Apple and Amazon do neat things. Apple is helping corporations establish their own interenal app store — from which they can distribute iPad and iPhone applications to their employees. Such apps help them in many aspects of their work.
Amazon is essentially rewriting the book business, destroying traditional distributors, replacing traditional publishers with itself and dealing directly with authors. Books will become ebooks, and be released instantly — no more months of publisher fiddling, slow printing scheduels and no more delaying for distant Spring and Fall catalogs. All this should make Amazon immensely more profitable and its stock more interesting — though it is strongly priced at $201, with a P/E ratio of 87.
Microsoft is introducing Ofice 365 today.
Office 365 will cost small businesses $6 a user each month for a package with programs like Office Web Apps and Exchange e-mail software. For an additional $12 a month, companies can add a full version of Office, including Word and Excel programs. Office 365 won’t make any significant addition to Microsoft revenue since many corporations and consumers are afraid of trusting their data to the Internet cloud and few people are unhappy with what they already have.
Meantime, Microsoft’s Kinect for Xbox 360, or simply Kinect, at $144 is the fastest-growing consumer electronics device ever. Microsoft has shipped over 10 million Kinects already. I’m guessing it will impact Microsoft’s bottom line positively and may even affect emotion surrounding Microsoft’s ailing stock. P/E is now actually under 10 and shows a dividend yield of 2.54%. My God, Microsoft is becoming a value stock.
Kinect is is a motion sensing input device for the Xbox 360 video game console. Based around a webcam-style add-on peripheral for the Xbox 360 console, it lets users control and interact with the Xbox 360 without the need to touch a game controller. It’s done through a natural user interface using gestures and spoken commands. More on this neat device — your kids will love it — on Wickipedia.
Why employees do strange things. A common story: Big company buys little company and then destroys it. The previous owner then try to buy their little company back. The big company won’t sell it to them for reasons the original entrepeneur doesn’t understand. Basically, the big company employees need to proect their tushies. They need not to look as though they had made a mistake buying the original company. I was fascinated to read this excerpt of a New York Times book review on a new book Cambodia’s Curse: The Modern History of a Troubled Land,
Cambodia is one of the world’s poorest countries. “Among Southeast Asian nations,” Brinkley writes, “only Burma is poorer, on a per capita basis.” At least 30 percent of Cambodians live on less than a dollar a day. About 40 percent of children suffer from stunting (failure to develop because of poor nutrition). In 2010 only 30 percent of Cambodian middle-school-age students were enrolled in school. Asia’s self-described “longest ruling prime minister,” Hun Sen, is a murderous kleptocrat, Brinkley shows. Corruption is rife. The sick may die waiting for treatment if they cannot pay doctors’ bribes in hospitals.
Statistics of suffering aside, “Cambodia’s Curse,” when it is at its most thorough, acknowledges the role of rich countries in this disaster. Every year for more than a decade, Brinkley recounts, donor organizations and states made toothless pleas that Hun Sen pass an anticorruption law. But once money was pledged, the law would stall another year. As a result of this annual pas de deux, donors had given Hun Sen $18 billion by 2010, essentially with no strings, before the law was enacted. And when it finally did pass last year, it had been gutted into meaninglessness.
“Some Cambodians and others remained astounded by the donors’ behavior,” Brinkley writes. Why didn’t they withhold aid? Echoing the economist Dambisa Moyo, Brinkley suggests that the corruption is symbiotic. “If they cut off aid to the government, as the human rights groups were demanding, many donors would lose their jobs.”
Read the entire review here.
The latest ripoff in magazine subscriptions. Fortune Magazine loves me. I’m one of their “valued automatic renewal customers.” I don’t have to do anything. They’ll put $59.95 on my credit card for my next 20 issues. That’s “a 33% savings off the cover price.” However, if I simply go to Fortune’s own seb site, I’ll pay only $19.99 for 20 issues. “a 78% savings off the cover price.” Hence I pay three times as much to be a valued customer. I don’t make this stuff up.
Michele Bachmann’s Holy War. Matt Taibbi’s latest piece in Rolling Stone is fascinating. He writes, ‘The Tea Party contender may seem like a goofball, but be warned: Her presidential campaign is no laughing matter.”
To read Taibbi’s piece (and you and your family should), click here.
Endgame on Afghanistan. The New Yorker’s lead article this week. Click here.
Sounds like a really nice place. If you visit Saudi Arabia, you’ll have to sign a piece of paper that includes:
I, the undersigned, hereby agree to have my fingerprint and iris data (biometrics) captured as part of the application procedure for an entry visa to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. I further agree and declare as follows:
If granted the visa, I shall abide by all the laws and regulations of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and respect the Islamic customs and traditions of its people;
I am aware that all alcoholic beverages, narcotics and other illegal drugs, pornographic materials or publications that violate the social norms of decency and all other publications that are disrespectful of any religious belief or political orientation are prohibited and shall not be brought into the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia;
I am also fully aware that the crime of smuggling narcotics and other illegal drugs into the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia is punishable by the death penalty….
