Last week Apple realised iOS 7, the latest version of its mobile operating system. It was a very large update reflecting the design choices of Johnny Ive rather than Steve Jobs. I have been using iOS 7 for about six weeks now and I can say that it is a pleasure to use. It feels …
Continue reading "iOS7 is great for developers but Apple's own apps continue to suffer"
Susan Athey, Emilio Calvano and myself finally released our NBER working paper this week on the impact of the Internet on the news media. Having chatted with a journalist trying to decode our maths -- which by the way was critical in developing our theory -- I thought I'd link here to some more readable …
When I look at economics papers and reports, the graphical presentations have hardly changed. This is despite a sizeable change in the tools available to us to provide clearer graphs. To illustrate what I mean take a look at this animated gif presentation. It is very compelling.
Following up from my earlier post on Apple's iPhone versioning, Apple has released its new range. Here is the pricing: iPhone 4S (8GB): $0 ($450 unlocked) iPhone 5c: 16GB: $99 ($549 unlocked) 32GB: $199 ($649 unlocked) iPhone 5s: 16GB: $199 ($649 unlocked) 32GB: $299 ($749 unlocked) 64GB: $399 ($849 unlocked) In other words, the same …
Continue reading "They're all wrong. Apple's iPhone versioning (redux)"
Tomorrow, Apple look set to introduce some new iPhones including an iPhone 5S (its flagship) and an iPhone 5C. The latter is seemingly a break from the past. From the rumours, it will be a lower cost iPhone but with colourful options possibly targeting the Chinese market where Apple finally signed on China Mobile as …
Ronald Coase passed away yesterday. In his 102 years, he had an extraordinarily widespread impact on economics; especially its interactions with legal thinking. There is much discussion today about his contributions; in particular, was the Coase Theorem really a theorem and the Coase conjecture ever proved. But, in so many respects, those discussions miss the …
In a fascinating blog post, Adam Ozimek makes the case that we will see much more individualized pricing (which economists call "first degree price discrimination") as more data mining becomes available. For instance, in a new working paper, Ben Shiller is able to use big data to massively improve his ability to predict demand for Netflix subscriptions by any given individual: …
Continue reading "Will Big Data Create a Personalized Pricing Nirvana for Retailers?"
In Slate, Marianna Mazzucato argues that it is a myth that entrepreneurs drive innovation. I'll chalk that up to the Slate sub-editorial title writers because what the article is really saying is the 'independent' entrepreneurs do not drive innovation. Instead, in many classic situations the hand of the government was there and it is difficult …
The NYT published an article today on "Which start-up could be the next big thing?" Of course, who really knows. The NYT basically appears to be looking at "buzz." But what we would really want is some forecast of potential demand. This is where Google trends becomes useful. For instance, the NYT considers SnapChat and Whatsapp as two potential contenders. Both …
Continue reading "Predicting start-up success with Google trends"
Prior to yesterday, if you wanted an iPad that worked just like your computer, you pretty well needed to buy a Microsoft Surface. But thanks to Parallels Access that has all changed. This is an app on your iPad that allows you to control applications on your Mac or PC. But unlike some other remote …
Digitopoly 