Investors are affected, since over time the talent leaves a company and the company loses innovation and just maintains their current product.
Even if that's the trend, the "talent" will have to go to companies that don't issue stock options (because if they did, they'd have to expense them, thus drive off talent). Since stock options are apparently functioning as talent incentive according to your tone, the talent will be obtaining other incentives from the companies they end up in. Those incentives will tend to be expensed.
Fella, it seems to me that some sort of equality is hiding in your argument. I'm unconvinced therefore from said argument that expensing stock options is a bad thing.
The last time I checked our economy was still the envy of most of the world. At least that's what I hear from the millions of Mexicans trying to sneak in.
Nice right-wing troll; too bad it takes about 3.4 seconds to puncture it.
Sure, the "economy" is a subject of envy. That's why people in a profoundly Third World nation like Mexico sneak over the border, do various menial labor for what are good wages in comparison TO A THIRD WORLD NATION'S WAGES, and send much of that money home to Mexico. Eventually, they do leave, going back to their country, having taken what they need from the only thing America really offers anyone (wages), and live their lives in a real society.
Other than the myopia of "the American economy", the American model is nothing to emulate. It requires vast amounts of bullying... escalating quickly to outright murderous use of military weaponry. Note well that that exercise involves the very WMDs which your beloved nation took such an issue with in Iraq.
Do you want to discuss the rest of what the "American economy" means now? How about enormous budget deficits? Trade deficits? How about the Dollar-denomination of oil that is starting to change in favor of Euro-denomination? Got anything to say about all that... anything that doesn't involve brainless right-wing American cheerleading? No? I didn't think so.
The question is, since we live in a land of capitalism and the cell phone market has tremendous competition, why hasn't the price of SMS messaging dropped? For that matter, why hasn't the price of mini-bar food dropped?
Because the Coefficient of Consumer Stupidity (CoCS) is rising... geometrically, if anything.
Fiscal Luddite! Profit is so Old Economy. Your tired and dated irrationalities are very restricting for the new pursuit-of-wealth methodology (namely: make business plan, take it public, cash out, retire). Now go out and sink more of your retirement funds into www.GreenWhalesForSale.com and www.NicheServiceOffering.com... and W*I*N B*I*G!
Re:How Israeli Companies Are Succeeding...
on
Business Under Fire
·
· Score: 1
Daftily enough, *I* do claim as much. After all, Iraq was invaded by the US for no justifiable reason whatsoever, and once the US military rolled into Baghdad they high-tailed it to the Oil Ministry. If I were an Iraqi with a suitcase nuke or two, how would I dislodge such an invader? Answer: Induce such a domestic trauma that the invader would be forced to withdraw. Hence: Nuking some site in the invader's nation (after all, I wouldn't want to nuke my own nation, now, would I?). Obliterating millions in a highly representative area like NYC would be about the biggest trauma that one could achieve. The American economy would collapse immediately, since too much American economic activity devolves upon the "moneylenders" who predominantly work out of NYC.
(The 911 strike probably damaged America to the tune of $30 billion. That's a great return on the perhaps $15 million you could have spent making the operation possible. Nuking NYC would probably result in at least x100 the damage. The American economy cannot withstand a $3000 billion hit; look how severely it was affected with a measly $30 billion hit.)
The Neo-Cons have dared to raise the spectre of "clash of civilizations". That makes it perfectly understandable that an Iraqi may feel the need to hide in a cargo container with his "package" for the trip to NY harbor, and then make for a position where he can detonate his device.
If this scenario disturbs you, then I can only suggest that you don't invade and occupy other nations. The US invasion and continued occupation of Iraq have no moral foundation whatsoever. Everyone knows this. The funny thing about this all was well expressed by Bill Maher, when he noted that when you condemn suicidal pilots as cowards, and praise people who drop bombs from the safety of 35K feet up, you have lost all sense.
You know I'm right. The question on my mind is: Why do you continue to justify the unjustifiable?
Re:Basic darwinism, but inefficiency has its charm
on
Business Under Fire
·
· Score: 1
Efficient business is a metastable position. Even assuming an organization is lean-n-mean from top to bottom, once the execs start slacking off, the lower echelons start catching wind of it and the normal backlash starts.
