Saturday, August 11, 2012

Charitably Funding Start-ups

From the BBC:

At times people may wonder why charitable foundations would consider funding projects within the information technology and communications (ICT) sector in Africa, when there is already significant private sector investment.

Really?  I think most people assume the reason any charitable foundation funds anything is to pick winners and losers and to extend wolfish imperialism dressed as a sheep.  Western charity is a trojan horse.

The article argues:

When used as a tool and integrated into well-devised programmes, information technologies are also enabling; they put power into the hands of citizens who can use technology to hold governments and other service providers to account.

Name one instance so far where this has occurred.  One single instance.

When capitalism is failing miserably, especially the crony capitalism of picking winners and losers, one desires, like rats fleeing a sinking ship, to find other shores to maintain the lifestyle.

The rest of us ought not be obliged to pay to protect the exceptional wealth that resides in the few hands.  Let the kickstarter.com's of the world fund worthy start-ups, no strings attached.

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Beastie Boys Will

Adam Yauch of the Beastie Boys died and left instructions in his will that his music never be used in advertising.  Since positive law allows for "intellectual property rights" Yauch's oeuvre can be constrained by law through his will.

But what if we had no IPR, would he still be able to stop the practice?  Of course.  He simply states the same thing in his will, and then it would be a very uncool thing, to his fans, for anyone to use his work in an ad.  The use of the music contrary to Yauch's will would be counter-productive.

Or without the force of law, Yauch might say in his will "anyone who uses my music in an ad must pay $100,000 to save the Noh drama. Or whatever. Let someone use the music and not pay, and see again what they get.

I'll try to think of some examples of where a will was complied with although there is no legal force behind it.  I'd be glad to hear of some.


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Friday, August 10, 2012

Hakka Hong Kong

A horrible thing happened after Gabby won her gold medal in gymnastics.  Someone at ABC ran an ad of a monkey training for the Olympics.



It is probably just a coincidence, like when a throat medicine company ran an ad featuring an auctioneer distressed by a sore throat when the TV Miniseries Roots was running in the 1970s.

Sensitivities run high because there is no doubt people with some African heritage in USA are a targeted class. Our prisons are full of people with some African heritage who self medicate or provide a missing product in society, and people with some African heritage are used for all sorts of experiments such as the Tuskegee thing.

Here an MD lets the cat out of the bag...




No one would likely notice if Nabisco ran cracker ads after every Romney news story.  Slights to people with some African heritage are noticed because people with some African heritage are clearly targeted.

You'll notice I try not to say "black" because racially categorizing is about as sensible as categorizing by shoe size. The bad guys use race, class and gender politics to destroy the market, through divide and conquer.




Every country in the world has a group targeted for abuse.  The Japanese have the Ainu, the Germans have their Turks, the French the Algerians, the Peruvians their Indians,  the British the Irish and so on.

Big economies have more than one despised group, and one group in China is the Hakka.  I first encountered these people in Hong Kong back in the mid-1970s.  They tended to be the ones who did the dirty work, and they were the only women I saw in China smoking.  They were plentiful in Hong Kong, and easily distinguishable by their distinctive hats.

fotosearch.com
Now to my point.  In Hong Kong people are no different than anywhere else on earth.  People will have a group upon which they look down.  The difference is no matter what your biases, you really do not have much chance to act on them in a place with a polity like Hong Kong.  It takes a powerful state for people to leverage hate into action, to where people can be exempt from punishment for perpetrating horrors on others.

Cops, doctors, jailers, building inspectors... it is always those backed by government who can be exploitative.  Little or no government, and bad guys have trouble getting the traction to do evil.  Remember the Jim Crow laws were laws, written and passed by racist cracker legislators.  And remember that when Abernathy and King finally appealed to business, instead of wasting their time appealing to the state, that the walls came tumbling down.



In Hong Kong people of merit can and do excel.  Because of Hong Kong, with so many people who would be despised for backwardness or lack of intelligence in fact excelling, no one can quite maintain the conceit that Hakka are somehow lacking.  Deng Xiaoping is Hakka, and the list of famous Hakka is quite long.  And note, China has no "affirmative action."  These Hakka rose on merit.  No affirmative action to shade their success.

