Business models drive big changes

It was announced today that HP was abandoning its efforts with Palm software and hardware. It had just purchased the company for 1.2 billion in April of this year. Last month HP put on the market its first “tablet” to compete with Apple’s iPad.  The sales have been abysmal. HP is abandoning that hundreds of million dollar effort too. They have even announced they are considering getting out of the PC business. I imagine that does not include printers and ink. That is where the lion’s share of its profits is derived.

The business model forced on technology companies by Investors is behind the HP moves. Some other companies by design use a similar model, like Sony and Apple.  These companies and their Investors are paranoid that they will find themselves in the situation of IBM in the early 1980s.

In the early 1980s a few people at IBM were experimenting and threw together some off-the-shelf parts to create a computer. This was not a “sanctioned” activity of IBM. But it gained an instant life of its own and was adopted by the corporation. IBM now found itself associated with “the personal computer”. The Executives got involved and they immediately moved to do what they normally do. They attempted to make it “proprietary” like its other products. This would restrict others from competing and secure the revenue stream. The Executives were flabbergasted. By using off-the-shelf parts, patents and a completely proprietary nature was out of reach. Soon personal PC clones were everywhere. In the mid 1990s IBM sold its desktop PC business to Acer. Around 2000 it sold its laptop business [ThinkPad] to Lenovo.

The most successful technology company right now at proprietary products [locked down and completely under their control] is Apple, followed by Sony. They made absolutely certain their products are built within their patent framework. That can result in a design hodgepodge of less effective ways of doing things or the absence of desired customer features. This business model means that all profits, including third party additions, flow to it. It is the Investor's holy grail of business models.

The problem in today’s communication market is patent road blocks. Big players have spent years acquiring key patents. Apple and several other players recently got together to buy Nortel patents in an effort to keep Google from acquiring them.  Last week Google announced its intention to buy Motorola and acquire its patents. Within days HP abandons and financially "writes off" key initiatives in this arena.

I imagine that HP found itself locked out of key patents to move ahead. It was boxed in with Apple holding key patents along with control of Nortel patents and Google potentially acquiring Motorola patents. To license the needed patents would probably be very expensive for HP and reciprocal demands would be made to license HP’s proprietary technology in other areas. 

The big HP Investors probably said if they could not have the whole cake in terms of profits, a slice would not do.

Power of the Media

A few decades ago there was an effort to “right” the story of the Indians. The movie industry gave us “Dances with Wolves” and other offerings. But they were basically a “White” overlay still tilted to the accepted storyline. 

[Note: The term “White” is describing a race and cultural group. The term “White men” is used to describe an identifiable subset of that group].

I grew you watching Westerns on television. In fact, television when I was young, was dominated by Westerns in prime time. Outside of prime time there was a steady stream of Western movie reruns. We were inundated.

There was something inconsistent in the portrayal of Indians. The television shows and movies postulated Indians as a seemingly invincible adversary to be feared. Yet they were always depicted as inferior to the White man in the movies and on television. It was always inevitable they would be defeated by an innately superior White individual. I believed the tough Indian line in movies and television was a tale to frighten children or to justify the extreme measures used against them.

One evening about a decade ago I started watching the Michael Mann produced movie, “Last of the Mohicans”. I was mesmerized. The Indians were real warriors with a culture. The main protagonist was an Indian that could cause White men to wet their pants. I had never seen an Indian that was displayed in this manner and not isolated from his Indian culture. He was one able to stand up to the best of the best White men and conquer. He also was not one stereotypically lusting after some White woman. It took another great Indian warrior to kill him. I can now appreciate the stories about the fear of Indians in fights. Especially, if the Indians in the movie were representatives of Indians in the old west.

That one movie changed my whole view of Indians. I no longer saw them as the marginalized and degenerate people on reservations. I saw them as a people so feared that efforts might be made even today to make certain they never rise again.

This movie episode demonstrates the power of the media. The media could do tremendous good. It could be used to dissuade discrimination. It could be used to have women achieve greater equality. It could be used to help us see beyond race, religion and culture to being part of the human race.

However, the media in America has found its niche. It is exacerbating the negative.

