Hedge Fund U, Version 2

We have posted frequently on the governance and leadership of academic medical organizations. While one would think that health care organizations, and especially academic health care organizations ought to be held to a particularly high standard of governance, we have noted how their governance is often unrepresentative of key constituencies, opaque, unaccountable, unsupportive of the academic and health care mission, and not subject to codes of ethics. How the governance of organizations with such exemplary missions and sterling repuations got this way has been unclear.<br /><br />In 2007, we <a href="http://hcrenewal.blogspot.com/2007/09/oceania-in-new-hampshire.html">reported</a> on one famous institution which had a more representative, transparent, and accountable form of governance. Let me provide a <a href="http://www.thefire.org/index.php/article/10355.html">summary</a> of the background from <a href="http://www.thefire.org/">FIRE</a>, the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education,<br /><blockquote>For over a century,<em> </em><a title="http://www.thefire.org/index.php/schools/979 blocked::http://www.thefire.org/index.php/schools/979 http://www.thefire.org/index.php/schools/979" href="http://www.thefire.org/index.php/schools/979"><em>Dartmouth College</em></a><em> provided alumni with an avenue for direct participation in selecting leadership, with eight of the 18 members of Dartmouth's Board of Trustees coming from popular vote</em> (the other ten were appointed by the Board). <em>Starting in 2004, petition candidates—those who had to gather alumni signatures to be nominated—</em><a title="http://www.thefire.org/index.php/article/5400.html blocked::http://www.thefire.org/index.php/article/5400.html http://www.thefire.org/index.php/article/5400.html" href="http://www.thefire.org/index.php/article/5400.html"><em>challenged</em></a><em> those selected by the Association of Alumni in the annual trustee elections</em>. Alumni <a title="http://www.thefire.org/index.php/article/5645.html blocked::http://www.thefire.org/index.php/article/5645.html http://www.thefire.org/index.php/article/5645.html" href="http://www.thefire.org/index.php/article/5645.html">responded</a> in kind: over the next four years, four petition candidates were elected to the Board of Trustees. <p></p><p><em>These trustees spoke out</em> when they perceived their alma mater as not living up to its mission, and Dartmouth students benefited. In May 2005, the college <a title="http://www.thefire.org/index.php/article/5624.html blocked::http://www.thefire.org/index.php/article/5624.html http://www.thefire.org/index.php/article/5624.html" href="http://www.thefire.org/index.php/article/5624.html">repealed</a> its speech code, and it immediately moved from FIRE's "<a title="http://www.thefire.org/pdfs/5622_3832.pdf blocked::http://www.thefire.org/pdfs/5622_3832.pdf http://www.thefire.org/pdfs/5622_3832.pdf" href="http://www.thefire.org/pdfs/5622_3832.pdf">red-light</a>" rating and became a <a title="http://www.thefire.org/index.php/codes/979 blocked::http://www.thefire.org/index.php/codes/979 http://www.thefire.org/index.php/codes/979" href="http://www.thefire.org/index.php/codes/979">'green-light</a>' institution.</p><p>These developments did not please everyone, however. <em>Some campus officials viewed the propensity of petition candidates to voice their opinions on illiberal policies as detrimental to the school's image.</em> The Wall Street Journal <a title="http://www.opinionjournal.com/editorial/?id=110010549 blocked::http://www.opinionjournal.com/editorial/?id=110010549 http://www.opinionjournal.com/editorial/?id=110010549" href="http://www.opinionjournal.com/editorial/?id=110010549">profiled</a> T.J. Rodgers, a petition-nominated trustee, who explained the criticisms leveled at the 'divisive dissidents.'</p><p>>> If 'divisive' means there are issues and we debate the issues and move forward according to a consensus, then divisive equals democracy, and democracy is good. The alternative, which I fear is what the administration and [Board of Trustees Chairman] Ed Haldeman are after right now, is a politburo-one-party rule. <<</p><p>As the petition candidates <a title="http://www.thefire.org/index.php/article/5645.html/ blocked::http://www.thefire.org/index.php/article/5645.html/ http://www.thefire.org/index.php/article/5645.html/" href="http://www.thefire.org/index.php/article/5645.html/">grew in numbers</a> (including George Mason Law Professor Todd Zywicki), so too did the <a title="http://www.thefire.org/index.php/article/9462.html blocked::http://www.thefire.org/index.php/article/9462.html http://www.thefire.org/index.php/article/9462.html" href="http://www.thefire.org/index.php/article/9462.html">official criticism</a>. After Zywicki expressed disagreement with Dartmouth's leadership, the Board's chairman responded.</p><p>Haldeman and his cohorts wrote in a statement on the board's Web site that Zywicki 'violated his responsibilities as a trustee of Dartmouth College, which includes acting in the best overall interests of Dartmouth and representing Dartmouth positively in words and deeds.' </p><p>It was clear that a frank discussion of the issues at Dartmouth was not welcome on the governing board. <em>The Trustees thus moved to alter the playing field. In September 2008, the Board declared that it would </em><a title="http://thedartmouth.com/2008/09/06/news/boardupdated/ blocked::http://thedartmouth.com/2008/09/06/news/boardupdated/ http://thedartmouth.com/2008/09/06/news/boardupdated/" href="http://thedartmouth.com/2008/09/06/news/boardupdated/"><em>add five new positions</em></a><em>—all hand-picked by current Trustees. The century-long tradition of parity between alumni-elected Trustees and the self-perpetuating Board members was erased</em>. It came as no surprise when the Association of Alumni <a title="http://thedartmouth.com/2009/01/27/news/aoa/ blocked::http://thedartmouth.com/2009/01/27/news/aoa/ http://thedartmouth.com/2009/01/27/news/aoa/" href="http://thedartmouth.com/2009/01/27/news/aoa/">announced</a> in January that the 2009 election would feature no petition candidates. </p></blockquote><br />In 2007, what really got our attention was the stated rationale for this push towards less representative and accountable governance. Mr Haldeman, the chairman of the board of trustees, announced a smaller proportion of elected trustees would ensure that the board "has the broad range of backgrounds, skills, expertise, and fundraising capabilities needed," and that the board members would possess "even more diverse backgrounds." Yet when we examined the backgrounds of the current charter trustees, we found that they exhibited little diversity. Remarkably, three-quarters (6/8) were in leaders of the finance sector. In 2007, they seemed not very diverse, but why the majority should be in the financial sector, and what implications that had, was then obscure.<br /><br />Things have changed. In the fall of 2008, the world economy descended into an unprecedented financial collapse. Many concluded that the global economic collapse was caused by arrogance, greed, and corruption within the financial sector.<br /><br />This suggested that leadership of academia, and academic medicine in particular, by leaders of the finance sector might not, in retrospect, have been a such a good idea. Furthermore, when we had other occasions to look, we found that Dartmouth College was not an isolated case.<br /><br />We <a href="http://hcrenewal.blogspot.com/2008/12/what-linked-parallel-declines-of.html">noted</a> that half of the Fellows of Harvard, the university's equivalent of a board of trustees, were from finance, and two were affiliated with corporations at the center of the global financial collapse. We recently <a href="http://hcrenewal.blogspot.com/2009/04/hedge-fund-u.html">found</a> that almost 40% of the board of Yeshiva University were from finance as of the end of 2008. One former board member was Bernie Madoff, now in jail for running a giant Ponzi scheme disguised as an unregistered hedge fund. Yeshiva lost $110 million of its investments with Madoff. Another former member was indicted, accused of fraudulently abetting Madoff's operations. One current member runs a hedge fund that had to pay $180 million to settle other fraud allegations.