Representing the Narcotics Supply Chain as a Graph
Foreword: Controlled substances (better named “controlling substances”) have a colorful, complex, and controversial history. Drugs abuse, addiction, and drug policy are charged topics that I will throughly avoid attempting to unpack here. This is a discussion of graphs and supply chains. http://www.bostonglobe.com/opinion/editorials/2015/09/08/bring-back-war-drugs/h2wWV7ojkje4P5dwIbmgPK/story.html https://reason.com/archives/2015/09/14/bill-bennett-wants-to-bring-back-the-war http://www.forbes.com/sites/jacobsullum/2015/09/10/the-fantasy-of-stopping-the-heroin-epidemic-by-stopping-the-heroin/ http://www.insightcrime.org/news-analysis/20-years-after-pablo-the-evolution-of-colombias-drug-trade Two former U. S. Drug Czars are claiming the federal […]
The Cold War and Prisoner’s Dilemma
The idea of Prisoner’s Dilemma was first brought up in 1950s. The prisoner’s dilemma is a standard example of a game analyzed in game theory that shows why two completely “rational” individuals might not cooperate, even if it appears that it is in their best interests to do so. It was intended to use for economics, however, both […]
Poke
In an effort to further explore the algorithms associated with Facebook and how they may be relevant to our social networks, I came across an interesting article based on arguably one of Facebook’s most ambiguous features – The Poke. What most people fail to realize, is users had the ability to poke their friends on […]
Homophily
The creation of the internet and social media was supposed to connect everyone together, breaching walls created by differences in location, religion, and political beliefs. News and communication were supposed to become more widespread and help facilitate understanding among antagonistic groups. At least that was what was supposed to happen. The availability of information has […]
How do your friends affect your school performance?
http://restud.oxfordjournals.org/content/76/4/1239.full Paper Cited: Calvó-Armengol, Antoni, Eleonora Patacchini, and Yves Zenou. “Peer effects and social networks in education.” The Review of Economic Studies 76.4 (2009): 1239-1267. In this academic paper, the authors develop a theoretical model that explains how each student in a network maximizes his utility by choosing his personal effort and peer effort simultaneously. […]
What Alphabet Means
Many years ago, a satirical organizational chart was circulated around the Internet. Though the graphic was meant to be humorous, it is surprisingly insightful to some extent. If we examine Google’s structure in particular, it loosely resembles the hierarchal organizational structure found in many companies. However, because of the vast number of uncentralized projects […]
Networks in Straight Outta Compton
-Warning: This blog contains spoilers from the movie Straight Outta Compton. Over the past month, the movie “Straight Outta Compton” has opened to critical acclaim garnering over $170 million on a production cost of only $28 million. The biopic recounts story of the rap group N.W.A., their rise from the rough streets of Compton, California […]
The Network of a Network with the App Waze
http://www.forbes.com/sites/parmyolson/2013/06/13/what-waze-adds-to-google-a-view-from-wazes-ceo/ In this article, Forbes Magazine features the popular application, Waze and the 2013 buyover by Google. Waze is known as a useful tool to many motorists, allowing them to observe warnings about speed trap zones, police presence, construction zones, heavy traffic areas and many others as well as to warn other motorists. The […]
Twitter and Mobile Recommendations
Twitter’s new mobile update for iOS and Android takes recommendations of “Who to Follow” to a mobile framework. The company recognized the market’s need to continue to develop the mobile format to boost engagement rates amongst Twitter users. One piece that is particularly interesting in Twitter’s algorithms is the aspect of proximity and the resulting […]
hitchBOT: The Robotic Friend
The form of networking we are used to has dominated social networks for a very long time is mainly driven by human interaction. The ability to meet other human beings and connect to them on an emotional level is something that has been treasured as a unique ability that living beings possess. We see examples […]
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