So what to learn from this?  Instead of affirmative action, how about affirmative freedom?  Make a deal: if you ever qualified as "black" in USA, you can apply and become exempt: exempt from taxes, the draft, licensing, regulations, truly free in USA.  You can trade in illegal substances, and cannot be arrested.  You may have a passport for convenience sake, but otherwise have no connection to the State.

At the same time you can receive no Government benefits and you are subject to free market justice.

Now before you say this is unworkable, it is exactly the deal USA has with American Indians, in place, right now (with a few liberties thrown in).  Indians have restaurants at their casinos that are not subject to health inspectors.  Indians trade illegal fireworks and all manner of goodies.  The only difference is people who were once deemed "black" will not be limited to reservations, as they are now in USA prisons and in criminal supervision.

Put it to a vote.

Remember, to be in the black is a happy thing in business.  USA still allows slavery in its Constitution. Let's go for real freedom.  Reverse what we are socially conditioned to expect.

Warning: Diabetics may experience insulin shock:


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Thursday, August 9, 2012

Regulating Corporate Personhood & Tea & Occupy

There is a grand irony to the Tea Party and Occupy movements.  They are both an example of last ditch resistance to the status quo, that is the right exercise to assemble, petition and protest, and speak freely. It is political action a the human level, politics in its rawest form, politicians in the popular sense.

But what happened?

First let's note that both movements are born of the problem of corporate personhood, people in each having their ox gored by the unholy alliance of big business and big Government.  The left has left-wing oxen gored, the right has right-wing oxen gored.

Both movements formed spontaneously out of the chaos in good anarchic fashion.  People began to organize and get voice.  I myself early on attended meetings of both groups, and found many others of good will such as myself there.  People looking for change but not too concerned about the politics of those advocating change.  anything is better than what we have now.  A very open spirit.

And then the corporate world, in the form of Soros for the Occupy Movement and the Koch Bros. for the Tea Party stepped in and took over.

With their money, resources and organization any leadership of both the left and right movements were embraced, funded, redirected to irrelevancy.  Just like the politicians we have now.  Both movements behaved as politicians, as soon as they get a wee bit of traction, they get bought by corporate interests.

There is no sense in talking about "doing something" about corporate personhood, the job is to eliminate the system in which taxpayers fund the protection the state provides to the corporation.  If we are not paying for intellectual property rights enforcement, regulations that only benefit the corporation, and subsidies and so on, the corporations will wither as a power base.  Don't mend it, end it.

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Wednesday, August 8, 2012

Because Hillary Can Beat Romney

By this summary you can see the republicans stole the nomination from Ron Paul.  The die is cast, Hillary is to be the next president.  She could not beat Ron Paul, but she will bury the odious Romney.

I too experienced the leadership cheat on procedures and steal a Ron Paul lead in 2008.  No one was prosecuted for election fraud.  For the simple reason the powers that be cannot remain so without election fraud.

The powers that be like the Clintons.  The Mormons can be useful to the powers that be, so they are being encouraged.  But Romney will not be president. Feel free to forward this by email to three of your friends.


Joys of Raw Milk

Few below forty years old will credit it, but many of we older folk recall when bread was Wonder and Cheese was Velveeta, which was neither bread nor cheese.  A big breakthrough in cheese when they figured out how to put it in an aerosol can.  People were conditioned to fear real bread, real cheese.
Against this trend were the intrepid who came back from Europe and re-introduced real bread and cheese.  Wine saw a similar renaissance, after being conditioned to drink some nasty wines in USA.  In the 1970s Orson Welles  pitched Paul Masson with the tag line "We serve no wine before its time."




And he was not easy to work with...


I stress Plan A in business startup for the simple reason it is most likely.  Occasionally there comes a Plan B option, to buy something off the shelf.  And this would be the Swiss Raw Milk dispensers.  What are they? Check this out. (NB, some bad words.)



Your fear of raw milk is 100% social conditioning.  Big Milk has been harming your health for decades, and needs to have its subsidies and regulations eliminated.

Anyone intrepid enough to import this item would be in an uphill battle against Big Dairy and its assault teams at the FDA and USDA.  But the very fact you would be assaulted would be great advertising.  By fighting the powers that be via pro se, you'd be able to afford the legal challenges.