<br /><br />So we raised the hypothesis that some of the problems of academia, and particularly the problems of medical academia, may have been at least enabled by leadership more used to working in an increasingly amoral marketplace than to upholding the academic mission. Simultaneously, a <a href="http://chronicle.com/weekly/v55/i31/31a06001.htm">commentary </a>in the Chronicle of Higher Education put it this way,<br /><br /><blockquote><br />Most college and university boards are composed largely of wealthy people, usually from the worlds of finance, law, and private enterprise. They are sometimes alumni but are often selected for their personal capacity to give, their links to other people who might give, or their historical record of having given.<br /><br /><em>Many trustees today have in fact been part of the elite sectors of finance, law, and enterprise that have proven <strong>improvident, shortsighted, and badly governed</strong>. <strong>Can they be seen as the wisest of our wise</strong> who will bring both generosity and wisdom to the academy?<br /></em></blockquote><br />News items from last week, some generated by release of financial disclosure forms from new members of the current US administration, add insight into what now appears to be a pervasive web of entanglements among academia and the finance sector.<br /><br />One set of stories was about Lawrence Summers, now chief economic advisor to the US President, but president of Harvard University from 2001-2006. Just after resigning as president, and while still a <a href="http://www.hks.harvard.edu/about/faculty-staff-directory/lawrence-summers">professor at the university's Kennedy School of Government</a>, Mr Summers suddenly began lucrative relationships with multiple players in the financial sector. <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/06/business/06summers.html">Per the New York Times,</a> Mr Summers assumed an amazingly well-paid part-time position at a hedge fund,<br /><br /><blockquote><em>Mr. Summers, the former Treasury secretary and Harvard president who is now the chief economic adviser to President Obama, <strong>earned nearly $5.2 million in just the last of his two years</strong> at one of the world’s largest funds</em>, according to financial records released Friday by the White House.<br /><br />Impressive as that might sound, it is all the more considering that <em>Mr. Summers worked there just one day a week.<br /></em><br />Much is known about Mr. Summers’s days in Washington and Cambridge, but little attention has been paid to his two years in New York, from late 2006 to late 2008, advising an elite corps of math wizards and scientists devising investment strategies for D. E. Shaw & Company. </blockquote>Mr Summers also collected prodigious speaking fees from many financial corporations, some of which subsequently failed or had to be bailed, out, as <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/04/03/AR2009040303732.html">per the Washington Post</a>, he<br /><br /><blockquote><em>was <strong>paid more than $2.7 million in speaking fees</strong> by several troubled Wall Street firms and other organizations.</em><br /><br /><em>Financial institutions including JP Morgan Chase, <strong>Citigroup</strong>, Goldman Sachs, <strong>Lehman Brothers</strong> and <strong>Merrill Lynch</strong> paid Summers</em> for speaking appearances in 2008. Fees ranged from $45,000 for a Nov. 12 Merrill Lynch appearance to $135,000 for an April 16 visit to Goldman Sachs, according to his disclosure form. Summers reported donating two fees totaling $70,000, including the payment from Merrill Lynch, to charity.<br /></blockquote>Summers received all this money why he was still a faculty member at Harvard. As noted by the Washington Post, he did not leave his faculty position there until 2009.<br /><br />Although there is no evidence that Summers had financial relationships with corporations in the finance sector while president of Harvard, his sudden and very lucrative jump into that sector after leaving the presidency, and while nominally a full-time faculty member, suggests at least a major alignment of interests. Some commentators have made this point more forcefully, for example, <a href="http://www.thenation.com/doc/20090420/scheer?rel=hp_picks">Robert Scheer in the Nation</a>,<br /><blockquote><br />Not surprisingly, Lawrence Summers is convinced that he deserved every penny of the $8 million that Wall Street firms paid him last year. And why shouldn't he be cut in on the loot from the loopholes in the toxic derivatives market that he pushed into law when he was Bill Clinton's treasury secretary? <em>No one has been more persistently effective in paving the way for the financial swindles that enriched the titans of finance while impoverishing the rest of the world</em> than the man who is now the top economic adviser to President Obama.<br /></blockquote><br />Perhaps this alignment was related to charges that while president of Harvard, Summers helped stifle someone who tried to blow the whistle on excessively risky investment practices involving financial derivatives at the Harvard Management Company. <a href="http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=527380">Per the Harvard Crimson</a>,<br /><blockquote><br />After a year-long stint at a European investment bank and another at Enron, Iris M. Mack signed on to be a quantitative analyst for Harvard Management Company in early 2002, hoping, she says, to find job security and distance from the risky trading and accounting practices that forced her last employer into bankruptcy in the company charged with managing Harvard’s endowment.<br /><br />But only a few months later, <em>Mack says she was fired after she raised concerns to University officials about managers’ qualifications and possibly irresponsible usage of financial instruments that could have contributed to the recent and sudden decline in Harvard’s endowment.<br /></em><br /><em>In an e-mail sent May 30, 2002 to Marne Levine, chief of staff for then<strong>-Harvard President Lawrence H. Summers</strong>, Mack detailed her concerns regarding what she deemed HMC’s 'frightening' usage of derivatives and statistical modeling techniques, as well as the Company’s lack of a timely and portfolio-wide risk management system, high employee turnover rate, and low level of productivity in the workplace, specifically among managers.<br /></em><br />According to documents and e-mail records, all provided by Mack, <em>Levine had initially assured Mack that their correspondence would remain confidential</em>.<em> But on July 1, HMC chief Jack R. Meyer called Mack into a meeting, in which she was presented with copies of her e-mails</em>, according to a letter sent to Levine and Summers by Mack’s attorney.<br /><br />The next day, <em>Meyer dismissed Mack, pointing to 'these baseless allegations against HMC [that you sent] to individuals outside of HMC,'</em> the letter says.<br /><br />Ultimately, <em>Mack says she reached an out-of-court settlement with Harvard</em> over her firing because her lawyers felt that the University did not want to attract media attention from the dismissal....<br /><br />Now, with the economy in an unprecedented slump in part due to the widespread and unregulated use of derivative contracts, Mack says she feels 'vindicated' but also sad.<br /><br />'I’m not trying to pretend I’m omniscient or anything, but a lot of people who were quantitative traders, in the back of our minds, we knew a lot of these models were just that: guestimates,' Mack says. 'I have mixed feelings, on the one hand, I wasn’t crazy, I knew what I was talking about. <em>But maybe if more and more people had spoken up, the economy wouldn’t be the way it is now</em>.'<br /></blockquote><br /><br />So now we wonder whether the poor governance practices, and resultant poor leadership of many academic health care institutions may have resulted from the increasing dominance of the governance of these organizations by people from the "improvident, shortsighted, and badly governed" finance sector?

