Archive for the ‘Business’ Category

Updates and Such

November 18, 2008

Traveling since Friday. Have first 2 advertisers for Scoopd! Removing membership for RedefineChange and introducing a 15 minute book club. Just got an email that said “Hey, Brandon, I was looking for a salon in Tampa and I found on ClickBricks via google” - sweet! Given the economy sucks and is getting worse, if I’m not in a shanty in 6 months maybe I’ll still have an internet connection to keep these crazy ventures moving forward.

Also, I made a small post over at the ClickBricks blog about Yellow Pages, and I instantly got responses from some Yellow Page salesmen (at least that’s what I’m deducing based on their email addresses and URL’s). You should check it out - pretty funny how defensive they are.

Finally, the new, totally official BrandonMuth.com is on it’s way before Christmas. And, don’t worry, I won’t be changing it for all of 2009. I promise.

Talk soon,

Brandon

Way to go Walgreens

September 29, 2008

Walgreens profit up 12% because of “sales growth and cost cutting.” Wow, imagine that. Cost cutting contributing to a profitable business. Maybe those fancy bankers can learn something from a simple, main street company.

So Much For a “Lender of Last Resort”

September 14, 2008

It’s a sad day when CEO’s - you know guys who are supposed to be educated in the finer points of finance and running a business - turn down private equity in favor of the Federal Government. This has to be a joke, right?

Yo Heart T. Boone Pickens!

August 21, 2008

Remember those Taco Bell commercials several years ago? The ones where the chihuahua said “Yo quiero Taco Bell” which translated to “I want some Taco Bell”? Well, using the same stellar foreign language skills of those great commercials the title of this post translates to “I love T. Boone Pickens!”

Yes there are haters and critics who say his only concern is spinning a profit out of capitalizing on hot new trends in alternative energy and worries that we are increasingly becoming overly dependent on foreign oil.

To those critics, I say “So what?!” Let’s assume for a moment his motivation is solely profit - that he has absolutely NO interest in benefiting the country by reducing our foreign oil imports thus creating jobs and bolstering our economic strength and independence.

At the present time he is using his OWN capital to build the wind fields and advertise his campaign. I have absolutely no problem with this. Dude has already spent north of $60 million just promoting his plan. That’s his money and he is free to do what he wants with it. He is taking the risk, and as long as he doesn’t attempt to socialize potential losses (as our quasi-fascist government has done with the airline, bank and mortgage industries), he is free to reap the reward.

Granted, certain legislation must pass in order to continue to expand the development of the wind corridor in the central United States (his pockets are deep, but not THAT deep), and I WOULD be surprised if Mr. Pickens didn’t try to influence the legislation in order to benefit his own interests in some way.

However, given that you don’t have to be smarter than a fifth grader to observe the direct and effectual relationship between lobbyist dollars and legislation I support using the system to benefit America’s economy for a change.

Let’s face it, for years we’ve been selling off our country to China, Saudi Arabia and a slew of other foreign nations in order to prop up our dollar so we can soothe ourselves through rabid consumption - finding solace in a skewed, phantom, materialistic euphoria. So, even if T. Boone Pickens is in it solely for the profit, I say “fine!” It’s about time to not only keep, but create, new jobs here in the US. If we can lessen our export of dollars to foreign countries in the process that is a huge bonus.

His motivation behind his plan is between him and the good Lord. Opposing a plan ONLY because it could make a rich geezer richer is stupid, especially, if such opposition causes us to continue to fork out $700 billion a year for foreign oil. There are clear and theoretically viable alternatives to develop. T. Boone Pickens, whether for profit, or our economic good, or, most likely, a combination of the two, has chosen to pursue one of several alternatives. I say “Go for it (old) man!”

Now, if you want to question the viability of his plan, challenge the accuracy of his figures or debate whether wind is a sufficient replacement for foreign oil that’s an entirely different conversation. But PLEASE don’t join the growing hoards of intellectual and logical weaklings who accept or reject things based upon emotive, partially construed, tidbit agendas.

For the love of liberty and personal freedom PLEASE begin (if you haven’t already) to think, reason, argue and by all means debate this issue and several others! I fear that if we don’t begin to cherish debate and sound argumentation we are going to complete our sad decline into becoming a thoughtless nation where our only concern is individual comfort and removal of pain.

