Mish – I started tracking these for the first time today – complete historical data. These are two of the noisiest series of all time.
Take a look at the charts, especially the population-adjusted versions. You'll see why you need at least a 3-month moving average to get an idea of the real trend direction and slope. And check out where the latest data points put us relative to the total series.
If you ask the builders, sales conditions are very good with a score of 59. Sales expectations rose to an excellent score of 64. Meanwhile, actual lookers score a very poor 39.
Average it all together and you get the totally useless chart above.
Housing Market Index Components
Yesterday afternoon I asked the NAHB for the subcomponent data. Here is a chart I put together today from that data.
Note the actual traffic of prospective buyers vs. sales expectations six months out.
Mike "Mish" Shedlock http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com
Those in medical school pondering career specialties need consider which fields may soon vanish to robots. Anesthesiology is one field in the robotic spotlight.
I wrote recently about Sedasys, a machine that automates anesthesia. It's a first-of-its-kind device in the United States. Only four hospitals use it for now. It's restricted to colonoscopies in healthy patients.
But Sedasys, in development for 15 years, is no longer on the true cutting edge of what's possible with automated anesthesia.
A machine with the clunky name of iControl-RP is. It's an experimental device that pushes the boundaries of how much responsibility is turned over to technology. It monitors brain wave activity. And it's even been tested on children. One of the reasons that Sedasys was approved by U.S. health regulators is that it's a conservative leap forward. The device is innovative, but it doesn't decide alone how much anesthesia to give to a patient.
It's an open-loop system. The initial dose is pre-determined based on a patient's weight and age. And Sedasys only reduces or stops drug delivery if it detects problems. Only a doctor or nurse can up the dose. That gave regulators a level of comfort.
But the iControl-RP makes its own decisions. It is a closed-loop system.
This new device, being tested by University of British Columbia researchers, monitors a patient's brain wave activity along with traditional health markers, such as blood oxygen levels, to determine how much anesthesia to deliver.
"We are convinced the machine can do better than human anesthesiologists," said Mark Ansermino, one of the machine's co-developers, who works as director of pediatric anesthesia research at the university's medical school in Vancouver.
Sedasys dips its toes into what's possible. The iControl-RP dives right in.
Anesthesia is tricky. It's often compared to flying a plane – keeping a patient hovering in just the right plane of consciousness. It's called depth of hypnosis. Surgeons don't want patients writhing on the table. And patients don't want to be aware of the operation. Of course, no one wants patients to die, a distinct possibility if too much of an anesthesia drug is delivered.
The iControl-RP aims to thread that needle by using an EEG to scan a patient's brain waves to make sure the sedation is adequate. And it looks at heart and breathing rates and blood oxygen levels to make sure the patient is not slipping too deeply into sleep. The machine's algorithm makes all the medical decisions that a doctor usually does.
Ansermino said anesthesiologists are not very good at maintaining just the right amount of sedation. This is especially important in children, where studies show that deep sedation can have negative longterm cognitive impacts on infants and toddlers.
The iControl-RP team says it has struggled to find a corporate backer for its project. Ansermino, the anesthesiologist in Vancouver, thinks he knows why.
"Most big companies view this as too risky," he said.
But, he said, a device like this was inevitable.
"I think eventually this will happen," Ansermino said, "whether we like it or not."
Anesthesiology Robots Coming Like It or Not
I side with Ansermino. These devices will happen, like it or not. Look for approval in Canada first, then Europe. The US will then be forced to catch up.
Meet iControl-RP Your New Anesthesiologist
The iControl-RP, which fully automates anesthesia for operations, stands on the right. On the left are traditional anesthesia monitors that would be used by a human doctor. UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA PHOTO
Clinical Trials in Canada
iControl-RP is in Clinical Trials in Canada. The study is currently recruiting participants.
It's increasingly important to choose your career wisely. Healthcare in general may be a good choice, but select fields in healthcare will go to robots.
