Author Archives: John Hunter

USA Health Care Costs reach 15.3% of GDP – the highest percentage ever

Posted on January 11, 2005 by John Hunter

re: Health Care Spending In The United States Slows For The First Time In Seven Years The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (part of the United States Department of Health and Human Services) issued a report (the press release states that report will appear in the Jan/Feb edition of Health Affairs but does not provide a link so the link is my guess of where the report will appear) and a news release putting a positive spin on the … Continue reading →

Posted in Economics, Health care, Popular, quote | Tagged , , , , , , | 7 Comments

Drug Prices in the USA

Posted on January 8, 2005 by John Hunter

re: Canada mulls end to drugs by mail order, by Colin McClell, Associated Press, 6 Jan 2005, The discussion of restricting Americans from buying drugs from Canada highlights failures of the current system. Unfortunately the focus in not on health care or the best economic plan but rather monopolistic behavior and economic regulation that is politically motivated to support high drug prices within the United States. Most articles on reimporting drugs to the USA will mention the idea that the … Continue reading →

Posted in Economics, Health care | 7 Comments

Wikipedia and Anti – Elitism

Posted on January 3, 2005 by John Hunter

re: recent post by by Larry Sanger, co-founder of Wikipedia: Why Wikipedia Must Jettison Its Anti-Elitism Wikipedia is an awesome example of the power of the internet. Essentially it is a freeware, open source encyclopedia. The results are amazingly good, still it could be improved. Many have knocked the Wikipedia because they can’t believe a project that allows anyone to edit the content could possibly work. I must admit I am amazed how well it does work. Larry’s long post … Continue reading →

Posted in IT

Digital Rights Management

Posted on January 2, 2005 by John Hunter

From Cory sets DRM strawmen ablaze: “For starters, any market-correction for DRM will surely involve informed customers making good purchase decisions about the DRM in their devices. That’s what this debate is all about. The implicit, “Stop complaining and let the market sort it out” in these comments ignores the fact that complaints about DRM are vital to the market sorting it out.” This quote cuts to one of the critical issues in the current debate on digital rights management. … Continue reading →

Posted in Customer focus, Economics | 2 Comments

The Greatest Wall Street Danger of All: You

Posted on December 31, 2004 by John Hunter

re: Born Suckers [the broken link was removed] – The greatest Wall Street danger of all: you by Henry Blodget. Henry Blodget mentions two profoundly (though simple) important factors that lead to poor investment decisions: Prospect Theory and Outcome Bias. He lists 7 factors, I find two profound. Prospect Theory (more details) essentially states people are eager to “lock in gains” (sell positions with profits to realize gains) and hold losses (deffer selling positions in which they have losses so … Continue reading →

Posted in Investing | Tagged , | 1 Comment

Google Photo Management Software – Picasa

Posted on December 20, 2004 by John Hunter

Topics: Freeware – Photos I am a big fan of Google, the search engine, and the company. Google bought Picasa, digital photo management software, a few months ago and decided to give the software away as freeware. I just got around to downloading Picasa. My initial reaction is that this is a wonderful product. I suggest you give it a try. It can automatically inventory all the images on your computer and it does a great job of organizing the … Continue reading →

Posted in Google, Travel photos

Adventure Capitalist and China Wakes

Posted on December 19, 2004 by John Hunter

I recently read two books that offered perspectives I found worthwhile and were enjoyable to read. Adventure Capitalist by Jim Rogers tracked his trip around the world by car. Previously he had documented his around the world motorcycle journey in Investment Biker. His views offer a worthwhile perspective that is often missed, in my opinion. That said I wouldn’t accept his views as the final truth they are valuable as one perspective to shed light on areas that are often … Continue reading →

Posted in Books, Economics | Tagged , , , | 1 Comment

Big Cats in America

Posted on December 18, 2004 by John Hunter

I found a recent Washington Post article interesting: Mountain Lions Move East, Breeding Fear on the Prairie. Many new realities are suprising. Some are historically important worldwide like the fall of the Berlin Wall. Others are not as significant but still something I would have thought extremely unlikely such as the return of Cougars to a wide range of the United States. I would have thought big cats would be found only in Zoos and in the remote West and … Continue reading →

