Getting GM up and fighting
Gregg Bresner has some ideas for the American automotive industry: how it can both recover from its catastrophic slide and help fight the war on terror.
Fascinating speculation by Robert X. Cringely on the future of Google in the world of IPTV. The telcos and cable companies are probably quiverying in fear contemplating a world where Google controls all marketing data. And for good reason. Just ignore the yelling (capital letters). It's still worth a long, careful read.| VIRTUALLY EVERY TV AD IS WASTED ON PEOPLE WHO AREN'T REAL PROSPECTS... Google is going to let the telco and cable companies burn their capital building out IP-TV, knowing that Google will still be the only game in town for the crux of the whole thing: the ability to show every viewer the specific ads that companies will pay the most to show him at that specific moment. What Google wants to do with these trailers is SERVE EVERY TV COMMERCIAL ON THE PLANET because only they will be able to do it efficiently. Only they will have the database that converts those IP addresses into sales leads... ...You're puttering in your home office around 6pm when you hear your wife call out from the living room where she's watching CNN. She says she'd rather not cook tonight -- how about going out for Italian and a movie? You Google movie showtimes and restaurants, print out a list of what's playing, and a map to Antonio's, and walk out into the living room just as Wolf Blitzer is throwing to commercial... Guess what the commercials are? Yep -- nothing but movie and local restaurant ads, with special "code words" to give at the box office and restaurant for steep discounts, good that night only. And it seems a new Italian place just opened up in town, and their commercial is hammering away at a recent review they got that said that they're so much better than that cheesy Antonio's dump it's not even funny. And it's half-off for new customers, tonight only! ...Google will cut a deal with every network to customize their ad spots for every viewer. For a small cut of their ad revenues, Google will handle all customization costs, hardware and software. The networks will all go along because the customized ads will be so much more profitable that it would make no sense for any network to refuse. |
If you've ever wondered what Niagara Falls, Neverland Ranch, and the St. Louis Arch look like from space, wonder no more. For your exclusive viewing pleasure, i-hacked has assembled a list of Hundreds of Interesting Google Maps Locations. And, no, you can't see Michael Jackson from space.
The indispensible James Taranto notes that the Palestinian Authority (PA) is going broke:"The [PA], the largest employer in the territories, is facing a fiscal crisis that could result, as early as next month, in it being unable to pay the salaries of its 130,000-plus officials and security staff, Nigel Roberts, the World Bank's man in the West Bank and Gaza Strip," tells Ha'aretz:
So an organization whose leaders are devoted to feathering their own nests and to committing violence against the only country in the region that has a functioning economy is in bad financial shape. Imagine that. |
There are reports that H&R Block inadvertently (or, perhaps, vertently -- is that a word?) released customer social-security numbers on direct-mail address labels:| For a small group of former clients, the company inadvertently included some personal information in the mailing label. Embedded within the more than 40-character source code were the nine digits of the recipient’s Social Security Number (SSN)... |
| After holding up his Robert Byrd™ mini-Constitution, Schumer demanded several times whether he still believes as he wrote in his 1985 memo that he doesn’t think abortion has Constitutional protection. Alito demurred each time, saying that he would have to weigh each case in light of its facts and its reliance on precedence. Like the bad lawyer he has proven himself to be, Schumer asked one question too many: Q: Does the Constitution protect free speech? A: Yes, Senator, the First Amendment protects free speech. Q. Well, why can you give me a straight answer on that issue but not give me a straight answer on abortion? A. Because the text of the Constitution explicitly includes the term “free speech". Case closed. It’s like watching the Washington Generals play the Harlem Globetrotters. |
The Maxwell Airforce Base website has a fascinating -- and somewhat terrifying -- description of an Electromagnetic Bomb (or "E-Bomb"). What's an E-Bomb?| Electromagnetic weapons... open up less conventional alternatives for the conduct of a strategic campaign, which derive from their ability to inflict significant material damage without inflicting visible collateral damage and loss of life. Western governments have been traditionally reluctant to commit to strategic campaigns, as the expectation of a lengthy and costly battle, with mass media coverage of its highly visible results, will quickly produce domestic political pressure to cease the conflict. An alternative is a Strategy of Graduated Response (SGR). In this strategy, an opponent who threatens escalation to a full scale war is preemptively attacked with electromagnetic weapons, to gain command of the electromagnetic spectrum and command of the air. Selective attacks with electromagnetic weapons may then be applied against chosen strategic targets, to force concession. Should these fail to produce results, more targets may be disabled by electromagnetic attack. Escalation would be sustained and graduated, to produce steadily increasing pressure to concede the dispute. Air and sea blockade are complementary means via which pressure may be applied... ...Another situation where electromagnetic bombs may find useful application is in dealing with governments which actively implement a policy of state sponsored terrorism or info-terrorism, or alternately choose to conduct a sustained low intensity land warfare campaign... ...high value targets such as R&D and production sites for Weapons of Mass Destruction (nuclear, biological, chemical) and many vital economic sites, such as petrochemical production facilities, are critically dependent upon high technology electronic equipment. The proliferation of WMD into developing nations has been greatly assisted by the availability of high quality test and measurement equipment commercially available from First World nations, as well as modern electronic process control equipment. Selectively destroying such equipment can not only paralyse R&D effort, but also significantly impair revenue generating production effort. A Middle Eastern nation sponsoring terrorism will use oil revenue to support such activity. Crippling its primary source of revenue without widespread environmental pollution may be an effective and politically acceptable punitive measure.... |
I can't say I've ever been happy paying the hucksters at our local movie theater for any of their outlandishly priced food and beverage items. Four bucks for a large diet coke? Five bucks for a big bucket of popcorn (hold the artificial, butter-flavored grease, please...)?
