Netflix founder Reed Hastings issued an in-depth apology to netflix customers on the Netflix Blog yesterday. In it, he gave a detailed explanation of his decision to start charging additional fees for streaming vs. DVD delivery.

My initial reaction was, "good for you!" especially since he seems to be rescinding the "I'm going to charge you twice as much for the same service" message that had been previously announced.

But when I started reading the comments, I came to realize that his solution - to split the company in two (netflix for streaming and qwikster for DVD-delivery) doesn't solve the problem at all. Alert reader Jeremiah Cohick summed it up nicely when he said (paraphrased), "I don't care about your business model. As your customer, I don't think of you as DVDs vs. streaming. I think of you as the place I go to watch movies."

At the end of the day, THAT is what makes all the difference. And to have separate recommendations, queues and ratings makes NO sense - and is in no way integrated. I'm afraid that Netflix' slide is going to be faster than ever now.

Whatever you might think about the bridge situation in Louisville, it's impossible not to love Humana founder David Jones' spirit and his bias for action. He's a good example of how much one man can do to bring a city together when the chips are down.

I can only hope that politics aren't going to get in the way of saving Louisville's future - and that a wealthy few won't sacrifice the fate of millions to protect their turf. Time will tell. I'm going to choose to be optimistic on this one.

Any opinions of Klout aside (I'm still a strong skeptic), I like what Mark Schaefer had to say about what makes for online influence - boiled down to its essence.

"The ability to create and move content is the absolute key to online influence."

That's true. It's also really interesting to unpack. How do you *create* content that *moves*? It involves a lot of stuff ... stuff like:
- Knowing your audience: Where they live online; what kind of content they like to consume; how they like to consume it; in what forms they share it
- Creating content that's easy for that audience to FIND, CONSUME and SHARE.

I don't know about Klout. But I definitely agree with Mark that the ability to create and move content is the key to influence. Good one.

This is truly outrageous. Anna Mathews (no relation) of the Wall Street Journal reports on some of the new medical codes available as we migrate from ICD-9 to ICD-10. Apparently the number of codes is increasing from 18,000 to 140,000, and will include the affliction from this headline, as well as "Walked Into a Lamppost" (both primary and secondary) and injured while playing a brass instrument. The new codes will also apparently delineate the difference between an injury that occurred in the bedroom vs. the bathroom - in a mobile home.

While it's hard not to laugh at the ridiculousness of these codes, it points to a healthcare system that - far from becoming EASIER - is actually becoming more difficult for physicians and patients to navigate.

Makes you wonder who's in charge around here.

Great, thought-provoking article from Sam Biddle on Gizmodo ... definitely give it a read if you're into a) Instagram; b) facebook; or c) the relationship between the elitist digerati of the former versus the swarming masses of the latter.

On one hand, I agree that Instagram is special for two reasons ... it gives me, an amateur photographer, the tools to create photos that don't suck without investing thousands of dollars and hours to do so. Second, it give the the opportunity to share those photos with friends ... and in turn, it gives me a window to understand and appreciate those friends more deeply through the photos that they create and share.

On the other hand, I see here much ado about nothing. If, as Mr. Biddle asserts, Instragram will go on about its business; immune to facebook's copying of its service ... and if facebook users start using filters to make crappy photos crappier ... who cares?

What people do behind their own backyard fence is no business of mine - I don't see it, and I couldn't care less. For that reason, this article feels more like elitist claptrap than any kind of real social commentary. But I do thank Mr. Biddle for the thought-provoking piece, and Grant Harrison for sharing it.