by Thane Ritchie | May 8, 2017 | Innovation, Technology, Uncategorized
Within just 3 years Uber devastated the L.A. taxi industry. The smartphone based company has gone on to affect many other markets. Even the English language has been changed by the Uber app. Start-ups everywhere pitch themselves as the Uber of “x” product or “x” service. Uber has become a noun signifying a type of a market disruptor. Next flying cars. The LA Times reports how thanks to Uber the number of taxi rides has fallen by 30%. Taxi Commission President Eric Spiegelman reports that now taxis take in somewhere around $400-$500 a week apposed to $800 (in 2012). In under 4 years Uber has revolutionized the transportation industry, beginning as a small start-up and becoming a large-scale company valued at over 60 billion. For this young and successful company, ‘sky’s the limit’. Well, not exactly, in 2016 the company announced their desire to pursue project “Elevate,” flying cars. While the statement certainly raised some eyebrows. It was met with many reservations. How would the FAA regulate the semi-private pilots? How would Uber ensure safety? In addition, Uber’s new strategy counted on the invention of a cheap and lightweight plane. The plan seemed implausible. It was not until Tuesday, April 25th, before many in the technology industry world began to take the proposal seriously. Uber hosted their 3 day Elevate Summit from the 25th – 27th to provide information and garner support for the venture. “It’s push a button and get a flight” This is the vision Uber’s Chief Product Officer looks forward to. The company hopes to launch its first Vertical Take Off and Land (VTOL) airplane in 2020....
by Thane Ritchie | Jan 29, 2017 | Innovation, Misc, Uncategorized
“To do these things well, most lawyers must forget everything they ever learned in law school…” This is the advice that the award winning author, Bryan Garner, holder of three honorary degrees, gives on legal writing. Garner is a lawyer, lexicographer, and teacher. Having written over 20 books, including a book he co-authored with Justice Antonin Scalia, Garner is considered one of the leading experts on legal writing of our time. One of Garner’s central values is efficiency. In Garner’s book, The Winning Brief: 100 Tips for Persuasive Briefing in Trial and Appellate Courts, he discusses the perfect formula on writing legal briefs. (Legal briefs are short documents used as pre-trial summaries). He urges lawyers to stop muddying the waters for Judges. Identify the main issue for the judge and give the Judge a quick and clear reason as to why your argument is the only possible option. “Within 90 seconds, the judge understands the basic question, the answer, and the reasons for that answer.”1Garner, Bryan A. “8 Frame the Deep Issues from the Outset so That You Meet the 90-second Test.” The Winning Brief: 100 Tips for Persuasive Briefing in Trial and Appellate Courts. New York: Oxford UP, 2004. 53-56. Print. Bryan Garner remains a somewhat controversial figure. His writing advice goes against the grain of traditional legal writing. According to Garner 1% of professionally written briefs are actually successful.2Garner, Bryan A. “8 Frame the Deep Issues from the Outset so That You Meet the 90-second Test.” The Winning Brief: 100 Tips for Persuasive Briefing in Trial and Appellate Courts. New York: Oxford UP, 2004. 53-56. Print. He urges lawyers...
by Thane Ritchie | Oct 26, 2016 | Innovation, Misc, Uncategorized
Why has Oxford climbed to the top spot on some surveys of the worlds best Universities? There seem to be a couple of main reasons for the ranking. One is a renewed emphasis on the hard sciences at Oxford in recent years. Oxford’s tradition as a bastion of literary arts and philosophy remain but are giving way to the needs of the modern workplace which requires first rate math and science education. Oxford’s Science Park is becoming a tech corridor for companies that reside there and feed off the the University’s programs and talent. Oxford was recently named the number one in research quality int the UK University system. The other reason that Oxford has made its push to the top is that it has relied on a time tested formula for education excellence. According to the University President Oxford hires quality professors who love to teach. No stockpiling of “names” that rest on their laurels need apply. All this excellence for only 12,000 USD per...
by Thane Ritchie | Oct 26, 2016 | Uncategorized
The future of Natural Gas in the US is a very cloudy picture. Natural gas production around the world continues to march ahead, despite low prices, and Major Oil players like Shell are moving to expand new markets for Nat Gas, but US regulation threatens that expansion in the US. US Natural gas has been on a trajectory that seems good for most people over the last few years with lower prices, higher production, higher consumption, more exports and fewer imports. With the clean burning nature of Natural Gas I would have thought that the pace of use, and new markets, for Natural Gas would have been much faster. Projections for new natural gas cars and filling stations seem never to achieve rosy projections, and millionaire T Boone Pickens attempts to get the government to subsidize the market for Nat gas truck engines has fallen flat. You would think that Natural gas would assume the role that many have called for, that of in making it a cleaner “bridge” to the future of energy. Seemingly solar and wind are not ready for prime time and Nat gas seems the logical choice to get us to a day in the future where alternative energies take over. So why the hesitation? US natural gas has a problem. The “never fossil fuels” crowd. This “never fossils” camp fears that Natural gas will replace oil and entrance itself in the energy structure leading to slow development of alternative energy. President Obama plays to this crowd. As other governments are out there are making deals to expand gas markets (Russia to...
by Thane Ritchie | Oct 6, 2016 | Misc
Why Are The Polls Different? This US presidential political season there seems to be extra disparity in the polling data coming out. Personally, and this is just a theory, I think the US presidential race polls are swinging wildly in short time frames because the 2 major candidates are so odious that a number of people are vacillating on who they like less on any given day. That is strictly opinion but there are real reasons why the polls show disparity. First and foremost the various polls use different criteria to determine “likely voters”. Using anything from self-reporting to 7 question indexes pollsters frame how likely someone is to vote. Another issue is cell phones. Most polls include cell phone users (Gallup, NY Times , NBC etc) some do not (Rasmussen, Public Policy). The big outlier this year has been the LA Times Poll which consistently favors Trump by 4-7 points it seems. It uses a methodology that asks respondents on a scale of 1-100 how likely they are to vote for a particular candidate and puts that data into a formula to determine probable voting. There is weighting in the poll that many think skews to Trump. Maybe you should just average all the polls? The folks at 538 don’t think that idea is too helpful. They more reason that you should search for bias and note it in your estimation of accuracy. If you want to dig deeper go here for more in depth study of the polls. Just remember polls can be wildly wrong, ask the Brexit poll followers about that. UPDATE 10.27.16: And just when we thought there...
