Pulitzer Awarded to Genocide Denier
I am of course talking about the 1933 prize awarded to Walter Duranty, who hid the fact of forced starvation in Ukraine by the Soviet Union in order to continue to have access to Stalin. This is probably one of the most vile episodes in U.S. journalism - a reporter denying mass atrocities in order to continue exclusive coverage to a brutal dictator.

I have wrote about this before here and here. The forced famine in Ukraine starved between 5 and 7 million people - the actual numbers will never be known.

The Pulitzer board studied revoking the prize and declined the opportunity. This is the equivalent of the Pulitzer going to a Holocaust denier and the Pulitzer board saying, "Well, it's not THAT bad he said the mass execution of millions of Jews didn't happen, and look at the access he had to Hitler!."

The Pulitzer is worthless - I would hope that maybe others would turn in their awards in protest, but I don't see that happening.

Hat Tip for the Breaking Story: Up for Anything

posted by Director_Mitch @ 6:09 PM (Permalink)
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Where Do We Use It?
MOAB Tested in Florida

I would vote for Syria, but you do have to put the two remaining Axi of Evil - Iran and NK - on the short list (Syria is in the Axis of Just as Evil).

posted by Director_Mitch @ 2:07 PM (Permalink)
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Rumor Management of Management Rumors
First, some background: My company is actually a wholly owned subsidiary of Global Megacorp. This means that my boss, the Imperial President, while head of this company, is the equivalent of an executive VP at the parent company, so there are actually a handful of executives above him.

Global Megacorp has been going through a purge, similar to what happened every few years in the old Soviet Union. Dozens of senior managers have been cut, divisions reshuffled, product lines combined, you name it. The rank-and-file workers have largely been spared from loosing their jobs - they mainly have been moved around or find themselves working on new assignments. Strategically, the reshuffle is probably getting the company ready for the upswing in the tech market, which we are already experiencing this quarter.

The purge started taking place in October and the word from my contacts at headquarters was that this was a Global Megacorp reshuffle only and wouldn't go down to the subsidiaries. Even if it did, I am not particularly concerned about my position since the purge is in the senior ranks and I am one rank too low. If something did happen, however, it could affect MY boss, and good or bad, a change in a boss is not something to take lightly, so I decided to poke around to see what I could find out.

So what did I hear? Two completely opposing rumors:

Rumor 1 - I make it a point to go out to lunch with my boss once a week (excuse me while I rub this brown stuff off my nose). Subtle probing ("So when is the reorg at our parent going to be complete?") indicated that a) the reorgs would be complete by the end of December and would not effect us and b) the Imperial President was not particularly concerned about them. So in light of this rumor, nothing will be changing for me.

Rumor 2 - The second rumor - and sub-rumors - go something like this: the Imperial President is moving from his present position (one says he is being promoted up to one of the top positions at the parent company, the other says he is being let go), and in his place will go Director Mike, my colleague in the sales area, as my new boss.

So which one do I believe and how do I react?

Well, I personally find certain aspects of Rumor 2 hard to believe, but corporations do not behave in a logical manner, so all rumors that have an affect on your career must be taken seriously.

So what does this mean for me? It means that I now brown-nose BOTH of the people who I might find as my boss when I come back from Christmas break. This means no change in my treatment of the Imperial President, but if he is actually being promoted UP, then that could actually be a really good break for me since it always helps to have worked directly for the Big Guy in the executive suite. If he isn't and he is still my boss in January, then nothing changes. If he is let go (which I find VERY hard to believe), then it still doesn't hurt me to treat him as I always have.

Diretor Mike and I have always had a good relationship and I respect his work and experience, but I have been a little more "helpful" to him the last few weeks, sending him last week a VERY large sales lead that I received as a cold call, being sure to spend more time having one-on-one chats with him, letting him know what I am doing (besides blogging). If he is the new president in January, then I should be in good. If he is still my peer in January, my treatment of him now will just make our working together better.

There are those of you, no doubt, who are thinking "aren't you being a bit pathetic, brown-nosing all the possible people who might be your boss?" My answer to you is "yes", but this is how the game is played in the corporate world. You can choose not to participate, but you do so at the risk of your job and career. Even when I started working at a start-up as employee number six, you would not believe the level of politics that took place while we grew to over 40 people (Rorschach can back me on this one).

