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Mets statistical analyst has seen growth and evolution of sabermetrics in MLB

Ben Baumer says his gig as the Mets statistical analyst was a direct result of the popularity of “Moneyball” early last decade. And in his seven seasons in that position, he has seen the sabermetrics movement expand and deepen.

Now, about 15 Major League Baseball teams have a person designated to do some kind of statistics crunching – including the Yankees, Red Sox and Cardinals, Baumer said – and they are looking for new statistical frontiers as well.

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The Constitutional issues of cloud computing

Would James Madison, for example, agree with some current interpretations of the Fourth Amendment, which hold that old-fashioned letters stored in a dresser drawer enjoy stronger legal protection against search and seizure than an e-mail stored on the Web or a private post left for a friend on Facebook?

In a world where every computer is connected, where it doesn’t matter whether your e-mail is on the hard drive in your bedroom or a server half a world away, where your critical company documents can be viewed from anywhere, where would the Founding Fathers draw the line for law enforcement? The “cloud,” already well formed with Hotmail and Google docs, is a potential treasure trove for police investigators. But how can we make sure the cloud doesn’t rain all over Americans’ Fourth Amendment rights to avoid unfair searches?

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Is Flying Under the Radar Better Than Being Stealth?

They seem to be becoming less popular lately, but not too long ago “stealth” startups were a growing fad in the Internet entrepreneurship sector. A team with a big idea would insist on keeping their business a secret from the public and even from investors until the last possible moment in an effort to ward off any fast moving idea vultures that might swoop in and copy their idea. Others went stealth to create a buzz around their mysterious and unknown project. Some argue, however, that being stealthy limits a startup’s opportunities for funding and feedback, among other things, so is there a better way to go about this?

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Why Predictive Analytics Is A Game-Changer

In simple terms analytics means using quantitative methods to derive insights from data, and then drawing on those insights to shape business decisions and, ultimately, improve business performance. Thus predictive analytics is emerging as a game-changer. Instead of looking backward to analyze “what happened?” predictive analytics help executives answer “What’s next?” and “What should we do about it?”

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Ad Tech SF 2010 Party List

I decided to take the liberty to make a list of all the parties and mixers that will be going on in and around Ad Tech SF 2010 this year.  Please comment on any I may have forgotten and will add to list.  Let me know if you would like to meetup while there (@jascha).

Delegate Mixer – Conference Only

Where: Moscone North 747 Howard St. (Room 134) When: Monday Apr 19th 5pm-6:30pm

Opening Night Party – hosted by Brian Solis, Murray Newlands, Steve Hall, and Marissa Louie

Where: Roe Restaurant and Nightclub 651 Howard Street/4th Street (1 block north of Moscone North) When: Monday, April 19th 7:30pm

ROCK OUT – presented by Partner Weekly

Where: Great American Music Hall 859 O’Farrell Street When: Monday, April 19th 9pm to 1am

Meetup202

Where: B Restaurant, Moscone Center (upstairs from ad:tech) When: Tuesday, April 20th 5pm to 7pm

Big Networking Bash (Open to All Attendees)

Where: Moscone North 747 Howard St. (Room 134) When: Tuesday, April 20th 6pm – 7:30pm

Old Timers Party

Where: XYZ bar in the W Hotel When: Tuesday, April 20th 6:30pm – 7:30pm

VIPMix+Mingle – presented by Moss Networks

Where: Manor West 750 Harrison Street When: Tuesday, April 20th 10pm to Close

Cocktails for a Cure – presented by Affiliate Summit

Where: House of Shield’s Saloon 39 New Montgomery Street When: Tuesday, April 20th 7:30pm to 10:00pm

Blumberg Capital & DoubleVerify Cocktail Party!

Where: Blumberg Capital Offices 580 Howard Street, Ste.101 When: Tuesday, April 20, 2010 from 6:00 PM – 9:00 PM (PT)

Clickbooth Party

Where: 1015 Folsom When: Wednesday, April 22nd (Free Drinks 9pm – 2am)

After Party presented by AdRoll and Girls in Tech

Where: John Colins, 138 Minna at New Montgomery When: Tuesday, April 20th 6pm – 8pm

Thanks to @stevehall for the Google Calendar Link for parties!

How to Build a Lean Startup with Free and Open Source Software – Part 1

I have been reading recently about the “Lean Startup” concept, which is funny since I have been working with and been part of more than a few without knowing there is a nifty catch phrase for them. So now I am all up on the lingo and hash tag #leanstartup I can speak on it. Today is the perfect time to take a gamble and dive into a lean startup. Being that there are so many free tools and services you can use along with very inexpensive solutions to infrastructure that were not available even a few years ago. By using the power of Open Source software, free online services, and cloud computing one can build a scalable and very cost effective lean startup.

Core Needs

Let’s first look at your new companies hosting and servers.  being that you are lean you may most likely be working from home.  So let’s look at hosting and services you will need in order to host some of the Open Source applications will will talk about in a moment.  In my experience the basic things you need to get going in terms of setting up shop are the basics:

The Salesman’s Creed

This is my phone. There are many like it, but this one is mine. My phone is my best friend. It is my life. I must master it as I master my life. My phone, without me, is useless. Without my phone, I am useless. I must txt and email with my phone true. I must call faster than my competitor who is trying to out sell me. I must call him before he calls me. I will….

My phone and myself know that what counts in this war is not the calls made, the buzz on Twitter, nor the calls we make. We know that it is the sells that count. We will SELL…

My phone is human, even as I, because it is my life. Thus, I will learn it as a brother. I will learn its weakness, its strength, its parts, its accessories, its battery life and its dead zones. I will keep my phone clean and ready, even as I am clean and ready. We will become part of each other. We will…

Before God I swear this creed. My phone and myself are the defenders of my company. We are the masters of our competition. We are the saviours of my life. So be it, until victory is my company’s and there is no competition, but Revenue.

Future: Amazon’s ‘Think Clouds’ are Data Aware

As we understand it from the discussion on stage, a Think Cloud is a “body of knowledge” that is a real-time information base of Amazon cloud that can be pivoted all the way down to the threads and individual data concurrency. It would be an index that acts like a control point that helps define movement of data through a servers and compute tasks. Looking at the journey from the data point of view, including data about the environment itself and how to repair itself when damaged and keep data concurrency in tact.

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Why TV Lost

Graham identifies four forces: 1. The Internet’s open platform fosters innovation at hacker speeds instead of big company speeds. 2. Moore’s Law worked its magic on Internet bandwidth. 3. Piracy taught a new generation of users it’s more convenient to watch shows on a computer screen. 4. Social applications made everybody from grandmas to 14-year-old girls want computers — in a three-word-nutshell, Facebook killed TV.

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Nation’s New CIO Speaks of Clouds

NYTimes has a good blog post about the nation’s new CIO and his desire to embrace cloud computing:

Mr. Kundra also said that he would push the government to embrace cloud computing — having work done on large servers rather than on desktop PCs. He acknowledged that there are privacy and security issues with some cloud-computing efforts, particularly when the computers are not all operated by the government. But he said that should not stop the government from taking advantage of the speed and efficiency such systems offer.

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