On the State of Neuromarketing as Science

Via Forbes,  by Roger Dooley.  He examines the status of a long running ARF study, which he says includes both positive and negative results for neuromarketing.  I have been part of neuromarketing tests, both inside a large enterprise, and as part of a startup that sold the analysis methods.

" .... Most recently, an exciting new study from Temple University researchers took direct aim at the most popular neuromarketing technologies in an attempt to validate their effectiveness. The work was done at Temple University’s Center for Neural Decision Making at the Fox School of Business. A separate team at New York University analyzed the collected data and compared it to actual advertising results. The project was funded by the Advertising Research Foundation, which has been engaged in a multi-year effort to develop standards for neuromarketing. ... " 

Good read, but still preliminary. Links to the Temple study above are worthwhile.   Conclusion?  Neuromarketing studies appear to extend classical maketing analysis techniques.  But the reason the studies appear to work cannot yet be confirmed by the neuroscience reasons suggested.  Seems to aim towards an art vs science conclusion.  Which increases risk in their application.   Similar to what I heard from neuro scientists in 2007.

Soft Starfish Robots

More practical than models that use stiff bodies?  Unclear, but an interesting play ... " ... The bots undulate and walk using compressed air that is forced in and out of many tiny pneumatic channels running through their limbs—essentially, they get inflated and deflated like balloons. These soft robots, inspired by creatures such as starfish, worms, and squid, could one day squirm through obstacle courses that might prove challenging or impossible for metallic robots.  ... " 

About the End of Work

In Kurzweil:   Podcast and text.  Kurzweil and company discuss the dilemma of no labor force.

" ... The jobless economy: a fully automated, engineered, robotic system that doesn’t need you, or me either. Anything we can do, machines can do better — surgery, warfare, farming, finance. What’s to do? Shall we smash the machines, or go to the beach, or finally learn to play the piano? ... " 

Bandwidth on the Battlefield

Looking for bandwidth on battlefields. In my own Pentagon days, simulating tank warfare, these issues were still still unheard of. Now you can readily see the key of controlling communications in the battle ... "

Statistical Challenges for Big Data

Covered in FlowinDdata:  Review of another article where the point is that using Big Data bears some of the same challenges that were in evidence before data got 'Big'.  So  you cannot ignore those issues, some unsolved, that we had before. What is refreshing about BD is that you can attempt to solve problems that were not considered before, because data was unavailable, were not  manipulable by hardware or software, or solutions were not as 'clean' as we thought were required. See original article by Tim Harford in Financial Times.

iBeacon and Shopping Behavior

In Mashable: More looks into location based shopping information.   With some obvious comments:

  " ... Will consumers embrace Apple and iBeacon's nearly frictionless in-store buying process and "I'm aware you're there" in-store experience? ...

Rob Garf, VP of Industry Strategy & Insight for Demandware, a digital commerce company said it depends on what's in it for them. "Consumers will embrace technology if there is material value such as greater convenience, service and personalization," he said. Garf added that though adoption can vary by segment and geographic location, digitization of the sales experience may be inevitable: "Over time much of the checkout will be via virtual point-of-sale on the sales floor.” ... "