Jury Duty: They're Making It Easier

Showed up at 7:45 this morning at Orange County Superior Court for jury duty. In my 18 years since being an eligible juror, this was the first time I actually had to show up. Every time I was called in Texas, I had just moved cities or counties and by the time my new address caught up with me I had moved again. Every time I have been called in California it was for "dial in" to see if they needed me, and they never did.

So for my first time to actually show up, I was pleasantly surprised. Orange County provides study carrols with power outlets and phone lines for laptops, and they tell you on the juror form, so I brought mine along. The only thing missing was a WIFI connection, but I made do. I tried dialing in to "blog from the courthouse", but I never established a connection, so I just worked on some reports that are due this week.

The first 1.5 hours I worked while they asked for "volunteers" who were free for long trials. They had trials scheduled for 30 days, 20 days and 10 days and reminded the 500+ of us sitting there that jury duty is compulsory and not voluntary. The only excuses they allowed to get out of these trials were if you had an employer who did not pay during jury duty, were a student, or had to take care of someone. Basically retirees, home makers and people who could take off from their jobs were hosed (why couldn't they have called me when I was on my LAST job?). I don't know what my current employer's guidelines are, but you can bet they would not want me gone for that long, so I sat and worked while the clerks processed everyone who was eligible.

After that, I was called with 50 others for a "normal" trial. A panel of 18 was assembled in the jury box and the rest of us sat in the court room. The judge then gave the timeframe - 4 days - and asked if this would inconvenience anyone. About 12 of us raised our hand and the judge quizzed us, telling us we would be "deferred" and would have to show up for jury duty again in a month. After meeting in chambers with the lawyers (it was a criminal trial), he came back and excused us, but instead of being deferred, we were to check back into the jury pool to be called in for other trials. Luckily, the clerks didn't need us, so they sent us away with a certificate saying we served out our term of jury duty, even though we were excused by 10:30am.

So I did my civic duty by spending a couple of hours in the court house on my computer from 7:45-10:00 and 30 minutes in a courtroom getting excused by a judge - not a bad deal. On my juror opinion card I asked them to add WIFI, which would make serving really easy.

California Prices Themselves Out of More Jobs

Kraft is closing one of its Nabisco plants near Los Angeles, laying off 235 people (link requires registration). This is one of two plant closings they recently announced as they try to "consolidate operations" after a dismal quarter.

Kraft states that jobs will be moved "elsewhere in the U.S.", meaning they will consolidate production in lower cost states with sane worker's comp and tax laws (no, they can't make Oreos in India since they would be stale the time they hit the U.S., although I suppose they could do it in Mexico or Canada).

This story caught my eye after seeing several giant Intel plants in Phoenix this week, each of which must employ several thousand workers. These plants aren't new, but Intel is a California company and I couldn't help thinking that each of those billion dollar plants represented jobs that were purposely put outside of California. So "offshoring" to lower cost areas isn't exactly new.

Shocking...

French Lawyer to Defend Saddam. I guess Johnny Cockrin was already booked.

If you liked the OJ trial, you are going to love Saddam's. Personally I think the U.S. should treat Saddam as a prisoner of war, but perhaps the decision is better left to the Iraqi people. I just hope they have someone with better sense than Judge Ito running this thing.

Gambling in Phoenix: No Dice

So I am in Phoenix for a customer meeting and my customer, having already been entertained to a heavy lunch a few hours earlier, demurred on dinner, leaving me to an evening alone. The city is currently packed due to the NCAA championships and spring training, so restaurants and bars are filled to overflowing. While I waited for the crowds to thin, I decided to kill some time by swinging by one of the Indian casinos in the area. I wasn't interested in gambling so much as just checking the place out.

In a nutshell: take the worst casino you have ever been to in Nevada, make it a little worse, and take out the craps tables.

The thing that really blew me away: Bingo. I took a picture, but unfortunately the camera phone defaulted to the smallest resolution, but what you are seeing here is a giant room with over 500 people (literally) with an average age of 68 playing bingo:

The rest of the place was nearly all slots, although they did have a few blackjack and poker tables. Maybe I have become a little snobbish after all my visits to Vegas, but definitely not a stop for the jet set.

Let Me Give You Some Advice...

On TV shows and movies we often see characters who hear voices in their heads on advice they once received, or even flashbacks of characters getting advice (Kung Fu, of course, being the master of flashback advice). So, I wondered, if I were TV character, what voices/flashbacks would I have?

The line between legal and illegal isn't fixed, and can come out and grab you : I often hear the voice of my business ethics prof Dr. Windsor when I read about all the shenanigans at Enron, Worldcomm, Parmalat, etc. and did a post on his advice before. Although appropriate, Dr. Windsor never referred to me as "Young Grasshopper".

Never ask a man how much he makes or how many women he's made love to: I think Dad was trying to tell me that there are just some things that should always remain private.

Automatically put aside money from each paycheck into savings so you never see it in your account: Mom's a CPA. Enough said.

Don't go outside with a wet head!: My grandmother, rest her soul, was chock full of wisdom on how to avoid getting sick, what to do when you got sick, what to do when you were no longer sick and how to avoid getting sick again. She lived to 86.