The bottom line is this: big company or small, politics are the rule of the jungle and you have to play it if you want to be anywhere above a first-rung manager. Even if you are the CEO, you still answer to VCs, bankers and your board, so the bottom line is that no matter how high you climb, you got to play the game.

posted by Director_Mitch @ 10:51 AM (Permalink)
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Comdex Review
As I noted before, Comdex, which used to be THE high-tech trade show in North America has really fallen on hard times. Attended by over 200,000 people at its peak, it was the venue for major announcements of new products, technology trends and innovative ideas, a role now filled by the Consumer Electronics Show (CES), which is scheduled every January, also in Vegas (they have a link, but it is currently down).

Comdex, having lost the battle to CES, is now focusing on software and IT, making it less glamorous and less attended. Attendance, forecasted at 50,000 by the show's coordinators, was estimated at 30,000 by the Las Vegas convention bureau (other estimates are at 40,000). I don't know which number is correct, but I can say that it was very sparse and the number of booths were a fraction of what they used to be.

Due to the change of the show's nature, I saw no real product trends in areas I specialize in: consumer electronics, semiconductors, and wireless technologies. Those people in IT who went to the show could probably comment better than I could about announcements made in security and digital enterprise, two main themes of the show, and I recommend going to the Comdex web site if you are interested in these areas.

In short, the show was a waste for the segments I specialize in, but I saw a few things that were sort of interesting.

France has Technology?



This was surprising. Some of the products being showcased included:

SurrenderCell(TM) - A very impressive cellphone technology, this system generates surrender voicemail messages to ALL enemy cellphones any time an invader passes into French territory.

InstultAmerica(TM) - This software product takes any American policy and automatically generates insults about it. Apparently Michael Moore consulted on the project.

VacationCount(TM) - A software program created on the demand of French industry to keep count of the months of vacation time given to the average French worker. Apparently the core technology was derived from UnemploymentCount(TM), a technology created in France to keep count of unemployment rates above 10%.


A Democratic Issue - Outsourcing to Armenia
You heard it here first, people. As companies lay off people to outsource to Armenia, you can bet the democrats will make this an issue in the next election. I'm just surprised that the dems didn't try to shut the booth down, but they apparently were in the area since the guy in the booth can smell them.





Warp Drive?




Introduction of a new space travel technology? Oh, wait, that's a BAR. I must be in Vegas.


I'll be back in January for CES, which should be a better show in terms of technology trends and consumer electronics and will report on it.

posted by Director_Mitch @ 4:49 PM (Permalink)
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I'm Back
From the post below I am obviously back from Vegas. The dice were cold, but the concoctions at the Rum Jungle were colder, allowing me to drown my monetary loss down the memory hole.

I want to thank Rorschach for posting - even if he DID do a post on a competitor to the iPod. He has guest privileges to the site and is welcome to post any time. I'm still waiting for him to do a post on doing business in Japan, but with his travel schedule that may be a while.

I will post on Comdex late this afternoon when I am able to retrieve some of my digital pictures.


posted by Director_Mitch @ 12:23 PM (Permalink)
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Dean Calls for Halt of U.S. Diplomatic Trips
BURLINGTON, Vt. - Democratic front-runner Howard Dean has called for a full stop to all foreign presidential visits after bombings in Turkey killed 27 people in the British consulate and a British bank.

Dean, a governor with no foreign policy experience and head of a state with fewer than 800,000 people pointed out, "This terrorist attack is obviously our fault, since if Bush hadn't visited England, the terrorists would have blown up someone else instead. As president, I promise never to go to Britain or any other country since it would only invite terrorist attacks on whatever nation I was visiting."

posted by Director_Mitch @ 11:58 AM (Permalink)
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Guest Review: Dell DJ 20 Gigabyte MP3 jukebox
Rorschach here again, and for today's post I will review one of my new road warrior toys. (Our Director is an iPod owner, so consider this equal time.)