Mike "Mish" Shedlock http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com
There were hardly any indications before today, but the spring housing surge is here. Today's housing starts & permits report is one of the very strongest on record with starts soaring 20.2 percent in April to a much higher-than-expected annual rate of 1.135 million with permits up 10.1 percent to a much higher-than-expected 1.143 million. Both readings easily top the Econoday high-end forecast of 1.120 million for each. The gain for starts is the best in 7-1/2 years with the gain in permits the best in 7 years. Today's report is an eye-opener and will re-establish expectations for building strength in housing, a sector held down badly in the first quarter by severe weather.
Recent History Of This Indicator
Housing starts & permits have been some of the most disappointing data on the calendar, underscoring how weak the new home market really is. Excuses were abundant during the heavy weather of the first quarter but those excuses won't apply to the latest report which is for April. Both starts and permits are expected to show big gains from depressed levels.
Housing Starts
Mike "Mish" Shedlock http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com
This guy bought a Nintendo 3DS case at Goodwill for only $2.99 but he got something worth so much more. He heard something rattling inside and that's when he decided to do some investigating. He found this 3DS case at Good Will for $2.99 and could hear rattling inside but no way to know for sure. After he got home, he took off the tape and opened it up.
Red 3DS!
What's this?
21 USD! Score! That'll buy some games for it! But wait, what's behind the black foam? Could it be...?
Woah! It even came with games!
Does the 3DS work? Might want to check it out... Oh wow! Prescription drugs! This gets better and better! Opened it up to find Pokemon Y running...
Gen I starters!
Extra Chespins!
Decided to flip it over to see what was behind it...
Mustang logo?
A '69 Black Ford Mustang! To think he only spent $2.99 for the 3DS box.
Today we're excited to make freely available the new Web Developer's SEO Cheat Sheet 3.0.
Ever since the indelible Danny Dover created the original version in 2008, the SEO Cheat Sheet has been downloaded tens of thousands of times by developers and marketers alike.
Countless beginner and advanced SEOs have printed it out, laminated it, and hung it on their walls as a quick reference to the most impactful best practices in search engine optimization. Web developers and software engineers also find it handy to easily reference SEO technical standards.
New for 2015
Lots has changed in SEO since 2008 (even since 2013 when we published version 2.0.) To keep pace, we updated version 3.0 to reflect best practices in SEO today.
Updated information in several places, most notably in User Agents, Social Metadata, and Mobile Web Development
Eliminated sections with reduced relevance, such as Authorship and Publisher markup
Simplified sections to make them easier to understand, such as User Agents
Made the "best practice" advice clearer and easier to understand throughout
Added entirely new important material such as Schema and Rich Snippets
All together, we incorporated close to 100 new changes in this edition, some big, some small.
If you can wait to dive in and print it out, feel free to download it right now:
Here you'll find the basics of creating webpages that can be understood by search robots. From title tag best practices to the ideal URL structure, page one will get you up and running in no time. We've also included all the major Webmaster Tools of the primary search engines to register and monitor your site.
Page two
Robot Control Syntax
Important User Agents
Sitemap Syntax
Pagination
Beyond having a page that search engines understand, you want to ensure search robots crawl your site effectively for optimal performance. Use these tips and best practices to avoid unwanted crawling or to stop accidentally blocking important bots from your top pages.
Page three
Social Metadata
Rich Snippets
Structured Data
After your site is crawled and indexed, you may want to focus on how your content is displayed in search engine results and across social media. Both social metadata and rich snippets can improve your visibility, and structured data can add additional meaning to your content for search engines to understand.
Page four
Targeting Multiple Languages
Mobile Web Development
As both search engines and users evolve, you likely want to optimize for different devices, or target users of a different region or language. The final page of the SEO Cheat Sheet introduces you to the basics of International and Mobile SEO.
Always free, always changing
At Moz, we're dedicated to the principal that SEO knowledge should be free and accessible to all (in contrast to the often secretive nature of search engines and their algorithms).
We also believe in supporting a community that shares and exchanges information for the betterment of all. We've made version 3.0 of the SEO Cheat Sheet the best it can be, and it's been great fun watching it evolve to this point, but we also can't wait for it to change again.
Thanks to everyone in the SEO community who has contributed to this body of knowledge and to all of you who have downloaded and shared the Web Developer's SEO Cheat Sheet to make it a success!
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