How long are technology adoption lags? Can cross-country differences in technology adoption lags account for a significant fraction of cross-country GDP disparities? Diego Comin of Harvard Business School and Bart Hobijn of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York develop a new benchmark to understand the diffusion process of individual technologies and the consequences that this has for aggregate growth. This benchmark provides a rationale for the evolution of diffusion measures that include how many units of technology each adopter has adopted in addition to the traditional extensive margin. The model is estimated to obtain measures of adoption lags for 15 technologies in 166 countries. Key concepts include:

* Adoption lags are large. On average, countries have adopted technologies 47 years after their invention.
* There is substantial variation across technologies and countries.
* Over the past two centuries, newer technologies have been adopted faster than old ones.
* The remarkable development records of Japan between 1870 and 1970 and of the so-called East Asian Tigers in the second half of the 20th century all coincided with a catch-up in the range of technologies used with respect to industrialized countries.
* Adoption lags account for at least 25 percent of cross-country per capita income differences.

An Exploration of Technology Diffusion

A lack of consistent and transparent regulations governing concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFOs) is underscored by a report released today by the Pew Commission on Industrial Farm Animal Production (PCIFAP) and the National Conference of State Legislatures (NCSL). The report is entitled Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations: A Survey of State Policies.

The survey is just one aspect of PCIFAP’s 2½-year study of the effects of industrial farm animal production on public health, the environment, rural communities, and animal welfare. Because of its familiarity with state regulatory issues, the Commission asked NCSL to conduct a 50 state survey of the appropriate state regulatory agencies in hopes of gaining a better understanding of the regulations already on the books, as well as whether the states have the resources available to implement those mandates.

“State and local governments have developed a patchwork of regulations typically using federal regulations as a basic guideline that can vary from jurisdiction to jurisdiction. That may result in imbalanced and ineffective enforcement,” said John Carlin, Commission chairman and former Kansas Governor.

The survey highlights the patchwork of regulation from state to state, and in many cases, a complete lack of regulation in areas that are essential to protecting public health and the environment. While many states do have regulations beyond federal requirements, it is clear that the regulation has not caught up with the CAFO model of food animal production. Kentucky, for example, is contemplating whether or not to even continue regulating CAFOs. And other states, like New Mexico, have limited policies on animal feeding operations and rely on the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to regulate CAFOs in their states. What is actually being done to regulate CAFOs within the EPA delegated states is obscure. South Dakota refused to respond to the survey and Mississippi responded only minimally. It should be noted that all information requested from state agencies is supposed to be available to the public.

The survey also revealed that several states have made strides in their attempt to mitigate the potential threats posed by CAFOs. Oregon, for example, has gone beyond regulating just those facilities that fit the federal definition of a CAFO, and thus regulates more than double the number of animal feeding operations that federal law requires. California, a state that faces ongoing water quality issues, appears to be working diligently to curb any runoff from CAFOs into water sources. While this survey showed that some states appear to be setting comparably robust examples of CAFO regulations, the survey did not address the actual enforcement of their respective policies.

Putting Meat on The Table: Industrial Farm Animal Production in America

DOD has taken a number of steps to implement its global strike concept and has generally assigned responsibilities for the planning, execution, and support of global strike operations. However, key stakeholders, particularly the geographic combatant commanders, have different interpretations of the concept, scope, range, and potential use of capabilities needed to implement global strike. Several factors affect the understanding and communication of DOD’s global strike concept among key stakeholders, including the extent to which DOD has (1) defined global strike, (2) incorporated global strike into joint doctrine, (3) conducted outreach and communication activities with key stakeholders, and (4) involved stakeholders in joint exercises and other training involving global strike. GAO’s prior work examining successful organizational transformations shows the necessity to communicate to stakeholders often and early with clear and specific objectives on what is to be achieved and what roles are assigned. Without a complete and clearly articulated concept that is well communicated and practiced with key stakeholders, DOD could encounter difficulties in fully implementing its concept and building the necessary relationships for carrying out global strike operations.

DOD Needs to Strengthen Implementation of Its Global Strike Concept

The Global War on Terrorism (GWOT) is about defending against relentless ideological enemies who are bent on destroying the American way of life. However, the methods employed by the members of the homeland security, intelligence, law enforcement, and military communities that are charged with protecting the United States must be carefully measured. American citizens’ individual civil liberties must be safeguarded from infringement against a backdrop of evolving intelligence requirements. This paper will examine several related questions. First, what laws, judicial rulings, executive orders, regulations, policies, and precedents govern U.S. intelligence gathering related to operations that could affect American citizens? Are governmental departments and agencies operating in compliance? Does our current legal framework permit the sort of intelligence collection, sharing, and dissemination needed? If not, how can the agencies charged with doing so continue collecting the domestic intelligence needed to meet homeland security requirements, without trampling on the very Constitution those of us in the military are sworn to defend? Thoughtful consideration of these issues is the key to a true “victory” in the GWOT, lest we sacrifice our way of life along the way.

Balancing the Pendulum of Freedom

The Department of Defense (DoD) is rapidly moving forward into the cyber domain of warfare, but the United States Government is not ready to exploit this evolution in Civil-Military affairs. With the United States facing new threats to its national security at home and abroad like never before, U.S. policy and law must change to enable DoD to fully defend and fight in cyberspace. Due to the highly automated and interconnected nature of U.S. critical infrastructure, it is not practical to erect a barrier between military and civilian operations that can serve U.S. national interests. Within the interagency framework, DoD should serve as the lead, including the response phase whenever defense critical infrastructure is involved or when a cyber attack has seriously affected other national critical infrastructure. To enable this transformation, the Posse Comitatus Act (PCA) should be amended or rescinded so DoD can conduct full defensive and offensive cyberspace operations against all required targets.

DoD Computer Network Operations: Time to Hit the Send Button

Are chip makers building electronic trapdoors in key military hardware? The Pentagon is making its biggest effort yet to find out

The Hunt for the Kill Switch

This article initiates a poetics of Web video by considering the central features of one kind of video on the Web, the amateur videoblog, in terms of its functions, which include various affordances of use, and constraints, which include economics, technology, and viewing conditions. It takes as its central example an American videoblog called The Show With Ze Frank, which ran from 2006–2007, and which drew a passionate community of fans into collaborating in its creation. This article considers amateur Web video as a potentially democratic space for media production, offering an alternative to commercial media that involves ordinary citizens as participants and champions their creativity.

Ze Frank and the poetics of Web video

Do you remember the classic xkcd diagram about Wikipedia?

The code is uglier than Fergie on a rainy day, but it works and I find the results to be pretty fascinating.

Mapping the distraction that is Wikipedia

We picked some of the best brains in town to write an account of the next 17 years

Washington's Future, a History

We've talked about this book before, but if you don't have a copy, there's something new:

Free chapters from the second edition! Wiley has agreed to let me put six sample chapters online for free. Here they are.

Security Engineering - A Guide to Building Dependable Distributed Systems