Efficiency is an easy sell to the autocrat, but such organizations are filled with misery at any rate, and there must always be some overhead costs incurred by oversight methods (cameras, security people, HR "disciplinarians", etc.). Overhead=inefficiency.
Efficiency is not only overrated, but it is treated in such a buzzword-y fashion that I can only surmise that it is a lingering business derangement.
The tech workers themselves are hurt, but the consumers of the products produced by tech companies benefit, mainly from lower prices.
Those gadgets had better be cheap, since you'll have to start burning them for heat. Your sentiment had no credibility if a collapsed economy results... and it is very much resulting in America. It's been wisely said that if the prices of luxuries fall, and prices of necessities rise, then your economy is in trouble. That also fits America's current plight.
Dropping the prices on -- and raising availability of -- goods and services are "positive" things. But you must be very careful that you don't destroy the middle class as a result of some deranged level of worship of these ends. Similarly, a desire for prosperity is positive; greed, however, is quite negative, and the level of Hypergreed in America today is outrageously negative and destructive indeed.
Negative. This is not the same as guided education.
A fine sentiment. However, you confuse the average college experience with "guided education". Do you really claim to ignore the faults of teaching things the current American college way?
I was immensely disappointed in the so-called Engineering Physics program at UMass/Boston. It had such potential, and it wasted it all on what could only be called "continuing ed". From that experience and other anecdotes, I can only have become the college protester (i.e. I actively opposed the collegiate system of education) I am today since I am honest about all the promises that colleges make yet don't deliver on.
The average college experience really is just a mind-control program for getting you to sit, regurgitate, and shut the fuck up otherwise. Independent thought is highly disruptive to established orders... hence, you will not find training in such thinking methods being honestly offered in American universities.
I'm not the only one who has noticed this "little problem" with the gargantuan disappointment that American colleges provide.
I'm also not alone in noticing how functional that practical and self-directed education can be. This means that a library and Internet in the hands of a motivated man are every bit as good as a college degree.
The problem with this attitude on Slashdot is the presence of all the people with degrees who have to somehow (and falsely) justify having spent all that money and time acquiring them. Methinks thou doth protest too much, alla youse.
The flaw in your little drama play is that once the suit concludes they are an IP company, all the build-it yokels will be fired. The suit will likely instead have a little drama play about yelling at the janitor for not keeping the bathroom clean... after all, an IP company only has an office.
Mod this man up! I rail frequently enough against irresponsible concentrations of wealth, but lets' face the fact that you must concentrate wealth to get things done. A few market leaders (using the 80/4 rule where about 80 of the market is monopolized by 4 large firms) is ecnomically healthy. Where this breaks down is the point where the public is unwilling to regulate general business behavior, and monopolies in particular.
The parent post's comment about 20 nearly-bankrupt firms is quite insightful. Anecdotally, I see this happen with used bookstores all the fucking time. It seems that some lazy n00b in an area wants to make money without working for it, so he opens another used bookstore... making the 3-10 other used bookstores in the area groan under the increased weight of their rents, utilities and the like, what with further lost customers.
Check the heat shield? And then what? "Houston, we have damage." {crackle} "Commander, nice knowing ya. Please refer to your cyanide capsules. It beats suffocating to death. We'll name some high schools after you. Over and out."
Sure. Look at how we treat many other classes of vehicles. For cars, we have person-movers (cycles), passenger carriers (cars, buses) and cargo carriers (trucks). The same differentiation applies to things like boats and planes. (Trains are a special case, since track-width pretty much dictates a "large box on wheels" style of design, and then you can just choose a box full of seats for passengers, or a box full of tie-down points for cargo.)
NASA's tried to make something of the Shuttle. Unfortunately, during the process of constant compromises to get many missions behind the single transport project, the end product is not good at any job. It is a poor transporter of people, a poor platform for satellite launch/recovery, a poor cargo lifter, and finally a poor platform for deep-space missions.
The Shuttle was a nice try. We can give NASA due credit. But a bad idea is still a BAD IDEA. The Shuttle program should be broken into at least 3 major pieces.
