About a year ago, I did a project for de-duping customer entered contact info. We had less than 100k records for any particular region (Bay Area, New York, etc.) From what I recall, we were able to confirm identity in about 80% of cases using Name, DOB, and zip code.
By far the best metric is phone number, that bumped us up over 97%. If the comparison was limited to only three metrics, then we would use Name, DOB, and phone number. In reality, we also compare zip code, street address, and contacts (like friends on facebook), in that order.
It would be interesting to see if on average, people change their phone number less often than their name (marriage) or address (renters).
I have had a car here in SF for the last few years, and only use it to go shopping, or get out of town. Last month I picked up a little motorbike - it is super convenient in the city. Parking everywhere, and for the most part, motorists are fairly contentious.
There has been some excellent feedback on this topic already. I just want to point out a distinction that has been glossed over - OSX laptop users have a very different scrolling experience than Windows users (laptops or desktop). The two finger scroll method is very pleasant, and highly accurate. I don't ever have to re-find content while scrolling, because of how tactile and accurate the feedback is.
As interfaces get better, I believe the vertical scroll method will be preferred, because it allows the user to quickly skim, jump ahead, or reference previous content, within the same context.
To be fair, I had forgotten how different scrolling is with a traditional mouse. This design trade off (arrow keys and next buttons) is probably excellent for windows and traditional mouse users.
This doesn't surprise me, I live in San Francisco, and my neighborhood has only one option for internet connectivity: comcast cable. Well, that or tethering via my cell phone.
For me, this further confirms the value of usability and design. Facebook did a better job, and so people used their service.
I can't help but draw a parallel with what is currently happening in the tablet market. There was a quote posted on daring fireball yesterday from Jim Dalrymple: "There is no compelling argument that anyone can give that says that comparing an operating system to a hardware device makes sense. None."
I think he's nailed it, we've entered a phase of computing where software counts for more of the value of the device or service.
There was a study of the town Roseto, Pennsylvania in the 1950s that may explain why this is the case. They ate a traditional american diet, exercised the same amount as other americans, etc. But they had almost no heart disease, which was astounding at the time.
The difference was that everyone in town was very social. They would frequently share meals with neighbors, and several family generations would live together under the same roof. The conclusion the study came to was that the excellent health was from community and social connections.
I disagree with the author, and think that he hasn't used google image search very extensively.
"Instead of the single page of thumbnails, you get over 20 pages of large thumbnails all on the same huge page."
The (near) endless scrolling model works better for rapidly sorting large sets of images, not worse.
"There is no information, just endless thumbnails. No sizes, no locations to scan, nothing! ... Now you have to place the pointer on top of each image for ... size and location information."
If you are optimizing for a an interface for sorting the most images possible, removing text makes sense to me. Also, sorting options for the image size is now on the left, which I find more useful than reading text below each image.
The pop-ups also contain controls which the author ignores that are very handy: similar images, and different sizes of the same image.
What about all the people who shoot in jpeg instead of RAW? Also the camera manufacturers who don't enable RAW on their cameras, they are stealing our data! Revolt!</sarcasm>
I was a professional photographer before becoming a programmer. I think apps like instagram and hipstamatic are fantastic. Not everyone can to take the time to learn photo editing software, and filters add a new perspective on ordinary subjects.
I wouldn't mind seeing single sentence google adwords in the comment sections, perhaps 1 for every 30 comments. Bonus points if they got worked into the pun threads.
By far the best metric is phone number, that bumped us up over 97%. If the comparison was limited to only three metrics, then we would use Name, DOB, and phone number. In reality, we also compare zip code, street address, and contacts (like friends on facebook), in that order.
It would be interesting to see if on average, people change their phone number less often than their name (marriage) or address (renters).