Interesting Reading: 11/13
Why Canada's Banks Don't Need Help
http://www.time.com/time/business/article/0,8599,1855317,00.html
In the midst of the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression,
Canada has joined the ranks of governments that in recent weeks stepped up
to help banks cope with more fallout from bad U.S. subprime mortgages. In
Canada's case, however, the reason for the assistance is a little
different from some of its G-7 partners. Unlike banks in the U.S., Britain
and Germany, which needed to be bailed out with hundreds of billions of
dollars in new capital, Canada's major banks are solid and solvent. They
don't need any help to work through their subprime exposure.
So why did Ottawa agree to insure the money they routinely borrow from
other banks, a practice that keeps their credit operations liquid?
Ironically, the troubled non-Canadian institutions that received capital
injections and loan guarantees in other countries now carry a government
seal of approval that tilts the playing field in their favor when it comes
to borrowing. That leaves Canada's big banks, including Scotiabank, TD
Bank Financial Group, RBC Royal Bank and CIBC, at a competitive
disadvantage. So the government acted to level the field, not to aid
troubled banks.
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RED Monster Announcement: Modular Cameras, a DSLR, 3D and 28k
http://gizmodo.com/5085242/red-monster-announcement-modular-cameras-a-dslr-3d-and-28k
Rumors of a RED DSLR had been confirmed a long time ago, but what of the
Scarlet and EPIC übercamcorders? On the REDUser forums, RED CEO Jim
Jannard has explained it all: Scarlet and EPIC are the DSLR - all cameras
are "part of the same DSMC system", so each and every camera will be part
of a modular, build-your-own, still and video product line based on the
Scarlet and EPIC 'Brains'. To do this, RED has furnished an insanely
diverse new collection of components, with sensors ranging from the $2500
3k Scarlet to the $55,000, 28k EPIC 617 Mysterium Monstro.
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Entrepreneurs Who Rose From The Ashes
http://www.forbes.com/entrepreneurs/2008/11/10/recession-depression-entrepreneurs-ent-manage-cx_ml_1110upfromashes.html
A word of encouragement for all the entrepreneurs (and every other working
stiff, for that matter) scrapping it out in the latest downturn:
Recessions--for all the havoc they wreak--can also sow the seeds of
serious fortunes.
"At a basic level, there is an important job or problem that customers
can't do or solve for themselves," says Scott Anthony, president of
Innosight, a Watertown, Mass.-based innovation strategy consultancy. "The
best chance of creating something powerfully profitable is starting with
an important, unsatisfied problem."
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Using Design to Crack Society's Problems
http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/130/mission-critical.html
Â…Participle isn't a conventional bunch of social workers or do-gooders.
It's a design team. Participle's interdisciplinary crew includes
anthropologists, economists, entrepreneurs, psychologists, social
scientists, and a military-logistics expert, but it is driven by design
techniques and headed by Cottam, 42, who also has used such strategies to
tackle the shortcomings of Britain's school and health systems. "Hilary's
-- and my -- favorite kind of design has to do with making people's lives
better, often taking account of their mundane daily concerns," says Paola
Antonelli, senior curator of architecture and design at the Museum of
Modern Art in New York. "Her projects not only work, they give people a
sense of hope and strength."
Cottam is one of a new wave of design evangelists who are trying to change
the world for the better. They believe that many of the institutions and
systems set up in the 20th century are failing and that design can help us
to build new ones better suited to the demands of this century. Some of
these innovators are helping poor people to help themselves by fostering
design in developing economies. Others see design as a tool to stave off
ecological catastrophe. Then there are the box-breaking thinkers like
Cottam, who disregard design's traditional bounds and apply it to social
and political problems. Her mission, she says, is "to crack the
intractable social issues of our time."
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Jane McGonigal's Brave New Worlds
http://www.businessweek.com/innovate/content/nov2008/id20081110_453173.htm?campaign_id=rss_innovate
Major corporations, including Procter & Gamble (PG), Electronic Arts
(ERTS), and National Semiconductor (NSM), have given some of their
employees an unusual assignment: play a free online game.
Admittedly, it's not a typical entertainment video game, with
sophisticated 3D graphics, fantastical characters, or shoot-'em-up plots.
And the corporations aren't just allowing workers to have fun on the job.
Instead, the game, called Superstruct, asks players to imagine the world
in 2019.
They're asked to consider a series of future scenarios, including a
respiratory disease pandemic, a global food shortage, or a refugee crisis.
Then they write blog posts, upload videos, and enter discussions on social
networking sites such as Facebook to paint a picture of life in those
conditions. For the players, it's an exercise of the imagination. For the
supporting firms, it's an experiment with the idea of future-scenario
planning using the game as a collaboration tool.
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The Crisis Last Time
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/09/books/review/Parker-t.html?_r=1&ref=books&oref=slogin
For writers who seek to influence public affairs, timing plays a paramount
role. And few writers have had better timing than Adolf Augustus Berle.
In the summer of 1932, with America trapped in the greatest financial
crisis in its history, Berle published "The Modern Corporation and Private
Property," a scholarly yet readable analysis of America's largest
companies and their managers. Berle is largely forgotten today, yet with
that book he succeeded in persuading Americans to see their economic
system in a new way - and helped set the stage for the most fundamental
realignment of power since abolition.