Command and Control. These operations can probably fall back into NASA's general idea of controlling space operations.
Mission Vessels. We could get the X15 plans out of mothballs and give Burt Rutan and his little prissy ship a run for his money. The X15-ish ships would be used for small satellites, small person transport, and of course repair missions. They should be cheap to launch as far as a rocket is measured; perhaps strapping 1 or 2 of these babies to an Atlas.
Heavy Lifting. We already have a heavy-lift system called the Shuttle main tank, engines and SRBs. But we mostly lift that goddamned Shuttle with them. Ditch the shuttle mainbody and install a internally-reconfigurable body that can contain 100 tons of cargo, people, several satellites, or a deep space mission. If people are supposed to come back (for instance, a personnel-swap mission for the ISS), then install instead a re-entry body. It will be far cheaper and safer to have a re-entry body that does a splashdown off Florida than to even use one of the old orbiters.
I guess they don't teach MBAs how to calculate profits and do basic business marketing analysis first.
Oh, they do, it's just that calculating their stock options is such a priority that all other considerations become buried under the Great Whiteout. MBA education is a fine study in authorized hypergreed.
To be fair, I don't suppose that it's really the fault of MBA education. We simply have a culture of business scam that is so pervasive that everything an executive is taught can be twisted around into serving the ends of hypergreed. Every play the college game of "endless sexual innuendo"? No matter what someone says, play it into some sexual intent. It's rather easy to do. And that just demonstrates that no matter what the modern American corporate exec hears, he always seems to hear "this decreases the stock price" OR "this increases the stock price".
Yeah, I've gotta add my 2c to this. What do you call an $8000 television? Answer: WORTHLESS. You can't (note: you SHOULD NOT) be able to afford such a thing. Other than the wealthy, what absolutely dumb motherfucker would buy a TV for the price of FOUR GOOD USED CARS?
I went into one of these shyster shops the other day, and there was this 50+ inch flatpanel TV for sale. Price? TEN THOUSAND DOLLARS. I was laughing openly and heartily about it, right in front of the sales-pukes. What working-class moron pays 10 grand for a TV, and how many sales do you expect such that it actually justifies having this monstrous thing dominating the sales floor?
I've seen families struggling to pay their heating bills, but they have a huge flatpanel TV in their living rooms, paying $100/mo on the fucking thing. At least with a tube TV, you can get some heat out of the thing.
Would YOU want to start a computer-subscription company? Let's speculate freely.
Here, start one up. Charge $50/mo. For that fee, you have to provide DSL-connection speeds, the latest processor (since the user will at least want to run the latest game, which requires the fastest machine), and so on.
Sure, you get $600/yr off each user. Your networking charges will eat at least 1/3rd of that. Your equipment support costs (maintenance, upgrades) will eat another 1/3rd. That leaves you $200/yr from each customer for overhead costs, licensing (all those apps and games aren't free) and your profit.
And, oh yeah, you will have several competitors within 12 months offering the same service at $39.99/mo. Time to start cutting prices. Time to start offering deep discounts and rebates. Time to start cutting your own throat.
I figure that the next thing you'll know, your little company will be in bankruptcy court with at least half of your competitors, while the biggest are simply bought out or undergo mergers. The service will be scaled back, and the customers will peter off until they are finally shipped AOL CDs and wished a merry "good luck" with their new provider.
The point here is that the margins on such things are too small, since the computer industry produces tiny margins at the retail outlets to begin with. Inventory is a nightmare in computer retail, since it drops in price so quickly. So, why would you start a business that is "on the hook" for always buying equipment when it's at its most expensive point?
The modern user can go to a local computer shop in even a modest town, find a computer for $600, buy a couple of games for $100, hook it up to the Internet for a marginal cost (since they generally will have cable TV already). It's tough to compete with that easy purchase with just "service". Your service would have to be comprehensive... but that means licensing costs, which YOU (the provider) pay for.
The problem with "50 channels and nothing on" is the same problem we've have for much of CATV's life. The problem revolves around community access (more precisely, the utter lack of it).
The barrier for entry on the Internet is very low. Hence, we have an astounding number of "channels", and very much is going on indeed.