Hedge Fund U, Version 2

We have posted frequently on the governance and leadership of academic medical organizations. While one would think that health care organiz...

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Will it lens?

Not long ago, a bunch of us in our <a href="http://maps.google.com/?q=604+Arizona+Ave%2C+Santa+Monica%2C+CA+%28Google+Santa+Monica%29">Santa Monica office</a> pooled together the money to buy a four-foot by three-foot <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fresnel_lens">Fresnel lens</a>. We've since been spending our lunch hours out in the sun playing with it.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgGrc6e7MqD0cXDQJ-EsLM25_PV2_LbpRiEuSnWUghW-WSRQgA8SnpxwiXxhlavc45UeCl8TR8KtO2xrHHvqeVw6TB2VtNf7qqorr6OtePPK7t9_i5t_DoMWz8Mw6my0RO6oOrAnRIZLeCv/s1600-h/first+day.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5322812932029818850" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgGrc6e7MqD0cXDQJ-EsLM25_PV2_LbpRiEuSnWUghW-WSRQgA8SnpxwiXxhlavc45UeCl8TR8KtO2xrHHvqeVw6TB2VtNf7qqorr6OtePPK7t9_i5t_DoMWz8Mw6my0RO6oOrAnRIZLeCv/s400/first+day.jpg" style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 300px;" /></a><br />A normal lens this big would be several feet thick and weigh a proverbial ton (the right-hand image below). However, it's possible to remove much of the inside of a lens and collapse down the shape without introducing too much distortion (the left-hand image):<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFv0stjbEmVcfYEFhL6E5ZarKQ7bSSMGpprrlOFacsV8NzoasBXwETzb45MLqFWrkvTcFu8sWOWLzipgiyxkdOnECHxM90zqnPmmvMVNC0_b7na5gkOpBajx9nKXhVfMfgI3PlwBaj7hf5/s1600-h/401px-Fresnel_lens.svg.png"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5322812928721086178" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFv0stjbEmVcfYEFhL6E5ZarKQ7bSSMGpprrlOFacsV8NzoasBXwETzb45MLqFWrkvTcFu8sWOWLzipgiyxkdOnECHxM90zqnPmmvMVNC0_b7na5gkOpBajx9nKXhVfMfgI3PlwBaj7hf5/s400/401px-Fresnel_lens.svg.png" style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 267px; height: 400px;" /></a>Fresnel (pronounced "freh-NELL") lenses are used in overhead projectors and lighthouses. We've been using ours, however, to see what happens when you focus 1,000 watts of sunlight onto a single point. It's like when you were a kid and tried to burn ants with a pocket magnifying glass — but 400 times stronger. We built a wooden frame to keep the lens flat and focused, and a stand to hold it steady:<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFupQP3PaAHKGNfO6YG_npMtMs005AnziI-C5tvQ0gX_7K2rdv54VAxIulay3tnT5YgizvNCiZ8kcFLaSrfbjBFqyzmThaCtApbk75v05Cj7dFwF5wXTX5A7sJjXrcmAJ6DciwAp2yVJLh/s1600-h/alternative+lens+stand+2.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5322812929088300530" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFupQP3PaAHKGNfO6YG_npMtMs005AnziI-C5tvQ0gX_7K2rdv54VAxIulay3tnT5YgizvNCiZ8kcFLaSrfbjBFqyzmThaCtApbk75v05Cj7dFwF5wXTX5A7sJjXrcmAJ6DciwAp2yVJLh/s400/alternative+lens+stand+2.jpg" style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 300px; height: 400px;" /></a><span style="font-size:78%;"><span style="font-style: italic;">The light in the focal point is so bright that you can't look directly at it without welding goggles.</span></span><br /></div><br />The lens maker claimed you could melt a penny with it, so that was the first thing we tried:<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhgSqeRs_zvYfXEwnEyurvP1R2lHuhP_C5CPvzQEH9OGC02e-kKC_KP80hPNJrrdUGJk_eiRc268GluQH-d4r9dfD-z9WTqCYjx_bz4F-ZZ79fLBdYi8tbbSE-WGdQgFe61Ko0UZwPHKsYJ/s1600-h/pennies.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5322812461074296450" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhgSqeRs_zvYfXEwnEyurvP1R2lHuhP_C5CPvzQEH9OGC02e-kKC_KP80hPNJrrdUGJk_eiRc268GluQH-d4r9dfD-z9WTqCYjx_bz4F-ZZ79fLBdYi8tbbSE-WGdQgFe61Ko0UZwPHKsYJ/s400/pennies.jpg" style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 300px;" /></a><br />Modern pennies are made of zinc with a copper coating. The bottom row shows what happens when you put a penny in the focal point of the lens: the inside melts away and the coating stays intact (zinc melts at 693 <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kelvin">kelvins</a>, copper melts at 1,356 K). But if you heat it just enough, the metals mix and you make brass (the gold-colored penny in the middle). Older pennies (those minted before 1982) are almost entirely copper, so they didn't melt (top row).