I suppose it happens to the best of us occasionally. Ouch. July 14, 2009
Posted by markblei in : Humor , 1 comment so far
I know I only work in research, so my opinion may hold only so much validity. Just as an observation however, I would guess that when publishing an article discussing CBC’s mandate to feature at least 50% Canadian content. It might make sense to master the spelling of the word “English” correctly in your illustration slide before you rush that bad boy to publication.
Just a thought…
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Space Beer Lands In Japan-Have A Great Weekend! December 5, 2008
Posted by Mark Blei in : Uncategorized , add a commentMediaBloodhound: The Wounded-Courier: Comedy World Devastated by Obama Victory November 7, 2008
Posted by Mark Blei in : Uncategorized , add a commentAs the majority of Americans continue to bask in the glow of Barack Obama’s landslide victory on Tuesday, comedians nationwide have suddenly fallen on hard times. Some literally.
Widespread reports of comics leaping from windows on Election Night have received little attention in the press. Some historians liken the turn of events to the stock market crash of 1929. But Freddy Roman, Dean of the legendary New York Friar’s Club, called it “worse, much worse, mayo on corn beef bad.”
Read The Rest—>MediaBloodhound: The Wounded-Courier: Comedy World Devastated by Obama Victory
Have a Great weekend everybody! Otto the octopus wreaks havoc October 31, 2008
Posted by Mark Blei in : Uncategorized , add a commentA octopus has caused havoc in his aquarium by performing juggling tricks using his fellow occupants, smashing rocks against the glass and turning off the power by shortcircuiting a lamp.
Staff believe that the octopus called Otto had been annoyed by the bright light shining into his aquarium and had discovered he could extinguish it by climbing onto the rim of his tank and squirting a jet of water in its direction.
The short-circuit had baffled electricians as well as staff at the Sea Star Aquarium in Coburg, Germany, who decided to take shifts sleeping on the floor to find out what caused the mysterious blackouts.
A spokesman said: “It was a serious matter because it shorted the electricity supply to the whole aquarium that threatened the lives of the other animals when water pumps ceased to work.
“It was on the third night that we found out that the octopus Otto was responsible for the chaos.
“We knew that he was bored as the aquarium is closed for winter, and at two feet, seven inches Otto had discovered he was big enough to swing onto the edge of his tank and shoot out a the 2000 Watt spot light above him with a carefully directed jet of water.”
Director Elfriede Kummer who witnessed the act said: “We’ve put the light a bit higher now so he shouldn’t be able to reach it. But Otto is constantly craving for attention and always comes up with new stunts so we have realised we will have to keep more careful eye on him – and also perhaps give him a few more toys to play with.
“Once we saw him juggling the hermit crabs in his tank, another time he threw stones against the glass damaging it. And from time to time he completely re-arranges his tank to make it suit his own taste better – much to the distress of his fellow tank inhabitants.”Link HERE
Analytics According to Captain Kirk Via Sitelogic August 29, 2008
Posted by Mark Blei in : Uncategorized , add a commentI found this really goos posting from a company Called SiteLogic they have a very clever blog thats worth a look at .
Anyway, I found this cool post by Matt Bailey the company president ,and as a trek fan, it seems to be the perfect TGIF Holiday weekend post
“In my seminars, I enjoy teaching analytics because the fun is in finding effective and memorable methods to help people understand the concepts. One of my favorites is an analysis of the Red-Shirt Phenomenon in Star Trek.
What? You don’t know about the Red Shirt Phenomenon? Well, as any die-hard trekkie knows, if you are wearing a red shirt and beam to the planet with Captain Kirk – you’re gonna die. That’s the common thinking, but I decided to put this to the test. After all, I hadn’t seen any definitive proof; it’s just what people said. (Remind you of your current web analytics strategy?) So, let’s set our phasers on ’stun’ and see what we find . . .
The basic stats:
The Enterprise has a crew of 430 (startrek.com) in its five-year mission. (Now, I know that the show was only on the air for 3 years, but bear with me. 80 episodes were produced, which gives us the data to build from.) 59 crewmembers were killed during the mission, which comes out to 13.7% of the crew. So, that will be our overall conversion rate, 13.7%.
Data Segmentation:
However, we need to segment the overall mortality (conversion) rate in order to gain the specific information that we need:
- Yellow-shirt crewperson deaths: 6 (10%)
- Blue-Shirt crewperson deaths: 5 (8 %)
- Engineering smock crewperson deaths: 4
- Red-Shirt crewperson deaths: 43 (73%)
So, the basic segmentation of factors allows us to confirm that red-shirted crewmembers died more than any other crewmembers on the original Star Trek series.