The barrier for entry for video really isn't that much higher. People can do video production from a PC with a webcam. And you will note that there is plenty of this going on. But it's not happening with delivered video streams.
This is so since the delivery of video on the CATV model is elitist and hence quite restricted. It's not open to the public, by the industry's choice. And that's why we have such a pathetic set of choices in CATV and its online counterparts.
On the basis of consumer choice alone, CATV may be given a run for its money within the next 20 years. It may be forced to merge with Internet access entirely in order to compete. In fact, merging may give the CATV industry all the restrictions it presently practices, leaving us kinda-sorta back in the same boat of having essentially no community television.
Not to nitpick, but when I see someone grab a flashlight, over 90% of the time it's a plastic version of the 2xD-cell, incandescent-bulb flashlight that our fathers used. Any fool can make a better flashlight... at a greater purchase price. If you want to impress me about how high-tech has supplied a benefit to something like a flashlight, please point out how it has been brought to the masses in an affordable fashion.
Well, there is a good deal of competition, so listing items is pretty pointless. It's a feature of a mature market. And in market maturity, those ads aren't talking to YOU; instead, they're talking to corporate execs in order to control the conversation that happens on golf courses, in bars, and occasionally in the board rooms. In effect, it panders to the lowest common denominator of the class that is highly insulated from the daily reality of work. And the mark of that denominator is branding. After all, no one ever got fired for buying IBM, right?
There isn't a price tag on "solution" since in the mind of the marketing twit, you'd pay anything for a "solution". Price is no object for things which solve your problems. And thence lay the heart of the high-tech scam: it will solve our problems. Instead, it has created many, many more problems.
After all, what would you pay for a "problem"? That's exactly what IBM, Microsoft, Sun and all the rest are really selling you: PROBLEMS. High-tech infrastructure is plagued with problems. But no marketing drone is going to even go near the honesty in that.
I've been busily replacing perfectly good Pentium IIs with expensive P4s. The price alone should have told the company execs that this is a PROBLEM. But they are sold on "solutions"... for instance, on the myth that employees are a "problem", so replace them with machines. But machines introduce all kinds of other problems... which marketing n00bz never seem to include in their presentations and shiny brochures.
Don't get me wrong here. I approve of selling problems as "solutions". Those are giant IQ tests, and America's corporate execs are failing them left and right. What bothers me unduly is how long it's taking the American investor to realize this. After all, stupid people are simply a baaaaaad investment.
Slashdot Mirror
Haven't you heard of the "jobless recovery"? How about a "job-LOSS recovery"? I just love using industry standard propaganda language, don't you?
Investors are affected, since over time the talent leaves a company and the company loses innovation and just maintains their current product.
Even if that's the trend, the "talent" will have to go to companies that don't issue stock options (because if they did, they'd have to expense them, thus drive off talent). Since stock options are apparently functioning as talent incentive according to your tone, the talent will be obtaining other incentives from the companies they end up in. Those incentives will tend to be expensed.
Fella, it seems to me that some sort of equality is hiding in your argument. I'm unconvinced therefore from said argument that expensing stock options is a bad thing.
The last time I checked our economy was still the envy of most of the world. At least that's what I hear from the millions of Mexicans trying to sneak in.
... escalating quickly to outright murderous use of military weaponry. Note well that that exercise involves the very WMDs which your beloved nation took such an issue with in Iraq.
... anything that doesn't involve brainless right-wing American cheerleading? No? I didn't think so.
Nice right-wing troll; too bad it takes about 3.4 seconds to puncture it.
Sure, the "economy" is a subject of envy. That's why people in a profoundly Third World nation like Mexico sneak over the border, do various menial labor for what are good wages in comparison TO A THIRD WORLD NATION'S WAGES, and send much of that money home to Mexico. Eventually, they do leave, going back to their country, having taken what they need from the only thing America really offers anyone (wages), and live their lives in a real society.