<br /><br />We also had an aluminum can:<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgefKqEltPXRYnVpNtcgUA8lhZdfoIdsESlwyo_6S9-FXctXyd9mP3JcALnqVkSfAZfKzKHSa-6R76_QuthGzvRv1CwD9jTX3B1epjrvBHnBuDsWQYX78d2cO7qRijlNCa2fHO2otSewUeD/s1600-h/can.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5322812469214949410" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgefKqEltPXRYnVpNtcgUA8lhZdfoIdsESlwyo_6S9-FXctXyd9mP3JcALnqVkSfAZfKzKHSa-6R76_QuthGzvRv1CwD9jTX3B1epjrvBHnBuDsWQYX78d2cO7qRijlNCa2fHO2otSewUeD/s400/can.jpg" style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 300px; height: 400px;" /></a><br />The water we poured in boiled quickly, while the can itself became so brittle that we poked holes through it with nothing more than sunlight.<br /><br />Then we tried cooking. Popcorn did both what you'd expect and not quite what you'd expect: when you really focus the light on it, it kinda pops but mostly burns. However, if you don't put it directly in the focal point, so the light is spread over a larger area and doesn't heat it up as quickly, you can get a whole bunch of kernels to pop without burning too much.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiA8qTDDwYea-J4Z8hQoFZ9TQWUXCf2D-3wn3Ltxzvj3Mso4l8AhPWPmdfO4uGuFFAPDmm6DVaLqt4919ob5IGfuMXu3bl6XSTaD3b9DrWj5X3aHocpSbloCVGvpGEsXSRuHqiv5xZCrp2f/s1600-h/popcorn+cooking.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5322812467866512130" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiA8qTDDwYea-J4Z8hQoFZ9TQWUXCf2D-3wn3Ltxzvj3Mso4l8AhPWPmdfO4uGuFFAPDmm6DVaLqt4919ob5IGfuMXu3bl6XSTaD3b9DrWj5X3aHocpSbloCVGvpGEsXSRuHqiv5xZCrp2f/s400/popcorn+cooking.jpg" style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 300px;" /></a><br />The steam/smoke coming up from the kernels really highlighted the spectra from the lens beautifully. Our yield was very low (lots of unpopped kernels for each popped one), but at least we had real popcorn!<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgxNIz3WAZTDxGYyEu8xSp9sGhUnCDNrp2PK09ikOwVJMm5YGKAi71NKYnBSfDYAjdSWTXamO16S_1Cv1Ao_p6NmFslU329hj-u1U5V1kTlP5fsAkvrK7-NZz3cHsPhfUMx1D8CmwaXMU7S/s1600-h/finished+popcorn.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5322812466365970994" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgxNIz3WAZTDxGYyEu8xSp9sGhUnCDNrp2PK09ikOwVJMm5YGKAi71NKYnBSfDYAjdSWTXamO16S_1Cv1Ao_p6NmFslU329hj-u1U5V1kTlP5fsAkvrK7-NZz3cHsPhfUMx1D8CmwaXMU7S/s400/finished+popcorn.jpg" style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 300px;" /></a><br />When we tried to cook bacon, about a third ended up well done, a third was burnt, and a third was uncooked. Cooking with the lens is difficult because it heats stuff up too hot too fast. But the well-cooked parts tasted great, so we added an egg:<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjivcszX48n9O4wH0WjoD589W6NILkz5jnyq48jJaLJzGjFVVaacnqILIRrti3utsiYmSbIhooCkWIg181BFIXgym7aP6ZLS4s9IODNsf8k8Ou-inBCgNIngMu1c0F3DyX_lrbGFtUJufoK/s1600-h/bacon.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5322812473237975682" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjivcszX48n9O4wH0WjoD589W6NILkz5jnyq48jJaLJzGjFVVaacnqILIRrti3utsiYmSbIhooCkWIg181BFIXgym7aP6ZLS4s9IODNsf8k8Ou-inBCgNIngMu1c0F3DyX_lrbGFtUJufoK/s400/bacon.jpg" style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 300px; height: 400px;" /></a><br />(We didn't lens the spoon; we used it to eat the egg afterwards.)<br /><br />It's been fun experimenting with different lensing techniques and items and we've learned a lot (including where the nearest fire extinguisher is!). These are just the highlights — we've lensed gourds, soap, gummy bears, CDs — you name it. Next on our list: marshmallows!<br /><br />We've got more details and more pictures of our results on <a href="http://big-bad-al.livejournal.com/103588.html">Alan's personal blog</a>. If you have ideas of other things we should try lensing, we'd love to hear suggestions.<br /><br /><span class="byline-author">Posted by Alan Davidson and Dustin Boswell, Software Engineers</span>