However, that’s only just simple stats reporting – ready for some analysis?
In-depth Analysis:
Analysis involves asking questions about the data. Analysis attempts to bring reason and cause to the reported data in order to find why something is happening. With that data, one can improve the situation based on the intelligence gained from the analysis.
Q: What causes a red-shirted crewman to die?
- On-board incident – 42.5%
- Beaming down to the planet – 57.5%
There were also many fights during the mission; on the Enterprise, on planets, and various space stations. The fights were also divided between alien races or crazed crewmen (usually wearing red shirts).
- There were 130 fights over 80 episodes.
- 18 of the 130 fights resulted in a fatality.
- 13 of the 18 fatal fights resulted in a red-shirt fatality.
Q: what was the rate of red-shirt casualties?
- 18 red-shirt fatality episodes:
- 8 multiple fatality occurrences; involving 34 red-shirted crewmen.
- 9 single re-shirt fatality situations.
It was found that red-shirted crewmembers tended to die in groups. In 17 red-shirt fatality episodes, 8 were multiple incidents, 9 were single incidents. In a little less than 50% of the fatal red-shirt situations, multiple crewmen were vaporized.
Q: What factors could increase/decrease the survival rate of red-shirted crewmen?
Besides not getting involved in fights, which usually proved fatal, the crewmen could avoid beaming down to the planet’s surface, which is inherent to their end. However, that could result in a court-martial for failure to obey orders.
Besides not beaming down, another factor that showed to increase the survival rate of the red-shirts was the nature of the relationship between the alien life and captain Kirk. When Captain Kirk meets an alien woman and “makes contact” the survival rate of the red-shirted crewmen increases by 84%. In fact, out of Captain Kirks’ 24 “relationships” there were only three instances of red-shirt vaporization.
The caveat to this is when Captain Kirk not only meets the local alien women, but also starts a fight among alien locals. The combination of these events has led to the elimination of 4 crewmembers (3 red-shirts).
Here are the statistics:
Red Shirt Death episodes = 18
Episodes with fights = 55
Probability of a fight breaking out = 70%
Kirk “conquest” episodes = 24
Kirk “conquest” + fights = 16
Kirk “conquest” + red shirt casualty= 4
Red shirt death + fight + Kirk “conquest” = 3
And the data trends;
Probability of a red-shirt casualty= 53%
14% of fights ended in a fatality (with a 72% chance the fatality wore a red shirt)
Probability of a red-shirt “incident” when Kirk has a “conquest” = 12%
The red-shirt survival rate is slightly higher when Kirk meets women than when a fight breaks out. This trend necessitates the question: How often did Captain Kirk “meet” women? In 30% of the missions.
As the data shows, Captain Kirk “making contact” with alien women has an impact on the crew’s survival. The red-shirt death rate is higher when a fight breaks out than when Kirk meets a woman and a fight breaks out. Yet the analysis shows that meeting Kirk meeting women only happens in 30% of the missions.
Conclusion:
We can reliably improve the survivability of the red-shirted crewmen by only exploring peaceful, female-only planets (android and alien females included).
Reporting the Data:
Now, researching the data can be fun and informative. However, that is only half of the battle. The interesting part comes when you have to communicate not only the data, but your conclusions in an effective, persuasive manner. The best analysis won’t go far if you can’t communicate the conclusions in a manner that people understand.
There are a few options at our disposal. First, the PowerPoint Method.
alt="enterprise powerpoint 2" /> 
There are a number of things wrong with the typical method of presenting data. For starters, this presentation could bore even the most hardened Starfleet manager (CEO). The typical corporate PowerPoint slide design is obnoxious and does not leave room for information, the charts are redundant, even unnecessary, and it does not do a good job of communicating the information or the analysis.
In most cases, PowerPoint is NOT the recommended tool for communicating analytics data. It is not the right tool for the job. Communicating analytics data involves providing conclusions based on facts, tests, comparisons, and research. In order to display the necessary data, a better method must be used, and not one that forces redundant bullet point and “snazzy” charts.
Visualizing the Data:
There are some necessary elements required in developing a chart for this type data:
- A list of the specific episodes
- Events that happened in each episode
- The number of events that happened in each episode
- An easy way to identify data, then compare and contrast actions in all episodes
By seeing all of the available data in one chart, associations, patterns and conclusions can be drawn simply by comparing the relationships as they are presented. This is something that I learned from Edward Tufte – 1. More information is needed to simplify data presentation. 2. Unless all of the data is presented, there is no data integrity.
