In Slate Peter Aspeden writes that HBO transformed television from something that was viewed as “the lowliest form of cultural consumption” into a premiere art form. In this article he discusses the attributes that helped HBO achieve this success and take in $4 billion along the way.

• The Larry Sanders Show was the tipping point for the network. Viewers realized that HBO was doing “something original and distinctive.”
• This and other shows attracted the creative community which soon learnt that their ideas would be given a fair chance on the network.
• All of this combines to create a commitment to quality and excellence in television programming that is the reason for HBO’s success.

Find out more about redefinition of television as well as which TV show is considered the “best televisions series ever made” over here.

Source: Slate

The class of 2012 is facing better hiring prospects than the class of 2011 did. It appears that hiring will increase by 9.5% for those in the class of 2012 over the levels the class of 2011 saw according to employers. Current projections also predict that pay increases will amount to around 6% from an average of around $48,000 to an average of around $51,000. The highest paid major is looking at an average salary of $82,740 and that major is petroleum engineering. Some worry that this increase in hiring is largely made up of “replacement hires,” though, and therefore its impact on the unemployment rate and overall jobs picture is still uncertain.

Source: Yahoo!

In this article, investment strategies for improving education levels in the U.S. is debated. Some argue that investing in programs at the college level are cost effective and beneficial, while others argue that the greatest results are to be had when investing in the early stages of education. This latter argument is based on the assumption that a solid foundation is most beneficial and skill will then build on itself. The article ultimately sides with this argument, citing many studies that early investments in education benefit both attendance rates and college completion rates. The benefits seem to be felt even outside of educational results, as these early programs also appear to benefit the health and mortality rates of the children involved.

Source: Economix Blog

A new study claims that Google search results are a good indicator of future stock performance. Many studies aim to predict stock performance based on the attention given to the stock by investors (as attention is a good indicator that they would like to buy that stock). It is difficult to find ways to measure these attention levels, though, and if this study is correct, Google may offer one of the most effective methods. Apparently, looking at Google search results also helps explain the high prices of IPOs as the number of Google searches for these stocks often surge during the week leading up to the IPO.

Source: Freakonomics Blog

India is currently spending billions of rupees on a new Unique Identification System for its citizens. The system aims to give all Indians a unique 12 digit number that they can use to access government and private services. Wired went to India to find out more about the system and its progress. Some of the highlights of their extensive analysis include:

• The government is recording both finger prints and retina scans. By itself finger prints would only have a 95% accuracy. By combining the two the system has a 99% accuracy. Moreover certain Indians have had their finger prints rubbed away by years of hard labour, and finger prints are inadequate for children whose prints are still developing. Iris scans face none of these drawbacks. The bigger challenge though may be human error while inputting data. One study places this error rate at 4.2%. At the moment identity cards are not being issued, instead an individual’s retinas or finger prints should serve as adequate identification.
• Less than half of Indian households have a bank account, and hold their money in cash instead. This means that this money is not being invested in the country’s growth, nor is it earning interest for the individuals. Transferring that money into bank accounts would inject billions of dollars into the capital system. The designers of the new system hope that it will encourage Indians to open up bank accounts as their identities can now easily be verified. Systems are even being put into place to verify identity via mobile phone apps, allowing individuals to withdraw money from their accounts without ever having to visit a branch that might be miles away.
• The creators of the system want to make it an open database that any company can use to validate somebody’s identity including schools, airlines and other institutions. But this openness comes with severe risks. As hard as the designers are working to make it a secure system with multiple state of the art safeguards they note that “there’s no lock in the world that can’t be broken.” But they also point out that credit card numbers are stolen all the time and those are still widely used.
• The system is called “Aadhaar” which means foundation. It is run on India’s cell phone network and the government is massively expanding investments into the broadband system so that it is capable of dealing with the 100 million requests per day that the system is meant to eventually deal with.

Find out more about the logistical hurdles both technical and administrative as well as the implications for security and civil liberties over here.

Source: Wired

Steam is a digital games distribution and experience platform. Individuals can buy games online, have them downloaded to their computer and then play it through Steam, all without ever having to leave the computer to visit a store, or to insert a cd. At a conference the software President of Valve, the company that owns Steam, Gabe Newell suggested that games were priced too high. Some of the key points from the presentation include:

• It’s difficult to run tests on the effect of prices on demand in retail stores since prices can’t easily be changed.
• In a promotion where Steam reduced the price of Left 4 Dead by 50%, sales increased by 3,000%
• During a holiday period when Steam discounted third party titles sales increased by 300%
• Brick and mortar store sales were unaffected by the discount

Read more case studies and fine out how much more money publishers made after they cut their prices over here.

Source: Edge

Interbrand recently released its rankings of the top 100 brands around the world. Some of the interesting features of the list:

• Three of the top five companies have a technological focus.
• All of the top ten are companies based in the United States.
• Toyota and Mercedes-Benz at numbers 11 and 12 are the most valuable non-American brands.
• Sitting at the very top however is Coca Cola, a brand that is estimated to have gained 2% in value in the past year.

To read the entire list click here.

Source: Interbrand

Starbucks has announced that it has started a fund with the goal of spurring job growth in the U.S. The fund is also a part of the Opportunity Finance Network, which provides loans to those people and communities with a lower income. Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz says the plan is to provide credit to small businesses seeking to hire more workers. Starbucks is making an initial donation of $5 million to the fund and will be accepting donations both online and at Starbucks stores. What affect this move will have on creating new jobs remains to be seen, but it’s difficult to imagine anything making the current unemployment rate, sitting at about 9.1%, any worse.

Source: Reuters

According to a study by physicists(!) the worst possible way to board a plane is by row number. In fact, it’d be more efficient to let people board the plane randomly. Other highlights from the experimental study include:

• The Window Middle and Aisle technique of boarding where passengers in window seats board first, followed by the middle and aisle passengers was more effective than both the row number technique and the randomized boarding technique.
• In the paper the physicists suggested their own boarding method that maximized the number of people who could use the aisle at the same time. This method turned out to be the fastest way that passengers could board the aircraft.
• How the different boarding times compare with each other depends, in part, on the length of the aircraft with the different methods scaling in different ways.

Source: Experimental Test of Airplane Boarding Methods

Via: Discover Magazine, Marginal Revolution