Will it lens?

Not long ago, a bunch of us in our Santa Monica office pooled together the money to buy a four-foot by three-foot Fresnel lens . We've ...

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Mosaic: bringing diverse perspectives together

<span style="font-size:78%;"><span style="font-style: italic;">This is the next post in our <a href="http://googleblog.blogspot.com/search/label/diversity">Interface series</a>, which takes a look at valuing people's similarities and differences in the workplace. For more information on how Google fosters an inclusive work environment, visit <a href="http://www.google.com/support/jobs/bin/static.py?page=about.html">Life at Google</a> on our Jobs site. – Ed.</span></span><br /><br />Since joining Mosaic, our diversity initiatives group in the <a href="http://maps.google.com/?q=5+Cambridge+Center%2C+Cambridge%2C+MA+%28Google+Cambridge%29">Boston office</a>, we've seen firsthand how even a small group of Googlers dedicated to a cause can make a real difference. Mosaic was created in 2007 when a few Boston Googlers were talking informally over lunch about how to increase the diversity in our rapidly growing office. Since then, we've made great strides in growing our membership and highlighting the creativity and varied experiences of our colleagues. The idea even spread to other Google offices, with several Mosaic chapters opening across the U.S.<br /><br />Over the past year, Mosaic Boston has participated in Google's university recruitment efforts by holding three open houses to encourage traditionally underrepresented students from the Boston area to apply for careers at Google. This past summer, we hosted two enthusiastic interns as part of <a href="http://www.google.com/support/jobs/bin/static.py?page=bold.html">Google's BOLD</a> (Building Opportunities for Leadership & Development) diversity internship program to explore opportunities in the technology industry. We watched their leadership skills grow as they organized events such as a career panel and product demos for high school students through Mosaic.<br /><br />Most recently, we co-hosted a lunch-and-learn with esteemed Harvard Business School professor <a href="http://drfd.hbs.edu/fit/public/facultyInfo.do?facInfo=bio&facEmId=dthomas">David Thomas</a>, co-author of "Breaking Through: The Making of Minority Executives in Corporate America." Down-to-earth and engaging, Professor Thomas presented his findings about minorities and women who had "made it" in corporate America, stressing the need to build wide networks of support, find strong mentors and develop a niche within a company that meshes with one's personal values. His message reminded us of how important it is for Mosaic to provide these opportunities for our own community here at Google. You can <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hGPyU1cJAaM">watch the video</a> from his visit on the Authors@Google YouTube channel.<br /><br />As both Googlers and members of Mosaic, we feel empowered and excited to live out our values in our workplace. To us, this means anything from inviting authors to speak and training non-profits on how to use Google Apps, to throwing a Brazilian Carnaval-themed edition of our weekly company meeting complete with <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H3B9V0axCpU&feature=channel_page">capoeira performers</a>, caipirinhas, and authentic Brazilian food. We're excited about what Mosaic has accomplished so far and can't wait to see what's next. In the meantime, we continue to be committed to providing personal and professional growth for the members of our diversity group, as well as doing our part to keep Google an inclusive place to work.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhcI2dvP_3npKQntAHj0ZTNvmPcIZP_cKRqtCXn-127SojQ8K_0oDJtT6ZHOCykAstWAlZ9FFE1UzSQhND9qUE_oIedKE99ggCr9HteXb-HzMxXYMkyDtyxnX2Bnhf5_j98svyBLeaEzibu/s1600-h/DSCN2341.JPG"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5322805217330592034" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhcI2dvP_3npKQntAHj0ZTNvmPcIZP_cKRqtCXn-127SojQ8K_0oDJtT6ZHOCykAstWAlZ9FFE1UzSQhND9qUE_oIedKE99ggCr9HteXb-HzMxXYMkyDtyxnX2Bnhf5_j98svyBLeaEzibu/s400/DSCN2341.JPG" style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 300px;" /></a><span style="font-size:85%;"><span style="font-style: italic;">Boston Mosaic team with capoeira performers</span></span><br /></div><br /><span class="byline-author">Posted by Priti Sanghani and Mariam Shaikh, AdWords Account Associates</span>

Mosaic: bringing diverse perspectives together

This is the next post in our Interface series , which takes a look at valuing people's similarities and differences in the workplace. Fo...

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Who Is Now Scolding the "Pharmascolds?"