Prepared

No government is likely as prepared as the Vatican for an alien revelation.  The Vatican has had centuries of experience dealing with revelations that test the doctrines of faith. The Vatican has also been blessed with the intellectually astute in its monasteries and later scientist and mathematicians in its inter sanctum for centuries. They would have advised long ago the possibility of aliens is real and discovery only a matter of time.

The Vatican has enjoyed a great deal of time to analyze its doctrines to determine which would be most impacted. They have carefully crafted how doctrines would be modified or emphasis shifted to maintain the faith. A constantly updated list of authorized communicators is kept. The communicators are skillfully trained. 

In today’s world the challenge for the Vatican will be navigating through the mind field of Evangelistic doctrine. There will be many adherents professing the appearance of Satan. They will command center stage with their vaulted American financial positions. The other major Western religious denominations will take an agnostic stance. More ambivalent will be the Jewish, Muslin, Hindu and Buddhist religions. However their doctrines can easily accommodate flexibility on the issue. 

Why this obsession with aliens? There has been enough smoke in terms of information to suggest there is something to it. The tobacco industry for decades was able to continue to market cigarettes without significant attention being given to the disastrous health effects. They successfully addicted whole generations giving them away to soldiers in both world wars. They made certain cigarettes were prominently displayed in movies. They set up institutes and paraded experts to debunk detrimental heath claims about cigarettes. Their strategy of ridicule and denial worked. Why would it not work for the government?

Recently a prominent Congressmen claimed the worst cyber breech in America had occurred.  It was done by a somewhat retarded British citizen using a 56K modem. He breeched the Pentagon system searching for information about UFOs and aliens. The British thought he should get a slap on the hands given his mental condition. However, he was extradited to America after America practically threatened war. He has been hidden since his arrival and held incommunicado. Seems a bit extreme! Trying to keep a secret while fanning the flames does not work.

The Vatican has outlived other nations and endured for a reason.

Alice

In the book by Lewis Carroll of "Alice in Wonder Land", Alice uses the refrain, “... curiouser and curiouser!”.
  

There are seemingly a constant stream of revelations suggesting the conditions of the two largest minority races in America are getting worst. The disparity in prosperity between them and the White majority is widening. But as in any story, the challenge is to find the relevant truth. 

Perhaps the relevant truth is the absence of statistics and analysis on the prospects of the population under forty years of age, irrespective of race. This is very curious. Could it be that this type of analysis is to be obscured by design? Might the analysis reveal a dismal situation that cannot be rectified. Might it be the harbinger of a nation that has departed forever from realization of dreams of general prosperity? Could the analysis be the horror of a nightmare these generations will never awake? Could this be the real "American Exceptionalism"?

The Baby Boomer generation is keeping the national illusion of prosperity and opportunity alive. In fact the economy should get a significant boast in the next several years as Baby Boomers spend to transition into retirement. But it will be short lived. It will have no lasting positive affect on the under 4o generations. Not even the speculated transfer of wealth through inheritance will make an impact. The sharks are already circling to separate them from that money.

It is reported there is more social mobility in Europe now than America. America has become a self perpetuating closed aristocracy to younger people seeking advancement. Education is no longer a route to ensure advancement. Things such as healthcare and pensions, that were employer provided without significant costs, have been shifted to young people to fund. The costs in many cases make it unaffordable. Also increasingly business and industry is getting its more skilled people from the international labor market. The achievement level of people in that market dwarfs that of most domestic applicants. Business and industry has constantly pushed wages down in the domestic market. The worst the job situation for the under 40 generations, the cheaper business and industry can obtain select domestic workers.

What do things portent for the under 40 generation? They will be serfs to the whims of business and industry and their control of government. The better opportunities will be outsourced on given to select foreign candidates. The rules and regulations will overwhelmingly favor business and industry. These generations will live at a subsistence level while the self perpetuating aristocracy reaps the benefits [investor class]. 

Do you really want the younger generation to understand? It might lead to social activism. The ignorance creates the highly desirable plasticity of the under 40 generations to the vicissitudes occurring around them. Shouting alarms is met with denial by the under 40 generations. It is like the famous line by Jack Nicholson in the movie, A Few Good Men, "...you can't handle the truth".