Archive for February, 2004

CSS tidbits

by eleanor on 22 Feb 2004 @ 8:55 am in Toys, Tips, & Tricks   ++

From collected sticky notes:

[#] -> id
[.] -> class
[ ] -> contextual selectors

padding, margin sequence is clockwise from top. T - R - B - L

Eric Meyer’s “cookbook” is recommended. Amazon gives us two likely candidates CSS 2.0 Programmer’s Reference and Eric Meyer on CSS: Mastering the Language of Web Design. Will have to find out more info on their specifics.

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Busy busy busy

by eleanor on 20 Feb 2004 @ 11:18 am in Geek   ++

I’ve been ragingly busy the last two weeks, so forgive the rush of back posts that I’ll be making today and tomorrow. Tons of drafts waiting for polish and release. BMA breakfast on Tues, social networking stuff, nanotech at Staford, Digital Visions program. And all the other random stuff I’ve run across.
They’ll be backdated to when they were started, so new stuff will randomly pop up. RDF feeds good. Being too busy to publish, bad.

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Why on Ruby

by eleanor on @ 9:07 am in Open Source   ++

Ruby is a programming language - lightweight, open source. Like Perl or Python, except it’s from Japan. I’ve known a few enthusiasts, but have never been able to place it firmly in the firmament of tools.
Even as I write this, I say, hmmm - I know python because of the Zope project. Where do I know Ruby from? What made it interesting? Bitsplitter is on his way to Mardi Gras (poor foolish humans) otherwise, I’d have him explain it to me.
All this comes up from the most delightful little book, Why’s (Poignant) Guide to Ruby. Open source itself (under the Creative Commons licencse, interesting since we just heard Larry speak yesterday), this book fits my entertainment and education goals perfectly. The online version, at least, is chock full of weird little comics and cartoons. Check it out for yourself and see if you can find a way to make Ruby useful in your life and work.

I’ll probably pick it up myself. I’ve been wanting to script vim for spell checking and other things I take for granted in things like MSWord - and it might be a good chance to learn about Ruby instead of going back to Perl.

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Lessig at Digital Vision

by eleanor on @ 8:47 am in Events & Happenings   ++

Lawrence Lessig presented yesterday at the Digital Visions Programme at Stanford. A very catchy presentation from a guy who’s obviously been paying more attention to selling his message. I was there with Mike from Bitsplitter and he blogged it already, so you can read his review for what went on.

It was funny to hear Larry twice reference that he lost the Eldred case - I’ve read (I’ll link back if I can find it) that that seems to be a bit of an obsession with him. It might have been a ‘loss’ in black and white terms, and within the context of that case. However, my view of the legal process is that it’s usually slow growth as momentum builds. These are large, complex, and highly charged issues - tied intrinsically to both the social and the commercial fabric of our world. In my view, it’s not something that could have ever been dealt with neatly in one case. I still am pleased that it the Court took on the case, giving the opportunity to make the case and air the arguments. My legal is limited, so I could well be missing the point.

Big issues, big problems, but now Creative Commons has a solution that is increasingly seeing adoption. I missed the launch party back in December, and had lost track of their progress. But I will check it out and re-license all the content on this site under their license. Stay tuned.

The DV folks are an interesting crew working on important projects. They’re looking for fellows (seems generally like ones who come with funding) - but donation of time seems to be the most important thing. Definitely a good way to get access to the Stanford community.

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C&EN with technical synthetic diamond article

by eleanor on 14 Feb 2004 @ 9:20 am in Emergent   ++

Chemical and Engineering News has an excellent technical overview of the state of synthetic diamonds.