Ah, there they go again. This week, the Wall Street Journal published an <a href="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123914780537299005.html">op-ed </a>by David A Shaywitz and Dr Thomas P Stossel whose title says it all, "It's Time to Fight the 'Pharmascolds.'"<br />On the Hooked: Ethics, Medicine and Pharma Blog, Dr Howard Brody <a href="http://brodyhooked.blogspot.com/2009/04/pharmascolds-strike-back-latest-from.html">provided</a> a pithy point by point response to Shaywitz and Stossel, which is very much worth reading. But given the sweeping nature of Shaywitz and Stossel's arguments, and the prominent forum in which they appeared, I thought I could add to the discussion.<br /><br />Shaywitz and Stossel's main point was that "relationships between university researchers and medical product companies are under relentless attack by critics who portray these associations as a morality play in which noble academics struggle to resist the dark, corrupting influence of industry." They castigated<br /><br /><br /><blockquote><br />the disproportionate influence of a <em>coterie of prominent critics we have previously dubbed 'pharmascolds,' who routinely vilify the medical products industry and portray academics working with it as traitors and sellouts</em>. These critics are pious academics, self-righteous medical journal editors, and opportunistic politicians and journalists. <em>Their condemnation of anyone's legitimate profit -- it's all 'corruption' in their book -- has in fact materially enhanced their own careers</em>. They extrapolate from occasional behavioral lapses in industry -- which is equally, if not more prevalent, in universities -- to demonize the market and portray scientific medicine as an ascetic religion, which it is not.<br /></blockquote><br /><br />I can't claim to be "prominent," and my career has certainly not been "materially enhanced" so far by my writing on Health Care Renewal, but I am sure some of what my colleagues and I have written puts us at least in the company of more prominent "pharmascolds," in Shaywitz and Stossel's book.<br /><br />However, their arguments seem to be based on a slippery slope, or, on over-generalization of criticism of certain kinds of relationships among certain people and organizations under certain circumstances.<br /><br />In particular, I see nothing wrong, in general, with "relationships" among academics and industry. However, there are specific kinds of conflicts of interest in academic medicine that ought to cause concern. So let me take this opportunity to first postulate a simple definition of conflict of interest in this context, and provide specific examples of the sorts of conflicts that ought to be troubling.<br /><br />Definition: <em>An individual conflict of interest occurs when a person with entrusted responsibility has another interest that may conflict with the proper exercise of that responsibility</em>.<br /><br />Examples of conflicts of interest relevant to academic medicine include:<br /><br />- A physician entrusted to take the best possible care of individual patients receives payments from a drug manufacturer which might bias his or her decisions to use that company's drugs even for patients for whom these drugs would not be the best possible treatment.<br />- A clinical teacher entrusted to honestly impart information, skills, and judgment receives payments from a drug manufacturer which might bias his or her teaching in favor of that company's products<br />- A clinical researcher entrusted to discover and disseminate the truth based on research on human beings receives payments from a drug manufacturer which might bias the design, implementation, analysis or dissemination of studies on humans in favor of that manufacturer's products, or against its competitor's products<br />- An administrator entrusted to uphold the mission of the academic institution receives payments from a drug manufacturer that might bias his or her management decisions in favor of that company's interests, but against the institution's mission<br />- An academic entrusted to provide honest, clear health policy advice receives payments from a drug manufacturer that might bias his or her advice in favor of that company's interests<br /><br />On the other hand, I do not have a problem with true collaboration among academics and industry that does not involve industry paying the academics money, or paying the academics' institutions money for which the individuals receive credit. One can envision all sorts of collaborations that do not involve one party paying the other.<br /><br />Furthermore, I do not necessarily have a problem with industry paying an academic in the course of the conduct of basic science, that is in this case, science that does not involve research done on humans. Shaywitz and Stossel seem most concerned with the damage "pharmascolds" might do to basic and translational research. They warned of dire results from barriers that might mainly be designed to discourage the sorts of conflicts of interest listed above, but would damage the progress of basic science and translational research. For example, they warn<br /><br /><blockquote>each new barrier -- such as the National Institutes of Health's ban on paid consulting for industry -- erected between publicly funded researchers and companies, especially cash-strapped start-ups where many of the breakthroughs occur, slows the progress of potential treatments. </blockquote><br />There is the germ of an important idea in there. In fact, many medical academics simultaneously wear many hats. So someone who sees patients in practice, and teaches students about clinical medicine may also do bench research in the laboratory. Banning such an individual from receiving consulting payments from drug, biotechnology, device and other companies to prevent bias in his or her patient care or teaching might conceivably adversely affect his or her biomedical research. How to handle such trade-offs has not been widely discussed, but needs to be. <br /><br />But the notion that all relationships among medical academics and industry are meant to promote science and find new cures for disease, but not to market products or influence policy in favor or industry, is at best naive.