Don't put your #$*% where you wouldn't put your tongue - Dr. Bessem was a gynecologist and my friend's father, and he would sometimes come into the gameroom where we were hanging out, scotch in hand, and dispense all sorts of interesting advice that was probably more appropriate to a hormone-raging 17 year old than grandma's advice.

Interested People are Interesting People - I spent 6 years at summer camp as camper and counselor and we always had a "thought of the day". Most were trite truisms we have all heard before. Sunday was always a Bible verse. But a few stuck in my head that were valuable as I grew up and entered the business world, like this one. This is similar to "People's favorite subject is themselves", and whether on a date or doing sales, this is good advice.

I have a bunch more, but a blogger friend of mine told me to always keep my posts short to keep them interesting.

From the Who Cares Department

Elvis Presley's Roots Traced to Scottish Village

The guy's been dead for a few decades now (Ed: or IS he?) and even if he were alive, does anyone really care? (Ed: There's a whole fan base that will now go to this village he never went to because some ancestor is supposedly from there).

Telling Headlines from the Middle East

Some recent headlines catching my eye that are pretty telling of the "bizzaro world" that Arabs and Europeans live in:

Hamas Vows Revenge - A group that kills as many Israelis as it cans through terrorism promises to kill as many Israelis as it can through terrorism? Make any sense to you? They already do as much as they can to kill innocent civilians, so there is no reason for the Israeli government NOT to go and systematically kill each and every member they can.

European Leaders Condemn Yassin Killing - A bus load of Israelis gets blown up and European leaders yawn. 201 Spaniards get blown up and they blame the U.S. A homicidal maniac gets killed and Europe goes apoplectic.

Hamas Warns It Will Retaliate Against U.S. - I guess these guys haven't kept up with the news, but the U.S. goes after and eliminate terrorists, terrorist groups and countries that harbor them. I think they are hoping for a Kerry win in November, in which case this strategy would make sense.

Sopranos Episode 3: Season Finds Its Pace

Great episode tonight: Complex plot developments. High drama. Random acts of violence. This is the Sopranos I know and love. Most of tonight's episode concentrated on the Johnny Sack power struggle and Junior, although I liked the subplot of the battle between La Manna and Paulie and the poor lawn men caught in the middle. It looks like the La Manna/Paulie thing is going to heat up even more next week.

BFL "Mini" Lunch

Friday's Bear Flag League lunch was a small, if very fun event. There were only three of us: Calblog (Justene), Daily Prescott (Patrick) and your's truly. It was simply too hard for a lot of people to make a lunch event during a work day and a lot of "maybes" became "nos", so Justene announced that all future events will be on the weekend (like the last one, which had a much larger turn out).

The smallness of the group didn't detract from the conversation as the three of us chatted away for nearly two hours. We would have sat there longer if it weren't for a personal errand that Justene had and a business meeting I had (Patrick had the day off). Since it was only the three of us, I decided not to take pics.

Special thanks for Justene for picking up the tab! I hope to make the weekend event next month and meet more of my fellow BFL bloggers.

Also, here are some pics from the lovely Pasadena court house:

Cigar Review: Ashton Classic Esquire

Enjoyed an Ashton after a home-cooked steak on my coal-fired grill (pissing off both environmentalists and animal rights activists at the same time). I had a Ashton Classic Esquire, one of two I received as stocking stuffers this last Christmas. The cigar had a rich, smooth, pleasant taste, but it did have a bit of an after-taste which detracted from the experience, knocking some points off its rating. It also had an uneven burn, which I find annoying, but isn't always the fault of the producer since it could be caused by improper storage (I have a proper humidor which I check regularly, but I wouldn't call myself a storage expert).

Overall, a very good cigar: four out of five stars, or keeping with my 100 point scoring system I used when I started these reviews, 83 out of 100. Ashton markets themself as Pleasure Beyond Expectation, and I think they produce a very good cigar, but not the top of the line.

No "Real" Posts Today

I am heading out to a Bear Flag League Lunch so will be away from the computer today. It will take me over an hour to drive there, but I managed to wrangle a business meeting in the area afterwords, so at least I can get reimbursed for the mileage (heh). It will be a smaller gathering than last weekend's BFL brunch, but I hope to post a few pictures this weekend.

Blogging and Marketing

An entry over at Techdirt comments on an article about the attempted use by marketers to use blogs. The direct link to the article is here, and is a rant on what is admittedly the questionable marketing practice of companies paying people to leave positive product comments on blogs. While the author has a point, the problem is that she damns by association nearly all internet marketing to "sleaze" and promises "never trust a blogger's recommendations again!". (I'm crushed she won't trust my positive review of Netflix or the fact that I thought Last Samurai was a pretty good movie).

