artdiamondblog.com – Page 388 – Art Diamond's web log

“Israel’s Entrepreneurial Character”

(p. 272) Israel’s entrepreneurial character led Google to establish a center in Haifa as well as the more expected Tel Aviv. The Haifa office was a move to accommodate Yoelle Maarek, a celebrated computer scientist who had headed IBM’s labs in Israel. Google hired another world-class computer scientist, Yossi Matias, to head the Tel Aviv office. (In 2009, during Google’s austerity push, the company would merge the engineering centers and Maarek would depart.)

Source:
Levy, Steven. In the Plex: How Google Thinks, Works, and Shapes Our Lives. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2011.

Amazon’s Story of the Evolution and Revolution of Disruptive Innovation

Source of book image:
http://i1.wp.com/allthingsd.com/files/2013/10/Stone_EverythingStore1.jpg

(p. C5) Mr. Stone, a senior writer for Bloomberg Businessweek and a former reporter for The New York Times, tells this story of disruptive innovation with authority and verve, and lots of well-informed reporting. Although “The Everything Store” retraces early ground covered by Robert Spector’s 2000 book, “Amazon.com: Get Big Fast,” Mr. Stone has conducted more than 300 interviews with current and former Amazon executives and employees, including conversations, over the years, with Mr. Bezos, who “in the end was supportive of this project even though he judged that it was ‘too early’ for a reflective look” at the company.

“The Everything Store” does not examine in detail the fallout that Amazon’s rise has had on book publishing and on independent bookstores, but Mr. Stone does a nimble job of situating the company’s evolution within the wider retail landscape and within the technological revolution that was remaking the world at the turn of the millennium.

For the full review, see:
MICHIKO KAKUTANI. “BOOKS OF THE TIMES; Selling as Hard as He Can.” The New York Times (Tues., October 29, 2013.): C1 & C5.
(Note: the online version of the review has the date October 28, 2013.)

The book under review is:
Stone, Brad. The Everything Store: Jeff Bezos and the Age of Amazon. New York: Little, Brown and Company, 2013.

“Brad Stone” Source of caption and photo: online version of the NYT review quoted and cited above.

Paper Towels Are Better than Air Dryers at Removing Bacteria

Green environmentalists have forced hot air hand dryers on us in many public restrooms. They are slow and noisy and frustrating, and many of us leave the restroom with still-wet hands. But did you also know that by taking away our paper towels, the environmentalists are helping to spread disease? Read the article abstract below:

(p. 791) The transmission of bacteria is more likely to occur from wet skin than from dry skin; therefore, the proper drying of hands after washing should be an integral part of the hand hygiene process in health care. This article systematically reviews the research on the hygienic efficacy of different hand-drying methods. A literature search was conducted in April 2011 using the electronic databases PubMed, Scopus, and Web of Science. Search terms used were hand dryer and hand drying. The search was limited to articles published in English from January 1970 through March 2011. Twelve studies were included in the review. Hand-drying effectiveness includes the speed of drying, degree of dryness, effective removal of bacteria, and prevention of cross-contamination. This review found little agreement regarding the relative effectiveness of electric air dryers. However, most studies suggest that paper towels can dry hands efficiently, remove bacteria effectively, and cause less contamination of the washroom environment. From a hygiene viewpoint, paper towels are superior to electric air dryers. Paper towels should be recommended in locations where hygiene is paramount, such as hospitals and clinics.

Source:
Cunrui, Huang, Ma Wenjun, and Susan Stack. “The Hygienic Efficacy of Different Hand-Drying Methods: A Review of the Evidence.” Mayo Clinic Proceedings 87, no. 8 (Aug. 2012): 791-98.

Kits Let Model T Owners Transform Them into Tractors, Snowmobiles, Roadsters and Trucks

“OFF ROAD; Kits to take the Model T places Henry Ford never intended included tractor conversions, . . . ” Source of caption and photo: online version of the NYT article quoted and cited below.

(p. 1) WHEN Henry Ford started to manufacture his groundbreaking Model T on Sept. 27, 1908, he probably never imagined that the spindly little car would remain in production for 19 years. Nor could Ford have foreseen that his company would eventually build more than 15 million Tin Lizzies, making him a billionaire while putting the world on wheels.

But nearly as significant as the Model T’s ubiquity was its knack for performing tasks far beyond basic transportation. As quickly as customers left the dealers’ lot, they began transforming their Ts to suit their specialized needs, assisted by scores of new companies that sprang up to cater exclusively to the world’s most popular car.
Following the Model T’s skyrocketing success came mail-order catalogs and magazine advertisements filled with parts and kits to turn the humble Fords into farm tractors, mobile sawmills, snowmobiles, racy roadsters and even semi-trucks. Indeed, historians credit the Model T — which Ford first advertised as The Universal Car — with launching today’s multibillion-dollar automotive aftermarket industry.