Full disclosure: I do not own an iPod, but I have used them from time to time, but never on a long trip. I am familiar with the new iPod features and interface details. I like the iPod. It is a revolutionary product. My interest in the DJ was driven by 1. battery life and 2. cost. Any review must unavoidably compare the Dell DJ to the iPod. I travel quite a bit (about 40% of my month). Many of those trips are flights to Japan, which are 8~10 hours. Prior to owning the DJ I made the progression through 64Mbyte flash player, CD-based RioVolt, and finally using my iPaq PDA and SD cards to carry MP3 music. My iPaq lasts about 6 hours playing MP3s and using the screen: not enough and storage is limited.

First impressions: The unit is smaller than I expected, this surprise comes from reading the iPod-o-sphere complaints about size and weight. 1 oz and a few mm has no impact on me. The unit comes with a sling holster (just like the iPod), REALLY crappy earbud headphones, a wired remote (nice), world-voltage charger (thank God), USB cable, docs and software. My unit was almost fully charged (it had the newer firmware already installed), but I dutifully plugged it in for several hours just to make sure per the manual. Upon power up, the unit is quite pretty, in a high tech way. The front and side power buttons glow a deep blue. I dare say the DellDJ is better looking than the iPod when the buttons are lit (heresy!) The same electroluminescent blue is used for the LCD backlight, and here Dell did well to blatantly rip off the iPod with nice Helvetica fonts and good sized LCD.

Here is a pic I took in low light to try and (poorly) capture the effect



Interface: I am a southpaw, and I believe the mundane dell scroll wheel to be more usable one-handed than the iPod wheely-bob. Don’t get me wrong, the iPod is more fun to play with from a sheer “joy-to-use� factor, but the Dell is easier to use one-handed IMHO. Back/Play-Pause/Next buttons are oversized and easy to find in the dark. The wired remote mirrors these ergos. Volume is easily accessible with side buttons. The on-off button takes a good 2-second depression to toggle, and that makes it seem long. I could go into petty details about how artist/genre/albums are selected, but let me make one simple request for future firmware versions: I should be able to drill down into albums after I select a specific artist. As it is right now (I think), I can only select an artist and then must choose from all of their tracks. If I want a specific album, I must browse specifically by album name. This can be tricky when you have over 600 different albums represented on your player as I do. The Dell does not have any games or PDA-like functions like the iPod. I already have a great PDA for these jobs, so no loss.

Software: It can’t all be a bed of roses, eh? Now listen here: I like MusicMatch Jukebox. I was one of the first people to pony up my $20 for the full feature version. It’s one of the best programs available on the PC to manage large MP3 libraries. However, there was a mistake made on the software for MusicMatch -> Dell DJ. Unfortunately it does not transfer the track # correctly on the ID tags. Therefore your tracks on the DJ will not play in “Album order� automatically if you desire. And I do. Do not despair, there is a workaround: a spunky little company called Red Chair has a program called Dudebox, which solves this problem and enables a host of other cool features on the Dell DJ. HIGHLY recommended. The DJ of course can be used as a hard drive. It works fine for this purpose, and my USB 2.0 connection got about 38-40 Mbit/s real transfer rate. That’s pretty good. BONUS feature: The unit can charge off of the USB connection as long as there is at least 25% charge remaining. I was unaware of the feature and was delighted to discover it. It will NOT charge if you are transferring files, by the way.

Using a 20 Gig jukebox: the staggering availability of your entire music catalog makes using playlists even more important. You can instantly transport yourself to nostalgia blasts of pre-teen days (Steve Miller for me), high school (early 80’s), college (late 80’s), and beyond that chronicle the salient periods of your life. The joy of this abundance amplifies the time it takes to peruse your tracks. Another recommendation: most people have “current� tracks that they have most recently purchased/downloaded, there should be some way to browse most recent tracks in the library.

The Good: I really like this unit so far, the battery life seems excellent and the construction is solid. $100 cheaper than equivalent iPod. Dell specified quality into this unit.

The Bad: Headphones are poor. Get some Bose, Sennheiser, Sony, whatever.

The Ugly: The driver problem for Track # on Musicmatch is inexcusable. I recommend Dell put pressure on MM to fix it ASAP.