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Best (photo) blog ever

by eleanor on 11 Feb 2004 @ 12:13 am in Emergent   ++

Penelope Patsuris on Forbes.com brings the burgeoning world of photoblogging to the attention of the masses, however prematurely:

“These days, people are almost as likely to have their digital camera or camera phone on them as they are their wallet and keys, which is what accounts for the recent explosion of photo blogs. Photo blogs are the visual equivalent of the Web logs where self-publishers, both famous and obscure, post their opinions for the world to read. Unlike text blogs, photo blogs literally give visitors a glimpse into a blogger’s world. As you might expect, this is often not very interesting. “

Her list seems to be missing some of the favorites I’m familiar from Bitsplitter’s research in mobile blogging, like textamerica and picturephoning.com.
Nevertheless, it’s an interesting collection - showcasing people who have integrated the media in with their blogs, rather than those who are just experimenting.

Cynically, I have to wonder how accurate her assessment of photoblogging’s usefulness for the average blogger (as different from the rest of the population as they may tend to be). This is especially true given how cumbersome the interfaces still are, and how many must resort to emailing photos as attachments to get them out of their provider’s network.

The statistics discussed on Bitflux provide a less encouraging picture, citing research reports that Japanese consumers have 15M camera phones, yet sent only 45M photos over the air. 3 per camera is probably a far away goal for US providers.

Though, just for fun, it’s worth noting the slightly tongue-in-cheek but perhaps still relevant report from TheRegister that 75% of Polish blogs are from teenagers. When mixed with the findings that 62% of them are women, we get the sensational headline that (in Poland) most bloggers are teenaged girls.

Perhaps it’s different here though, where most of the blogs I run across are produced by guys.

Sources: Forbes’ Best Photo Blogs, Bitsplitter’s work in Mobile Computing, textamerica and picturephoning.com, Bitflux’s Mobile: Europe vs. Japan,
The Register’s
Most bloggers ‘are teenage girls’ - survey

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NGO Boycotts, Davos, and Diamonds

by eleanor on 10 Feb 2004 @ 10:10 pm in   ++

Not since my undergraduate studies in International Relations have I read so much about NGO’s (non-governmental organizations) as I have this week. I admit I’m puzzled why they would step into focus right now.
This month’s Harvard Business Review has an article arguing persuasively that companies can benefit from engaging NGO’s directly as partners. They cite the avoidability of the huge PR snafu that was Shell’s Brent Spar affair back in 1995, when Greenpeace and other activists opposed Shell sinking the disused structure, in favor of dismantling it (for more info see an archived BBC News story). That’s fine and interesting, but typically outside of my focus in that it impacts large companies that make good targets.
Our second piece is from Bain and is yet another piece from Davos, which seems to serve as an annual term-paper deadline for a decent amount of research. In the paper, James Allen posits that the old view of supply chains as “corporate obligations toward the communities that supply important products or services and the need to make those communities sustainable” is unworkable. He puts forth a slightly modified view, ” a broader definition of value chain accountability, which extends beyond supply sources to include networks of distributors and consumers. In an increasingly multinational environment, CEOs must constantly balance their efforts between consumer and supplier communities.” To deal with this change, Bain’s research suggests 6 themes:

1. Focus on brands, not boycotts - NGO boycotts might hurt less in revenue, but strongly impact customer perception of your brand
2. Build values not departments - you will do less damage control (not all that effective anyway) if your culture is sensitive to these issues from the ground up
3. Define borders and battleplans - they suggest a model of some complexity here that might be best summarized by focus your risk minimization efforts on the most important part of your business
4. NGO’s are NGO’s - they cannot be fully co-opted, and must indeed retain the full appearance of disinterest. Given this, and how extraordinarily useful publicity is for their causes, your interests often remain starkly divergent; deal with them only when interests align.
5. Implementation - even once senior management decides to ‘do the right thing’, you need to have processes in place to ensure that this policy is put in place across the organization. Incentives and goals (such as missions to take costs out) need to be adjusted to reflect this commitment.
6. Corporate Social Responsibility redefined? - will the expenditures entailed by the above recommendations grow to take the place of more traditional good neighbor gestures such as supporting the arts and other organizations?

