My Disability Studies is (Not) Better than Yours

My Botnet Is Bigger Than Yours (Maybe, Better Than Yours): Why Size Estimates Remain Challenging

As if fueled by its own fire, curiosity and speculation regarding botnet sizes abounds. Among researchers, in the press, and in the classroom—the questions regarding the widespread effect of botnets seem never-ending: what are they? how many are there? what are they used for? Yet, time and time again, one lingering question remains: how big are today’s botnets? We hear widely diverging answers....

The binomial cumulative distribution function, or, is my system better than yours?

In human language technology, it is becoming more and more common to run systematic evaluations in which two or more systems, or two or more versions of the same system, are pitted one against the other. We propose the binomial cumulative distribution function as a way to assess the cumulative effect of the measures collected in such evaluations. We present an application of this measure to the...

My stent is better than your stent...Or is it?

Before coronary stents, balloon angioplasty was limited by arterial dissection, acute closure, Q-wave myocardial infarction (MI), a 5% risk for emergency coronary artery bypass graft surgery, the need for repeat procedures to treat restenosis, and sometimes procedural death. Coronary stents immediately reduced those major procedural complications. The current debates about asymptomatic periproc...

My reality and yours.

I was having coffee with a friend in a Greenwich Village café when he announced suddenly that we had to leave. " Why? " I asked. Because, he said, acid was dripping from the ceiling. I thought for a moment and took a chance. I asked whether he wanted me to take him to the VA hospital in Northport, about an hour's drive from Manhattan. His answer, " yes, " was a sur-prise—and a relief. The dripp...

Colorectal polyp characterization: Is my computer better than me?