This Robot Can Grab a Beer, with George Konidaris-EP 272
Open your fridge and grab a beer without knocking anything else over. It’s usually not hard for a human to do it. But getting a robot to do the same task can take an engineer weeks or months. George Konidaris is a professor of computer science at Brown University, director
Renaissance Machinery Dealer
A few weeks ago I traveled to Berlin, Germany. During my stay I visited a used machine tools company called Innovac GmbH where I met
Pools of Money
We hear the term “private equity” tossed around every day in business. The Bloomberg ticker tells us about the giants that often go by initials
Equal Opportunity?
I have been thinking a lot about whether America has become hopelessly stratified by wealth, race, education and all sorts of barriers that make it
Let Me Work
I’m on vacation in the Bay Area and I’m working. Today it’s a blog, business calls, thinking about options for TMW and Graff-Pinkert. I’m in
Respect the Streak
Baseball fans love statistics because they tend to make the daily events seem more rational and orderly. We humans crave order and predictability, even when
A Father’s Day Baseball Story
John Arguello is a favorite writer of mine, these days. He covers the Chicago Cubs intensively and works with a stable of writers and commenters