For me, the best part of this article is his use of the term ‘conflict diamonds’. I had previously only heard the juicier term of ‘blood diamonds’ applied to these extra-DeBeersian stones. A stunning example of the power of marketing either way, both names are highly evocative. These stones are the ones supposedly smuggled out and traded for guns and other terrible things. Personally I remain unmoved, as I am suspicious of cartels like DeBeers as a rule. I hold out my hope - both personally, economically, and technically - for the approaching availability of lab-created diamonds. Read the article from last fall, if you haven’t already, and perhaps Neil Stephenson’s Diamond Age.

Sources: HBR’s Turning Gadflies into Allies, Bain’s Responsible Value Chain: What Are You Accountable For?, the BBC’s Brent Spar gets chop , and Wired’s The New Diamond Age.

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More on climate theory

by eleanor on @ 9:29 am in Datapoints   ++

Supplemental to last week’s post on scenario planning and climate change, I ran into this more complete paper from Robert Gagosian, Pres & Dir of Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, which presented a couple of weeks ago at Davos. WHOI’s Climate and Change Institute has done a lot of the research to support this theory.
This paper gives a very good description of the science behind the idea, and shorter than the Nova or other PBS spot I saw sometime last year.

Source: Ocean & Climate Change Institute - Abrupt Climate Change

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Strategy, scenario planning applied to global warming

by eleanor on 6 Feb 2004 @ 8:42 am in   ++

David Stipp writes in Fortune that the Department of Defense is applying scenario planning to brainstorm responses to a horrific possibility, an extreme drop in climate that would kick off a mini-ice age. The gist is that global warming has begin to impact oceanic currents that flow up from warmer climes and help moderate the temperature in northern areas such as Great Britain. Without those currents, colder weather would move to dominate what are now temperate zones, leading to great costs in fuel and reduced food production. The DOD brought in famed expert in scenario planning, Peter Schwartz, whose work for Royal Dutch/Shell in the 1970s saw them ready with responses to the oil shocks of that decade.
This is a snapshot of what they are outlooking, perhaps as soon as 2020:

Violent storms are increasingly common as the conveyor becomes wobbly on its way to collapse. A particularly severe storm causes the ocean to break through levees in the Netherlands, making coastal cities such as the Hague unlivable. In California the delta island levees in the Sacramento River area are breached, disrupting the aqueduct system transporting water from north to south.
Megadroughts afflict the U.S., especially in the southern states, along with winds that are 15% stronger on average than they are now, causing widespread dust storms and soil loss. The U.S. is better positioned to cope than most nations, however, thanks to its diverse growing climates, wealth, technology, and abundant resources. That has a downside, though: It magnifies the haves-vs.-have-nots gap and fosters bellicose finger-pointing at America.
Turning inward, the U.S. effectively seeks to build a fortress around itself to preserve resources. Borders are strengthened to hold back starving immigrants from Mexico, South America, and the Caribbean islands—waves of boat people pose especially grim problems. Tension between the U.S. and Mexico rises as the U.S. reneges on a 1944 treaty that guarantees water flow from the Colorado River into Mexico. America is forced to meet its rising energy demand with options that are costly both economically and politically, including nuclear power and onerous Middle Eastern contracts. Yet it survives without catastrophic losses.

This is interesting from several angles, not the least it’s potential to impact business and economic conditions worldwide. A situation as drastic as this certainly calls for divergent thinking. While this may be either (or both) far off or far-fetched, it provides a worthy platform for speculative analysis.
I do wonder that their conclusions for the continental US were so upbeat….. Without having access to their data, it’s hard to say. One factor they don’t mention directly is how they anticipate coping with the US’s reliance on oil imports for power and heating. Such conditions would surely devastate international trade, and our technological edge might be of little use if the lights are out. Given the simultaneous greying of our population as the baby boomers age, I would be more worried about our capacity to feed and care for ourselves absent the amenities we are used to enjoying.

