emconsteroids

Swiss Miss – the famous swiss designer based in New York City has blogged about my sister’s RRR Ribbons project!

Those ribbons are great, I am wearing one myself. Helps keeping awareness and stands for responsibility and sustainability.

See how to make one on youtube:

OECD composite leading indicators (CLIs) for June 2009 point to stronger signs of improvement in the economic outlook of OECD economies compared with last month’s release. This is typified by stronger recovery signals in Italy and France and clearer signals of troughs in Canada, Germany, the United Kingdom and the United States. In Japan tentative signs of improvement have also emerged. Troughs can also be observed in China and India, with tentative trough signals now appearing in Brazil and Russia.. etc.

Source: oecd.org

Good news! Details here as PDF.

In the last couple of days, rumors have appeared claiming Apple wanted to buy Twitter. At the first glance, this doesn’t make much sense.

It just occurred to me, that there is actually a perfect reason for Apple to buy Twitter. In fact, it could turn Twitter into a massive money making machinery. Let me explain:

Three key elements lead to this perfect deal:

You probably already guessed what I’m going to write next: Twitter will replace SMS on the iPhone! Or in other words: If you have an iPhone, you can send free push notification messages (i.e. Tweets) to other iPhone users AND across the Twitter community. For free! Because of the large user base, there is no chasm to cross or no Metcalfe’s law to deal with.

Who wins? Apple! They have established a new USP for the iPhone with 25m users who can see immediate benefit: free peer-to-peer push messaging!

This is all just a hypothesis. One thing’s for sure though: The operators wouldn’t like that idea.

We have started a new blog about all the silly things you can find in the mobile industry and all its facets. Since the mobile industry is such a young industry, there are a lot of silly decisions being made. But because it’s so fast paced and the big players are holding their power and trying to stick to hold to their power, a lot of irrational things happen as well.

This blog is the attempt to capture the one or the other finding and preserve it in time. Hopefully, we will be able to read these posts with a sufficient smile on our faces thinking: “Gee, this was stupid.”

A few examples of silly or simply stupid things which happened in the mobile industry could be:

1.) The .mobi top level domain: I already blogged about this. The details about my opinion can be read from my blog or the .mobi’s post. Funnily some senior members of the .mobi top level domain people have engaged with me in a lively conversation. The success of the .mobi domain, if you want so, could have proven them right, although I am still convinced the idea is fundamentally faulty. “A lot of flies fly on shit – shit must be a good thing.” goes the saying. In my personal opinion, it reflects what happened to the .mobi domain.

2.) The Vodafone rendering engine: Often quoted as one of the most disastrous projects in the mobile history. The idea was simple, particularly for the marketers: “If you are on Vodafone, you have the Internet on your phone.”. The way it worked was, whenever you request a website via mobile phone gateway, this gateway will take the source code of the website, apply some clever logic to it and turn it into a mobile page. The images will also be resized accordingly. Sometimes, the site would even change the whole navigation. It simply does not make sense to create an engine which tries to transform the normal internet sites out there into mobile sites. It’s simply not possible. Deal with it. You’ll simply end up with unmatched expectations. For example as soon as there is some interactivity such as a login, the system breaks. To make things worse, it tried to do the same thing to already mobile-optimized sites. When doing so, the Vodafone gateway would override the original user agent (which was necessary to detect the device) the whole mobile site functionality was compromised.

The blog may also touch on topics such as the mobile strategy of device manufacturers, operators or web site and mobile service providers in general and how they would go about changing the space or being changed within the space.

Happy reading!

In many ways, the work of a critic is easy. We risk very little, yet enjoy a position over those who offer up their work and their selves to our judgment. We thrive on negative criticism, which is fun to write and to read. But the bitter truth we critics must face, is that in the grand scheme of things, the average piece of junk is probably more meaningful than our criticism designating it so. But there are times when a critic truly risks something, and that is in the discovery and defense of the new. The world is often unkind to new talents, new creations. The new needs friends.

From: Ratatouille, Anton Ego’s critics speech

Here are some stats about gay males and lesbian females in the United Kingdom. Did you know that there are more female lesbians than gay men? In fact there are more than twice as many of the former! See for yourself:

I’ve bought myself a nice suit at Marks & Spencer around mid November 2008. It was quite a nice buy, however I soon after found a tiny hole in the fabric of one of the sleeves. The hole looked like a fabrication error. Luckily I hadn’t worn the suit yet, that’s why I decided to return it to Marks & Spencer.

I was quite surprised today, when I found out, that by returning the suit, Marks & Spencer would give me cash return as well. The reason for this seemingly strange cash return was however a temporary reduction of the UK VAT tax announced by Chancellor Alistair Darling on November 24th 2008.

The suit was exchanged with no questions asked. On top of it, I got another £2.80 in VAT tax back. That’s quite illogical, because technically I bought the suit in November, when the tax was 17.5%. I reckon however the Marks & Spencer book-keeping infrastructure would technically handle the exchange as a full return and a re-sell. Since the new suit is sold in December, I got it 2.5% cheaper. Therefore the money back.