Robert J. Samuelson, writing in the Washington Post, warns of the impending disaster represented by the suite of current U.S. entitlement programs. His op-ed, entitled "Our Entitlement Paralysis," is a must-read.| ...By 2030, Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid may cost 15 percent of national income -- almost double their level in 2000 and equal to 75 percent of today's federal budget. Left alone, these programs would require massive tax increases, cause immense deficits or crowd out other important government programs. We also know of at least partial solutions: curb costs by slowly raising eligibility ages and cutting benefits for wealthier recipients. Still, we fiddle... |
| The responsibility for this failure is widespread: among liberals, who like massive government programs; among conservatives, who fantasize about "free market" alternatives to Social Security and Medicare; among pundits and "experts," who speak of the "entitlement crisis" in meaningless generalities or incomprehensible technicalities... |
The Weekly Standard's Steve Hayes published a lengthy article this week describing his journeys with Dick Cheney (hat tip: PowerLine) during recent tours of Iraq, Afhanistan, and Pakistan. It includes Cheney's vehement denunciation of the Mediacrats -- without naming names -- and their inherent inability to take this war seriously:| There's a temptation for people to sit around and say, well, gee, [9/11] was just a one-off affair, they didn't really mean it. Bottom line is, we've been very active and very aggressive defending the nation and using the tools at our disposal to do that. That ranges from everything to going into Afghanistan and closing down the terrorist camps, rounding up al Qaeda wherever we can find them in the world, to an active robust intelligence program, putting out rewards, the capture of bad guys, and the Patriot Act...Either we're serious about fighting the war on terror or we're not. Either we believe that there are individuals out there doing everything they can to try to launch more attacks, to try to get ever deadlier weapons to use against [us], or we don't. The president and I believe very deeply that there's a hell of a threat, that it's there for anybody who wants to look at it. And that our obligation and responsibility, given our job, is to do everything in our power to defeat the terrorists. And that's exactly what we're doing. |
The best example of a Web 2.0 technology news and discussion site is, without question, Digg. The power of Digg -- and the reason it has quickly supplanted Slashdot for many -- is its user-focused approach. Users submit content and their votes promote stories to the "front page." There's no big-brother editors to worry about... the collective audience is the editing mechanism.| Sidebar: isn't it odd that when you go the Bank of America site, you immediately note that the page is presented in cleartext ("http://"), not SSL ("https://). The first step to combat phishers is to provide an SSL connection... first time, every time. Customers need to get used to expecting a secure connection on every BofA page. Yes, their sign-in operation itself is secure. I just think it a tad bizarre that every page isn't secure as well. Just for the customer's peace of mind. |
| If we don't recognize your computer: We will ask you one of your secret SiteKey Confirmation Questions. After you answer your question correctly, we will show you your SiteKey. |
The Guardian, a leading British newspaper, was given a top secret, 55-page intelligence assessment dated July 1 2005 that describes Iran's quest for nuclear weapons (hat tip: Hugh Hewitt). The report was gleaned from British, French, German, and Belgian intelligence agencies and was used to brief the heads of European governments on the dangers represented by the Mullahs.| The Iranian government has been successfully scouring Europe for the sophisticated equipment needed to develop a nuclear bomb, according to the latest western intelligence assessment of the country's weapons programmes. Scientists in Tehran are also shopping for parts for a ballistic missile capable of reaching Europe, with "import requests and acquisitions ... registered almost daily", the report seen by the Guardian concludes. |
| [A] string of visits by high-profile US politicians to Turkey and surrounding reports are drawing new attention to the issue. In recent weeks, the number of American and NATO security officials heading to Ankara has increased dramatically. Within a matter of only days, the FBI chief, then the CIA chief and, most recently, NATO General Secretary Jaap De Hoop Scheffer visited the Turkish capital. During her visit to Europe earlier this month, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice also traveled to Turkey after a stopover in Berlin. |
It's amazing to me that a few otherwise reasonable people still believe that 9/11 was a grand plot by the U.S. Government. According to this alternate universe club, 9/11 was intentionally fomented by the U.S. to incite a war for the Saudis or to boost Halliburton's stock price, take your pick.| To investigate 16 of the most prevalent claims made by conspiracy theorists, POPULAR MECHANICS assembled a team of nine researchers and reporters who, together with PM editors, consulted more than 70 professionals in fields that form the core content of this magazine, including aviation, engineering and the military. In the end, we were able to debunk each of these assertions with hard evidence and a healthy dose of common sense. We learned that a few theories are based on something as innocent as a reporting error on that chaotic day. Others are the byproducts of cynical imaginations that aim to inject suspicion and animosity into public debate. Only by confronting such poisonous claims with irrefutable facts can we understand what really happened on a day that is forever seared into world history... |