Source: Fortune.com - The Pentagon’s Weather Nightmare

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Fortune on Enron

by eleanor on 5 Feb 2004 @ 11:39 am in Strategy-Marketing   ++

Despite constant discussion in the news, what Enron’s business was and what it did wrong is rarely discussed. Bethany McLean of Fortune has, apparently, been reporting on this quite effectively for some time (the magazine generally hasn’t come up on my radar much heretofore). McLean, with co-author Peter Elkind, even has a book forthcoming on Enron, entitled The Smartest Guys in the Room.
Having reviewed her articles, I’m struck by the contrast with most Enron reporting. The financial press discusses the accounting treatment as if that’s the core issue, while assuming that laypeople have detailed knowledge of accounting intricacies.
What really went wrong at Enron wasn’t an issue of spurious accounting so much as a catastrophic failure of a business model. The accounting, of course, was the means by which Enron hid its poor performance, but that’s only one of three major issues swirling around the story.
I’d argue that the Enron scandal boils down to three main issues: 1). energy trading is an invalid business model; 2). extremely high-volatility businesses ought not to be publicly traded; 3). lastly, the shared dependence among finance, auditing, and legal providers and their corporate clients, lead to irredeemable agency conflicts. The last point has been commented on extensively, but it seems that the first two have largely gone unaddressed.
Energy trading as a failed business model is complex, but deals with the opportunities to game the system when only part of the market is deregulated. I once read a wonderful piece talking about the power crisis in California, which discussed instances of power operators being ordered to do absolutely crazy things to move power around at the behest of traders. I will look for more references and finish this section later.
Volatility is your beta, your risk. Markets don’t like risk. Investors hate surprises, and will hammer stock value over small deviations from consensus estimates (which are, it’s worth mentioning, just guesses after all). Companies with high volatility must hedge their risk in order to viably participate in equity markets. Creative markets have devised any number of clever mechanisms for diversifying risks, including such things as insurance, futures, options, and an astonishing array of derivatives. If a company’s core business is in an area of high ongoing volatility that cannot be effectively diversified - it is far better off as a privately held firm, with a close group of investors who understand the risks and can adjust their expected returns accordingly. For a public company faced with high volatility, the pressure to cook the books to smooth earnings is very high, as we’ve seen with even quasi-governmental agencies such as Fannie Mae.

Contrary to what finance theory teaches us, there is a tremendous psychological component to markets. Expectations become demands, which fails in the abscence of perfect information. I’m a huge fan of the behavioral finance school of thought, pioneered by Kahnneman and Tversky, which seriously questions the business-school enshrined assumptions of rational markets.
Smooth earnings are what the market wants, but is that reasonable? [That would be another worthy research project, to gain a historical view of earnings distribution.] Is the natural profile of corporate performance a steady march to the upper right? If we were in a world where there was no economic cost involved in dissolving companies when their profit trend blipped, perhaps these expectations would be valid. However, there is significant cost to the company, both in terms of capital availability and employee incentives, when the share price takes a beating. While that threat does provide a powerful motivation for companies to stay on top of their markets, to deliver the performance necessary to fulfill expectations, the ‘no excuses’ mentality of the market easily leads to destructive short-term practices. Managers have powerful incentives to hit the numbers no matter the cost, whether it’s through layoffs or questionable accounting.
The point is that the focus shifts to the accounting side from the customer-facing side. Investment in and support of new and existing products suffer as all stops are pulled out to make past investments pay off. Between merciless pressure from markets and increased overhead from compliance with Sarbanes-Oxley, many companies are rethinking the value created from being publicly-traded. A bellwether for what’s going on in the minds of leaders, the case in this month’s Harvard Business Review focuses on a publicly-traded consulting company that’s considering going private. There;s a good case to be made for public markets taking the focus off of customers in favor of shareholders. After all, customers are easier to satisfy…..