For the full story, see:
LINDSAY BROOKE. “Mr. Ford’s T: Mobility With Versatility.” The New York Times, Automobiles Section (Sun., July 20, 2008): 1 & 14.
(Note: the online version of the story has the title “Mr. Ford’s T: Versatile Mobility.”)

Google Surprised at Success of Chinese Cyberattack

(p. 268) Though the underlying issue of Google’s China pullout was censorship, it was ironic that a cyberattack had triggered the retreat. Google had believed that its computer science skills and savvy made it a leader in protecting its corporate information. With its blend of Montessori naiveté and hubris that had served it so well in other areas, the company felt it could do security better. Until the China incursion, it appeared to be succeeding.

Source:
Levy, Steven. In the Plex: How Google Thinks, Works, and Shapes Our Lives. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2011.
(Note: italics in original.)

Kerosene Creatively Destroyed Whale Oil

“The whale-oil lamps at the Sag Harbor Whaling and Historical Museum are obsolete, though at one time, whale oil lighted much of the Western world.” Source of caption and photo: online version of the NYT article quoted and cited below.

(p. 20) Like oil, particularly in its early days, whaling spawned dazzling fortunes, depending on the brute labor of tens of thousands of men doing dirty, sweaty, dangerous work. Like oil, it began with the prizes closest to home and then found itself exploring every corner of the globe. And like oil, whaling at its peak seemed impregnable, its product so far superior to its trifling rivals, like smelly lard oil or volatile camphene, that whaling interests mocked their competitors.

“Great noise is made by many of the newspapers and thousands of the traders in the country about lard oil, chemical oil, camphene oil, and a half-dozen other luminous humbugs,” The Nantucket Inquirer snorted derisively in 1843. It went on: “But let not our envious and — in view of the lard oil mania — we had well nigh said, hog-gish opponents, indulge themselves in any such dreams.”
But, in fact, whaling was already just about done, said Eric Jay Dolin, who . . . is the author of “Leviathan: The History of Whaling in America.” Whales near North America were becoming scarce, and the birth of the American petroleum industry in 1859 in Titusville, Pa., allowed kerosene to supplant whale oil before the electric light replaced both of them and oil found other uses.
. . .
Mr. Dolin said the message for today was that one era’s irreplaceable energy source could be the next one’s relic. Like whaling, he said, big oil is ripe to be replaced by something newer, cleaner, more appropriate for its moment.

For the full story, see:
PETER APPLEBOME. “OUR TOWNS; Once They Thought Whale Oil Was Indispensable, Too.” The New York Times, First Section (Sun., August 3, 2008): 20.
(Note: ellipses added.)
(Note: the online version of the story has the title, “OUR TOWNS; They Used to Say Whale Oil Was Indispensable, Too.”)

Dolin’s book is:
Dolin, Eric Jay. Leviathan: The History of Whaling in America. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, Inc., 2007.

Beer Was Safer than Water

(p. C24) . . . what would beer be without water? . . . New York City, at least until the opening of the Croton Aqueduct in 1842, had no clean, reliable source. In fact, since hops have a preservative quality, and brewing requires boiling, “beer was once considered safer to drink than water.”

For the full review, see:
EDWARD ROTHSTEIN. “EXHIBITION REVIEW; A Tipple or Two? It Was Safer Than Water.” The New York Times (Fri., May 25, 2012): C19 & C24.
(Note: ellipses added.)
(Note: the online version of the review has the date May 24, 2012.)

Former Botswana President Won Prize for Ceding Power

“Festus G. Mogae, trained as an economist, was Botswana’s president for two terms.” Source of caption and photo: online version of the NYT article quoted and cited below.

(p. A10) JOHANNESBURG — A foundation dedicated to celebrating and encouraging good government in Africa awarded its annual prize on Monday to Botswana’s former president, Festus G. Mogae. He was honored for consolidating his nation’s democracy, ensuring that its diamond wealth enriched its people and providing bold leadership during the AIDS pandemic.

Mr. Mogae, 69, a man with a modest style, will receive $5 million over the next 10 years and $200,000 per year thereafter for the rest of his life. Over the coming decade, the foundation may also grant another $200,000 a year to causes of Mr. Mogae’s choice.
The award, the Mo Ibrahim Prize for Achievement in African Leadership, is bestowed by the Mo Ibrahim Foundation, named after its founder, a Sudanese billionaire.