Other than the myopia of "the American economy", the American model is nothing to emulate. It requires vast amounts of bullying
Do you want to discuss the rest of what the "American economy" means now? How about enormous budget deficits? Trade deficits? How about the Dollar-denomination of oil that is starting to change in favor of Euro-denomination? Got anything to say about all that
The question is, since we live in a land of capitalism and the cell phone market has tremendous competition, why hasn't the price of SMS messaging dropped? For that matter, why hasn't the price of mini-bar food dropped?
... geometrically, if anything.
Because the Coefficient of Consumer Stupidity (CoCS) is rising
Fiscal Luddite! Profit is so Old Economy. Your tired and dated irrationalities are very restricting for the new pursuit-of-wealth methodology (namely: make business plan, take it public, cash out, retire). Now go out and sink more of your retirement funds into www.GreenWhalesForSale.com and www.NicheServiceOffering.com ... and W*I*N B*I*G!
Daftily enough, *I* do claim as much. After all, Iraq was invaded by the US for no justifiable reason whatsoever, and once the US military rolled into Baghdad they high-tailed it to the Oil Ministry. If I were an Iraqi with a suitcase nuke or two, how would I dislodge such an invader? Answer: Induce such a domestic trauma that the invader would be forced to withdraw. Hence: Nuking some site in the invader's nation (after all, I wouldn't want to nuke my own nation, now, would I?). Obliterating millions in a highly representative area like NYC would be about the biggest trauma that one could achieve. The American economy would collapse immediately, since too much American economic activity devolves upon the "moneylenders" who predominantly work out of NYC.
(The 911 strike probably damaged America to the tune of $30 billion. That's a great return on the perhaps $15 million you could have spent making the operation possible. Nuking NYC would probably result in at least x100 the damage. The American economy cannot withstand a $3000 billion hit; look how severely it was affected with a measly $30 billion hit.)
The Neo-Cons have dared to raise the spectre of "clash of civilizations". That makes it perfectly understandable that an Iraqi may feel the need to hide in a cargo container with his "package" for the trip to NY harbor, and then make for a position where he can detonate his device.
If this scenario disturbs you, then I can only suggest that you don't invade and occupy other nations. The US invasion and continued occupation of Iraq have no moral foundation whatsoever. Everyone knows this. The funny thing about this all was well expressed by Bill Maher, when he noted that when you condemn suicidal pilots as cowards, and praise people who drop bombs from the safety of 35K feet up, you have lost all sense.
You know I'm right. The question on my mind is: Why do you continue to justify the unjustifiable?
Efficient business is a metastable position. Even assuming an organization is lean-n-mean from top to bottom, once the execs start slacking off, the lower echelons start catching wind of it and the normal backlash starts.
Efficiency is an easy sell to the autocrat, but such organizations are filled with misery at any rate, and there must always be some overhead costs incurred by oversight methods (cameras, security people, HR "disciplinarians", etc.). Overhead=inefficiency.
Efficiency is not only overrated, but it is treated in such a buzzword-y fashion that I can only surmise that it is a lingering business derangement.
The tech workers themselves are hurt, but the consumers of the products produced by tech companies benefit, mainly from lower prices.
... and it is very much resulting in America. It's been wisely said that if the prices of luxuries fall, and prices of necessities rise, then your economy is in trouble. That also fits America's current plight.
Those gadgets had better be cheap, since you'll have to start burning them for heat. Your sentiment had no credibility if a collapsed economy results
Dropping the prices on -- and raising availability of -- goods and services are "positive" things. But you must be very careful that you don't destroy the middle class as a result of some deranged level of worship of these ends. Similarly, a desire for prosperity is positive; greed, however, is quite negative, and the level of Hypergreed in America today is outrageously negative and destructive indeed.
{laughs nearly uncontrollably} Bless you, Sir. {wipes tears} Bless you indeed for your efforts, albeit they are pearls thrown before swine.
"Txtspk" is the Ebonics of the '00s. "Text me up!" Sheesh.
Negative. This is not the same as guided education.
... hence, you will not find training in such thinking methods being honestly offered in American universities.
A fine sentiment. However, you confuse the average college experience with "guided education". Do you really claim to ignore the faults of teaching things the current American college way?