Bottom Line: for us world traveler types, these jukeboxes are a must own. I highly recommend playing with the Dell before you buy an iPod. You just might be surprised. I can honestly say recommended.


posted by Rorschach @ 4:17 PM (Permalink)
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Marketing Supplemental: What the heck do we build?
“Hi everybody!” Rorschach here, guest blogger for the day at Window Manager. (Quick introduction: I’m a VP of Marketing for a silly-cone valley technology company. Shameless plug: I have my own totally unrelated photoblog about blade collecting, if you’re in to that sort of thing.) For this entry I’d like to delve into the process of product definition, specifically as it relates to the marketing department. How does one go about defining a “killer product”? At times it may seem like chaos theory, but you can actually minimize a lot of risks by following a simple process. Let me qualify all of this by stating that my experience is primarily in high technology: startups and large companies. I have an old graphic lying around that we can use as one possible model:



1. Know the Total Available Market Space: The whole process is an iterative cycle, and I am a big believer in understanding trends in your entire chain (end customers, brand company, system houses, component vendors, raw materials) to help identify where the most customer pain exists. Your mission is to come up with a product that has a minimally acceptable feature set (validated by end customers) and get it to market as quickly as possible. At the same time, you must play scenario-based strategy games by anticipating competitor response and planning counter-strike tactics.

In your voluminous spare time, you must voraciously consume as much relevant market data as possible, but also be aware of the end customer trends. Let me just pander to the community here and state that blogs (Indeed. Blogs.) can play a huge role in spotting trends, pain points, and possible solutions. Bloggers love to review things, complain, praise, and otherwise opine. It’s a self-replenishing natural resource for the savvy marketeer.


2. *Really* know your chosen market segment: Can you really build something for this segment? Most startups fail: not because of bad core technology, not because of bad sales/marketing, but because of poor execution. So make sure you have (or can buy) the competence to get the product to market. That having been said, customers are notoriously fickle, but you would never bring a product to market without patron customers (read:sugar-daddies) who will assuredly buy your wares as you have pre-sold them on the Specification and have their input.

3. Construct a brief analysis of your market segment: Share it with your customers. Have them edit/correct your assumptions. This requires the networking skills to have a database of market-knowledgeable people you can turn to for advice and constructive criticism.

4. Write a brief business plan for your product: this should not take months. This can be PowerPoint. More than one person should read and edit the plan. If you are agonizing over prose then you are not going quickly enough. You should have multiple revs. Stuff should be missing. Assumptions MUST be listed.

5. Write the spec => hand it off to engineering/operations => ride them for feedback until they run away screaming at your sight: Take the same spec to key customers, have them edit the details. Beg/borrow/steal enough resources to put together a simple demo to show off the main features or mockup details of your spec. Amazing deals can be won with an “ah-ha!” demo.

It may seem pedantic, but you’d be surprised how many startups skip most of these steps because some “genius” founder “knows exactly what product to make.” If you have one guy who knows all the answers, go find yourself another team. If you know all the answers, change jobs: it sucks to be the only omnipotent being in a world of losers.

So what happens when you do all this stuff and it still doesn’t work? It’s not the end of the world, and rejection is truly the best mentor.
1. Downgrade the feature set: just make sure its minimally acceptable
2. Downgrade the target customers: maybe you’ve been going after prima-donna customers when what you really need are meat-and-potatoes buyers. Expand your business development to include non traditional targets. Ask your sales guys, they probably have more ideas than you expect.
3. Partner with the enemy: Do you have some of the pieces, but failed on the whole enchilada? Try going to your competitor and put together a deal that plays on both partner’s strengths.

So there you have it, and by all means, throw it all out the window when the crisis/opportunity dictates. Rules are made to be broken, and changing course in increments more frequently is still better than sailing in the wrong direction. In an upcoming post I’ll write more about doing business in Japan, which consists of an intoxicating mixture of formality, informality, and bizarre settings that may land your company profits while teaching you about life on another planet.

posted by Rorschach @ 8:06 AM (Permalink)
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Off to Comdex - Guest Blog While Away
I am leaving for Vegas (yeah, baby) for Comdex. For those outside of tech, Comdex (originally Computer Dealers Expo) was once one of the largest trade shows in the U.S., bringing in over 150,000 visitors. The double punch of the tech meltdown and 9-11 cratered the 2001 show and it never recovered, with attendance now optimistically estimated at 50,000 (no slouch, but way off its hey-day). I'll blog on the event when I return, but not too much since there are probably 100s of other people doing the same thing.

