Business ← A Little Ludwig Goes A Long Way

Why FB is worth just a fraction of GOOG

Oct

2012

“Privacy Fix”:https://www.privacyfix.com/start is instructive. Who knows how accurate it is, but I bet it is directionally correct. And it says that FB makes about 5 cents a year off ads delivered to me, whereas GOOG makes about $32. I have most of my privacy settings cranked up (on both GOOG and FB), so maybe FB ...

Is healthcare the greatest limiter on startups?

Sep

2012

@shanselman has been sharing a lot of tweets today on the topic of healthcare and startups. For example: * https://twitter.com/lobrien/status/247408555651645440 * https://twitter.com/doozerblake/status/247407834130690048 * https://twitter.com/shanselman/status/247403381012975616 * https://twitter.com/timsonofsteve/status/247413105750077440 The shared assertion is — the lack of easily available health insurance is preventing a lot of people from joining or creating startups. Nothing scientific about this data, it ...

Does anybody ever click on this???

Jul

2012

Pixar story rules — relevant for us all

Apr

2012

At “Ritholtz”:http://www.ritholtz.com/blog/2012/04/21-pixar-story-rules/, who lifted them from “Pixar TOuch”:http://www.pixartouchbook.com/blog/2011/5/15/pixar-story-rules-one-version.html who in turn lifted them from “Emma Coats”:https://twitter.com/#!/lawnrocket. Great stuff, relevant for so much more than movie making. We all have stories to tell every day, many of these tips are relevant in so many settings — * “Come up with your ending before you figure out ...

Dealing with business documents on my Windows Phone

Apr

2012

I am starting to fill out my apps on my Nokia Lumia 900. The first class of apps I need are the apps to handle all the documents in my job/life — text documents, pdfs, office documents, etc. * PDFs. Adobe Reader downloads by default the first time you need it, and it seems to ...

I am tired of being used by the web.

Mar

2012

Jerry Michalski just published a “nice article on big data”:http://www.forbes.com/sites/jerrymichalski/2012/03/10/big-data-stalker-economy/ and how we are all being stalked online by commercial entities seeking to extract value from us. Everytime we hit a web page, tens and hundreds of companies and organizations are learning about us and making money off us. On that Forbes page with Jerry’s ...

This month’s advice for B&N — put those Nook dudes to work

Feb

2012

Scene yesterday afternoon at the Local Barnes & Noble — 5 of us in line waiting to pay for books; 1 sales clerk working hard (and telephoning back for help that never came), and the Nook salesperson at the Nook counter waiting sadly for someone to ask him about Nooks, straightening and dusting all his ...

How many cupcakes do they expect us to eat?

Feb

2012

We now have 3 cupcake stores in downtown Bellevue — stores that feature cupcake in their name, and sell primarily cupcakes. In addition to all the bakeries and other establishments that offer cupcakes, and the giant cupcake display counter now at QFC. I like baked goods as well as anyone, and I estimate that, prior ...

Do you want to be right, or do you want to be effective?

Feb

2012

Relating to my post about effective business communication the other day, here’s a “great post on being right vs. being effective.”:http://www.farnamstreetblog.com/2012/02/do-you-want-to-be-right-or-do-you-want-to-be-effective/. Of course it is best to be effective AND be right — being wrong and effective leads to epic disasters. Reminds me of the classic 4 quadrant chart of ambition vs competence. Being competent ...

You might want to develop a weapon besides the bazooka

Feb

2012

In my first job after grad school, I was giving a client presentation when a junior staffer at the client asked me a question that I felt was dumb. And so during the presentation, in front of his boss and his boss’s boss, I ripped his question apart. After the meeting, my mentor and manager ...

Ifttt.com and platform reminiscing

Sep

2011

I’m playing around with ifttt.com and it is intriguing. I remember an earlier effort, yubnub, that I always found compelling. A general script interface to all my Internet data and services so that I can do interesting things across sites seems good. I remember the evolution of Lotus Notes. A super general collab platform that ...

Apple is the new Honda

Sep

2011

Nice writeup of “Apple’s manufacturing/supply advantage vs the PC OEMs”:http://daringfireball.net/2011/09/new_apple_advantage. Reminds me very much of the way Honda and Toyota crushed the American car manufacturers in the 70′s and 80′s — GM in particular had overly complex product lines, cars with a gajillion options. Honda came in with a simple model, no options, and great ...

Business Models and Evil

Aug

2011

Some interesting commentary on “Google’s business model by Gruber”:http://daringfireball.net/linked/2011/08/23/swartz-google-evil — a total Apple fan, doesn’t view ads as inherently evil, but says you need to be very respectful of your users. And referring to “an original article by Aaron Swartz”:http://www.aaronsw.com/weblog/googevil who says you can’t make things worse for users just to make money. I don’t ...

Why didn’t I buy VMWare stock when Paul Maritz stepped into leadership role?

Sep

2010

Kicking myself totally on this one, “VMWare”:http://www.google.com/finance?client=ob&q=NYSE:VMW has been on a tear. Paul is a great guy, he has been hiring great guys (who wouldn’t want to work with Paul?), they’ve been acquiring lots of interesting assets. And fundamentally they are on the right side of history. Paul has always been insightful and articulate on ...

Amazon vs Macmillan vs You

Feb

2010

OK so Amazon’s “move against Macmillan”:http://whatever.scalzi.com/2010/02/01/all-the-many-ways-amazon-so-very-failed-the-weekend/ was seriously ham-handed and Amazon is “still caught up in their own undershorts”:http://whatever.scalzi.com/2010/02/01/seriously-now-theyre-just-being-dicks/. Some Amazonians deserve some serious reprimands, this is just not the way these things are handled. Now Amazon has created even more problems for itself. That said — we are talking about 4-5 days of inconvenience ...

Interesting reads

Aug

2009

* World’s busiest ports * Fractal Nature of Legal Systems. Human systems/societies/cultures are capable of pretty much unbounded complexity. It is not just legal systems. * Kid solves rubik’s cube while playing guitar hero. Ah, youth. * Why are cheap airlines so cheap. Love the “passengers per employee” stat.

Linkfest

Jul

2009

* My Favorite Things Mars. Amusing and entertaining * Why Nokia and Sony are failing. Succinct. Complexity is a killer. * Inflatable buttons. Cool, not sure practical. * Computer Hardware Chart. Periodic table of connectors * W* house. Your portal for great looking expensive sh$t. * Ford developing laser ignition. Nice, car engines with laser ...

Contrasting Quarters — Apple, MSFT

Jul

2009

Apple’s quarter (NYTimes): “We’re making our most innovative products ever and our customers are responding”…”unexpectedly strong sales of Macintosh computers and a surge in iPhone purchases pushed Apple’s profit up 15 percent in the third quarter”…”PC shipments for the industry fell 3 to 5 percent over the last three months. But Apple said it sold ...

Black-Swan Proofing, Useless Business Plans

Apr

2009

Gleaned from the twittersphere: FT.com / Comment / Opinion – Ten principles for a Black Swan-proof world. Man some good common sense in here. Business plans a waste of time. Sounds like your typical entrepreneur would be far better off meeting people and networking than spending time on a plan. There is probably some minimum ...

Scott Loftesness: The AIG Firestorm Spreads

Mar

2009

“It’s time to let the sun shine in on this mess.” via Scott Loftesness: The AIG Firestorm Spreads. Hear hear.