You may find your product poisoned as was apparently done to Chilean fruit growers by the FDA.  The likely motive of the poisoners was distress at Chile's economic boom after the overthrow of Allende.  There was an internal investigation, but nothing came of it.  In the Government, whistleblowers are prosecuted, but not real criminals.

All those people who fought uphill battles before you for bread, wine, cheese did good while doing well.  If you've ever had raw milk, and know its benefits, then you may have the passion necessary to do this work.

And you just may end up like Willian McGowan who fought the telephone monopolies and founded MCI.  He became a billionaire.  Drink up the wonderful, healthy goodness of raw milk.

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Tuesday, August 7, 2012

Finding Buyers

Here is a colloquy on finding buyers, mine is in bold, my correspondent in plain, edited for some confidentiality...

8:24 pm 
I'd like to know more about your Fall 2012 course. I'm in the process of learning all I can about importing and exporting before starting a company and I came across your book on Amazon.  Please let me know what background I can give you on me.


The fall course info can be found at www.johnspiers.com.  If you could trade in absolutely anything you wanted what would it be?


7:26 am
The Register link on your website doesn't have a college near me. The course is conducted on-line through IRC, right?  Also, I don't see the cost for the course on the Register link.  When I looked at it on my mobile, it said $95...but that can't be right.

If I could trade in anything I wanted?  Coffee!!

Let me know how I can register. 


Yes, it is an online course you can take form home or work, on your computer...
it is $95
and you can register here
http://seattleteacherscollege.net/tradworinnin.html
Next question... how come coffee?


7:55 am

I'll be signing up. 

I love coffee.  But aside from that, it's the second most traded commodity on the planet after oil.  Annual US coffee consumption averages 4.2kg per capita.  Mexico, a major coffee producer, only consumes 1.2kg per person annually.  There's a big potential for growing the market for roasted coffee.

OK...  the first answer was right.  The second answer might be factual, but it is wrong.  
Do you think the monster businesses in coffee are unaware of exactly who drinks what and where the opportunities are?
Tell me how you will beat Starbucks, nescafe and so on in Mexico.  Careful, because I have a neighbor who is back from selling coffee to mexicans.
it's not too early to begin thinking...  I look forward to your reply...

9:18 am
I guess the answer is, is that I don't beat Starbucks, nescafe, Folgers, whoever, in Mexico or the US. Those guys already have a team of market researchers, dedicated buyers, distribution networks, etc. etc. I'd have to focus on smaller roasters, cafes, shops, in both markets. Businesses who would actually talk to me rather than just wait for the regional sales rep from Starbucks or Nestle to call and put them down for X pounds a month.



OK so you are not delusional...  good.
What keeps smaller roasters in business, why will they want to buy from you?


9:34 am

I'd like to think I'm not.

Smaller roasters stay in business because of dedicated client bases; their ability to keep costs low and, accordingly, their margins higher; by offering fair trade coffee, unique blends, "house blends" that are roasted by a roasting company and then "blended especially for So and So Coffee, Co."  Honestly, I think some of them stay in business because they're not Starbucks.  To get them to buy from me, I'd have to offer them a better wholesale price than what they're currently getting or something unique.  Or maybe I could get them interested in buying from me because I'm not a big distributor, but local, available, responsive, and willing to find what they need to make their business unique.

...

Smaller roasters stay in business because of dedicated client bases ...
***  Dedicated to what?  Are the costs of local shop lower than Starbucks?  Or higher?  If so, are local's prices lower than Starbucks, or  higher?  Is it possible that the costs, margins and prices are all higher than starbucks?  And if so, why do they customers come?  Is it USP?  Unique, as you note, selling proposition?  IN general the answers to all these questions are yes.  the take-away is small and start up compete on design, not price.***
Honestly, I think some of them stay in business because they're not Starbucks. 
***Right, and starbucks has moved into that market by designing non-starbucks starbucks.  Wine bars with coffee.***
To get them to buy from me, I'd have to offer them a better wholesale price than what they're currently getting or something unique. 
***You can never win on price, so that leaves something unique.***
Or maybe I could get them interested in buying from me because I'm not a big distributor, but local, available, responsive,
***Those are standard offers, not competitive offers.***
and willing to find what they need to make their business unique.
*** Bingo.  Raison d'etre.  For which both you and they can charge more since you need to charge more because the volumes are less.  Make more doing less.  
The most important thing is business is the customer.  The hardest thing in business is getting the product or service right.
All products are solution to problems.  What problem in coffee needs solving, thus the market needs you?***