While I am away, Rorschach has agreed to do a guest post on Tuesday. I'll return to regular blogging on Thursday.

posted by Director_Mitch @ 4:29 PM (Permalink)
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Blogging as Networking
I have written about the dubious area of Social Networking, which are web sites that allow people to post their information and then ask the people in their network to join. Those people then ask everyone in their network to join, who then ask the people in their network to join, etc. Like the movie "Seven Degrees of Separation" or the game "Six Degrees from Kevin Bacon", the theory is that you and anyone you want to find in the business world are separated by a maximum of six people.

I think this area misses the mark on what is becoming the next big thing in networking: the blogosphere.

If I get an email from some person I don't know from Linkedin, maybe I'll read it, possibly I'll respond. After all, this request is probably from someone 4 or 5 people removed from me, and it's not too different from getting a cold call. I really don't know anything about him.

On the other hand, I have helped fellow bloggers with contact leads, proofed resumes, even donated money. Although I have never met these people face-to-face, I know them better than some people I have worked with for several years. I know how they think. I know how they write. I know their political philosophy and sometimes their religious philosophy. I know their sense of humor. And if one of them sends me someone I don't know who needs something, I will trust them more than some random person off a social networking site.

I now have regular correspondence with a handful of people I have never met, and am part of a team of dozens of similar minded people who have never been in the same room. I think this whole blogging thing is what the next generation of networking is about and is another reason why venture capitalists are throwing their money down a hole with social networking.

Perhaps there is a way to combine the best aspects of blogging with the best aspects of social networking?


posted by Director_Mitch @ 3:14 PM (Permalink)
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Observations on the Business World
Another Rice Grad writes about quitting his job:

Life is too short to do something you don't enjoy. I definitely believe that, and it's a lesson I've learned from this job. I'm making myself miserable working insane hours at an inane job where I never do anything substantive. I'd rather be a risk taker or entrepreneur than a corporate climber who has to depend on superiors' favor. This is particularly true while I'm young and can afford to take risks.

He has his situation nailed. There is no question about it, but starting at the bottom and moving up the corporate ranks just sucks. It can take literally years of mind-numbing work while you network your abilities to management so you can be considered for that next promotion, or catch the shirt-tail of someone else moving up the ladder. And these years of drudgery can end with absolutely no promotion whatsoever. I know people at one tech firm that have literally held the same job in the same cube for 20 years. The people who get the promotions don't have the same experience or ability of these cube dwellers, but somehow they do the right networking and politicking.

It's hard coming to the reality that in large corporations promotions are not based on ability. In my first position I won the "most outstanding" marketing award three out of my first four years. This award was voted on by the marketing and sales organizations - my peers. Despite this recognition, I received absolutely no promotions. I then found out that after four years and three awards that I was barely making more than new-hires coming out of college.

That's when I quit to join a start-up.

That was some years ago. Two large companies and one more start-up later I am back at a megacorp spending time looking out a window, but with a comfortable title and level of pay.

So what has my experience taught me? Here are a few rules that I have observed:

1. Corporations value people outside the company more than inside the company (this is usually true, but doesn't hold for organizations like UPS that only promote from within). Generally speaking, I have found that the unknown candidate outside the company usually gets a job over promoting the internal guy who's been slogging at it for half a decade. There is something mysterious and sexy about the external guy that the internal guy just can't provide (sort of like getting a mistress after years of marriage). I think this issue is also a reason why consultants who know nothing about an organization are listened to more closely than people who know the internal workings after years of experience.

So, I have found that changing jobs and companies moves you up the corporate ladder faster than slogging your way up (exceptions: if you are the son of the chairman or a "golden child", which I will post on another date).