There is a 90 days return policy on all the goods so if you’ve bought something within the last 90 days and before the 1st of December, it might be worth getting it exchanged. For a 2.5% return in cash could give you one of those nice M&S Cookies.

THIS APPEARED ON CRAIG’S LIST

What am I doing wrong?

Okay, I’m tired of beating around the bush. I’m a beautiful (spectacularly beautiful) 25 year old girl. I’m articulate and classy.
I’m not from New York . I’m looking to get married to a guy who makes at least half a million a year. I know how that sounds, but keep in mind that a million a year is middle class in New York City, so I don’t think I’m overreaching at all.

Are there any guys who make 500K or more on this board? Any wives? Could you send me some tips? I dated a business man who makes average around 200 – 250. But that’s where I seem to hit a roadblock. 250,000 won’t get me to central park west. I know a woman in my yoga class who was married to an investment banker and lives in Tribeca, and she’s not as pretty as I am, nor is she a great genius. So what is she doing right? How do I get to her level?

Here are my questions specifically:

- Where do you single rich men hang out? Give me specifics- bars, restaurants, gyms

-What are you looking for in a mate? Be honest guys, you won’t hurt my feelings

-Is there an age range I should be targeting (I’m 25)?

- Why are some of the women living lavish lifestyles on the upper east side so plain? I’ve seen really ‘plain jane’ boring types who have nothing to offer married to incredibly wealthy guys. I’ve seen drop dead gorgeous girls in singles bars in the east village. What’s the story there?

- Jobs I should look out for? Everyone knows – lawyer, investment banker, doctor. How much do those guys really make? And where do they hang out? Where do the hedge fund guys hang out?

- How you decide marriage vs. just a girlfriend? I am looking for MARRIAGE ONLY

Please hold your insults – I’m putting myself out there in an honest way. Most beautiful women are superficial; at least I’m being up front about it. I wouldn’t be searching for these kind of guys if I wasn’t able to match them – in looks, culture, sophistication, and keeping a nice home and hearth.

it’s NOT ok to contact this poster with services or other commercial interests
PostingID: 432279810

THE ANSWER

Dear Pers-431649184:

I read your posting with great interest and have thought meaningfully about your dilemma. I offer the following analysis of your predicament.
Firstly, I’m not wasting your time, I qualify as a guy who fits your bill; that is I make more than $500K per year. That said here’s how I see it.

Your offer, from the prospective of a guy like me, is plain and simple a crappy business deal. Here’s why. Cutting through all the B.S., what you suggest is a simple trade: you bring your looks to the party and I bring my money. Fine, simple. But here’s the rub, your looks will fade and my money will likely continue into perpetuity…in fact, it is very likely that my income increases but it is an absolute certainty that you won’t be getting any more beautiful!

So, in economic terms you are a depreciating asset and I am an earning asset. Not only are you a depreciating asset, your depreciation accelerates! Let me explain, you’re 25 now and will likely stay pretty hot for the next 5 years, but less so each year. Then the fade begins in earnest. By 35 stick a fork in you!

So in Wall Street terms, we would call you a trading position, not a buy and hold…hence the rub…marriage. It doesn’t make good business sense to “buy you” (which is what you’re asking) so I’d rather lease. In case you think I’m being cruel, I would say the following. If my money were to go away, so would you, so when your beauty fades I need an out. It’s as simple as that. So a deal that makes sense is dating, not marriage.

Separately, I was taught early in my career about efficient markets. So, I wonder why a girl as “articulate, classy and spectacularly beautiful”
as you has been unable to find your sugar daddy. I find it hard to believe that if you are as gorgeous as you say you are that the $500K hasn’t found you, if not only for a tryout.

By the way, you could always find a way to make your own money and then we wouldn’t need to have this difficult conversation.

With all that said, I must say you’re going about it the right way.
Classic “pump and dump.”
I hope this is helpful, and if you want to enter into some sort of lease, let me know.

What media does to us. And everyone around us.

Today, I was helping my sister to sell her Recycled Magic Wallets at Brick Lane Market (Back Yard Market).

On one of the stalls, an Italian fellow was selling cheap chinese imported sun glasses for £5 a pair. He was the “odd man out” in the market as everyone else was selling hand made stuff. Yet it seems that his stall seemed to be one of the most popular ones. It was the perfect prove that the price was what makes people buy stuff. Everyone liked the idea of my sister’s Recycled Magic Wallets, yet hardly anyone appreciated the work which was needed to produce them. Let alone pay for it. It’s sad but a hard fact. Cheap stuff from China still sells better quantities than good hand made local craftsmanship. And better quantities gives more profit. And more profit gives more incentive.

You can see more pictures of Recycled Magic Wallets on Flickr.

NOTE: My sister still sold a couple of wallets. Not everyone was just looking at the price. There are people who appreciate ideas, innovation and hard work.