Is there one link, story, picture or thought that you saw online this week that you think somebody you know must see?

My friends: Alistair Croll (BitCurrent, Year One Labs, GigaOM, Human 2.0, the author of Complete Web Monitoring and Managing Bandwidth: Deploying QOS in Enterprise Networks), Hugh McGuire (PressBooks, LibriVox, iambik) and I decided that every week or so the three of us are going to share one link for one another (for a total of six links) that each individual feels the other person "must see".

Check out these six links that we’re recommending to one another:

• Homeland (TV series): What do people in the intelligence community think of Homeland? – Quora. "One of the things I love about the Internet is the transparency. Here’s a fascinating discussion on Quora about how closely Homeland mirrors the real world (spoiler alert: not much.) I loved Rubicon before it was taken off the air, and there have been films like Three Days of the Condor and Tinker Tailor  Soldier Spy that apparently came close to reality. But that’s not why I’m sending this link. It’s because of the thread that followed. One poster mentioned a series called The Sandbaggers, which was made in Canada from 1978 to 1980. It was created by Ian Mackintosh, a British naval officer. Mackintosh’s stories were so close to the truth they were apparently reviewed by British Intelligence, and one was actually vetoed–series two is missing an episode. The icing on this cake is that Mackintosh mysteriously disappeared in 1979, when his plane went missing near Alaska in the one area not covered by US or USSR radar. Naturally, I bought the whole series five minutes later. There’s nothing like a good backstory to break out the credit card." (Alistair for Hugh).
• REM’s "Losing My Religion" shifted into a major scale – BoingBoing. "I spent some time last week making music with my friend Sean Power. He’s a natural; to me, this stuff is opaque. But it’s hard to argue with the impact of a key change. In this video, REM‘s ‘Losing My Religion’ has been shifted to a major key. It completely changes the vibe from lament to celebration." (Alistair for Mitch).
• Cat gap – Wikipedia. "I love Wikipedia." (Hugh for Alistair).
• Redesigning Google: how Larry Page engineered a beautiful revolution – The Verge. "I recently read someone say (can’t remember who): ‘Google is getting good at design faster than Apple is getting good at the Web.’ For a while there (Buzz, Wave) it seemed like Google had lost its focus, launching then canning big new products that didn’t seem to ‘work.’ But I’m seeing a methodical approach where Google is starting to bake social into their traditional strength of ‘good tools,’ rather than trying to reinvent social for social’s sake (and compete with Facebook head on). Coupled with this (very smart) direction, Google’s design approach matured greatly, which ties together this sense I have of a (new) very cohesive Google." (Hugh for Mitch).
• An Internet for Manufacturing – MIT Technology Review. "Think about the potential of integrating the Internet of things within a factory. This factory would be equipped with sensors, high speed connectivity and more. Ultimately, it brings us to a place where every product remembers how it was made, is networked and able to better tell us humans the quality level and issues that are happening (or that could evolve). Of course, this is big and new thinking… and, of course, it is already happening. People still think of the Internet as a place to look at cute pictures of cats or to creep on the people in high school that we hated but are dying to see if they got fat. As usual, we have the more evolved among us truly creating technological breakthroughs that will change the very fabric of our society." (Mitch for Alistair). 
• eBooks Now Multi-Billion Dollar Category for Amazon – Galley Cat. "I was meeting with my book publisher last month in NYC and they were informing me that the majority of business books are still bought in print. There is something about having them on our desks and bookshelves that make us feel smarter… or something. As someone who reads my books exclusively on my iPhone (occasionally on the iPad), I tend to act like a market of one, instead of looking at the bigger picture. Then, an article like comes along. ‘CEO Jeff Bezos had this comment: ‘After 5 years, eBooks is a multi-billion dollar category for us and growing fast – up approximately 70% last year. In contrast, our physical book sales experienced the lowest December growth rate in our 17 years as a book seller, up just 5%. We’re excited and very grateful to our customers for their response to Kindle and our ever expanding ecosystem and selection.’ So, you would think that I’m sharing this article because it speaks to the end of print books. I am not. I’m fascinated with a bigger, more macro thought: the virtual goods business. A multi-business dollar business of selling a product that is pure bits… and no atoms. Sure, we’re seeing this with entertainment (music, movies, books, etc…), but imagine all of the other, new and untapped opportunities." (Mitch for Hugh).

Now it’s your turn: in the comment section below pick one thing that you saw this week that inspired you and share it.

Major Scaled #2 : REM – "Recovering My Religion" from major scaled on Vimeo.