Information is Primary to Design
This is critical in developing a chart of information – the information is primary. List the necessary data elements first. Then, develop the design around the information, and not the other way around. Otherwise, a beautiful chart will lack the critical information necessary to support your conclusions. The graphing software that I found extremely effective for communicating the episode data for this Star Trek analysis is Microsoft’s Office 2007, and in Apple’s OS X graphics software.
click for full-size version
I like this chart – eliminating the need for a legend is critical to allowing the information to flow. The data is the same color or object as the information we are trying to convey. Because there is no suitable color for Captain Kirk’s affairs, we substituted a very flattering picture. Fights are represented by tiny phasers, which are not the best representation because of the size, but can easily be determined by the process of elimination. This chart allows conclusions and observations that simple charts, numbers, and explanations may never bring to the surface. It allows for easy comparison, both to other shirt colors, and in relation to other episodes. It also looks as though Kirk was a very busy man.
In the first year of the series, red-shirt casualties were lower than other color-shirted crewmembers. The second and especially the third seasons were especially brutal. In the third season, only red-shirted crewmembers died; maybe because the other colors enacted better safety protocols, or maybe because they avoided the bridge when a new planet came into view, for fear of beaming down with Cpt. Kirk.
Summary:
Of the elements that helped to provide this analysis, segmentation was key. Segmentation of groups allows for comparisons. Comparisons allow you to spot trends that by be different from the rest. Asking questions of the data allows you to dig into specific trends and spot additional factors that have affects the original analysis. Unless we dug into Kirk’s personal life, we may never have spotted the contrast of Kirk’s attraction to alien females as it related to saving red-shirt crewmen’s lives.
Remember, when you have to account for lost crewmembers, your report needs to account for the how, the why, and the ability to draw specific conclusions as to how to affect the trends in the future. Depending upon your approach, you could either doom the project, and future red-shirted crewmen, or you could be visiting planets full of peaceful alien women.
Addendum:
I found this motivational poster, that could well be hanging in a cubicle at Starfleet headquarters . . . (courtesy of StarTrek Motivational Posters).”
Added 1/4/2008: This just seemed too perfect and had to be added:The Sexy Women of StarTrek
Happy Holidays from the Great White North December 24, 2007
Posted by Mark Blei in : Uncategorized , add a commentRed Cross sued over its – Red cross! (Via BrandweekNRX) August 9, 2007
Posted by Mark Blei in : Uncategorized , add a commentRed Cross sued over its – Red cross!
J&J, one of the largest drug makers in the world has sued the Red Cross over its use of one of the most famous symbols in the world – the red cross.
The problem is that the Red Cross is not the only organization using this symbol. The red cross also appears on J&J’s first-aid kits and bandages.
In the suit, J&J asked the court to force the Red Cross to have “all licensed products with the red-cross emblem destroyed and to permanently enjoin all sales of products bearing the emblem on first-aid, safety-preparedness and related products.”
The Red Cross CEO, Mark Everson, called the action “bizarre” and “obscene.”
J&J claims the company has been using the red cross since 1887, before the chartering of the Red Cross. J&J trademarked the design consisting of two intersecting red lines of equal length at least “as early as 1906,” according to the suit. J&J also claims that the Red Cross only has the right to use the trademark “in connection with nonprofit relief services.”
And if you think this is a hoax, do a Google news search.
BrandweekNRX is a blog for marketing professionals. So seriously folks: Is this about the most foolish PR move by any drug company this year? Or is it the worst move in a decade???
Feel free to use the comment section of the original post by clicking HERE
The Six Stages of E-Mail July 3, 2007
Posted by Mark Blei in : Uncategorized , add a commentThe Six Stages of E-Mail
Stage One: Infatuation
I just got e-mail! I can’t believe it! It’s so great! Here’s my handle. Write me! Who said letter writing was dead? Were they ever wrong! I’m writing letters like crazy for the first time in years. I come home and ignore all my loved ones and go straight to the computer to make contact with total strangers. And how great is AOL? It’s so easy. It’s so friendly. It’s a community. Wheeeee! I’ve got mail!
