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Archive for December 31st, 2009

No decade has destroyed my business model

Paul Krugman calls this decade The Big Zero: “the decade in which we achieved nothing and learned nothing”. Rebecca Mead at The New Yorker bemoans this decade’s lack of a name, even calling our failure to come up with a popular name a “troubling harbinger”.

When Odysseus was captured by the man-eating giant cyclopes Polyphemus, Odysseus wisely said his name was οὔτις (“no man” in English). In a daring escape plan, Odysseus and his men blinded Polyphemus by stabbing him in the eye. Polyphemus howled in pain to the other cyclops that he was blinded by “no man”. They took this to mean that the infliction was punishment from the gods, so they didn’t help him.

This decade’s brought us an amazing advances in technology, particularly on the internet. Of course with new technology comes creative destruction. Its victims seem the most distraught that there’s no name to call the decade by.

With that, I’d like to start a list of great things we didn’t have a decade year ago (in no particular order):

• Wikipedia
• Gmail
• Facebook
• YouTube
• Twitter
• AdWords
• Amazon AWS
• RSS (started in ‘99 but didn’t catch on till the ’00s)
• Meetup
• iPod
• Google Maps
• Podcasts
• Mint
• Skype/VOIP
• iPhone
• Google Docs
• Creative Commons
• Flickr

I don’t know about you, but I learned a lot more this decade from Wikipedia than from Paul Krugman.

Tell me if I missed anything in the comments and I’ll add them.

Gregory Galant is founder and CEO of Sawhorse Media, which makes cool sites like MuckRack and organizes the Shorty Awards. He also created and hosts Venture Voice, a podcast for and about entrepreneurs. This post was originally published on his blog, and is reprinted with permission.

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See Also:

• 15 Gadgets That Changed Everything This Decade
• 15 Overhyped Products That Completely Flopped This Decade
• 15 Huge Ideas That Flopped This Decade

Apple COO Tim Cook is executive search firm Spencer Stuart’s first choice for the open CEO spot at General Motors, a reader tells us.

We have no idea whether this is true or not, but it makes sense. 

Tim would be a bold choice for GM and a clean break with the car company’s past.  Cars are vastly different than gadgets, but the magic Apple has brought to consumer product design could be just what GM needs to turn itself around.

Whether Tim would want the job is a different story (the answer is probably “no”).  Tim led Apple brilliantly for six months this year as interim CEO during Steve Jobs’s medical leave.  He’s also clearly in line for the CEO slot when Steve Jobs decides to relinquish it. 

Tim would be GM’s second C-level hire from the tech sector. Earlier this month, Microsoft CFO Chris Liddell announced he would become GM’s CFO and vice-chairman.  As our reader notes, the combination of a CEO from Apple and a CFO from Microsoft running one of America’s most iconic “old technology” companies would be interesting and ironic.

Again, this is an anonymous tip, and we have no idea whether it’s true:

I saw your recent post on Tim Cook at Apple.  I don’t know if he has been contacted yet but he is the top candidate that Spencer Stuart has identified as the next CEO of GM.  I have an inside source at Spencer Stuart.

[Interim GM CEO Edward E. Whitacre] wants the candidate to come from a company known for operational excellence, innovation and customer satisfaction and in addition he is looking for someone that has turnaround experience. It also doesn’t hurt that [Tim] has been able to work with Jobs. Whitacre does want to stay on as Chairman.  Also, Cook has been the key link to AT&T and should understand the culture that Whitacre,  [a former AT&T CEO] built.  

Will be interesting to see if he would leave Apple for this.  I don’t know him but if he wants to be a CEO it does seem he needs to leave with Jobs back.  Most interesting will be to see a CEO from Apple and a CFO from Microsoft.

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See Also:

• Microsoft CFO Chris Liddell Out
• Microsoft’s Departing CFO Joins GM As CFO And Vice-Chair
• Apple COO Saves The Company, Gets $12.3 Million Stock Award

Daily Candy, the style guide for with-it ladies, has come up with a drinking game for tonight.

Take a swill whenever someone says Goldman Sachs.

So if you want to see your fellow partiers get hammered, be sure to talk a lot about Lloyd Blankfein, the CDO scandal, AIG, and dark pools.

Happy New Year!

From Daily Candy 

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See Also:

• Today’s CNBC Drinking Game: "Bottoming Process"
• We’re Drinking More Beer Lately, Just Barely
• Goldman Sachs Should Have Known Its Gun Was Loaded, And It Owes The Public Reparations

From Daring Fireball:

Another former Apple executive who was there at the time said the tablets kept getting shelved at Apple because Mr. Jobs, whose incisive critiques are often memorable, asked, in essence, what they were good for besides surfing the Web in the bathroom.

—”Just a Touch Away, the Elusive Tablet PC”, The New York Times, 4 October 2009

I have a thousand questions about The Tablet’s design. 

But there’s one question at the top of the list, the answer to which is the key to answering every other question. That question is this: If you already have an iPhone and a MacBook; why would you want this?

Continue reading at Daring Fireball >

Image: Jesus Diaz, Gizmodo

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See Also:

• Apple Tablet Will Cost Under $1,000, Says Ex-Google Prez
• Nokia Strikes Back: ‘Virtually All’ Apple Gadgets And Computers Infringe Patents
• How Much Will The Apple Tablet Cost?

 Economic statistics don’t get enough recognition for all of their hard work. So, I’ve decided to offer an “Economic Statistic of the Decade” Award. The three criteria are simple. First, we want to reward the economic statistic that best reflects the decade (both the good and the bad). Second, we want to recognize the economic statistic that turned in a surprising performance–that is, back in 2000, if someone had shown you a graph of the statistic over the next ten years, you would have said “no way”. Third, we want to reward economic statistics that are reliable and accurate representations of the actual economy.

In the 1990s, for example, the Economic Statistic of the Decade Award would have gone to U.S. productivity growth. The runner-ups would have been Chinese economic growth, followed by global tech spending.

What about this decade?

See Mandel’s top graphs of the decade here –>

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See Also:

• Home Sales Surge 44.1% In November Thanks To Tax Credit
• Well, That’s The End Of The Good News On Housing
• Business Hiring Plans Are Still Very Weak