Week 32
I recently listened to an episode of This American Life called “When Patents Attack!”. Something that surprised me while listening was that while I think of patents as being mostly for gadgets and the kinds of products you see on infomercials, patents have become a huge factor in the software and online industries, to the tune of billions of dollars [..]
Patents are devolving into something the opposite of its original intent: a tool for tech-industry shakedowns and costly litigation [..]
[A patent has been awarded for] method for concealing partial baldness (combover) [..]
Many of [the ..] redundant patents are made in an attempt to capitalize on fundamental systems and behaviours in technology and online [Examples:]
"Backing Up Data Online". "Providing a User Interface". "Pop-up Windows on The Web".
Since Barack Obama entered the White House, the number of long-term unemployed Americans has doubled from 2.7 million to 5.4 million. During the same time, the price of a gallon of gasoline has risen from $1.85 to $3.49.
The U.S. government says that the number of Americans “not in the labor force” rose by 17.9 million between 2000 and 2011. During the entire decade of the 1980s, the number of Americans “not in the labor force” rose by only 1.7 million.
Eight million Americans have “left the labor force” since the recession supposedly ended. If those Americans were added back into the unemployment figures, the unemployment rate would be somewhere up around 12 percent.
The average duration of unemployment in the United States is nearly three times as long as it was back in the year 2000.
The unemployment rate in the U.S. has been above 8 percent for 40 months in a row, and 42 percent of all unemployed Americans have been out of work for at least half a year.
I would argue, again, the behaviour outlined above is also a function of distance.
When we label someone, in our minds and eventually during conversation to someone else we are passing information about that person. That information, in turn, will / can be used to (indirectly, additively) to form a trust network in a society. It will spread. You label in one town, and it might take effect in another town.
But, in the case of US, over vast distances, through few people in a populace, all the nuances of circumstance, mood that might have caused a negative feeling about someone might not carry over to another town. So you make up your mind, early (few people, vast landscape also means you are facing bigger dangers that might be more immediate in nature), so instead of bazillion nuances about someone, if the person is "bad enough" you say "he is an asshole". That will carry over to the next town, my friend. Or the reverse, you can also say someone is a "good man".
Done.
Alex Boldt: "The American friendliness is fragile however and is mixed with a strange moralistic streak: if somebody does anything considered morally wrong, the normal sympathy and empathy is immediately and utterly withdrawn and replaced by heart-felt condemnation"
"It could be said (some) religions try to replicate the hunger-feasting cycle by their fasting process. Jewish tradition has it, Budhists have it, and so does Islam. In Islam there is the 30 day fasting period, but then I see these Muslims sometimes who wake up pre-dawn and stuff themselves with food, so that the hunger period that follows is "easier on them". When you read the literature (and history) on this subject, that does not seem to be part of the religion. Even if you wake up pre-dawn, the eating is supposed to be light, and that fits with the hunter-gatherer mode of living. It is interesting how ppl can exploit loopholes for their own ease of living and claim it is the tradition, turning something potentially healthy into a dieting nightmare"
So basically what happened is this: FB has an internal product which competes with this poor guy's app that uses Facebook Connect (an authorization mechanism through which you can accept FB users, and use their friendship data -with their permission-, so you dont have to maintain user related code or data)
Now, first they call this person in the meeting under false pretenses, asking for "demo" of his app and so forth.. But what they really wanted to do was to squeeze him out of the game. He was cornered because he is using a key component of his (now) competitor.
This is not a put-up-or-shut-up situation either. Facebook attracts developers by making its platform available to all which helps it to enlarge its user base, they turn out products that in turn brings more customers, then more developers, on and on.. But then, it tries get cute, and offer products that use its own platform. Then all of a sudden Facebook starts competing with its own solution providers.
I need to be blunt about the situation -- the events outlined above is monopolistic behaviour and should be investigated under Antitrust Law. The situation is no different than Microsoft favoring its own browser on its own OS, screwing Netscape in the process, or working shoddy deals with OEM's to push others out of the game. It is exactly, the, same, thing. Facebook needs to draw a clear line between its platform, and its products which might compete with other products developed by people outside their company.
Generally speaking: we see again that concentration is bad; as bad in hi-tech as it was in industrial (old) tech. And as we get deeper into Third Wave, this form of concentration will start feeling the heat, just like commercial software development has largely been replaced by open source now for infrastructural projects -- open source being a disconnected model and more in line with the zeitgeist. In the long run a similar faith awaits today's "platforms"; I am guessing solutions such as Diaspora who aim to let each node on the Net to be able to "serve" content, data, services, "friendship graph" on top of being passive users of these services, will carry the day.
"On June 13, 2012, at 4:30 p.m., I attended a meeting at Facebook HQ in Menlo Park, California. In addition to myself, the meeting was attended by [bunch of VPs] at Facebook. The execs in the room made clear that the success of my product [which uses Facebook] would be an impediment to [Facebook's] ad revenue financial goals, and thus even offering me the chance to be acquired was a noble and kind move on their part [because FB has a competing internal product].. As someone that wants to build quality social software, software that doesn’t force users to re-create their friends list, or not use oAuth, etc., I have to endure huge platform risk"
"Platform Ecosystem Wars: Rome Is Burning
It is either a good week to be having a CrunchUp focusing on the faltering Facebook ecosystem or it is a terrible week. Either way it is a compelling and interesting week, and whether it is good or bad depends on who you are and what your role is in the ecosystem.
Following the departure of Ethan Beard (director of platform partnerships); Katie Mitic (platform marketing director) and Jonathan Matus (mobile platform marketing manager) this week; and the revelations from an embittered and chastened Dalton Caldwell, it seems to me that the tide is turning against Facebook as a reliable partner for developers to depend upon"
Post office nears historic default on $5B payment
The U.S. Postal Service is bracing for a first-ever default on billions in payments due to the Treasury, adding to widening uncertainty about the mail agency's solvency as first-class letters plummet and Congress deadlocks on ways to stem the red ink.
With cash running perilously low, two legally required payments for future postal retirees' health benefits - $5.5 billion due Wednesday, and another $5.6 billion due in September - will be left unpaid, the mail agency said Monday. Postal officials said they also are studying whether they may need to delay other obligations. In the coming months, a $1.5 billion payment is due to the Labor Department for workers compensation, which for now it expects to make, as well as millions in interest payments to the Treasury.