The Integrative Stream

The Carnival of the Capitalists

Welcome to the May 22nd Edition of the The Carnival of the Capitalists! For those visitors to the site who aren’t familiar, the the CoTC is a weekly roving roundup of the best business, investing and career management posts in the blogosphere, as nominated by the authors. Anyone blogging on business topics is eligible to participate. See the web site for more information.

For those who know the carnival but don’t know this blog, The Integrative Stream is a collection of short articles, links and general pondering from the perspective someone who’s been an independent consultant, CTO of a small software company and writer on technology issues, and is now in the middle of an MBA at MIT Sloan, on the principle of better late than never.

It’s been a lot of fun editing this week’s submissions. As per usual, most of the submitted posts have made the carnival. However, I did drop some posts which I felt lacked substantial original. A few blogs submitted every post for the week, and those got ignored too. For blogs which submitted too posts, I went with the one I found more interesting. The themes for the week seem to be international business ethics and network neutrality.

An Editor’s Choice doesn’t necessarily mean that I agree with the argument; but it does indicate that I respect the research and thought that went into the post and had some fun thinking about the issues. You might too.

Thanks for visiting, and don’t forget to check out next week’s host, Working Solo.

The Philosophy of Business

• Isaac Schrödinger defends Exploiting the Poor. Of course, it’s not that simple. Having grown up in Pakistan the author adds some first hand observations, and reminds the reader of some fundamental (classical and behavioural) economics.
• Starling David Hunter continues Email Conversation with an MBA Student at The Business of America is Business. Professor Hunter moved on from MIT Sloan right before I arrived at MIT Sloan. I wish he hadn’t.
• Wayne Hurlburt just thinks that good business ethics Change the World.

Managing

• Professor Steve Bainbridge takes an anthropological approach to Meetings and Dominance Rituals: Implications for Corporate Governance at ProfessorBainbridge.com. I was motivated to try to apply his analysis at my next meeting, so this one warrants an Editor’s Choice.
• In Predictably Unpredictable, Carmine Coyote of Slow Leadership takes a crack at the difficult issue of models. Computers make it easier than ever to gather vast quantities of information, but how much data is too much data?
• Michael Wade of ExecuPundit makes a case for why organizations need mavericks. A nice reality check if you get too worried about the occasional prima donna in the cubical farm.
• David Maister brings us Why Should I Help You? at Passion, People and Principles. It’s hard to be a supplicant, but most people can do a better job of it than they currently manage. Editor’s Choice.
• K T Cat at The Scratching Post suggests thinking about Process Improvement As a Current Liability. He (apparently, the author is a black and white tabby cat) is focusing on large-scale, corporate projects. It’s important to differentiate process improvement activities from process overhead, which can also be thought of as a current liability. What looks like overhead today can save your bacon tomorrow.
• A century ago, Frank Woolworth resorted to selling hammers disassembled — the head and handle separate — to maintain his promise that everything in the store was five or ten cents. From 1903 to 1970 Hershey shrank its chocolate bars 12 times to avoid crossing its own nickel price barriers as costs increased. What did they have in common? Constant values. Bob Pritchett suggests avoiding them, whether in software of strategy.

Public Policy

• On the Libertarian front, Brian Gongol has A Public Decision-Maker’s Checklist.
• Leon Gettler of Sox First writes about The SEC and the Jargon Maze. Plain english disclosures? It’s so crazy that it just might work. This is an issue close to my heart–and not just in regulated industries. Editor’s Choice.
• Jack Cluth at The People’s Republic of Seabrook raises important issues involving alligators.
• Tom Rants reviews reasons to mess with markets?.

Career and Employment

• Jacob Cazzell at SuccessMinders.com reminds you to Give value first. Paychecks will follow.
• Jack Yoest has 3 Questions for Your Prospective Boss.
• Mark at SportsBiz looks at the Psychic Income Appeal of playing for the WNBA.
• Brandon Peele at GT reflects on his time with a recent employer in SunTechnics & Me. There are some job search-and-selection lessons to be learned here.
• More ideas for personal growth from Adrian Savage.
• David Lorenzo suggests that you Be the Best.