It's a marketer's job is to find new ways to reach potential customers, and the fact that marketers are trying to use blogs should be seen as a positive - it is an indicator of the rise of the stature and popularity of blogs. That being said, there is definitely a right way and a wrong way that marketers can use blogs:

WRONG: Paying people to leave comments/blog about products - This is what the author was ranting about and is probably not a common or successful practice. Instapundit probably generated a lot of potential sales leads when he blogged about cookware, but imagine how much credibility that site would lose if it was found out he was paid to write about it. Even the 50-70 people who hit this blog daily would probably stop coming by if it was found out I took money for shilling for Netflix (yes, it was my honest, unpaid, opinion).

There is also the issue of its effectiveness versus the costs. There are a lot more cost efficient and proven methods to generate sales leads than paying 5-6 people to leave positive comments about a new video game in some gaming blog. If people like your product, chances are they will blog about it for free.

RIGHT: Create a Blog About You, Your Company, or Area of Expertise - As I mentioned in the comments section in Techdirt, Techdirt itself is an advertisement. The guy who writes the site provides consulting and other services to companies, and when I first hit his site, I contacted him to find out about his services since I liked his blog, the way he wrote, and the information he provided.

Essentially, blogs seem like a good marketing tool for personal services such as market consulting, legal services and the like. If you are a market consultant, create a marketing blog to talk about your expertise. Similarly, if you are a lawyer, create a blog about new laws and rulings. Heck, I bet a plumber who created a blog about his daily travails would probably pick up some additional business.


So "blog marketing" (bloggeting?) is not an evil if done honestly.

Remember: They're Still Commies

Very appropriate news for the blogosphere:

China Targets Blogs in Latest Internet Censorship - China is targeting blogs - personal pages for Internet users (DM: Oh, that's what they are!) - in its latest attempt to censor the increasing popularity of the web.

I have always been ambivalent about the U.S. treatment of China. The strategy has been to open them up to trade and make them capitalists, creating a growing middle class that would demand democratic reforms (sort of a reverse Marxism). While this strategy does seem to be working long-term, expect moves like this by the installed base of bureaucrats to keep a hold of information, and thus power.

Consumer Review: Netflix

Thumbs up! I have been thinking about signing up Neflix for half a year now and finally did it after wandering into my local Blockbuster and finding absolutely nothing to rent (never mind the fact that I pay $15 a month for HBO and except for the Sopranos, they never seem to have anything on).

For those of you not familiar with them, Netflix is a video rental company (DVD only) that operates through the internet and mail. You sign up over the internet for the movies you want to watch and they mail you the first three in your queue (you can also sign up for an 8 video package). You keep the movies as long as you want - a week, a month, whatever. When you are done with a movie, you send it back in the pre-paid envelope and they mail you the next movie on your queue.

You can watch any number of movies you want for a flat fee of $20 a month, so if you rent more than five movies a month from Blockbuster, you are in the money. In only my first week I have already received my sixth movie. The mail times are great (for me, at least). It took one day from the time I signed up until I received my first movies, and it is a two day turn from the time I return a movie until I get the next one in my queue (one day for them to get, one day for me to receive).

Another nice feature of Netflix is their browsing and recommendation software. Similar to Amazon, you rate the movies you have seen and they will suggest titles based on your selections. It's fun to sit down for a few minutes at a time and rate movies - I have done it for 500 titles so far, and I really don't consider myself a serious movie watcher.

The one unknown is the availability of "hot" new releases, but with my queue of over a dozen movies and growing, I won't mind if it takes a few extra days to get a new release versus dealing with Blockbuster. One nice feature I am looking forward to is getting a few movies to take with me for long business trips. With no late fee, I can take them with me and watch on the plane, hotel room, etc. on my DVD playing laptop and just mail them back when I get home.

Netflix's business model is being copied by several others, including Walmart, and there are indications that even Blockbuster will do something similar, so I think they hit on something here.

Update: I took a look into their stock since I liked their service, but with a PE of 341 and a business model that can be copied, I'll cheer from the sidelines.

How Do Democrats Handle Good Economic News?

By ignoring it. Have you seen any major play of the following stories today? (links require paid subscription):

Hiring Plans Increase, Survey Says - In the highest showing in three years, 28% of U.S. employers plan to add workers in the second quarter, according to a closely followed employment survey

Industrial Production Rises 0.7% - U.S. industrial production grew a stronger-than-expected 0.7% in February as factories raised output of such items as cars, computers and semiconductors.

Kerry needs a poor economy to have a chance in the election, so I expect him to continue to talk about jobs as the unemployment rate decreases, complain about the economy as it increases output, and rail against "outsourcing" as foreign companies add U.S. jobs at a faster clip than those being lost to outsourcing.

It's actually rather sad that Kerry has to present a fantasy world to the electorate in order to get elected. It's even sadder that a lot of people believe him.

Yeah, Let's Boycott All Those Products From Spain

Now that the cowards from Spain are cutting and running (you know, they are the SIXTH largest force in Iraq), there have been calls to boycott all those goods from Spain like...um, products such as...well, they really don't produce anything the world wants, do they? (Ed: Tapas?) At least the Poles produce some fine vodka.

So they'll be a country of cowards safe in their little homes producing nothing the world wants while being safe from the terrorists who dictate their domestic policy.

