets <http://www.biz.uiowa.edu/iem/>, the big daddy of the political prediction markets, is consistently better at forecasting winners than pre-election polls. (Read a 2003 Slate "Explainer" about prediction markets here <http://www.slate.com/id/2086316/>.)
If a single prediction market is wiser than the pundits and the polls, imagine how wise all the prediction markets are together. That's the idea behind Slate's "Political Futures," which offers a comprehensive guide to all the big political prediction markets. From now until Election Day 2008, we'll publish regular updates of the key data from Iowa Electronic Markets <http://www.biz.uiowa.edu/iem/>, Intrade.com <https://www.intrade.com/aav2/trading/tradinghtml.jsp?evid=23190&eventselect=23190&updatelist=true&showexpired=false>, Newsfutures.com <http://news.us.newsfutures.com/showmrkts.html?catid=9>, and Casualobserver.net <http://www.casualobserver.net/>. (Casualobserver has not yet launched its 2008 political prediction market, but we will add it as soon as it goes up.) In these early days of the campaign, we are tracking four markets: 1) Democratic nominee for president, 2) Republican nominee for president, 3) presidential victor, and 4) party control of the presidency. We'll add Senate and House races as they heat up next year.
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09:14 pm
[Link] | New Accents in the U.S. Economy
By CLIFFORD KRAUSS
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/k/clifford_krauss/index.html?inline=nyt-per>
Published: May 2, 2007
WILTON, Iowa -- First came a wave of immigrants from Mexico and elsewhere in Latin America. Next came tortillas and Spanish-language soap operas, made in the United States, for a growing Hispanic audience in this country.
Now, a Mexican bakery company called Grupo Bimbo is distributing English muffins, white bread and ready-made pizza crust across much of the country.
[That's a Mexican company owning Wonder Bread.]
Mexican executives pitching Italian pizza in cities like Kansas City, Mo., a Brazilian steel company buying up troubled mills in the Midwest, a Peruvian cement maker breaking ground in Arizona; these are all part of a surprising, broadening surge of investment in the United States by an intrepid group of successful and suddenly multinational Latin American companies.
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10:43 pm
[Link] | One Call to Tell the World All About You
By BRAD STONE
and MATT RICHTEL
Published: April 30, 2007
SAN FRANCISCO, April 29 -- While Walter Zai was in South Africa watching the wild animals recently, people around the world were watching him.
Mr. Zai, a 37-year-old Swiss engineer, used his mobile phone to send out constant updates and images from his safari for an online audience.
"You feel like you are instantly broadcasting your own life and experiences to your friends at home, and to anyone in the world who wants to join," said Mr. Zai, who used a new online service called Kyte to create his digital diary.
Central to the technology of Kyte and similar services is the marriage of mobile phones and the Web. Users download Kyte software for their phones at www.kyte.tv <http://www.kyte.tv> and can send their photos and videos -- however grainy -- from the phone to their online Kyte "channel."
"To run a television network used to require expensive cameras, a satellite connection and studios," Mr. Graf said. "But the production costs have gone down to zero. Now you can share your life over a mobile phone, and someone is always connected, watching."
Another company proving the potency of the sharing impulse is Twitter (www.twitter.com <http://www.twitter.com>), which is also based in San Francisco and has lately captured the enthusiasm of bloggers and tech insiders. Twitter, spun off this month from a company called Obvious, lets people broadcast short text messages from their phones and computers to those of friends and strangers.
<http://www.nytimes.com/auth/login?uri=http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/30/technology/30social.html>
The obvious next step is camera-phone sex (which has probably already come into use).
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06:27 pm
[Link] |
On living what you believe:
Minnesota Futurist meetings were held at the home of Earl Joseph till recently. He died February 23rd, at the age of 80. The Minnesota Futurist website (http://mnfuturists.org) still says in places that meetings are held at the home of Earl Joseph. Apparently, they hadn't planned for this future event.
Which doesn't surprise me. Futurists don't live for the future any more than most people do. Otherwise, for example, they would be way thinner than average. The best-proven method of extending life is calorie restriction -- that is, a diet extremely low in calories. If any futurists follow such a diet, they're not ones I've met or seen photos of.
Indeed, one very prominent futurist was very obese -- and died of a cause for which obesity was known to be a risk factor. (Herman Kahn; died of a stroke.)
[Note: I'm not claiming superiority. I'm at risk for high blood pressure and for diabetes, and ought to weigh a good deal less than I do.]
Futurists don't seem to have different political outlooks than people similar to themselves. They may invest differently, but few are independently wealthy.
There are people who live for the futures they believe will happen: survivalists and some political activists, for example. But for the most part, the predictions they follow aren't exactly scientifically grounded.
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09:41 pm
[Link] | From http://politicalwire.com:
Sen. Barack Obama's newly revamped Web site "looks a lot like MySpace and Facebook, and that is no accident," the Chicago Tribune1 reports. "As a presidential candidate offering himself as a generational change agent, Obama is leveraging online social networking in a nearly unprecedented way in yet another clear measure of how the Internet is transforming politics."
"The new look of the site2, launched this week, invites the user to create a profile for public viewing, complete with an uploaded digital photo. Anyone can create a personal blog. Users also can create their own onsite network of friends and public groups arrayed around any common interest that moves them."
1 http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-0702160200feb16,1,4940417.story?ctrack=1&cset=true
2 http://www.barackobama.com/
This may be what comes after Meetup.com (which worked well for local political organizing in 2004, though not well enough to get Howard Dean the Democratic nomination). And/or what comes after candidate-run political blogs (which don't seem to work nearly as well as independent political blogs).
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08:55 pm
[Link] |
More on the US a century from now
chipuni
2007-02-08
I don't even know that there will be a US in 100 years... it may have split into several countries (I see the West Coast separating from the rest, and there's always the chance of a Christian nation coming from America's South and Heartland.)
dangoodman
2007-02-12
The West Coast isn't anywhere near united enough to separate itself. Heck, all the West Coast states have their own internal fissures.
As for the South and Heartland separating: What do you mean by the Heartland?
The South? It's changing. Most obviously in parts of Florida, where Northerners and Hispanics are large parts of the population; and in northern Virginia. The growth in population is coming partly from people who return after living in the North -- and some of those people are African-Americans who don't exactly love the racist parts of Southern tradition. Partly from Northerners moving in. Partly from immigrants. Urban and suburban areas are growing.
More speculatively: The Northeast used to be far more religious than the Southeast; this is no longer true. The Northeast used to be far more industrialized than the Southeast; this is no longer true. The Northeast used to be richer than the Southeast; the Southeast still has more poverty, but the gap is closing. The Southeast is also becoming more educated than it used to be.
It's quite possible that a century from now, the Southeast will have followed the Northeast's religious fashion again -- and will be as irreligious as the Northeast is now. Or more so.
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09:08 pm
[Link] |
Some American futures
A century ago, more people were moving from the US to Mexico than in the other direction. Nevada was a few years from instituting a total ban on gambling.
What will the US be like in 2107? Here are some of my guesses:
Still the leading country in North America, thanks to having the largest population. But not the most prosperous one; Canada will be at least a bit ahead. Mexico will be less prosperous, but the gap will be much smaller than in our time.
In the Americas as a whole, Brazil will be ahead -- economically, industrially, agriculturally, in terms of influence.
The US will still be a major power in space. However, it will lag behind the European Union (or whatever it's called by then), China, India, Brazil, and Korea (reunited by then). Possibly also behind Argentina, Chile, and a few others.
On the world scene: the US won't have been a superpower for decades. It won't have the economic power; it won't have the military power.
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