Everyone seems to be so fascinated with the importance of the information that they produce. Or the information that they require you to produce… “These details are very important to us therefore they must be important to you.” The disparity in interest is an example of information asymmetry. Information is Read more…
The world is a jumble of contradictions. And this is just one of the big ones. Open communication is critical and so is confidentiality. Your privacy is important to us, now tell us everything about yourself so we can help you. How do you have both at the same time? Read more…
Conveying the most information in the most efficient manner is a big part of information science. It is key in physical networks where bandwidth is limited and it is important in human to human communication where bandwidth and time are also limited. How much information can you communicate in a Read more…
We know it is bad. And the bad runs really deep. You can almost default to bad, and anything better than really bad is acceptable. The goal, it seems, is to convey just enough information in the shortest amount of time. And share it widely. But it is all about Read more…
As a whole, search has created some bad information habits for us. Search has in some ways flattened hierarchy. For the haters of hierarchy out there, this might seem like a good thing. I have never been a fan of too much hierarchy as that often doesn’t leave enough room Read more…
Search has become a way of life. Sadly, we have become dependent on search to the detriment of better ways to find information. Google has spoiled us, made us lazy and monetized that all at the same time. PC search tools used to be really bad, so it truly was Read more…
Most of our systems are inside out. We develop our systems to serve our business needs and hope that more or less aligns with our customers needs. ‘Our system doesn’t allow that’ ‘Let me see if we can work around that?’ In some cases, these system rules are justified. They Read more…
Clicking a link can be very helpful or it can be very dangerous. You don’t really know for sure in advance. Most of the time, it is safe to click, but sometimes it can be really bad. Calculating the risk/reward of clicking is kind of split second sub conscious decision. Read more…
Apparently, the “creator economy” is a new thing. Even before there was an economy there were creators. Humans have been creating stuff for a long time. Cave paintings, stories, so called oral tradition, hierarchies, etc. These methods of conveying information didn’t have all that much content, different travel very quickly Read more…
Why are there still so many data defects in data transactions. Time, misunderstandings and clumsy fingers are largely to blame for a number of them. Pushing the responsibility out to the end user also has negative consequences. Even systems designed to reduce errors end up filled with bad data. And Read more…