I was immensely disappointed in the so-called Engineering Physics program at UMass/Boston. It had such potential, and it wasted it all on what could only be called "continuing ed". From that experience and other anecdotes, I can only have become the college protester (i.e. I actively opposed the collegiate system of education) I am today since I am honest about all the promises that colleges make yet don't deliver on.
The average college experience really is just a mind-control program for getting you to sit, regurgitate, and shut the fuck up otherwise. Independent thought is highly disruptive to established orders
I'm not the only one who has noticed this "little problem" with the gargantuan disappointment that American colleges provide.
I'm also not alone in noticing how functional that practical and self-directed education can be. This means that a library and Internet in the hands of a motivated man are every bit as good as a college degree.
The problem with this attitude on Slashdot is the presence of all the people with degrees who have to somehow (and falsely) justify having spent all that money and time acquiring them. Methinks thou doth protest too much, alla youse.
The flaw in your little drama play is that once the suit concludes they are an IP company, all the build-it yokels will be fired. The suit will likely instead have a little drama play about yelling at the janitor for not keeping the bathroom clean ... after all, an IP company only has an office.
Mod this man up! I rail frequently enough against irresponsible concentrations of wealth, but lets' face the fact that you must concentrate wealth to get things done. A few market leaders (using the 80/4 rule where about 80 of the market is monopolized by 4 large firms) is ecnomically healthy. Where this breaks down is the point where the public is unwilling to regulate general business behavior, and monopolies in particular.
... making the 3-10 other used bookstores in the area groan under the increased weight of their rents, utilities and the like, what with further lost customers.
The parent post's comment about 20 nearly-bankrupt firms is quite insightful. Anecdotally, I see this happen with used bookstores all the fucking time. It seems that some lazy n00b in an area wants to make money without working for it, so he opens another used bookstore
Stop it, you.
Check the heat shield? And then what? "Houston, we have damage." {crackle} "Commander, nice knowing ya. Please refer to your cyanide capsules. It beats suffocating to death. We'll name some high schools after you. Over and out."
NASA's tried to make something of the Shuttle. Unfortunately, during the process of constant compromises to get many missions behind the single transport project, the end product is not good at any job. It is a poor transporter of people, a poor platform for satellite launch/recovery, a poor cargo lifter, and finally a poor platform for deep-space missions.
The Shuttle was a nice try. We can give NASA due credit. But a bad idea is still a BAD IDEA. The Shuttle program should be broken into at least 3 major pieces.
It is an insightful observation that people ditch technical information and replace it with uneducated bullshit.
I guess they don't teach MBAs how to calculate profits and do basic business marketing analysis first.
Oh, they do, it's just that calculating their stock options is such a priority that all other considerations become buried under the Great Whiteout. MBA education is a fine study in authorized hypergreed.
To be fair, I don't suppose that it's really the fault of MBA education. We simply have a culture of business scam that is so pervasive that everything an executive is taught can be twisted around into serving the ends of hypergreed. Every play the college game of "endless sexual innuendo"? No matter what someone says, play it into some sexual intent. It's rather easy to do. And that just demonstrates that no matter what the modern American corporate exec hears, he always seems to hear "this decreases the stock price" OR "this increases the stock price".
Yeah, I've gotta add my 2c to this. What do you call an $8000 television? Answer: WORTHLESS. You can't (note: you SHOULD NOT) be able to afford such a thing. Other than the wealthy, what absolutely dumb motherfucker would buy a TV for the price of FOUR GOOD USED CARS?
I went into one of these shyster shops the other day, and there was this 50+ inch flatpanel TV for sale. Price? TEN THOUSAND DOLLARS. I was laughing openly and heartily about it, right in front of the sales-pukes. What working-class moron pays 10 grand for a TV, and how many sales do you expect such that it actually justifies having this monstrous thing dominating the sales floor?
I've seen families struggling to pay their heating bills, but they have a huge flatpanel TV in their living rooms, paying $100/mo on the fucking thing. At least with a tube TV, you can get some heat out of the thing.
Would YOU want to start a computer-subscription company? Let's speculate freely.
... but that means licensing costs, which YOU (the provider) pay for.
Here, start one up. Charge $50/mo. For that fee, you have to provide DSL-connection speeds, the latest processor (since the user will at least want to run the latest game, which requires the fastest machine), and so on.