Some Outsourcing Data You Won't See Get Much Play

The WSJ reports (link requires paid subscription) that more jobs are outsourced TO the U.S. than are outsourced FROM the U.S. Long story short, the U.S. has a net "inflow" of $53.6 billion outsourcing jobs ($131 billion sent to the U.S. for outsourcing work versus $77.4 billion outbound). In addition:

- The U.S. inbound (more jobs here) number is up $8.4 billion from 2002 to 2003.

- The U.S. outbound (exported jobs) is up $8 billion from 2002 to 2003.

So the increase in 2002 outsourcing from the U.S was more than matched by outsourcing to the U.S.

I don't think outsourcing jobs is a good thing, and I think some companies are doing it without looking at all the financial numbers or project issues (Dell has reversed some outsourcing as has some software companies). But the bottom line is outsourcing is the decision of companies, not the government. If you listen to politicians, you won't get the whole story. You'll hear sad stories about software people or call center people who lost their jobs, but you won't hear the fact that limiting outbound outsourcing will result in retaliatory measures from other countries that will hurt more Americans than it will help.

The people clamoring for outsourcing laws are of course the people most affected by it. And they have no compunction if more people lose their jobs, as long as they get in or stay in theirs. I am not blaming them - it's human nature. But if the job of the economy is to provide the most economic benefits to the most number of people, then laws limiting outsourcing are not the way to go.

Sopranos Episode 2: Booooring

Okay, maybe they're still setting up the plot lines, but I practically fell asleep in tonight's episode. Yeah, there are some questions like: is Tony's cousin Tony really going legit after getting out of prison, or is this some set-up? Are the feds finally going to get some dirt on Tony?

As the final season of Sopranos, bets are that Tony gets wacked - how better to end a series on a mobster? So all the plot lines on the fed crackdowns seem like a red herring to me.

Message to Spanish Government: Appease Terrorists

Like a lot of democrats, the electorate in Spain wants their government to do anything and everything to appease terrorists: Spaniards Vote Out Government Over Iraq, Bombing.

After all, the world would be such a better place with the Taliban and Saddam in power, and if Western nations did nothing, then all terrorism would go away, wouldn't it?

Update: Outside the Beltway is thinking along the same lines: Terrorists Winning in Spain.

Another Update: All sorts of similar commentary from Instapundit to War Watch, and lots of others. Seems to be the theme of the day this Sunday.

Perhaps He Needs Some Perspective

What do you think Kerry was talking about when he criticized "attack squads"?

a) Karl Rove

b) Mass murder of 200 people




While he is boo-hooing over verbal slights, terrorism continues unabated in the world. And if he can't take a few sticks and stones, what's he going to do under real fire?

I wonder if those "foreign leader" endorsements Kerry claimed to have changed in the last 48 hours?

Well, I Just Had To Do It Too

I used to have a Friday quiz, so this can count as the Thursday warm-up, but is already all over the blogosphere: Libertarian Purity Test. I scored a 51, just into the range of medium-core libertarian:

You are a medium-core libertarian, probably self-consciously so. Your friends probably encourage you to quit talking about your views so much

No, not really, but funny anyway.

Now I'm Happy She Was Convicted

Apparently Martha was a big-time contributor to democratic causes. I guess Kerry meant to say democrats are lying and crooked.

To Sopranos Watchers

Maybe a little risqué for a family blog, but does anyone think that the "dream scene" in this week's episode used a body double, or do you think that was Lorraine Bracco? Not that I focus on nudity or anything...

This week's episode just seemed to be setting up the plot lines for the season, so a good episode, if not entirely exciting. Like Miller's Time, I was horrified by the one act of killing, although that could turn out to be a plot line for future episodes.

(and I will spare you blog entries on other shows since this is pretty much the only series I watch on television)

We Work For Little Pieces of Paper

Just Procrastinating links to a story of a woman who tried to spend a “million dollar bill” at Wallmart. Lots of people have seen these novelty items in the store and it surprises me that someone was stupid enough to try to pass one off as real currency (but isn’t there a saying about never underestimating the stupidity of the American people?).

The only difference between her novelty item and a real bill (besides the technical aspects of the type of paper and printing method) is the fact that our government says a $20 bill is “money”. That’s it: it’s money since the government says it is (fiat currency). If you think about it, it’s a little strange – we work for and then buy all sorts of goods and services by passing these little pieces of paper around. And more recently, all this is done virtually with bits of data being transferred between banks, credit unions, credit card companies and the like with no paper at all.

The evolution of money is an interesting topic and one of the reasons I got into collecting obsolete U.S. currency. Besides the historical and economic history in old currency, many of the old bills are like little pieces of art compared to the monopoly money our government is churning out today.

I am what is called a “type” collector. Once I get a type of currency I move on to the next note (other people collect series, serial numbers, portaits, signatures, the list is nearly endless). For example, here are just a few of the types of small-size $1 notes issued since 1928 (all from my collection):

Note that this small slice of my collection contains silver certificates and a U.S. note. Other types of money that have been issued include gold certificates, national bank notes, federal reserve bank notes (FRBN), and most recently federal reserve notes (FRN). This is another interesting aspect of collecting, which is understanding the different schemes the government has tried to create money.

