- Schuyler Erle’s blog — Schuyler, a leading geohacker, is in Haiti as part of a World Bank effort to rebuild geospatial infrastructure. His blog posts and twitpics are excellent.
- Panton Principles — basic groundrules for useful open data in science. Raises the flag of licensing: arbitrary license clauses or hastily-repurposed software licenses lead to a quagmire of incompatible licenses and prevent useful combinations of data, just as license proliferation in open source created a confusing and difficult environment for people trying to combine multiple open source projects’ code.
- The Internet? Bah! (Cliff Stohl) — piece from 1995, which I remember reading when it was first published. It stands as a great reminder that scale and change happen: in 1995 there were barely 16 million Internet users and statements like this seemed self-evident: Then there’s cyberbusiness. We’re promised instant catalog shopping–just point and click for great deals. We’ll order airline tickets over the network, make restaurant reservations and negotiate sales contracts. Stores will become obselete. So how come my local mall does more business in an afternoon than the entire Internet handles in a month? Even if there were a trustworthy way to send money over the Internet–which there isn’t–the network is missing a most essential ingredient of capitalism: salespeople. (via Hacker News)
- Leadership Lessons from Dancing Guy (YouTube) — 3m long and it’s a brilliant insight into creating a movement. Must watch. (via robertobrien on Twitter)
"leadership" entries
Being CIO: 5 tips for surviving the first 90 days
How chief information officers can set the tone during their early days with a new organization.
The amount and methods in which you initially make progress will be indicative of your pace and style. Getting it right can ensure you are in sync with the business. Being too slow or too fast has considerable inherent risk.
IT transformations must begin with hearts and minds
Radical IT change starts not with technology, but with collaboration.
IT transformation must be managed in a deliberate manner. Heavy lifting is essential, but it should not be the first thing that gets done. Radical change must start with the CIO and his or her managers engaging in collaborative discussions across the business.
Four short links: 22 February 2010
Schuyler in Haiti, Data Principles, Damn Internet Get Off My Lawn, and Leadership Lessons
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