Via kottke a pointer to a piece from last summer by Michael Lewis about catastrophe bonds and the insurance industry before and after Katrina. Another interesting example about the difficulty in estimating and pricing very rare events, like black swans. Having liked both Moneyball and The Blindside, his upcoming book on the rebuilding of New Orleans should be worth reading.

Summer is here and I’ve had little to blog recently. Fred Wilson twittered recently, “posting to twitter and tumblr is fun. typepad is work.” He’s got a point.

A tour of the former Vanderbilt summer cottage The Breakers in Newport, RI convinced me that I’d much prefer having internet access, HDTV and cures for childhood diseases than all the marble bathtubs and fireplaces a 19th century railroad fortune could buy.

Today we’re launching WhoShouldiFollow, a Twitter friend recommendation engine. The goal is to let you know who you should be following. WhoShouldiFollow finds interesting people to follow based on who your friends are, and who they follow. It supports finding other twitter users near a specific location, and adjusting recommendations for popular people (since not everyone needs to follow Scobleizer).

I worked with Gary, who did the heavy lifting on the collaborative filtering, to build this small contribution to the growing number of twitter apps out there. Feedback welcome via @wsif. Enjoy!

We’ve been watching and greatly enjoying the John Adams mini-series, which prompted me to finally photograph the Captain William Smith House along the Battle Road in the Minute Man National Historic Park. I’ve always liked where it sits, and was looking for a subject to experiment with HDR techniques.