Besides types of notes, U.S. currency can be broadly divided into “large size” and “small size” notes, the small size notes being the size of the notes in your wallet, which started being issued in 1928 as a way to save money on printing costs. Large size notes tend to be more expensive due to their age, but are also the most beautiful, interesting and rarest notes in the hobby since the larger size gave the engraver more space to show his craft, as shown by this obverse of the 1914 $1 Federal Reserve Bank Note (FRBN) in my collection:




And for that woman? She should have known that the largest bill ever printed by the U.S. government was $100,000, but was used only for internal transfers between the federal banks and never put (and illegal to posses) in private circulaiton




The largest bill ever printed for general circulation was $10,000, and although ALL U.S. currency ever issued is redeemable at face value at your nearest bank, this bill would fetch well into the six figures in a private sale (most known examples are in museums).




The largest "current" bill in circulation is $100, so if you see anything larger than this it is either a phony or worth a lot more than its face value as a collector's item ($1000 bills are still out there and worth anywhere from $1200 up, so don't spend them as cash).

If You Are Against Outsourcing, You Must Be Against The "Do Not Call Registry"

So you are upset about Americans losing jobs?

1. Telemarketing Jobs Lost Due to "Do Not Call List" - 2 million to 6.5 million, according to the Direct Marketing Association.

2. Jobs Lost in U.S. Due to Outsourcing - Hard to find an exact number for an issue so many people are upset about, but halfway down this article it states that Forester Research estimates 3.3 million jobs will be be outsourced by 2015

So if you are upset about 3.3 million jobs going overseas in the next decade and want to so something, it seems to me that getting rid of the Do Not Call Registry will be a much faster and easier way to bring back jobs to America. After all, as I stated before, one of the riskiest things about doing business in the U.S. is being regulated out of existance by the government - which also leads to a loss of jobs - which is what happened to telemarketers.

Funny, getting rid of those 2 million+ telemarketing jobs was soooo popular with politicians of both stripes...

Political Dictate Versus Consumer Choice

Overseas outsourcing is a political hot potato these days and seeing Kerry pandering to the electorate by suggesting schemes that will do nothing to stop it would be funny if it weren’t for the fact that each suggestion represents a giant government intrusion into how businesses allocate resources.

The government will not create or save jobs by dictating to companies whom to hire or how to allocate resources. All it does is make business reluctant to hire in the first place.

If outsourcing is a concern to Americans, a better solution would be for companies to offer consumers a choice. In today’s WSJ (requires paid subscription) there is an article about E-Loan doing just this by giving their customers the following choice:
1. Have your loan processed in India for fast turn around, or
2. Have your loan processed the U.S., which will take, at minimum, two days longer than if you choose India (but with no additional cost)

I expect to see more of this, probably with monetary incentives given to customers who choose overseas support and those picking U.S. support paying more. After all, those who want to prevent offshoring should be willing to pay more for customer support, 24 hour service and fast turn around to keep jobs in the U.S. The rest of us who don’t have a lot of money to throw around can save a few bucks by having our services go to the place where it saves us money or gives us faster service, or pick according to the situation (I don't care if my PC support is in India, but I think I will keep my tax preparer state-side, but it's MY choice, and not some politician limiting my choices).

After all, isn’t one of the policies of the Left the “right to choose”? (well, they believe in the right to choose as long as they agree with your choice)

If I Am In A Real Job, How Come I am Not Busy?

I forgot about one of the drawbacks of working in a large organization: waiting for people to get back to you. I was a flurry of activity this morning with over a dozen outbound phone calls and emails requesting information and material I need to move forward on a variety of projects.

Now I'm waiting.

One of the problems is not being in headquarters - I can't go down the hall and camp in someone's office until I get the information I need (a good strategy), or grab the person I need as they pass in the hall (I think most men will agree that some of the most productive meetings in large corporations happen in the wash room. If you're standing there doing your business and the person you need comes in, it's not like they're going anywhere for the next few minutes and they can't exactly ignore you).

I suppose I could do something that doesn't need input from anyone - maybe some self-training - but blogging is much more fun.

Since When Did Coffee Need Ordering Instructions?

I was at Starbucks this morning for my daily amphetamine caffeine fix and noticed that, in order to help their clients, Starbucks has published an instruction book on how to order coffee.

Obviously this book is not for boring people like me (just coffee, please), but for people who like showing off how sophisticated they by ordering complicated drinks (you know the type). Here are the instructions for entering your order at Starbucks and some examples:

Step 1: Cup
Step 2: Shots and Size
Step 3: Syrup
Step 4: Milk and Other Modifiers
Step 5: Drink

So you order an Iced, decaf, tripple-grande, cinnamon no-fat, no-whip mocha, or Grande quad ristretto non-fat dry cappuccino.

Got it? Me neither. I'll just stick to coffee. It's the caffeine that's important anyway. And you can check your personality type by entering your Starbucks order here.