Business of Technology

• Jon Kay at Centrist Coalition has Everything You Wanted to Know About Network Neutrality. Excellent analysis and an Editor’s Choice.
• cehwiedel at Kicking Over My Traces comments on Net Neutrality, in the context of providing access to telecom services.
• Barry Welford says that [ I’m Feeling Lucky ] Out | [ Search Blogs ] In. He means the buttons on the Google Home Page.
• Scott Milener at The Browster Blog laments the end of the New Economy in Supernova Party – Not Quite Like Its 1999. The other day I was in a meeting and CommerceNet came up. The operative quote from the conversation was “Wow, the last time I read about them it was in The Industry Standard.” The parties were just better back then.

Personal Finance & Personal Business

• Brian at Financial Reference looks at The Role of Financial Advisors. That’s the role they play now, not the role that they should play in the future.
• Need to get motivated? Todd suggests you Learn to make money by emulating people who make money.
• Josh Cohen at Multiple Mentality has Gas Price Tips
• David A. Porter advises that you Beware of Mortgage “Rescue” Firms.
• Dan Melson at Searchlight Crusade presents Real Estate Boycotts and the current state of the SF housing market.
• Steve Mertz writes about how good record keeping helped claim a pension from a previous employer. In this case, $29,871.63 worth. His story does nothing for my own packrat tendencies.
• Free Money Finance has a theory of How the Middle Class Can Get Back on Solid Financial Ground.
• Bob Vineyard reminds us that we have insurance Because Things Happen. A very good health economics point, as well. Insurance doesn’t just
  improve health outcomes after disease strikes – it can engender habits that make disease, or at least acute disease, less likely.
• A Samuel at New Homes Blog has
  5 rules to follow for buying an off-plan property.
• Paul at Paul’s Tips presents Ten good rules-of-thumb for investing.
• Nina Smith at Queercents talks about Team Effort. It’s not a good idea to leave financial leadership to just half the couple.

Impersonal Finance

• RJH Adams at Capital Chronicle presents Equity Markets: Crunched by Deteriorating Liquidity?
• nickel at fivecentnickel.com notes that Bankruptcy Filings are on the Rise
• Dominic Basulto at Business Innovation Insider tells us why My 500 is better than your 500
• Ed at Daily Dose of Optimism saw that Bill Miller is Down on Commodities and decided to take a closer look.
• Inflation may be on the rise, according to Barry Ritholtz of The Big Picture. And apparently folks are catching on..
• Econbrowser notes the dilemma posed for the Federal Reserve by this week’s data suggesting both an increase in inflation and a slowdown of real economic activity. Stagflation wasn’t much fun the last time. Editor’s Choice
• Chris Welch examines Cramer’s “Cyclical Investing and Trading” Chart at InvestorGeeks.
• frugal has some Ramblings on Illegal Immigrants, Globalization, and Inflationary Pictures at My 1st Million At 33.
• Joe Kristan looks at backdating stock options at TaxUpdateBlog.com/a>.
• Japanese Stocks Nose Dive, Japan ADRs & ETFs Next? from Steve Towns at ETF Investor.

Entrepreneurship

• Yaro Starak at Entrepreneur’s Journey provides a Paypal Review from the merchant’s perspective. The same author writes at Small Business Branding about How To Throw Away $500. Australian money, though.
• Dave Navarro has some coaching on 10 sepcific actions for a healthy, growing small business. Keeping normal business hours is something that I can heartily endorse from my own startup and consulting experiences.

Sales and Advertising

• Kevin Hillstrom at MineThatData describes the ‘Multi Channel’ Myth in direct marketing. He starts by positing that the direct marketing industry is in the middle of a strategic collapse, and builds from there. I read this one with great interest, as I’ve recently had the good fortune to hang around with some of the marketing models theorists and practioners here at MIT. Editor’s Choice, and bonus points if you can come up with a new business model for direct sales.
• Steve Mertz at Sales Presentation Training gives a Sales Presentation Tip-Don’t Waffle. Good advice.
• Jim Logan tells us why Your Full Service Real Estate Professional has wasted an opportunity.
• Steven Silvers of Scatterbox presents a PR conundrum: Army chief backs off of war documentary because it has all that pesky war stuff in it.
• Le Centre at Centrerion Canadian Politics explores an Ethical Dilemme[sic] Facing Google Adsense Publishers.
• Abnu presents Naming Restaurants Down There at Wordlab.

Office Life

• The oft-amusing Big Picture Guy at Big Picture, Small Office asks why financial summaries have to boring in The Long and Short of It. I’ve sat through a few of these. It’s also worth noting that BPG got this submission in right at the 3:00 cutoff for Blog posts. Why bother with leftover time before the deadline?