Stage Two: Clarification
O.K., I’m starting to understand — e-mail isn’t letter-writing at all, it’s something else entirely. It was just invented, it was just born and overnight it turns out to have a form and a set of rules and a language all its own. Not since the printing press. Not since television. It’s revolutionary. It’s life-altering. It’s shorthand. Cut to the chase. Get to the point.
And it saves so much time. It takes five seconds to accomplish in an e-mail message something that takes five minutes on the telephone. The phone requires you to converse, to say things like hello and goodbye, to pretend to some semblance of interest in the person on the other end of the line. Worst of all, the phone occasionally forces you to make actual plans with the people you talk to — to suggest lunch or dinner — even if you have no desire whatsoever to see them. No danger of that with e-mail.
E-mail is a whole new way of being friends with people: intimate but not, chatty but not, communicative but not; in short, friends but not. What a breakthrough. How did we ever live without it? I have more to say on this subject, but I have to answer an Instant Message from someone I almost know.
Stage Three: Confusion
I have done nothing to deserve any of this:
Viagra!!!!! Best Web source for Vioxx. Spend a week in Cancún. Have a rich beautiful lawn. Astrid would like to be added as one of your friends. XXXXXXXVideos. Add three inches to the length of your penis. The Democratic National Committee needs you. Virus Alert. FW: This will make you laugh. FW: This is funny. FW: This is hilarious. FW: Grapes and raisins toxic for dogs. FW: Gabriel García Márquez’s Final Farewell. FW: Kurt Vonnegut’s Commencement Address. FW: The Neiman Marcus Chocolate Chip Cookie recipe. AOL Member: We value your opinion. A message from Hillary Clinton. Find low mortgage payments, Nora. Nora, it’s your time to shine. Need to fight off bills, Nora? Yvette would like to be added as one of your friends. You have failed to establish a full connection to AOL.
Stage Four: Disenchantment
Help! I’m drowning. I have 112 unanswered e-mail messages. I’m a writer — imagine how many unanswered messages I would have if I had a real job. Imagine how much writing I could do if I didn’t have to answer all this e-mail. My eyes are dim. I have a mild case of carpal tunnel syndrome. I have a galloping case of attention deficit disorder because every time I start to write something, the e-mail icon starts bobbing up and down and I’m compelled to check whether anything good or interesting has arrived. It hasn’t. Still, it might, any second now. And yes it’s true — I can do in a few seconds with e-mail what would take much longer on the phone, but most of my messages are from people who don’t have my phone number and would never call me in the first place. In the brief time it took me to write this paragraph, three more messages arrived. Now I have 115 unanswered messages. Strike that: 116.
Stage Five: Accommodation
Yes. No. No 
. No 
. Can’t. No way. Maybe. Doubtful. Sorry. So Sorry. Thanks. No thanks. Not my thing. You must be kidding. Out of town. O.O.T. Try me in a month. Try me in the fall. Try me in a year. NoraE@aol.com can now be reached at NoraE81082@gmail.com.
Stage Six: Death
Call me.
Squirrel goes on rampage, injures 3 June 14, 2007
Posted by Mark Blei in : Uncategorized , add a commentBERLIN (Reuters) – An aggressive squirrel attacked and injured three people in a German town before a 72-year-old pensioner dispatched the rampaging animal with his crutch.
The squirrel first ran into a house in the southern town of Passau, leapt from behind on a 70-year-old woman, and sank its teeth into her hand, a local police spokesman said Thursday.
With the squirrel still hanging from her hand, the woman ran onto the street in panic, where she managed to shake it off.
The animal then entered a building site and jumped on a construction worker, injuring him on the hand and arm, before he managed to fight it off with a measuring pole.
“After that, the squirrel went into the 72-year-old man’s garden and massively attacked him on the arms, hand and thigh,” the spokesman said. “Then he killed it with his crutch.”
The spokesman said experts thought the attack may have been linked to the mating season or because the squirrel was ill.
Uptight Spanish Executives Compete To Go All Led Zeppelin on Madrid Hotel June 13, 2007
Posted by Mark Blei in : Uncategorized , add a commentMADRID (Reuters) – A Spanish hotel chain is running a competition for stressed executives to let off steam in a fashion usually reserved for rock stars — by smashing hotel rooms.
NH Hoteles will allow 30 people chosen by a team of psychologists to help demolish the interior of the 11-year old NH Alcala hotel in central Madrid as part of its refurbishment, it said.
The chosen 30, armed with mallet and hard hat, can destroy any part of the 146-room building, NH said, from bringing down walls to smashing windows.
The demolition will take place on July 3.
