Cocktail napkin math uses brute force/ basic mathematics to better understand our world. This newsletter reviews interesting tidbits in Technology, Math, Cognitive Sciences, Business.
- There are 888,931,098 possible social security numbers. As of June 25, 2011, assignment of the future numbers is random, whereas previously we were expected to exhaust somewhat earlier. Now the expected exhaust time is roughly 2093... that is unless the majority of Americans were to request a new number, which (and I'm not suggesting subversion) Americans can in fact do. Now if it were to happen there would be a huge issue though because of the size of the social security administration, and it's dated technology. Ergo, if you wanted quicker social security reform... just convince a lot of people to change their number.
My math isn't that strong but the author makes a strong case that the behavior of VCs is rational.
New research has discovered that Alzheimer's is related to gum disease.
The author of Design for Hackers, recently published a book and wrote an in-depth article regarding the process and economics.
Just read the article.
A Venture Capitalist lays out some extremely boring math that shows the disadvantage of starting a business in the Bay Area.
Fantastic Study about the sound and quality of different woods for guitars
A research study using Application data turned out some interesting results.
Ben Thompson busts out an interesting idea... perhaps inflation is non-existent because of current monetary policy not in spite of it.
Robert M. Beren, Professor of Economics at Harvard University talks pretty colloquially about the wealthy in the U.S.
Meta-study of over 100 peer-reviewed studies on weight loss.