<br /><br />So Shaywitz and Stossel's dire warnings that seemed based on this notion seem as naive as the notion they attribute to their opponents, that all relationships among academics and industry are evil.<br /><br />Finally, Shaywitz and Stossel did some scolding of their own, addressed to medical academics who do not stand up for their relationships with industry<br /><br /><blockquote>When challenged by reporters, most academic consultants to industry refuse to comment or offer a meek explanation, <em>instead of retorting that industry pays them because they add critically important value</em>. This evasion has only emboldened industry critics, disheartened company employees, and caused <em>even allies to wonder if there really is something to hide</em>.<br /></blockquote><p>They concluded with plea that academics with industry relationships stand up for these relationships, to wit, </p><blockquote><br />For the sake of the many patients whose diseases require innovative treatments -- and for the medical philanthropists determined to make it happen -- it's time for the leaders of the medical products industry to take pride in their purpose and start fighting back.<br /></blockquote><br /><br />They are entitled to their opinion, of course. However, there is just a whiff of hypocrisy emanating from this.<br /><br />Just below it, Dr Stossel identifies himself as "a professor of medicine at Harvard and a fellow at the Manhattan Institute," which is surely true.<br /><br />But it is also surely incomplete. As we have posted before, Dr Stossel himself has multiple relationships with industry, some of which he has revealed in other venues.<br /><br />As we <a href="http://hcrenewal.blogspot.com/2007/04/can-people-with-conflicts-of-interest.html">wrote in 2007</a>, in a <a href="http://content.nejm.org/cgi/reprint/353/10/1060.pdf">commentary</a> in the New England Journal(1) in which Stossel attacked the rigorous conflicts of interest rules that were once again imposed on the US National Institutes of Health (NIH), Stossel disclosed<br /><br /><br /><blockquote>having <strong>received consulting fees from </strong><a href="http://zymequest.com/"><strong>ZymeQuest</strong></a>, <strong>owning stock options in ZymeQuest and Biogen</strong>, and <strong>having pending and issued patents, owned by Brigham and Women's Hospital, some of which are licensed to ZymeQuest</strong>. <br /></blockquote><br />In another paean to a laissez-faire approach to conflicts of interest in Perspectives in Biology and Medicine(2), Stossel also disclosed that he<br /><blockquote><br />is a <strong>member of the Board of Directors of Zymequest Inc</strong>, and <strong>the Scientific Leadership Advisory Board of Merck & Co</strong>. The author is a <strong>founding scientist of Critical Biologics Corporation</strong> and a <strong>consultant to Boston Scientific, Inc., and Gerson-Lehrman, Inc.</strong> <br /></blockquote><br />In a commentary in the British Medical Journal(3) arguing once again that concerns with conflicts of interest have gone too far, he disclosed, he<br /><blockquote><br />is on the <strong>boards of directors and owns stock options in ZymeQuest and Critical Biologics Corporations</strong>, and <strong>his employer has licensed intellectual property to these companies,</strong> which <strong>may result in his receiving milestone payments, royalties and in the stock options having financial value</strong>. He <strong>receives fees for speaking to corporations and other organisations on the topic of conflict of interest</strong>. He has served on <strong>scientific advisory boards for Biogen, Dyax, and Merck.</strong><br /></blockquote><br />So maybe Dr Stossel should take his own advice, and proudly declare his complex relationships with industry in the course of yet another of his arguments that any criticism of any relationships among medical academics and industry under any circumstances will deprive humanity of future cures of dread diseases. As long as medical academics with relationships to industry, of all kinds and in all contexts, fail to disclose such relationships when they might be germane to the topic at hand, others will continue to wonder if they indeed do have something to hide.<br /><br /><br /><span style="font-size:85%;">References<br /><br />1. Stossel TP. Regulating academic-industrial research relationships - solving problems or stifling progress? N Engl J Med 2005; 353: 1060-1065. Link </span><a href="http://content.nejm.org/cgi/content/full/353/10/1060"><span style="font-size:85%;">here</span></a><span style="font-size:85%;">.<br />2. Stossel TP. Regulation of financial conflicts of interest in medical practice and medical research. Perspect Biol Med 2007; 50: 54-71. Link </span><a href="http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/perspectives_in_biology_and_medicine/v050/50.1stossel.html"><span style="font-size:85%;">here</span></a><span style="font-size:85%;">.<br />3. Stossel TP. Has the hunt for conflicts of interst gone too far? - Yes. Brit Med J 2008; 336: 476. Link </span><a href="http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/full/336/7642/476"><span style="font-size:85%;">here</span></a><span style="font-size:85%;">. </span>