11:30 am

I think I hear what you're saying...the problem then with most coffee--coffee house coffee or vacuum bagged coffee--is that it doesn't have a story.  Even fair trade certified just tells the customer that some coffee farmer in the jungle isn't getting jerked around on the price of his product.  What then I'd have to sell to smaller shops is the story of the bean, videos of the farmers, crafts from the kids in the village where the stuff is grown, and then give the customer a chance to respond back--videos, letters, thank yous, etc.  Make getting a cup more interactive and give the customer a reason to come back other than the coffee he's drinking.  Then I'd be selling the shop not just fair trade coffee, unique blends, or single origins, but a service that provides the store coffee and gives it a chance to offer customers the opportunity interact with where their cuppa comes from.


So you have formed a hypothesis...  now before you invest a dime, test that hypothesis...
Go to those coffee shops, say a half dozen,  that you think will desire what you have on offer, and then say to them:
"I believe .the problem then with most coffee--coffee house coffee or vacuum bagged coffee--is that it doesn't have a story.  Even fair trade certified just tells the customer that some coffee farmer in the jungle isn't getting jerked around on the price of his product.  What then I'd have to sell to smaller shops is the story of the bean, videos of the farmers, crafts from the kids in the village where the stuff is grown, and then give the customer a chance to respond back--videos, letters, thank yous, etc.  Make getting a cup more interactive and give the customer a reason to come back other than the coffee he's drinking.  Then I'd be selling the shop not just fair trade coffee, unique blends, or single origins, but a service that provides the store coffee and gives it a chance to offer customers the opportunity interact with where their cuppa comes from I believe if I solve this problem, you will buy from me.  Am I right?"
Can you do that?


11:43 am

Yeah, I can definitely do that.  I'll give you a run down as soon as I have the results.


11:54 am

What if they say, "Yeah, you are right.  How do I buy from you?" What do I tell them while I'm testing the idea out?


Like Arnold, you say "I'll be back..."
With customers, the suppliers get very helpful real fast...


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Monday, August 6, 2012

China's next leader met with China's top experts at Chairman Mao's favorite resort Beidaihe.  Big deal.  But images are important, and the Chinese press is showing Xi Jinping in full cultural revolution dress.  White shirt, military belt, very inexpensive watch.  For a country that is about to experience some tough economic times, that is good iconography.  Here is what Mr. Xi had to say at a conference with overseas Chinese:

In Chinese, Xi remarked: "There are some bored foreigners, with full stomachs, who have nothing better to do than point fingers at us [China]. First, China doesn't export revolution; second, China doesn't export hunger and poverty; third, China doesn't come and cause you headaches, what more is there to be said?"

I think most of the world would agree.  Got drones?



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Welfare Queens Sue Google Over IPR

I wish they would not say that "authors" are suing google, because this "author" certainly is not.  There are some welfare queens, who by virtue of typing some words on a piece of paper, believe that the world owes them an income.  They are suing google.

These writers want to gain, or have gained,  exceptional wealth through our intellectual property rights system.  They want more.  They want it all.

Well, who doesn't?  The problem is for the system to work that gives them exceptional wealth, you and I must pay for the enforcement of the regime that makes them exceptionally wealthy.  That is capitalism.

Ninety percent of marketing is listening to your customer base and ever better meeting their needs.  The reason we have not had a Shakespeare in the last century or so is because we've had intellectual property rights.  Why get better if you are guaranteed fantastic amounts for being merely better than others?

These writers do not need intellectual property rights for self-actualization, they need to learn marketing or hire someone to help.

I would hate to see google lose and me have to pay for advertising my book, which google does for free.

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Sunday, August 5, 2012

New Hong Kong Foothold In USA

I've blogged several times we need to form a Hong Kong on USA territory, mirroring Communist China's "one country, two systems" economy.  In this way Communist USA could also have a relatively free market territory.  I even designed a flag.

Entrepreneurs have begun a version scheduled for 2013, which will be a massive ship anchored just outside the USA territorial waters.  Something tells me the government will have to be anarchy.

neurope.eu

Or as these things tend to go, a scam.

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