Niches and Riches

BusinessPundit suggests avoiding Chinese Math. “Chinese Math” is the common practice of beginning a business pitch with “the market is huge, and all we need is 10%”. And common it is: even I’ve heard it enough to be tired, and I’m not a VC, Angel, or other reads-business-plans-for-a-living type. Landing those first couple of customers is key, regardless of market size. Savvy investors will want to know how you plan to do that.

All of which is amply summed up in Rob’s post. Here’s my two cents: this kind of thinking doesn’t just stop funding; it stops entrepreneurs cold. I wonder how many good ideas have been left on the table because the potential founders can’t tell themselves a good story about how big the market is going to be? So maybe, after ten years, you end up with a hundred million dollar a year company rather than a five hundred million dollar a year company. That might be just fine. And you might be surprised. Why sit around waiting for the big score that may never come?

As my marketing professor used to say, “in niches there are riches.” Actually, that was just last fall, so I’m sure he’s still saying it. Niches don’t need Chinese Math (or huge populations). They need execution. Ok, maybe that’s just harder.

Health IT Microeconomics

More insurers are reimbursing doctors for online care. Cost issues have kept small physician offices from adopting sophisticated health information technology. And that’s no surprise: clinical systems are complex, and small medical practices are under increasing financial pressure. That means seeing more patients more efficiently and-surprise!-electronic medical records and related tools don’t always mean a quicker visit. Often a better visit, but not a quicker one.

Insurance companies control the final line of incentives for doctors and hospitals to invest in process improvement. If doctors can get paid for an online visit, even if only enough to cover costs, they’ll do a lot more. And since an online visit is less costly for all concerned, everybody wins. Patients win most of all, especially considering the noneconomic costs of going to see your physician. Those costs are substantial – travel time, lost work, gas.

Software Upgrade

I’ve upgraded the blog software to WordPress 2.x, which shouldn’t have any impact on readers. It should have quite an impact on me, however – this blog probably attracts more visits from comment spam-bots than from actual readers. Given the erratic update schedule this isn’t all that surprising, but it’s certainly been a hassle. I moderate everything, so the spam hasn’t been showing up on the site itself, but on an average day I get 20 or 30 notifications that some “reader” of this blog would like to encourage my other readers to purchase various black market medications.

WordPress 2 has some nice features that should fix that. But if you don’t see your comments, let me know.

Programmers vs. Users

Almost every problem in software development can be traced to one of two sources: programmers and users. The post below, and the comments associated with it, do an excellent job illustrating the major sources of miscommunication between the two.

Some users want hand holding. A lot of it. And they expect the software (or the software developers) to somehow intuit exactly what they want to have happen. I used to call this the “magic button” syndrome, since there was really one thing these users wanted: a magic button on the middle of a web page that would do whatever needed to be done.

On the flip side, though, are programmers who expect users to think like programmers. One thing I’ve noticed over the years is that techies and non-techies look at screens very differently. When I see a new screen, the first thing I do is look at every button, link and text box, and form a mental inventory of what I can do. Most programmers seem to do the same. Most users, however, don’t take an inventory approach: they decide what they want to do, and then hunt around until they find the option that does it. If there’s nothing on the screen that obviously solves the problem, mayhem may ensue.

The Bug is in the Details – The Daily WTF

Incidentally, I should go on record that in this particular example, the programmers were “right” – the end user demands are a bit naive. But I’ve seen worse. And most of the comments focus on issues like the difficulty of writing an email address parser that can say why an address isn’t valid. Yes, it’s hard to do. No, average non-programmer has no way of knowing that, other than intuition based on the fact that most software doesn’t do it.

Management in Software Companies

Those interested in starting or running software companies would do well to read Joel Spolsky’s essay on The Development Abstraction Layer and then think hard upon its meaning.

Spolsky’s an interesting character. He knows what he’s talking about from a software perspective. His writing appeals to developers and engineers, since, if you were to strip away everything except what he seems to care most about, you’re left with someone who cares about creating quality, usable software. From the perspective of cross-hallway evangelism (management to developers, developers to managers) he’s probably the best, or at least most consistent, person writing today.

World at ones fingertips…

I just did a Google search for “throwing out kitchen sinks in Cambridge MA”. The first page told me everything I need. You can toss one per week. The Internet is amazing.

TV Online

Fox Network just announced a contract renegotiation with their affiliates. The new deal will allow them to offer 60% of their prime time schedule online the day after the show first airs. ABC, of course, has just announced that they will be airing shows for free on the web, funded by unskippable advertising. ABC and NBC shows are available on iTunes.