The Search for Blame is Always Successful

Quite frankly, I am a little surprised at the Martha Stewart Verdict. I am not a lawyer or legal scholar, and I didn't follow the case closely, but based on what I knew about the case it seemed that the government's case was pretty weak and nothing more than a political effort to show a few CEOs swinging from lamp posts after the bursting of the internet bubble, Enron, Worldcom, etc.

However, I am not holding Martha blameless. Here are a few pointers that were hammered into my head by my business ethics prof (It was a fun class. The prof was like a young version of Professor Kingsfield from The Paper Chase, intellectually skewering young minds that would dare debate with him - and you had no choice but to debate him since he would call on you, ask your opinion about the case being discussed and automatically take the opposite view):

The Line Between Legal and Illegal Isn't Fixed - The prof drew up a wavy line on the board and said that was the line between legal and illegal. And - oh yes - this wavy line moved up and down. In other words, things that were perfectly legal one year could easily be found to be illegal the next year. And a lot of it depended on politics. If you want to stay clean, DON'T stay on the "just legal" side of the line - you could find yourself on the wrong side of the line in a heartbeat. Stay FAR onto the legal side of the line and you will stay in the clear.

Use the Smell Test - The prof liked this one and used it throughout the semester. If something even smelled unethical - even if it was legal - avoid it like the plague. During case study discussions he would often pick out a hapless classmate and simply ask "Does this pass the smell test?". Of course, whatever he said the prof would take the opposite view, so the trick was always to back up your opinion with facts.

The U.S. is NOT the Safest Political Place to Do Business - This was a good lecture. The topic was "safest political places to do business in the world". Everyone assumed that we were going to talk about countries that have a Dictator of the Month. The prof said he was going to start listing countries from top (safest) to bottom. "Wait", he stopped at turned to the class, "who do you think is first?". Everyone assumed the U.S. Wrong! The U.S. wasn't even in the top five.

The risk of doing business in the U.S. is being too successful. Become too big a target and the government will come after you, guaranteed. Standard Oil (broken up the government despite the fact that oil prices dropped for consumers in every single year of its existence), Microsoft (constantly on the defense from government), Halliburton (constantly on defense from the Left), the list goes on and on and on. Or you can be regulated out of existence, have your profits taxed away (anyone remember the Windfall Profits Tax on oil companies?), or attacked just for doing economically savy business decisions (there was an item today on CNN attacking companies for doing things to lower their taxes - like putting subsidiaries overseas. Lowering your taxes isn't illegal - avoiding them is - and there was nothing illegal by what these companies did - and I would say it would pass the smell test since this is like being attacked for deducting your mortgage interest, but my prof would, of course, debate me on that).

This goes into the whole discussion of business bashing by politicians, typically the Left. They love jobs but hate the businesses that provide them. I have never have figured this one out.

The Very Big Fish and The Very Small Fish Typically Get Away - This little rule of thumb didn't hold up for Martha (and maybe not applicable after 10 years): The law is like a fishing net. The really big fish can break through and get away. The really small fish slip through the holes in the net and aren't interesting to catch anyway. It's all the medium sized fished that get caught and eaten.

The warning 10 years ago was this: If as a middle manager at a company you know about malfeasance going on, you are more likely to serve time than the CEO (so come clean, turn State's, etc.). I think this was true a decade ago when I was in business school, but I think after the past few years with Enron and what not, the CEO is more likely to serve than the middle manager. But I think it is still something to keep in mind.

The Search for Blame is Always Successful - This wasn't in business school, but a quote I read somewhere (and can't find who to attribute it to), but a truism whether discussing political grandstanding by prosecutors or office politics.


So while I disagree with Martha's conviction, I think she could have avoided her situation all together if she had known about these little lessons.

Dammit Jim I'm a robot not a doctor.

Rorschach here with a small observation. When I saw this article from engadget:
Japan Seeks Robotic Help in Caring for the Aged



am I the only one who thought of good old Capt. Pike's chair?



Mrs. Hashimoto! Please beep once for shampoo and twice for conditioner!

Just asking.

Convergence: Inevitable or Marketing Minefield?

Convergence is a word thrown around a lot in several industries - mainly by marketing people like myself - to describe new products that will combine the functions of several distinct products. Today, the term can be found in marketing literature on portable devices (converging the portable phone, PDA, and digital camera), the home network (converging the TV and PC systems in the home), and in several other areas. But these aren't the first areas where convergence has been attempted. While some convergence areas look like a sure thing, a look at earlier efforts at convergence shows that the results aren't always pretty:

The post war boom of the 1950s saw unprecedented growth in purchases of both cars and leisure boats. Some marketing genius decided why not combine them into one?!? While the boatcar did make it easier to tow your leisure craft to the nearest lake or bay, the inability to throw out a good cast from a fishing rod relegated this to the collectors' market, where the few that still exist bring in high prices today.


After the fiasco of the carboat, the boys in marketing (they were all boys back then) went back to the drawing board and figured out their problem: they mixed the wrong product with the car. It should have been a plane instead of a boat! Alas, this attempt also resulted in failure, mainly due to the inability to find wide enough parking places at the new indoor malls that were starting to crop up by the end of the decade.