For the full story, see:
CELIA W. DUGGER. “Botswana’s Ex-President Wins Leadership Prize.” The New York Times (Tues., October 21, 2008): A10.
(Note: the online version of the story has the date October 20, 2008.)

Nebraska Teenager Becomes the “George Clooney of YouTube”

(p. 263) Google also became more aggressive in connecting sponsors for popular videos. A paragon of YouTube’s business model was “Fred,” a video channel created by a Columbus, Nebraska, teenager named Lucas Cruikshank. The teen pretended to be a six-year-old kid named Fred Figglehorn in a series of two-minute videos. “Fred is the George Clooney of YouTube,” says Hunter Walk. “He was the first one with a million subscribers. He uploads videos, and we put ads against them. Sometimes he sells product placement ads. Fred makes a million dollars a year. He just signed a movie deal.” The Fred videos– generally manic rants in which Cruikshank portrays a hyperactive, possibly brain-damaged child who speaks like one of Ross Bagdasarian’s chipmunks– often sported commercial messages for sponsors such as Samsung, the Food Channel, and Bratz on an overlay at the bottom of the window. Since he started in 2008, at age fourteen, Fred’s (p. 264) YouTube videos have chalked up over half a billion viewings. Though Fred’s success was solely a product of YouTube, people in the company never met the phenom. “We sent him a cake once,” says Walk.
YouTube helped Fred’s youthful creator not just by selling ads but by providing analytics, the same way it did for AdSense publishers. (This was a result of an initiative called the YouTube Insight project, developed by engineers in Google’s Zurich center.) Such data helped creators learn what was working and where. “They’re like, ‘Oh my God, I’m big in the U.K.! I never knew I had a London following!'” says Walk. Superusers such as Cruikshank were so successful in exploiting YouTube’s business initiatives that corporations such as Sony were studying their methodology and even paid some of them consultant fees to help them understand the digital world.

Source:
Levy, Steven. In the Plex: How Google Thinks, Works, and Shapes Our Lives. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2011.

Malcolm Gladwell Has High Praise for Michael Lewis

“Malcolm Gladwell” Source of caption and image: online version of the NYT interview quoted and cited below.

I have found the two books that I have read by Michael Lewis to be very useful. But I have found the five books that I have read by Malcolm Gladwell to be full of wonderful and important examples and thought-provoking insights. So I am a bit surprised by the level of Gladwell’s praise for Lewis. (Maybe the problem is that I have not yet read Moneyball or The Blind Side.)

(p. 8) What books, to your mind, bring together social science, business principles and narrative nonfiction in an interesting or innovative way?
. . . Bringing together social science and business principles is easy. Doing that and telling a compelling story is next to impossible. I think only Michael Lewis can do it well. His nonbusiness books like “The Blind Side,” by the way, are even better. That book is as close to perfect as a work of popular nonfiction can be.

For the full interview, see:
“By the Book; Malcolm Gladwell; The author of “David and Goliath” compares Michael Lewis to Tiger Woods: “I’ll never play like that. But it’s good to be reminded every now and again what genius looks like.” The New York Times Book Review (Sun., October 6, 2013): 8.
(Note: bold in original; ellipsis added.)
(Note: neither the print nor the online version of the interview identify the name of the interviewer.)
(Note: the online version of the interview has the date October 3, 2013, and has the title “Malcolm Gladwell: By the Book; The author of “David and Goliath” compares Michael Lewis to Tiger Woods: “I’ll never play like that. But it’s good to be reminded every now and again what genius looks like.”)

Fed Regulations Are “a Wild Card” Since “Regulators Have a Lot of Leeway”

(p. 1D) The president of First National of Nebraska, the nation’s largest privately held banking firm, said new federal regulatory and compliance efforts stand to cost the company as much as $30 million this year.
“It is a big uncertainty in the banking world,” said Dan O’Neill, speaking Wednesday at the company’s annual meeting in Omaha. “They are not operating off of concrete rules. A lot of it is their interpretation.”
The federal Consumer Financial Protection Bureau was formed as a result of the federal Dodd-Frank laws passed in 2010 after widespread bank failures and bailouts using taxpayer money.
. . .
The bureau, he said, worries banks because there is not a “clear body of rules” from which the regulator is operating in evaluating the fairness of a bank’s business practices. He said the agency’s regulators have a lot of leeway in deciding what to do af-(p. 2D)ter examining a bank; penalties for running afoul include fines.
“So it is a bit of a wild card,” he said.

For the full story, see:
RUSSELL HUBBARD. “ANNUAL MEETING; First National Chief Says Regulatory Costs Mounting.” Omaha World-Herald (Thurs., June 20, 2013): 1D-2D.
(Note: ellipsis added.)