There’s been a lot of talk about this trend, so I won’t waste time recap. However, it’s a great idea. The general consensus is that the networks are “under assault” by digital video recorders. People skip ads, and the whole television broadcast model will fall apart. This is broadly true. I wrote about the future of digital television back in 2002, arguing that DVRs would, all else equal, encourage a drive towards subscription channels like HBO. At that point I didn’t expect video on demand to come to market so quickly. My current Comcast cable system gives me a surprisingly large menu of programming options, and the selection is only going to grow. Without Comcast On Demand I would never have seen Marlon Brando in “The Appaloosa.” So the jury’s still out.

It’s worth looking at ABC’s move from a product development perspective. Why do consumers purchase DVRs? To time shift programs, and to skip commercials. These are not equal imperatives. It’s easy to determine which is more imporant – how much would you pay for a machine that let you do one, but not the other? I’m not sure I’d pay very much for a machine that only skipped commercials (or for scheduled programs that didn’t have them in the first place). But I know it’s much less than what I would be willing to pay for a service that would let me time shift programs but wouldn’t let me skip commercials. The fact that I’d pay even more for both is somewhat irrelevant.

ABC is solving the problem that affects the consumer the most, and doing it in a way that seems sustainable. That’s smart business. The iTunes project is complementary – viewers who are willing to pay a little more to skip commercials can do that. We’ll see what things look like in a few years, when bandwidth and video quality are higher and more PCs have the connectors that link them to TVs (Apple’s iMac is a step in this direction).

Data Modeling

Shadid Shah’s blog has a reasonably technical article about data modeling for healthcare databases. The concept is important in other industries as well, but particularly helps to illustrate the challenges in building interoperable healthcare systems.

The Healthcare IT Guy » Guest Article: Beware of NULLs in healthcare databases

Japan

In Japan right now. My network connectivity is somewhat limited, and I can’t figure out this keyboard. Great trip so far, however. Probably won’t be able to post much about it until I get home. I have, however, already had the most expensive glass of wine of my life.

And Shibuya is just cool.

Bill Crawford’s Flightlab Blog

Another Crawford blog: Bill Crawford’s Flightlab Blog. If you fly airplanes, ideally upside down, it’s going to be a good blog to read. If you’re not a pilot, these are probably the best posts about spin control that you’re likely to read.

Dad’s been writing columns about aerobatics since opening a flight school down in Plymouth a few years ago. They’ve been published in a local airport newspaper. The web is, perhaps, a better place for them. Mom is thrilled.

Flying, incidentally, is a habit that the men of my family seem to take up in their mid 30s. A few more years and I’ll need to start looking for hangar space.

Micropresentations

The best presentation may not be much of one at all. Seth Godin points out most presentations are given to large groups of people who aren’t very good at presentations. Maybe we’d all benefit if the people giving those presentations had access to an alternate methodology. Specifically, walk up on stage and ask “Any Questions?”

It’s an interesting idea, although I’m not sure that I buy it. I tried an experiment in my MIT Communications for Managers class, which backfired rather dramatically. Since PowerPoint feels artificial and enforces a linear view of events without a whole lot of nuance, I gave a presentation backed with only a few PowerPoint slides that I pulled out at various points. My theory was that narrative, punctuated by a few visual aids, would be more effective.

I got marked down because I didn’t include a slide with an agenda.

Moderation Patterns

I think patterns, whether in software development, architecture, or any other repeatable activity, are a very important thing. So much so that I wrote a book about them. So it’s interesting to watch the efforts at creating pattern languages for the social networking sphere. I’m particularly amazed that nobody has come up with a better web based group discussion system than the one I wrote back in 1995. Which was no different or better than the ones a lot of other people wrote at the same time.

Although I missed it, it appears that Clay Shirky gave an interesting talk on social networking patterns at the O’Reilly Emerging Technologies conference. Worth a read, and worth following the links.

Along the same lines, I’ve noticed a massive uptick in the comment spam on this blog over the last few days. Over 20 of them yesterday alone. I’ve closed off comments on some of the more popular posts, and will probably upgrade the blog software this weekend in an effort to cut them back further. Since I pre-moderate everything not posted by an approved user the spam doesn’t actually show up here.

Wal-Mart Bloggers

I barely have time to keep up with prolific business blogger Starling Hunter. Since I’ve been thinking about online promotions lately, this post on Wal*Mart’s blog strategy is a good read.

