Really impressive video on Youtube showing what it's like:
Really impressive work in designing a tiny and usable home space that can transform, and even have guests over. It's one thing to have a murphy bed in a studio apartment. This apartment takes that idea to its logical conclusion.
High praise for Instacart from PG:
Incidentally, of all the startups we've funded, Instacart is one of the ones we ourselves use most. Jessica can't stop talking about how great it is. You learn how useful grocery delivery when you have small children like we do, and Instacart is by far the best option for this.
Instacart is one of those rare products that's surprisingly great. I.e. you don't realize how good such a thing could be till you try it. A lot of the best startups have this quality. I wish we could figure out a way to identify them when they apply to YC, but at the moment I admit we can't.
-- PG via Hacker News
Instacart - now delivering groceries in Palo Alto, Mountain View, and SF
Freaking impressive.
Hat tip David Lieb of Bump (via Lookmark)
I love people. Everybody. I love them, I think, as a stamp collector loves his collection. Every story, every incident, every bit of conversation is raw material for me. My love’s not impersonal yet not wholly subjective either. I would like to be everyone, a cripple, a dying man, a whore, and then come back to write about my thoughts, my emotions, as that person. But I am not omniscient. I have to live my life, and it is the only one I’ll ever have. And you cannot regard your own life with objective curiosity all the time…
SYLVIA PLATH via brainpicker
The Christian Science monitor reports on a new study by The Millenium Project on the State of the Future:
“It is increasingly clear that the world has the resources to address its challenges.” And this: “[T]he world is getting richer, healthier, better educated, more peaceful, and better connected,” and people are living longer. The trend lines overall point in a positive direction: “[T]he 10-year future for the world is getting better.”
A few other highlights:
• By 2030, the middle class around the world is expected to grow by 66 percent, which is about 3 billion more new consumers with increased purchasing power and expectations. That’s a potential drain on world resources but also a tremendous opportunity for economic growth.
• Today’s worldwide life expectancy at birth is 68 years, which is projected to increase to 81 by 2100. (Life expectancy worldwide a century ago was little more than 30 years due to high infant mortality.)
• Some 85 percent of the world’s population will have a high-speed mobile Internet connection available to them by 2017.
• The number of people in extreme poverty (those living on $1.25 a day or less) fell from 1.94 billion (about half the world’s population) in 1981 to 1.29 billion (about 1 out of 5 people) in 2010, according to the World Bank.
• Over the past two decades, 30 percent fewer children under age 5 worldwide are dying.
• A large majority of people worldwide live in peace.
In a time where our media constantly fills us with fear, perhaps some perspective is in order. Perhaps technology is actually making the world a better, more transparent, richer, more educated, healthier place! And we get to play a part.