The 1970s saw new advances in science and the produce people figured they would get into the convergence game by combining two vegetables few liked into a single one everyone could hate. They succeeded by creating a vegetable that had the blandness of cauliflower with the rough texture of broccoli. While you can occasionally find broccoflower in the store, it has never been offered at any of the finer (or less fine) dining establishments of the U.S.


The 1980s found convergence success in the Multifunctional Printer (MFP) by combining four products that functioned poorly by themselves - fax machine, printer, copier and scanner - into a single product that functioned even worse. But people needed to reclaim desk space from all the gadgets that were taking over their office, and trying to get help from a single source when things went wrong was easier than trying to call four different help lines.


The 1990s saw politicos getting onto the convergence bandwagon with their introduction of Billary. Fortunately the initial product was rejected, although there is a reintroduction planned for 2008.

And the 00s? I think we'll see many more attempts my marketers to converge dissimilar products since it is easier for a marketing person to combine two or more products that are already on the market than to create a brand new product. The proposed business plan is deemed less "risky" since markets already exist for the current single products, meaning it is easier to get buy-in from management. Sometime convergent products make sense, but as I think I have shown here, the result is often ugly.

Extra Credit: Can anyone name the "convergence product" from a Classic Saturday Night Live "commerical"?

Hotels and WIFI

The hotel industry gets it.

I used to travel extensively, but things slowed down with unemployment and limited travel in my last job, so I haven't traveled a lot for business in the last two years. I am now traveling again (I'm on a one week swing through North America now) and am pleasantly surprised to find that (so far) 100% of the hotels I have stayed at have all offered free WIFI in the room. And I'm talking mid-range business hotels like Crown Plaza and Residence Inn. This is a big service to business travelors, and hotels that offer it definitely get a big plus in my book.

So when Rorschach leaves the comment Damn boy, you blog more on the road than at home!, it is a combination of having handy WIFI access along with some dead time on my hands. On this trip I spent a couple of days at corporate HQ where there were no dinners and the client visits haven't included any dinners yet (just lunches), so having an internet connection plus a few hours in a hotel room alone equates to a lot of email and blogging.

Beats drinking in the bar, I guess. Although in this hotel they did inform me that the WIFI DOES reach into the hotel bar, so if later blog entries this evening seem incoherent...

Everything You Wanted to Know About Semiconductor Packaging…

(but were afraid to ask).

I don’t know how many times I have been stopped on the street by people with a burning desire to know the finer points of semiconductor packaging. And then I get emails like this one from “Stephen”:

Director Mitch, I have been unable to sleep. I have been wondering about the intricacies of semiconductor packaging including ecapsulation, singulation and if backgrinding is always necessary. Please answer some of these questions so I can stop tossing and turning at night.

So, Dear Readers, I will start a series of entries that will answer these burning questions so many of you have. But let’s start from the beginning.

Intro: What is a Semiconductor and Why is it “Packaged”


(note: For this first entry I am going to assume the reader has NO knowledge of electronics, so you engineers go read Gizmodo or something).

A semiconductor is the technical name for what most people refer to as a “computer chip” (even when they are used in things other than computers). As the name implies, a semiconductor conducts (transmits) electricity neither particularly well, nor particularly badly. But semiconductor material can be modified through manufacturing processes to increase or decrease its electrical flow through desired regions to create an electrical circuit.

Think of having a box in front of you with a transparent front so you can see through it. There is water at the top, sand trapped in the middle, and nothing (an air pocket) on the very bottom. The sand doesn’t stop the water, but it doesn’t really let it flow - the sand is a semiconductor of water - the water sort of permeates the sand and eventually flows to the bottom, which isn’t particularly useful. But by creating little paths in the sand you could make the water flow exactly where you want it to in order to do something useful, maybe make it turn little water wheels. And by adding some additional materials to the sand (“doping”) you could make sure that the areas where you didn’t want water to flow would stay impermeable to water.




The process of making a path in the sand and adding materials to prevent water from flowing into the unwanted regions is similar to making an electrical circuit in a semiconductor material - the sand is the semiconductor material and the water is electricity (and the height of the water above the bottom is potential, or voltage, and the viscosity of the water is electron flow, and the size of the box…). Okay, in reality semiconductor manufacturing is a lot more complicated, but this is a good analogy for the layman.

The most common semiconductor material is silicon, the main component of sand (so the analogy is apt in more than one way).

So you made your circuit on a semiconductor material, and it comes out as a small, flat, rigid rectangle, like a small piece of glass (this is actually where the term computer “chip” gets its name since these look like little chips of…something. “Chip” actually isn’t used in the semiconductor industry at all. The very technical term in the industry for a raw chip like this is “die”, although old timers sometimes use the term “bar”. The etymology of these terms is unclear, but “bar” may be a reference to the original Kilby experiment – the first integrated circuit - although this term is now becoming obsolete).




You now need a way hook up a power supply to get it going and you need a way to get data on and off the thing. You also need to make sure this fragile thing doesn’t break, get wet, or shatter. And you do of this by putting it into a semiconductor package.



