Four short links: 3 May 2016

NHS Data Sharing, Underactuated Robotics, April Robotics Numbers, and The Counterfactual Internet

  1. NHS Data Sharing (Ben Goldacre) — as this project lands, we’re all becoming rapidly aware that incompetence, malice and creepiness around confidential data is policed with a worryingly light touch. Ben is scrupulously fair with the benefits and the risks, as clear on the state-of-the-art limitations for data sharing as the opportunities. We have a golden opportunity in the UK, with 60 million people cared for in one glorious NHS.
  2. Underactuated Robotics — MIT coursenotes, forming a working draft of a book is about building robots that move with speed, efficiency, and grace. I believe that this can only be achieve[d] through a tight coupling between mechanical design, passive dynamics, and nonlinear control synthesis. Therefore, these notes contain selected material from dynamical systems theory, as well as linear and nonlinear control.
  3. April Sees Robotics Investment Up (Robohub) — April was a big month for investing in robotics – 19 companies were funded to the tune of $175 million vs. $15.8M in January, $18.6M in February, and $45.4M in March. Four companies were acquired with 3 of the 4 reporting selling prices totaling $422 million.
  4. Inevitability in Technology (Ben Evans) — We think of the portal model as a dead-end, but half a billion Chinese Internet users suggest that it could have been otherwise. The Chinese internet is a great way to challenge your thinking on what’s inevitable in technology – it’s a living counterfactual.

Four Short Links is moving — On 5/9/16, new editions of Nat’s Four Short Links will be published at oreilly.com/ideas and oreilly.com/topics/four-short-links. The new RSS feed is available here. The existing RSS feed will soon redirect to this new feed. Please send questions or concerns to onlinecap@oreilly.com.

See more editions of Four Short Links...
tags: , , ,