There are many music platforms which allow you to ban songs that you don´t like as they stream music to you.  In this way they learn how to make you a happy music listener.   I know that if Facebook or Myspace allowed people to ban ads they could not survive.  But isn´t it times that instead of Facebook getting trashed for invading people´s privacy to show ads that they allowed users to actually favor or reject a certain type of ads so long as they get ads?  I think there´s a tremendous opportunity in turning this problem around and instead of spying on people you allow them to speak up and profile themselves in a positive manner.  I would love to see a button that says, do not show this ad again.

The troubles of the music industry are not caused by Apple. They are caused by heads so deep in the sand that they have not seen the light for the last 10 years.

I have wondered in previous posts why is it that America can be the wealthiest country in the world can also be the country with the most homeless people in the developed world.  This maybe an explanation.

The Alliance to End Homelessness, a public education nonprofit, based the findings of its report on numbers from Veterans Affairs and the Census Bureau. 2005 data estimated that 194,254 homeless people out of 744,313 on any given night were veterans.

I already mentioned how sad I think it is that USA, a country that has around 5% of the world´s population and is not seriously at risk,  should spend half of the money that is spent all over the world in the military.  But on top of that I think that there has to be something seriously wrong in the States if so many of those who have served their country end up sleeping on the streets begging to survive.  Other developed countries spend much less in the military, more on social services and have less homeless citizens.

I was reading an article on Techcrunch in which Michael Arrington criticizes Jay Adelson and Kevin Rose for having conversations with different parties for two years about selling Digg. Personally I think that Techcrunch is off on this one. There´s nothing wrong when you have come up with an amazing company, and Digg is one of those, to frequently talk to people about the possibility of selling it. Even Larry and Sergey were doing this in the early years of Google. What I dislike about the article on Techcrunch is a moralistic undertone, as if talking to potential investors or buyers is a bad thing for a start up. Personally I think it is essential. When I built Ya.com for example we started talking to potential investors and buyers from day one until we sold it to Deustche Telekom for 550 million euros. And sometimes these talks are just that, talks. My first company, Urban Capital, which I started in 1985, I never sold. But that does not mean that we did not talk to people over the years. Talking to potential buyers about your company is the only way to know how much is worth. There´s nothing wrong with that as we all need to make informed decisions. I find it hard to believe that Techcrunch blames Jay and Kevin for doing what all of us entrepreneurs, normally do.

This is a blog that is mostly about my ideas and not about unusual things that happen around the world but having breakfast this morning reading my favorite newspaper, the International Herald Tribune, I saw this news on the cover that rank tops in the weirdness index and felt like sharing it.  It is about how a drug that is used for date rape ended up as coating for a popular award winning toy.

Last night I had dinner with Louise Blouin Macbain, a very smart and attractive entrepreneur who founded LTB Holding, her venture in the art publishing world. During dinner we had a chance to talk about the many projects she is working on.

LTB promotes culture and art with 20 magazines, several annual publications and books, providing information to collectors, educators and academics. It also has a strong presence on the Web: Artinfo.com offers breaking news, profiles of artists, collectors, galleries, market trends and analysis. They recently launched Myartinfo.com, an online network for artists, galleries, collectors and art enthusiasts who join to chat, exhibit their work and share ideas with like-minded people.

Louise also launched the Louise T Blouin Foundation, a not for profit group working across the world to promote culture and creativity, investing in cultural exchange projects, research initiatives and multi ethnic art projects.

The Foundation also organizes the Global Creative Leadership Summit which brings together the most influential thought-leaders in business, technology, government, science and the arts to share ideas and best practices and form new partnerships for concrete problem solving on global issues.

Overall and impressive list of projects for this very talented woman.