2. It's Okay to Toggle Between Corporate and Start-Up - I actually learned this one from an MBA professor. Keep in mind that the vast majority of start-ups fail. His advice was to get the corporate job and get your financial bearings for a few years. Then spin out to a start-up. Repeat as needed.

This particular professor was in his 60s and had been doing this strategy for decades. He had worked in all sorts of large corporations and had started dozens of companies. He had been rich and broke numerous times, but he kept at it (he finally hit the big time and quit a few years ago).

This strategy won't get you inside companies that promote from within or take a dim view of company hopping, but I have found that most large companies want that "entrepreneurial edge" and are willing to hire start-up refugees. On the other side of the coin, most start-ups are usually started by people trying to escape the corporate dungeon, so there are usually no issues getting hired there (ideally, start your own).

3. Sometimes you have to grin and bear it - Unlike Rice Grad, I am older and have a family to support, so no matter how much I can't stand my current job, I am going to keep doing it and kiss the right @#$ to keep it until something better comes along. This sort of goes hand-in-hand with observation 2 above: you are going to work in large organizations so make the best of it: Say the right things to the boss. Politic with the right people. Even if your company is like Dilbert's, don't hang around the water cooler complaining since it gets to be known who's a whiner - post anonymously on a blog instead. You really don't know how long you are going to be there, so work the job like it has to last you 20 years. This means doing things that are boring and pumping up the ego of people you don't like, but just remember that sometimes a job is about paying the mortgage and putting food on the table and not "self fulfillment".

4. Network - I have already posted on this. This will land you the next job or the next round of funding for your start-up, so make it a priority.

Good luck to Rice Grad - I hope he finds what he is looking for.

posted by Director_Mitch @ 2:09 PM (Permalink)
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Dean Calls for U.S. Withdraw from Turkey
BURLINGTON, Vt. - Democratic front-runner Howard Dean has called for a full U.S. troop pull-out from Turkey after weekend bombings killed 24 people attending religious services at synagogues.

When informed that U.S. had no troops in the country, Dean, a governor with no foreign policy experience and head of a state with fewer than 800,000 people, pointed out that this was a good thing.

"All terrorists acts worldwide are the fault of the U.S., so this is our doing. We need a foreign policy that makes us popular overseas, so if this means letting dozens of innocent people be blown to pieces and allowing Israel to be driven into the sea, that's what we need to do. It's better than the current administration's fascist policy of sending in armed troops to set up democracy in Iraq."

"As president, I promise to allow tyranny to rein and to stop the export of democracy so we can set up affordable healthcare for U.S. citizens."

posted by Director_Mitch @ 10:41 AM (Permalink)
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Carnival of the Capitalists
Carnival of the Capitalists is up. I had something like four articles I could have submitted, but I submitted only the one on Sales and Marketing.

The good professor grouped them by subject, so go on over and browse around...


posted by Director_Mitch @ 10:12 AM (Permalink)
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BFL Member Being Sued by Infotel




It's Monday morning, so I come bright and early into my office. I check work email - not a single one (remember, I'm a Window Manager). I check my blog email since I didn't check it over the weekend and find a firestorm of emails (about 20) about a fellow-BFL member being sued by Infotel.

Now I'm pissed. As one member put it, take one of us on, take all of us on.

Long story short, Infotel is suing Calblog since Calblog has complaints in its comment section about Infotel's poor service and unethical business practices, plus some other BS issues (see letter). Now I'm a Marketing Director, but you don't have to have my experience, or be an ethical business person, to know:

1. Don't sue your customers.

2. Especially don't sue customers who are lawyers.

3. Really don't sue customers who have access to widely read blogs

4. Absolutely don't sue customers who have lots of friends who are also bloggers

5. Don't be stupid enough to sue customers who have blogger friends who are willing to work and donate money to their defense and get the word out to boycott your lousy company.

In addition, we're talking the blogosphere here. You can't bottle up information, and this lawsuit will only widen the number of people who know about this company's unethical business practices (Hey, Infotel, I called you unethical - want to come sue me?!?).

Logo created by Aaron

Update: Instapundit did a story on this - now the whole blogosphere knows.

posted by Director_Mitch @ 9:24 AM (Permalink)
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