Articles
Moneyball, UPS Delivery, and the Magic of Better
This article was previously published in October 2011. I am moving past blog archives to this site. Recently I watched the movie Moneyball, and thought about what it might mean for quantitatively-minded people. (Note: For the purpose of simplicity, I’ll temporarily pair together quantitatively-minded and operations research, although not everyone in one group would claim…
Read MoreMy Personal Debt to John Nash
Why did I even take Economics as a freshman engineering major at Youngstown State? It was a sort of happy accident, but there I was, surrounded by business majors, in Microeconomics*. I remember that the first textbook chapter tried to summarize many key concepts of Economics, doing its best to sell the field to often…
Read MoreTechnology in the Classroom: Blessing or Bane?
Originally published May 1, 2012. After about a year or two of teaching at the Saunders College of Business, I decided to make a new rule for my class. I banned personal technology (cell phones, tablets, and computers) from my classroom except during approved groupwork sessions. I’ve been in some excellent discussions about this, and wanted…
Read MoreAre Web 2.0 and Internet Interaction Becoming Obsolete?
Originally posted January 22, 2013. When can a researcher detect the end of a trend? The concept of “Web 2.0″, focusing on the web as an interactive space between users rather than the straightforward providing of information, continues to dominate much of Internet thought. Companies have rushed to provide users with many different options to…
Read MoreCrowdsourcing, Sociopolitical Legitimacy, and the Boston Marathon Bombing
(Post originally written April 23, 2013). I woke up this morning to read that Reddit had apologized for some of the blunders made by users searching for the identity of the Boston marathon bombers. Given the scolding given by the FBI to further detective work once the FBI had identified their targets, this proves that…
Read MoreOn Encouraging Business Experimentation
In innovation, many companies still seem to stick with the first idea they have for a new technology. This keeps happening despite all the research and anecdotes that often, one’s first instinct for a technology is the wrong one. For example, “Chemcor,” developed in the late 50′s for “phone booths, prison windows, and eyeglasses“, was…
Read MoreINFORMS 2014: Rethinking Classroom Exercises and Creativity
I sat in on a fascinating presentation by Sanjiv Erat on creativity and incentives. The setup, as best I remember it, was that students could earn money based on how creative their answer was to a certain prompt. They could have unlimited time or 10 minutes. The reward might be $2 per ratings point (where…
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