Who Is Now Scolding the "Pharmascolds?"

Ah, there they go again. This week, the Wall Street Journal published an op-ed by David A Shaywitz and Dr Thomas P Stossel whose title says ...

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Send a video message with Google Latitude

If you're like us, you never tire of finding fun ways to send a simple message (what's the challenge, after all, in just flipping open your phone?). Here's our latest idea: spell out the words with Google Latitude.<br /><br /><object height="344" width="425"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/h0GA73O_9O4&hl=en&fs=1"><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/h0GA73O_9O4&hl=en&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" height="344" width="425"></embed></object><br /><br />After you watch the video, feel free to send your own Latitude message by creating <a href="http://services.google.com/latitudevideo/">a custom video</a> for a friend. You can also check out the <a href="http://googlemobile.blogspot.com/2009/04/google-latitude-ftw.html">Google Mobile Blog</a> to learn about some of the other creative ways people are using Latitude.<br /><br /><span class="byline-author">Posted by Heaven Kim, Product Marketing Manager<br /></span>

Send a video message with Google Latitude

If you're like us, you never tire of finding fun ways to send a simple message (what's the challenge, after all, in just flipping op...

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BLOGSCAN - A Not So Tough Policy on Industry Interactions

<span style="color:#006600;">On the Carlat Psychiatry Blog, Dr Daniel Carlat </span><a href="http://carlatpsychiatry.blogspot.com/2009/04/johns-hopkins-read-my-lips-no-more.html"><span style="color:#006600;">dissected</span></a><span style="color:#006600;"> Johns Hopkins' heralded new "tough" policy on interactions with industry. It turns out to be not so tough, banning only the smallest gifts, but failing to ban various kinds of larger payments that cause more intense conflicts of interest. Dr Carlat summarize the policy as mainly designed to generate "good PR."</span>

BLOGSCAN - A Not So Tough Policy on Industry Interactions

On the Carlat Psychiatry Blog, Dr Daniel Carlat dissected Johns Hopkins' heralded new "tough" policy on interactions with ind...

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Designing lean, green, energy-saving machines

Last week Google hosted a <a href="http://www.google.com/corporate/green/datacenters/summit.html">Data Center Efficiency Summit</a>, bringing together approximately 160 industry leaders to share insights and best practices. Since it was April Fool's Day, we threw in a few jokes to keep the atmosphere fun (<a href="http://www.greenm3.com/2009/04/april-fools-joke-googles-oil-tanker-data-center.html">oil-cooled data center</a>, anyone?), but the topic is serious: How can the IT industry keep growing while also exercising good environmental stewardship?<br /><br />We disclosed for the first time details about the design of our <a href="http://www.google.com/corporate/datacenters">ultra-efficient data centers</a>. We also provided a first-ever video tour of a Google <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zRwPSFpLX8I">container data center</a> as well as a <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nPjZvFuUKN8">water treatment facility</a>. We detailed how we measure data center efficiency and discussed how we reduced our facility energy use by up to 85%. The engineers who developed our efficient battery backup solution even brought an actual <a href="http://news.cnet.com/8301-1001_3-10209580-92.html">Google server</a> to the event.<br /><br />By the end of the day, we narrowed in on a recurring theme: Reducing resource use through efficiency efforts is not just good for the environment, it saves money too. And it is this economic advantage which makes efficient data centers not just green, but truly sustainable.<br /><br />For a tour of a Google container data center check out the video below or watch the entire summit: <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ho1GEyftpmQ">part 1</a>, <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m03vdyCuWS0">part 2</a>, and <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=91I_Ftsd-7s">part 3</a>.<br /><br /><object height="340" width="560"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/zRwPSFpLX8I&hl=en&fs=1"><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/zRwPSFpLX8I&hl=en&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" height="340" width="560"></embed></object><br /><br /><span class="byline-author">Posted by Jimmy Clidaras, Principal Engineer</span>

Designing lean, green, energy-saving machines

Last week Google hosted a Data Center Efficiency Summit , bringing together approximately 160 industry leaders to share insights and best pr...

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