If you are looking to understand what your competitors are shipping, you can check out a company like Manifest Journals where a business connection of mine, Michael Heffernan, helps companies make sense of U.S. Customs Import Trade Data.

FORBES: Made In America Has A New Ring

He established the Michael Fux Foundation, which helps sick and underprivileged children and their families.

FORBES: Pebble Beach: The Most Famous Rolls-Royce

Michael Freund, director of Amishav - an organisation that helps Jews move to Israel - says he firmly believes that Menashe is one of the lost tribes of Israel.

BBC: Inside the Manipur synagogue

Michael Fertik owns ReputationDefender, a start-up company that helps individuals and companies manage their online reputation--essentially a Web-centric crisis PR firm.

FORBES: Magazine Article

"At least this helps us in some kind of way, " owner Michael Greenbaum says of the double-price-tag policy.

WSJ: Merchants Shred Costs of Payments by Plastic

All of which helps explain why Bagehot holds such hopes for the current education secretary, Michael Gove (even as my faith in the competence of many other ministers in the coalition government is tested).

ECONOMIST: Fixing British education