There’s no list of what constitutes “narcotics.”
Favorite recent New Yorker cartoons.
This kind of sensitivity can’t be taught.
The room was full of pregnant women with their partners. The class was in full swing. The instructor was teaching the women how to breathe properly and was telling the men how to give the necessary assurance to their partners at this stage of the pregnancy.
She said “Ladies, remember that exercise is good for you. Walking is especially beneficial. It strengthens the pelvic muscles and will make delivery that much easier; just make several stops and stay on a soft surface like grass or a path.”
She looked at the men in the room, “and Gentlemen, remember — You’re in this together–It wouldn’t hurt you to go walking with her”.
The room suddenly got very quiet as the men absorbed this information.
Then a man at the back of the room slowly raised his hand.
“Yes”, answered the Instructor.
“I was just wondering if it would be all right if she carries a golf bag while we walk?”
This kind of sensitivity can’t be taught.
Harry Newton who remains positinve on high-dividend yielders NLY, AGNC, ANH and MFA.
Harry the New York Times controls New Yorkers……….if the light is 'green” and the NYT says its “red” then its “red”….the rest of the country sees the real color of the light….
Here is a quote from Taibbi: “…perhaps it is more accurate to say we all discovered — that a total absence of legislative accomplishment and a complete inability to tell the truth or even to identify objective reality are no longer hindrances to higher office.” Matt is certainly correct, although the prime example of this truth is even more egregious than Bachmann.
Maybe Taibbi would like the Donald better. Most liberals will find fault with any Repub. Since we have the grandmaster screwup President in place now, hard to see how we could do worse(ok maybe Romney would be worse). Personally Id prefer to see Ron Paul as President…he would make a real difference. I dont think either party has the balls to do what must be done.
Harry, New York does not represent the positions and perspectives of the US at large. Not by a mile.
I didn't say New York is the center of the U.S. I sent the Taibbi piece to all the women in my family all of whom found it fascinating. Hence why I published it and recommended everyone read it.
A linked “hit piece” on Bachmann says: “At the end of the day, her politics are like this: Everyone will have a gun, nobody will have an abortion, no one will pay taxes, everyone will go to church, and there won't be any more pinko liberal teachers in school.” Sounds pretty darn good to me! Sounds like a place I'd like to live.
You wouldn't like it because there is only one “correct” church according to prez bachmann. What if the government correct church is Presbyterian not Catholic or Baptist not Mormon or “gasp” Islamic not Christian. It's best to leave church and government separate so you can practice(or not practice) as you see fit.
If you're Jewish, you're really screwed.
Joe300 — A good point and well stated. I would argue even further that “governments” (from potentates to politicians) have killed more good citizens in the name of God than for any other cause.
But, it seems that the US has “overachieved” on the separation of church and state and vastly under-performed on the separation of government and the rights of citizens. The ban on incandescent lights bulbs is merely the latest case in point. Why can't the marketplace or private citizens decide on how they light their homes? When will light-bulb smuggling commence? Will possession of a glass globe and a twist of tungsten be a federal crime? Will FBI agents sneak through backyard looking for the warm glow of incandescence? Will I be able to smuggle 100 watt bulbs off Indian Reservations? Intrusive government extended to ridiculous lengths.
At a time when the government has successfully outlawed a simple invocation at a high school graduation, hasn't it over-reached? Harry, certainly Antisemitism is a constant problem, but so are anti-religion, anti-patriotism, and anti-morality. Gotta keep an even strain.
You ask, “Why can't the marketplace or private citizens decide on how they light their homes?”
Why stop at light bulbs? Why have government-mandated mileage standards for autos, and why do I have to pay for those mandatory seat belts and expensive air bags? Who's to say how fast I may or may not drive my car? Why can't the marketplace or private citizens decide whether their autos are spewing too much pollutants or if they should wear a helmet when riding their Harleys? Why do we have those expensive, job-killing food safety standards? I'll check my own head of lettuce and canned fruit shipped in from somewhere in Mexico or Thailand! Why does the federal government stick their nose into the drug testing and approval process? Why do I have to see that my kid gets shots, or that I take him to a doctor if he's seriously ill, if I believe that God alone will heal him? Who is the government to tell me when my kid is too young to leave school and go to work? Why can't my kid work for 2 bucks an hour in a factory, if I want him to and he wants to? Why should the government tell my wife that she can't have an abortion? Who in the government determined when life begins? When did the government decide that “In God We Trust” or “Live Free or Die” was necessary and good for all of us – and why should our coinage and license plates be so emblazoned?
If we were to just leave it all to private citizens and the marketplace, what a wonderful world it would be.
Fderfler, your Heaven-on-Earth is already here – it's called the Gaza Strip. Why, it's just as democratic, civil and respectful of others' thoughts and views as your idealized US of A would be. Should you relocate there, all your dreams will instantly come true. Take a friend!