The package provides protection to the semiconductor from the elements (heat, humidity, etc.) as well as provides pathways to the “external world”, called “leads” where voltage can be input and data (electrical 0s and 1s) can be put on and taken off the thing. This is the end "semiconductor" device that is used to design all the consumer electronics goodies in your home.

However, a single chip usually can't do everything in a computer, disk drive, what have you. So they are put together with other chips on a printed circuit board (PCB) to create a complete product (computer, CD player, etc.).




One of the goals of both the semiconductor and packaging industries is to integrate more and more of these different chips that are on a PCB into fewer chips in order to reduce size and cost of the end product, and is the reason why everything electronic in the last 30 years has shrunk so much. Both industries (semiconductors and packaging) invest literally billions of dollars a year in order to achieve this goal and the technologies involved to do this on a mass production level are literally amazing. I hope to go into some detail on these technologies in future entries.

Maybe the Reason They're Unemployed is NOT About Offshoring

Here are a few reader comments to a CNN article on offshoring. My company has more than half a dozen tech jobs open and I guarantee that no one who writes something like this would ever get a job in a position I had any decision making authority on.

I want to find a political party or movement that will try to save American jobs. I am ready to vote for the Communist Party, the Nazi Party, or whatever it takes. The system we have now is a disaster. The system we have now is KILLING ME...If an enraged laid-off American engineer were to go up to his Indian replacement, and shoot him dead -- if I were on the jury the verdict would be NOT GUILTY."

"I don't give a hoot how much you and other pseudo-intellectuals write about paradigm shifts or globalization or off-shoring or whatever tired cliche you're recycling this week: American white-collar workers are going to fight against off-shoring with their votes. A jobless, highly educated, and angry voter doesn't give a rat's ass what you and the other windbags at consultancies like McKinsey or Gartner have to say

Do they think this attitude doesn't show up at interviews? You think any manager in their right mind wants to have anything to do with them?

I was unemployed for six months during the tech bust, and it was one of the more depressing periods of my life (and my wife was laid off at the same time, so there was no fall-back). However, I never blamed the government for losing my job nor looked to the government to pass special laws to get me a new one. If worse came to worse I would rather dig ditches than try to get a government handout job. Unemployment is now the average of what it was during the entire Clinton administration, and, as a manager in tech, I see dozens of open jobs and unemployed people I know getting jobs (all 42 people at my busted tech start-up are working in some capacity).

Those still having problems finding something won't have their problem magically solved by some politician in Washington trying to make offshoring illegal. Besides the practical issues (what are you going to do? Turn off the internet?), how fast do you think Michelinn, Toyota, Samsung and the thousands of other foreign companies that hire millions of American workers would retaliate?

I remember the oil bust in the mid 80s when well over 500,000 people lost their high paying jobs due to falling oil prices (my father's company went from 50 people to him and a secretary). The collective response of the nation? Yawn. But did the Nation benefit more from the lower oil prices everyone paid, or are all those oil workers, petroleum engineers and geologists still unemployed 20 years later? (hint, I occasionally run into a Chem-E or a Pet-E in high tech companies. Dad is now doing environmental consulting, nothing his Mech-E trained him for). These guys trained decades in the oil industry and had to start over. Maybe some of those people could provide advice to those going through the same thing today.

Who's Monitoring This Network?

I'm on the road today visiting HQ before hitting a few customers. I attached my computer to the HQ network and find there is INTERNET MONITORING/BLOCKING SOFTWARE ON THE HQ NETWORK!

I am a little amazed. I have worked at MUCH larger corporations and at a small start-up where internet blocking didn't exist. And it wasn't porn I was trying out. Here is some of the sites blocked:

Yahoo Mail - I do quite a bit of personal mail for personal correspondence, some side consulting, and for managing and communicating for this blog. The main Yahoo site and home page weren't blocked, but mail.yahoo.com was. This is actually what pissed me off - I actually get quite a bit of info to my one of my personal accounts that helps me out considerably in my present job. And it's not like I couldn't have my internet mail sites auto-forward to my corporate account (and there is no written restriction on doing personal correspondence on corporate email).

Business Pundit - I had some time to kill while I waited for my VP for lunch so decided to cruise some blogs. BP was blocked ("ENTERTAINMENT SITE"), but Instapundit, the most frequented blog in the world, wasn't (so, Rob, you are considered the bigger blogger at my company. Congratulations!). My own site wasn't blocked (I thought they would put a block up for anything off Blogger), but I wasn't going to hit it too many times since the troll who monitors the network may check it out and block it.

Ebay - This wasn't completely blocked (I checked it for an auction I was holding). The software said "Blocked for Personal Use. Hit Button to continue for Business Use". It's not like my manager would care, but I decided not to push it.

What shocked me is that the culture of this company doesn't seem to be one that would do something like this. Management is pretty laid back, so my guess is that this is some pet project of someone in IS, or more likely HR. Luckily my hotel has WIFI (I was going to go to a Starbucks down the road, but this is more convenient), so I can do my personal internet cruising when I get "home" in the evening. How frustrating.

Is anyone familiar with "forwarding" sites or other work-arounds for this type of site-blocking software?