I just added a new feature at Castlibrary to list the new audiobooks. It is now old enough that the new additions are starting to add up to a meaningful amount. Before the new listings were all mixed in with old listings because of the data import.

I like the new list.

Here’s what’s newest right now:

• The Wolfman Audiobook
• Shadow Tag Audiobook
• The 39 Clues, Book 7: The Viper’s Nest Audiobook
• Staying True Audiobook
• The Autobiography of an Execution Audiobook
• Idiots Unplugged Audiobook

This would be another good addition to the mailing list.

David Goldhill, a media exec, has written an excellent article in The Atlantic on what’s really wrong with health care. He does a fantastic job of identifying some of the real underlying problems with our system:

A wasteful insurance system; distorted incentives; a bias toward treatment; moral hazard; hidden costs and a lack of transparency; curbed competition; service to the wrong customer. These are the problems at the foundation of our health-care system, resulting in a slow rot and requiring more and more money just to keep the system from collapsing.

As I stare a at a surprise $2,000 bill for a bone scan, I can completely resonate with most of what Goldhill writes. It’s sad, but we get better service from our auto mechanics than we do from the health care system.

He argues for changes that make the patient the customer:

The most important single step we can take toward truly reforming our system is to move away from comprehensive health insurance as the single model for financing care. And a guiding principle of any reform should be to put the consumer, not the insurer or the government, at the center of the system. I believe if the government took on the goal of better supporting consumers—by bringing greater transparency and competition to the health-care industry, and by directly subsidizing those who can’t afford care—we’d find that consumers could buy much more of their care directly than we might initially think, and that over time we’d see better care and better service, at lower cost, as a result.

If you really want to know what we should be doing about health care reform – read this article.

Umair Haque, from Harvard Business, has an excellent post that shows how we spend more and get less for our health care dollar.

It’s scary how much more we spend than others. He brings in some other data as well that shows the US having lower life expectancy and infant mortality rates. Although, there is some analysis which shows we might not actual be very different in terms of outcomes when you adjust for fatal injuries like accidents and homicides.

And the higher infant mortality rate is likely due to low birth weight driven by higher rates of teen pregnancy.

In any case, we do spend a LOT more than everyone else and don’t seem to get much for the extra cash.

This graphic from the NY Times says it all.

If you have a small business and want some excellent coaching on how to increase profits and sales, then you should seriously consider signing up for Paul Lemberg’s Formula Five system.  I signed up and looked inside the program and it is a very impressive program.  I think it’s best for companies under $20 million that need to generate more leads, increase sales, improve margins and role out new products faster.

It’s all common sense stuff, but it works.  I found that it makes the normal business much simpler and increases the focus on what’s really important.  It cost around $2k so it only makes sense if your serious about executing what you find.

If you’re on the smaller side of $20M then the owner should probably take the course. If you’re a bit bigger it would be good for the top marketing guy to take.

Even if you don’t take the full course they have some great videos which are well worth watching.

You can find the course by clicking here and checking out the free videos.

I was surfing around the web working on improve the organic search results of some sites when I stumbled upon Google’s Guide to Search Engine Optimization (SEO). It’s a good primer on the basics of SEO.

Google’s guide describes best practices for

• site navigation
• content
• onsite links
• anchor texts
• heading tags optimization
• image optimization
• using robots.txt
• using rel=”nofollow” the right way

The guide is great for people who want to make sure they are doing the basic stuff right. If you’re new to SEO or want to check out the basics before hiring someone to help with SEO this is worth reading.

You can get the pdf of  Google’s Guide To Search Engine Optimization here.

I hate bad test questions. I was working with my daughter to help her get ready for her finals. On the test prep package we ran into a problem were there is no right answer based on the facts presented.

The problem went something like this:

Jason can do the job in 5 hours. Sloan can do the job in 3 hours. How long will it take them to do the job together?

Totally unsolvable. It completely depends on the nature of the job. Can the job be split? Is it a linear problem (eg filling a pool with water) or a non-linear problem (eg counting money)? If it’s non-linear, how evenly can it be broken down into sub-tasks?

You don’t know enough to solve the problem, yet it asks for an answer.

I hated these kinds of questions when I went to school. I used to take them to the teacher and tell them why it could’nt be solved. It’s totally unfair to kids who are taught there should be a “right” answer.

Teachers and schools should know better, given all the money we spend to test what kids have learned.

I just got back from a great presentation by Daniel Kraft, MD at a METal breakfast(Ken Rutkowski’s breakfast group) about regenerative medicine.

It’s amazing what’s going on with stem cells, especially adult stem cells (where you get them from yourself) and cancer stem cells( the cells that seem to drive cancer cells). They are making so much progress.

If what they’re doing progresses at the rate he describes we are going to see some amazing breakthroughs in health care and longevity.

Looks like it should be fun to watch.