Posted in Fun | 6 Comments

Management Improvement Articles

Posted on December 8, 2004 by John Hunter

Topic: Management – Library Additions The articles added to our library this month are especially good, in my opinion. Recent additions to the Curious Cat Online Management Improvement Library include: * A Brief Guide to Interactive Planning and Idealized Design by Russell L. Ackoff * Improving Problem Solving by Ian Bradbury and Gipsie Ranney * How To Compare Six Sigma, Lean and the Theory of Constraints by Dave Nave * In the Beginning by A. Blanton Godfrey * A Holistic … Continue reading →

Posted in Management

Economics – America and China

Posted on November 30, 2004 by John Hunter

Business Week has several good articles on the topic of China’s Economic impact including: Shaking up Trade Theory and The China Price. In Shaking up Trade Theory Aaron Bernstein explores: “The fact that programming, engineering, and other high-skilled jobs are jumping to places such as China and India seems to conflict head-on with the 200-year-old doctrine of comparative advantage.” Over the last few years the white collar job losses in tech US have seemed to cause quite a bit more … Continue reading →

Posted in Economics, Science | Tagged , , , , ,

Hack your way out of writer’s block

Posted on November 18, 2004 by John Hunter

Topic: Miscellaneous I thought this post, from 43 folders, on writer’s block, had some good ideas. If you are suppose to be witting something and instead are reading this blog perhaps you should take a look at the ideas offered and see if they help you get back on track.

Posted in Management

Management Improvement Articles

Posted on November 11, 2004 by John Hunter

Topic: Management – Library Additions Recent additions to the Curious Cat Online Management Improvement Library include: * Race for Quality Knows No Finishing Line by Venkatachari Jagannathan * Business Needs Determine What Black Belts Need to Know by Ronald D. Snee * Opportunities and Challenges for Industrial Statisticians in the 21st Century by Gerald J. Hahn * Innovation as a Deep Capability by Gary Hamel Find links to these, and other new additions, on the Curious Cat Management Improvement New … Continue reading →

Posted in Management

Google index reaches 8 billion

Posted on November 10, 2004 by John Hunter

Google Blog reported that the number of documents included in the Google index now exceeds 8 billion. “Today that number nearly doubled to more than 8 billion pages.”

Posted in Google

A9 Toolbar for Firefox Browser

Posted on November 1, 2004 by John Hunter

Amazon.com has released their A9 toolbar for the new Firefox 1.0 browser. The A9 toolbar has a number of handy features. I am most glad to see the increasing support (which will only encourage more use of the great, free, open source Firefox browser. The Google toolbar should provide such support soon, I would hope. Some people don’t like all the information Amazon gathers by tracking your use of the toolbar. Luckily, you can chose not to use it if … Continue reading →

Posted in Fun | 1 Comment

2004 Deming Prize Awardees

Posted on October 17, 2004 by John Hunter

2004 Deming Prize announcement – JUSE (Union of Japanese Scientists and Engineers) This year again provided impressive showings by India and Thailand: of the 6 awards 3 went to Indian Companies and 3 went to companies in Thailand. And this is not a fluke, a unit of the TVS group (India) has been awarded in each of the last four years, see, “Deming medal for Lucas TVS and SRF.” 2004 The Deming Prize for Individuals – Mr. Akira Takahashi, Senior … Continue reading →

Posted in Deming, India, Management | Tagged , , , , , | 3 Comments

Taguchi Loss Function

Posted on October 14, 2004 by John Hunter

Topic: Management Written in response to this post on the Deming Electronic Network (DEN) [broken link removed]. The responses on this topic show the strength of the DEN. 1) thoughtful responses that should help the person posting the original message 2) thoughtful responses that are of interest to many of us 3) the chance to explore concepts in some greater depth than we may otherwise Relating to the 3rd item in my list I would like to explore part of … Continue reading →

Posted in Deming, Management, Quality tools | Tagged , , , , ,