The Business of America is Business: The NY Times Takes on Wal-Mart

McKinsey on in-house software development

McKinsey & Company has an interesting article on in-house software development. Some good points on the challenges of productizing in-house innovation.

Registration required, but it’s free for their web exclusive articles.

The McKinsey Quarterly: The next generation of in-house software development

WSJ.com – Hospital Link Could Catch Outbreaks Early

Subscription required; writeup of the CDC’s BioSense system.

WSJ.com – Hospital Link Could Catch Outbreaks Early

Carnival of Biotechnology

Carnival of Biotechnology. You can never have too many. The first edition. Not that much in this week’s edition, but it’s a good idea.

Health Wonk Review

Managed Care Matters has the
first edition of the Health Wonk Review, a new biweekly carnival of blog posts on health care policy. Hopefully this will pick up some steam: it’s a worthwhile project.

Thinkpad X41 Tablet Mini Review

Now that I’ve been using it for a few months, I have some slightly more developed thoughts on the various merits and demerits of the IBM (Lenovo) ThinkPad X41 Tablet. As blog readers may recall, I picked up this particular piece of black plastic back in October, promised to write about it in more detail, and then never did. That, by the way, is why these things are called blogs.

I’ve been very happy with the machine itself, with one notable exception and a few small ones. On the plus side, general performance has been very good, and battery life, with the eight-cell extended battery, is excellent: I can usually get four hours or more of active work. Dialing up the power-saving functions gets further. The X41 is also extremely light, which is a real benefit over its predecessor. And like most ThinkPads I’ve used, the keyboard is excellent. I’m typing on it right now. I’ve also become a convert to the new style trackpoint device, which is made out of a software rubber rather than a pencil eraser. The only striking design flaw is the positioning of the fingerprint scanner, which is extremely hard to use when the system is in laptop mode, and upside down in tablet mode, at least in the orientation I tend to use. A higher resolution screen would have been nice, too, since the 1024×768 display can be cramped. More pixels would also allow smaller handwriting in tablet mode.

The big exception, though, is the bootup time, and the other X41 owners I know all agree. Going from power-on to actually using the machine takes a minute or more, and that’s with a gigabyte of RAM. So I generally avoid turning it all the way off and use the Hibernate function instead. This works fine for a while, after which I start having WiFi problems and need to reboot all the way.

I didn’t originally pick up the docking station, but I went out an got it later, since the base X41 doesn’t include a DVD drive. Carrying the docking station around when travelling is a pain in the neck, although the system comes with software that lets you mirror a few DVDs (or a lot of CDs) to the hard drive. The dock station is fine, although it doesn’t have a DVI out connector (which isn’t a big deal) and doesn’t have separate mouse and keyboard connectors (which is). The lack of separate connectors means I can’t tie the X41 into my keyboard/monitor/mouse sharing arrangement at home.

Of course, the real issue is whether or not the tablet functionality has changed my work patterns. I bought the computer mostly because my situation had changed: I didn’t need a large screen, software development workhorse computer anymore, I needed something small, portable, and good for note taking and the occasional spreadsheet. Tablet mode is great for sitting in lectures, since it allows unobtrusive (and quiet) digital note taking. The propensity for distraction is a little lower, too, since the pen moderates the speed at which you can, for instance, write email. You can still web surf to your heart’s content, though.

Tellingly, though, I’m currently sitting at a desk surrounded by paper printouts, all of which are covered with notes, and all of which are sitting on my desktop in electronic form. The problems are density and random access. The tablet PC pen writes more thickly than its 79 cent equivalent, so you can’t squeeze as much in the margin, at least if you want to keep it readable. Again, this is where a higher resolution display, even at the same physical size, would be a real improvement. And it’s still easier for me to flip through a printout of a journal article or business plan than it is to scroll. So the pen usually comes out for quick notes, small sketches, and lectures.

Bottom line, though, is that I like the machine even if I’m not getting everything I’d like from the tablet functionality. I’m certainly using it enough to justify the cost, although I bought it mine through MIT and thus paid a little less than at Lenovo’s web site.

Effective Delegation

As I continue to weather out the blizzard by catching up on the blogosphere, I’ve come across Thinking Faster’s guide to Delegating for Fun and Profit. Simple and easy to absorb, as is all the business advice that people actually manage to remember.

Update 2/13: For a two sentence post, this one had a surprising number of typographical errors.