Occupy Asia – there are more millionaires in East Asia than North America

There are now more rich people in East Asia than in North America. Both have around 3 million millionaires and there are 11 million worldwide. But don’t forget about the little countries. Japan still has three times as many millionaires as China.     And, if the rest of Asia were to unite they would …

Mars rover Curiosity test fires the laser – pulverizes a rock just for fun (and science)

Johnny Five, aka the Mars rover Curiosity, continues its scientific journey. The nuclear-powered laboratory in-a-box pulled out it’s laser to blast a rock that got in its way. From NASA: The mission’s ChemCam instrument hit a fist-sized rock named “Coronation” with 30 pulses of its laser during a 10-second period. Each pulse delivers more than …

Web stats for the London 2012 Olympic Games

Just a small slice of the 70-page, London 2012 Olympic Games – Digital Report Web stats: 431 million visits 109 million unique visits (on average, each person visited four times) 15 million app downloads 4.73 billion pageviews (on average 11 page views/visit) 4.7 million followers on social networks Data: 1.3 petabytes of data served 117 billion …

Could Mexico grow bigger than Brazil in the next few decades?

What if Mexico were to become a bigger economy than Brazil? In recent years Brazil has outplayed Mexico, growing at 6% or more as Mexico bumped along in the slow lane. But lately that has changed. Last year Mexico grew by 4% and Brazil by 2.7%. This year Mexico is expected to get close to …

NBC hits ratings gold, best ever – despite extensive online features, streaming events

NBC’s London Olympics ratings defy expectations NBC’s ratings are on track to outdistance numbers from the 2008 Beijing Olympics, which many TV industry executives had figured would be a high-water mark. The last Summer Olympics to consistently attract such large crowds were the Montreal Games in 1976 — long before cable TV networks began splintering the audience. Wow, …

A hundred million dollar exit in blogging means mixing Pulitzer Prize content with photos of kittens

One of the hardest decisions a writer makes is “who to write for,” also known as your audience. For this blog I have chosen to assume that my readers are smart rather than dumb, well-educated, and interested “good” stories (not controversy and bad-mouthing). Sarah Lacy wrote an interesting piece on the audiences that both the …

Twitter measures your feelings about Obama and Romney – Twitter Political Index

One glance at the numbers, and it’s easy to see why pundits are already calling 2012 “the Twitter election.” More Tweets are sent every two days today than had ever been sent prior to Election Day 2008 — and Election Day 2008’s Tweet volume represents only about six minutes of Tweets today. All this explosive …

Universal sets screenwriters loose on Twitter – helped Ted to gross near $200 million

The teddy bear’s first tweet, from an account called @WhatTedSaid set up by the Universal Pictures marketing department, was “Hello, Twitter. Kindly go f— yourself.” The author of the greeting was Alec Sulkin, co-screenwriter of the R-rated comedy “Ted,” who together with his collaborator Wellesley Wild was paid extra by the studio to build buzz …

FBI finally goes digital, stops using paper

Federal Bureau of Investigation agents have finally ditched paper files for a new computer system, an effort that took 12 years and cost more than $600 million. The system, called Sentinel, includes elements resembling Web browsers, with tabs and movable windows, and forms that are filled out in a question-and-answer format similar to consumer tax …

Healthcare reform for women – beginning today no co-pay for preventive care like mammograms, contraception

Under the Affordable Care Act, for the first time ever, women will now have access to life-saving preventive care, such as mammograms and contraception, without paying any more out of their own pockets.     Today, we move yet another step closer to giving women control over their health care. In addition to the benefits …