The table below summarises the measures used to calculate the rankings together with their respective weightings.

ECONOMIST: Which MBA? rankings

Seventeen-year-old Nick D'Aloisio's Summly app summarises news stories from popular media companies.

BBC: Technology

It summarises the lessons and struggles of the past 100 years, while serving as a road map of the coming millennium.

ECONOMIST: Letters

After months of influence by the American's more spontaneous behaviour, most presentations are now oral, and a one-page memo then summarises proceedings.

ECONOMIST: The DaimlerChrysler emulsion

The report summarises the findings from three research reports based on evidence from surveys of almost 3, 500 disabled people and their families, as well as a parliamentary evidence session.

BBC: Universal Credit: Disabled people 'to lose out'

One of the Manx shearwaters recorded in the latest edition of the British Trust for Ornithology's Ringing Report, which summarises data collected in 2003, was given its ring in 1953.

ECONOMIST: The oldest bird in the world

Another benefit is that a single number summarises what would otherwise be an immensely complicated picture, and one that varies a great deal (in quantitatively incommensurate ways) from country to country.

ECONOMIST: Working man’s burden | The

The chart summarises his results.

ECONOMIST: Economics focus