Associated Content has an article about using Google Trends to come up with story ideas that will generate attention on account of their trendiness.

Google’s graphs reflect the frequency, throughout a specified time span, with which a particular term has been searched for on Google. Google News articles can also appear as pushpins on the graph.Google Trends is also, not surprisingly, useful and cool for non-writers. For example, there have been claims that political and media pressure on Barack Obama to name his running mate is wildly disproportionate to the pressure on John McCain to do the same, especially considering that the Democrat secured the nomination a week ago, and the Republican has been presumptive nominee for months. A graph of these two trends corroborates the discrepancy.

Many insights wait to be discovered in the patterns: rise to prominence, annual cycles, arbitrary spikes, demise, tepid career, revolution and retreat.

Execution summary

March 31, 2008

Here is the list of countries which carried out executions in 2006, courtesy of Amnesty International:

  • Bahrain
  • Bangladesh
  • Botswana
  • China
  • Egypt
  • Equatorial Guinea
  • Indonesia
  • Iran
  • Iraq
  • Japan
  • Jordan
  • Korea (North)
  • Kuwait
  • Malaysia
  • Mongolia
  • Pakistan
  • Saudi Arabia
  • Singapore
  • Somalia
  • Sudan
  • Syria
  • Uganda
  • United States of America
  • Viet Nam
  • Yemen

Stats for 2007 are not yet available.

Facts & Observations:

Except for the 53 persons killed by governments in the U.S, there were no executions recorded in North America, South America, or Europe.

Of the world’s 1,591 documented executions, 1,010 were by China. An additional 6,500 to 7,000 undocumented Chinese killings are estimated by “credible sources”. (The official statistics are a state secret.)

The top six killers are China, Iran, Pakistan, Iraq, Sudan, and the United States, accounting for 92% of the world’s executions.

Food blog

March 20, 2008

I started a food blog in order to document the meals I make and to record my thoughts about all aspects of food.

Welcome

February 19, 2008

This is Matt Schonert’s personal blog.