David Lidsky's Blog, page 4533

Honey Gets Sexy in New Book on Global, Exotic Industry

Author Grace Pundyk spills the beans behind her new book.

Grace Pundyk's new book, The Honey Trail: In Pursuit of Liquid Gold and Vanishing Bees, out this week, might just make you pause and reflect for a really long time the next time you take a gulp of honey. Honey, like tea or salt, has a history and story you're not likely to have ever considered, except for when on 5th grade field trips or when getting the 'ol birds and bees lecture, but the product has a rich and diverse series of...

Don't Bogart That Name: Medical Marijuana Trademarks

I predict that the hottest holiday gift for Californians this year will be the Volcano Vaporizer. Haven't heard of it? It's a "revolutionary system that releases the active ingredients from herbs through hot air vaporization." And by herbs, they don't mean basil. As you probably know, Californians will vote this fall on Proposition 19, which would legalize, regulate, and tax the purchase and sale of marijuana in the state. Recent poll numbers show that 52% percent of voters--that's more than...

Apple's Great Japanese Nano Fires of 2010

Okay. Try to be calm. Put down your iPod Nano. Back away slowly. DON'T LOOK AT IT. Slowly now. Slowly.

Whew. Just when you think Apple has miraculously eked itself out of one controversy with its iPhone 4, another controversy ignites, making Antennagate look like a mere fading ember. In a shocking if not mind-blowing admission today by the Japanese government, it was revealed that Apple Japan had "failed to report" (see: conspired to cover up) major issues related to overheating (read: baby...

Wyclef Jean Leaves His Own NGO to Prep for Haitian Prez Run

Haitian-born musician Wyclef Jean has acknowledged officially that he'll run for president of Haiti, and he's leaving Yele Haiti, the NGO he created in 2005.

Jean confirmed his presidential aspirations, speaking Haitian Creole on Radio Tropics this morning, saying, "For the 250,000 people who died in the earthquake, that's the reason we out to see a change in the system." He still has to file paperwork by Saturday and prove to a nine-member board in Haiti that he's a native Haitian, has...

Warner Music: Apple, Google, and Microsoft in "Struggle for Supremacy"

Warner Music Group is one of the most innovative companies in the industry. So it's not surprising that in an earnings call this morning with WMG chair Edgar Bronfman, investors weren't interested in how much physical sales the business has managed to hang on to--no, that's an industry of the past. Rather, analysts spent the call trying to find out what the company has on the horizon in the digital marketplace, where Bronfman says Apple, Google, and Microsoft are battling for the industry's...

IBM's Open-Source Approach to Disaster Management

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Photograph by Javier Pierini

Director, Corporate Responsibility, IBM Latin America
São Paulo, Brazil

Patricia Menezes, 52, oversaw IBM's recent relief efforts in Chile, using open-source software to find missing persons and helping start communities on the long road to emotional recovery.

"Sahana is an open-source disaster-management tool, which was developed by the Lanka Software Foundation. We set it up, install it, donate the servers, support translations, and train volunteers. We can...

Google Slides Into Social Gaming

According to New York Times source, Google just acquired Slide, a social networking gaming startup founded by Max Levchin. The New York Times reports the sale price as $228 million, while TechCrunch hears it's more like $182 million. That's a big enough disparity that we'll hold off on any kind of cost-based analysis, but the independent reports do suggest that the acquisition is very real.

Slide, the brainchild of ex-PayPal employee Levchin, began as a third-party photo sharing service, but...

Caterina Fake's Hunch Is Now a Personal Recommendation Service, What's the Question?

Hunch, the brainchild of Flickr co-founder Catarina Fake, has adjusted its web service so that it's now more clearly defined as a recommendation service, rather than a social Q&A service which the folks at ReadWriteWeb note many media outlets have mistaken it for.

Hunch describes itself as a system to "offer you a great recommendation to address your choice, problem or dilemma, on thousands of topics" based on "the collective knowledge of the entire Hunch community, narrowed down to people...

Who Wants to Be the Mayor of Pizza Hut?

Who's the mayor of Pizza Hut? Or, in other words, who has been stuffing their faces with way too much deep dish? We'll soon know.

On Wednesday, Pizza Hut announced a new partnership with Foursquare aimed at giving us more of that doughy-fresh goodness. Devoted customers of the restaurant chain will soon be rewarded with a free order of breadsticks (with the purchase of a large pizza) if they earn the prestigious title of "Mayor"--of their local Pizza Hut franchise.

This isn't the Hut's...

China Overtakes U.S. as Saudi Arabia of Wind Power

The United States has been called the Saudi Arabia of wind. But for the first time ever, China has exceeded the U.S. in newly installed wind capacity.

In a report released Wednesday, the U.S. Department of Energy details how all old records of wind power have been broken. In 2009, the U.S. added roughly 10,000 megawatts of new capacity--that's 40% more than was added the previous year.

To put those numbers in perspective, the solar power industry added just 481 megawatts of new...