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Silicon Alley Takes on Silicon Valley

New York City has boasted a healthy tech presence for several years, with more and more entrepreneurs (including Portfolio authors like Jason Baptiste, Aaron Shapiro, and Jonathan Fields) opting to launch their startups in Gotham instead of California’s Silicon Valley. In an effort to promote this booming sector, Mayor Michael Bloomberg announced on Monday that Cornell University, in partnership with Technion – Israel Institute of Technology, will build a new applied sciences and engineering school on Roosevelt Island in the East River. The idea is to attract engineers, technicians, and other innovators to the region in the hope they will create more businesses and provide a boost to the economy. As Bloomberg put it:

It promises to create a beehive of innovation and discovery, attracting and nurturing the kind of technical talent that will spawn new companies, create new jobs and propel our city’s economy to new frontiers.

Others argue that it takes more than a university to create a hub for innovation. “A university by itself is not clear that it will transform New York into a more entrepreneurial dynamic place,” said Anna Lee-Saxenian, dean of the School of Information at the University of California-Berkeley. “After all, we have big famous engineering universities in Texas and California, in Europe, in Germany and England, that don’t have Silicon Valleys around them. So one single institution can’t be the story of Silicon Valley or of creating a new Silicon Valley.”

What do you think? Does NYC have what it takes to overtake Silicon Valley?

WNYC: New York City Takes on Silicon Valley

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Cory Doctorow on the difficulty of self-publishing

There has been a lot of debate recently about whether authors should still collaborate with traditional publishers or set out on their own and self-publish. Strong cases have been made on either side, including one from our own publisher, but even authors who have experience with both avenues are sharply divided on which is better.

The newest voice in the mix is blogger and sci-fi writer Cory Doctorow. After having worked with a traditional publisher to publish several books over the better part of the past decade, Doctorow self-published his short story collection With a Little Help earlier this year and, despite his name recognition and platform, found it more difficult than he imagined. As he writes in Locus magazine:

I figured I could deploy all the stuff I’d done when my other books had been published by mainstream publishers, the stuff that had given my books a little push to get them out of the midlist and into wider circles of attention and discussion. I knew I’d have to do some of the stuff my publisher had done, but like everyone doing something complicated for the first time, I dramatically underestimated how much work this would be. It’s not impossible, and it’s not horrible work – it’s challenging, exciting stuff, but it’s incredibly time consuming and it can be tough.

Locus Magazine: Cory Doctorow, Why Should Anyone Care?

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Tweet Emotion

One of the reasons I’ve basically abandoned my Twitter profile in the past year is that I never felt like no one was paying attention to my tweets. But a new study out of The University of Pennsylvania provides some insights that could help me–and you–make your tweets spread.

Jonah Berger, a professor at Wharton, conducted studies to figure out what makes people choose to share content online. He found that the number one determinant was whether the link, article, or tweet caused the user to feel intense emotion. According to a report in Fast Company:

If something results in higher physiological “arousal” because of action or emotional stimulus, then you’re much more likely to share it–it’s actually built into our nervous system, working unconsciously.

Good to know. Now I’m off to go rile up my followers

Fast Company: New Study Shows How to Rack Up Retweets: Pull Their Heartsrings, Piss Them Off, Make Them Laugh

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What makes a classic?

According to The Independent, Penguin UK, our sister imprint across the pond, is campaigning for the rights to publish the autobiography of Morrissey, the former lead vocalist of the iconic 80s alt rock band The Smiths. Among their offerings, Penguin plans to publish the book as an instant classic as part of its venerable Penguin Classics series.

When asked why the publisher would classify an as-yet-unpublished book as a classic, a spokeswoman for Penguin said, “There is a natural fit between Morrissey’s sensibility, his artistic achievements and Penguin Classics. A book could be published as a Penguin Classic because it is a classic in the making.”

The article goes on to note that the Penguin Classics “list embraces people or works that have ’caused scandal and political change, broken down barriers, social and sexual’” and that, under such a definition, Morrissey’s book might be a perfect addition.

Regardless of who wins the bidding war, the story poses an interesting question: what makes something a classic? What do you think?

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Student loan debt outweighs credit card debt

Today the New York Times reported that last year, for the first time ever, student loan debt outweighed credit card debt among Americans. And since college admissions seem to be getting more competitive while tuition costs continue to rise, that number is expected to grow past 1 trillion dollars this year.

But economists don’t seem to be worried. According to Susan Dynarski, a professor of education and public policy at the University of Michigan:

When you think about what’s good debt and what’s bad debt, student loans fall into the realm of good debt, like mortgages. It’s an investment that pays off over the whole life cycle.”

Many parents and students embrace this view, too, thinking that, when it comes to college, price=quality.

But some argue the opposite, claiming that student loan debt is just like any other debt and can threaten a person’s financial stability–even before they’ve started working. We’ve talked about Portfolio author Zac Bissonnette’s views on this subject before. His book Debt-Free U, released last year, argues that prospective college students should shirk the fancy private college labels in favor of a cheaper, but equally valuable, education. In a recent post on AOL’s Daily Finance blog, Bissonnette cited a study comparing the average incomes of those who attend elite colleges with those of less-selective schools. The study, conducted by economists Stacy Dale and Alan Krueger, reports that:

When we adjust for unobserved student ability by controlling for the average SAT score of the colleges that students applied to, our estimates of the return to college selectivity fall substantially and are generally indistinguishable from zero.

Of course some elite colleges are relatively affordable (e.g. public schools like the University of California and the University of Michigan), and well-endowed universities often offer scholarships and grants to low-income students who get accepted, but if you’re looking to send your kid to school (or trying to figure out how to afford your own tuition), it never hurts to consider all your options.

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Worried about paying for college? Bribe your kids.

In his book Debt-Free U, published by Portfolio in 2010, personal finance expert (and current college senior) Zac Bissonnette argued that the education you get at most private colleges isn’t worth the hundreds of thousands of dollars you have to pay to go there. And as easy and tempting as it might be to take out student loans, these only delay the day of reckoning and can potentially lead you to financial ruin.

This is generally an easy concept for parents to understand once you lay out the facts, but when applying to college, many students get caught up with the idea of the dream school and can’t accept the fact that they’d be happy anywhere else–even if it’s cheaper.

Today, Bissonnette addressed this issue in a guest post for the New York Times’ Bucks Blog. His solution? Bribe your kids with a great gift now if they agree to go to the less expensive school.

Offer your child a $1,000 (or whatever) gift card to Neiman Marcus (or Bath & Body Works — which would be easily the most awesome place to spend $1,000) in exchange for avoiding student loan debt and going to a college that’s affordable. Twenty years from now, you will both look back on it as the best $1,000 you ever spent.

As a graduate of an expensive private university who took on some (relatively modest) debt in order to go to the school of my choice, I’ll admit that, if given the chance, I would probably reconsider my choice of school (or at least how I would pay for it) if given the chance to do over. That being said, I’m not sure another school would have given me the same opportunities, and I’m fairly certain my eighteen-year-old self would not have been bribed by the promise of a car or a bunch of bath products.

What do you think? If your parents had tried to bribe you to go to a different school would you have taken the bait? Or do you think the education you received was worth every penny?

The New York Times: How a Gift Card Can Cut Your Tuition Bill

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