Sources: Why Enron Went Bust and Give My Regrets to Wall Street [subscribers only - but it’s worth it in both cases - see blog entries on Fortune and HBR].

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Using ‘premium’ content effectively

by eleanor on @ 8:06 am in Strategy-Marketing   ++

Fortune is a magazine I generally can take or leave. They do, however, have excellent Enron coverage. While looking through their materials, I eventually hit premium content.
Instead of it being an impenetrable wall, they present an offer: view current article, and all others - and receive 6 issues - for $4.95.
Sold.
This flexibility comes no doubt from the magazine’s need to drive dead tree subscriptions to bolster circulation, thereby justifying advertising rates. But it’s win-win, and the most effective impulse-buy, Point of Sale mechanism that I’ve seen in weeks.
They made it utterly painless, and have obtained my consent to mail me paper (and debit my account in the future). Good for them.
And now we’ll see if my opinion of its usefulness changes with usage.

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Trojan horses as competitive response

by eleanor on 3 Feb 2004 @ 8:19 am in   ++

This is a lovely anecdote. It shows an instance where creative thinking turned the problem (Soviets stealing and replicating American technology during arms race) on its head.

In our complex disinformation scheme, deliberately flawed designs for stealth technology and space defense sent Russian scientists down paths that wasted time and money.
The technology topping the Soviets’ wish list was for computer control systems to automate the operation of the new trans-Siberian gas pipeline. When we turned down their overt purchase order, the K.G.B. sent a covert agent into a Canadian company to steal the software; tipped off by Farewell, we added what geeks call a “Trojan Horse” to the pirated product.
“The pipeline software that was to run the pumps, turbines and valves was programmed to go haywire,” writes Reed, “to reset pump speeds and valve settings to produce pressures far beyond those acceptable to the pipeline joints and welds. The result was the most monumental non-nuclear explosion and fire ever seen from space.”
Our Norad monitors feared a nuclear detonation, but satellites that would have picked up its electromagnetic pulse were silent. [the coup] stayed secret because the blast in June 1982, estimated at three kilotons, took place in the Siberian wilderness, with no casualties known. Nor was the red-faced K.G.B. about to complain publicly about being tricked by bogus technology. But all the software it had stolen for years was suddenly suspect, which stopped or delayed the work of thousands of worried Russian technicians and scientists.

And, it is by the way, a good argument for open source software…..

Source: The New York Times, Safire on the Farewell Dossier

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IBM’s solution to “Innovator’s Dilemma” around Linux

by eleanor on 2 Feb 2004 @ 10:48 pm in   ++

What comes first, the chicken or the egg?
How do new markets grow and gain momentum?
Organic growth alone can do the trick, but a market can get on the fast track to critical mass and become mainstream as a result of entry of big players. This is just the phenomenon we’ve been seeing over the last 2 years with IBM’s heavy promotion Linux.
Why would IBM promote Linux, which often competes directly with their own operating system? IBM’s taken a very forward-looking approach here, putting aside worries of cannibalization to position itself as the go-to team for Linux in the enterprise. Linux makes anything possible, but the necessary skills can be hard to find. IBM is there, with its global services operations to make it happen.
Great, but that’s not the full story — there’s a more subtle dynamic here.
New markets start small. Big companies need big markets, both to justify the investment and edge up their margins.
As perhaps first suggested by Clayton Christensen, a professor at Harvard Business School, in his highly influential book, The Innovator’s Dilemma (check book review), one way for established companies to tap into innovation is by stepping in to aggressively grow the market. This way larger players essentially take the market under stewardship and infuse it with their credibility and reputation. IBM has thrown its full weight behind Linux, which has solidified Linux’s mission-critical credentials and created huge market awareness. This article from the BBC gives evidence that this strategy is working. As, of course, do all those banner ads on The Wall Street Journal……

Source: BBC NEWS - Linux steps into the limelight and , The Innovator’s Dilemma by Clayton Christensen.

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