Sure, you get $600/yr off each user. Your networking charges will eat at least 1/3rd of that. Your equipment support costs (maintenance, upgrades) will eat another 1/3rd. That leaves you $200/yr from each customer for overhead costs, licensing (all those apps and games aren't free) and your profit.
And, oh yeah, you will have several competitors within 12 months offering the same service at $39.99/mo. Time to start cutting prices. Time to start offering deep discounts and rebates. Time to start cutting your own throat.
I figure that the next thing you'll know, your little company will be in bankruptcy court with at least half of your competitors, while the biggest are simply bought out or undergo mergers. The service will be scaled back, and the customers will peter off until they are finally shipped AOL CDs and wished a merry "good luck" with their new provider.
The point here is that the margins on such things are too small, since the computer industry produces tiny margins at the retail outlets to begin with. Inventory is a nightmare in computer retail, since it drops in price so quickly. So, why would you start a business that is "on the hook" for always buying equipment when it's at its most expensive point?
The modern user can go to a local computer shop in even a modest town, find a computer for $600, buy a couple of games for $100, hook it up to the Internet for a marginal cost (since they generally will have cable TV already). It's tough to compete with that easy purchase with just "service". Your service would have to be comprehensive
The problem with "50 channels and nothing on" is the same problem we've have for much of CATV's life. The problem revolves around community access (more precisely, the utter lack of it).
The barrier for entry on the Internet is very low. Hence, we have an astounding number of "channels", and very much is going on indeed.
The barrier for entry for video really isn't that much higher. People can do video production from a PC with a webcam. And you will note that there is plenty of this going on. But it's not happening with delivered video streams.
This is so since the delivery of video on the CATV model is elitist and hence quite restricted. It's not open to the public, by the industry's choice. And that's why we have such a pathetic set of choices in CATV and its online counterparts.
On the basis of consumer choice alone, CATV may be given a run for its money within the next 20 years. It may be forced to merge with Internet access entirely in order to compete. In fact, merging may give the CATV industry all the restrictions it presently practices, leaving us kinda-sorta back in the same boat of having essentially no community television.
Not to nitpick, but when I see someone grab a flashlight, over 90% of the time it's a plastic version of the 2xD-cell, incandescent-bulb flashlight that our fathers used. Any fool can make a better flashlight ... at a greater purchase price. If you want to impress me about how high-tech has supplied a benefit to something like a flashlight, please point out how it has been brought to the masses in an affordable fashion.
The problem is that consumers believe marketers' lies, which are cheaper to produce than a working product.
Bless you, Sir. Your statement is sig material. I've been prattling around this topic for two postings, but you summed it up here quite well.
Well, there is a good deal of competition, so listing items is pretty pointless. It's a feature of a mature market. And in market maturity, those ads aren't talking to YOU; instead, they're talking to corporate execs in order to control the conversation that happens on golf courses, in bars, and occasionally in the board rooms. In effect, it panders to the lowest common denominator of the class that is highly insulated from the daily reality of work. And the mark of that denominator is branding. After all, no one ever got fired for buying IBM, right?
There isn't a price tag on "solution" since in the mind of the marketing twit, you'd pay anything for a "solution". Price is no object for things which solve your problems. And thence lay the heart of the high-tech scam: it will solve our problems. Instead, it has created many, many more problems.
... for instance, on the myth that employees are a "problem", so replace them with machines. But machines introduce all kinds of other problems ... which marketing n00bz never seem to include in their presentations and shiny brochures.
After all, what would you pay for a "problem"? That's exactly what IBM, Microsoft, Sun and all the rest are really selling you: PROBLEMS. High-tech infrastructure is plagued with problems. But no marketing drone is going to even go near the honesty in that.
I've been busily replacing perfectly good Pentium IIs with expensive P4s. The price alone should have told the company execs that this is a PROBLEM. But they are sold on "solutions"
Don't get me wrong here. I approve of selling problems as "solutions". Those are giant IQ tests, and America's corporate execs are failing them left and right. What bothers me unduly is how long it's taking the American investor to realize this. After all, stupid people are simply a baaaaaad investment.