Below is a video telling of supposed economic development happening in Sweetwater, TX as a result of Mr. Pickens’ wind fields.

Resolution #4: Never Again Fox or CNN

August 9, 2008

For several months now I have been using Reuters as my online news hub, occasionally visiting Fox and CNN for comparison and story scanning purposes, but as of this morning I have decided to never visit Fox or CNN again. Their trespasses against objective journalism are simply far too grievous to tolerate any longer.

For instance, it wasn’t until Georgian and Russian officials declared that 1,500 to 2,000 people have died in their recent violence that CNN or Fox gave the story lead coverage on their sites. Yesterday, the headline on Fox was “OUR DOGS WERE LIKE OUR CHILDREN!” about that story in Maryland where police killed two dogs. And this morning on both sites, the death of Bernie Mac took the lead. Yes, it is very sad to hear of Bernie Mac’s passing, but I believe (and please don’t view this as insensitive) it pales in severity to the Russian/Georgian conflict.

So long as consumers absentmindedly gobble up trite entertainment masquerading as news, CNN and Fox will continue to revel in their opportunistic, incestuous, money grabbing affair between big business, slimy politicians and special interest groups.

Until the market demands something different, I suppose they are free to keep their scandal laden, junior high gossip machine churning forward, but as of today, they will have one less googly-eyed bystander following their shallow and baseless pursuits.

Cuil is Cool

July 29, 2008

A couple of former Google programmers just launched a competing search engine called Cuil (pronounced “cool”). From what I’ve read, they sold their previous one to Google in 2004. Very interesting… I like how they are going complete opposite of Google with the whole black color scheme.

FedEx Kinkos DOES NOT Have My Business

June 27, 2008

Especially when they charge $0.49 per B&W computer printout. And especially when Staples charges $0.09 for the same service. Oh, yeah, Kinkos also charges $18/hour (or $0.30/minute) to use their computers in order to print the files. Later FedEx, you have lost my business for good.

The Emails Aren’t Too Bad

June 24, 2008

I didn’t realize that Pacific to Eastern time travel had such tiring effects. As a result of said tiredness I’m just getting around to my emails this afternoon and surprisingly they aren’t too bad. This could be good in that it’s evidence I’m slowly making the business model transition I’ve been pursuing or it could be an indicator that business is slow and I’m on the verge of bankruptcy. That would suck.

I’m Just Really Trying…

June 6, 2008

One of my brother-in-laws, who is the best manager I know, jokes that if he ever writes a book it will be called “I’m Just Really Trying.” It will be an analysis of the ever pervading thought in our culture that you just have to wish and really, really, really be sincere about wanting something then expect for it to mysteriously materialize.

He and I have good laughs over this topic every now and then. So why am I bringing this up now? Because there is a woman sitting next to me at Starbucks who has dropped various iterations of this line at least a half-dozen times within the last 15 minutes. (I think she’s on a job interview.)

“I just really want to be a part of some place that is successful.”

“I just really want to be on a team that values my ideas.”

“I just really want to not settle.”

Now, before you criticize me for being overly-cynical, let me say that I don’t necessarily believe there is anything wrong with the core desire of those statements. Who doesn’t want to experience success, be on a team that values your input and continue to achieve new things?

The problem, as I see it, is that the “I just really” statement carries a sentiment with it that is 1) naive and 2) responsibility shifting.

First, it’s naive because it ignores the fact that the world is filled with insecure, backstabbing suckers who will whack their own mom at a moments notice to save their own skin. If you have never experienced this or don’t know of anybody who has, please tell me where the company is, because I want to work there.

Second, it places the responsibility for cultivating that culture on others instead of putting the onus squarely on your shoulders to actively participate in building the culture you desire. I think people do this to hedge against (accepting) failure. There are exceptions, but I think this logic generally holds up.

Well, that was a quick post and I didn’t edit it, so please forgive me if the thoughts are a little rough. And EJ, if you’re reading this, you’re the first person on my “to hire” list and I guarantee this time around you won’t be surrounded by a bunch of “I’m just really trying” types.

Flip Dog, Flip

June 3, 2008

What does Monster do when people start complaining that it’s full of spam and lame jobs? Apparently they start a new job posting site called Flip Dog. It makes me wonder what other “new” sites are just rehashings of older, more saturated ones. Very interesting indeed.