Zara thrives by being smart

This article, Zara Thrives by Breaking All the Rules in BusinessWeek, talks about how Zara is succeeding by doing things differently. However, the fallacy is saying there are “rules”. The “rules” are how other people do it. What Zara has done is seen the weaknesses in those rules and done things differently. Zara knows that the sum is what matters, not the parts. So even if parts of its manufacturing could be made cheaper, it would add additional costs down the line. That’s smart. And that’s why they are thriving.

Of course, unlike some of their competitors, they know what to make that will sell. You can have the best supply chain in the world, but if you are delivering something people don’t want, you are dead. Zara knows what people want, and they can adjust quickly when they make a mistake. Not only that, but Zara has lots of ideas, unlike some of their competitors. They seem to produce way more styles than other clothing manufacturers, making it more likely you will find something you want. That’s also very smart.

The Great Stephen Fry and I


I have been a fan of Stephen Fry for a very long time: I’ve enjoyed his films (“Wilde”, “Peter’s Friends”), his TV shows (“Jeeves and Wooster”, “Pocoyo”) and his writing (the book “Paperweight” and his blog, “Paper Cuts”). He’s done much more than that of course. He’s a great artist.

Besides being a great artist — he would modestly disagree with that — he is also very computer literate.  I have seen him speak on some of the most arcane topics with the ease of someone reading a children’s bedtime story.

When I found out he was on twitter, I thought: I had to follow him. What surprised me is that he is trying to follow everyone back! I thought this was impressive: most famous (and no-so-famous) people on twitter do it mostly to broadcast as opposed to listen.

If you are on twitter, you can follow him here: Twitter / stephenfry

Better still, use that Google thingy and find the many things that he has done and go and seek them out. You’ll be glad you did.

Marvin Gaye – I Heard It Through The Grapevine (A capella)!

There are lots of people on YouTube, great people, who can sing “I Heard It Through the Grapevine”. (Besides the incomparable Gladys Knight and the Pips). Go listen to them. Then come back, and hear Marvin Gaye sing it a capella. It’s astounding. Watch as he leaves huge gaps in the song for the instrumentals: you can hear the band in the silence. I love when Gladys Knight sings this song, but I think Marvin does it best.

If someone said that if I wore that frilly shirt I could sing this good, I would wear that shirt everyday.

Sign of the Times

The U.S. national debt clock used to show all amounts starting with a “$” (like the $86017 above). Because the amount of debt in the U.S. exceeded the clock’s ability to display it, they “fixed” it by making what used to be a “$” into a “1”, so it now reads “10149…” instead of “$10149…”.

(AP Photo/Kathy Willens) from The National Debt Clock is shown near Times Square in New York, … – Yahoo! News Photos

It’s Jessica Ketola! And her backup band!…the Police?

Seriously, this is a great story.

According to the YouTube page and other sources, Sting was so impressed
by her in the soundcheck, he invited her to sing with him on stage. Was she any good? See the video and you’ll see.

Very impressive of Sting to offer, and very impressive she took him up on it.

(Found on the always great kottke.org…you can get more here too)

Iceland takes the financial meltdown hard

How hard? Well, according to this story, The party’s over for Iceland, the island that tried to buy the world from The Observer

‘Iceland is on the brink of collapse. Inflation and interest rates are raging upwards. The krona, Iceland’s currency, is in freefall and is rated just above those of Zimbabwe and Turkmenistan. One of the country’s three independent banks has been nationalised, another is asking customers for money, and the discredited government and officials from the central bank have been huddled behind closed doors for three days with still no sign of a plan. International banks won’t send any more money and supplies of foreign currency are running out.

… On Friday the queues at the banks were huge, as people moved savings into the most secure accounts. Yesterday people were buying up supplies of olive oil and pasta after a supermarket spokesman announced on Friday night that they had no means of paying the foreign currency advances needed to import more foodstuffs.’

That hard. Reading the article, I wonder how the people of Iceland are going to be able to get out of the situation. Not only that, but are other countries going to be in the same situation, countries you might not expected to be so overdrawn.

Rahier: where to get great cake in Toronto

It’s my 25th anniversary of working at IBM today, and a good friend of suggested I should celebrate with cake. (A fine idea, I thought). If you need cake, and you live anywhere near Toronto, I highly recommend you go to Rahier. I have been eating their cake and cookies for years, and it is consistently wonderful. One of my favourite things is a chocolate tart which manages to have three types of chocolate in a delicious crust. But really, any thing you get there will be delicious. For more details, see:

Rahier Patisserie, Toronto (french pastries) 1586 Bayview Avenue

The U.S. Senate gets it done (with regards to the bailout/rescue plan)

How? According to the NYTimes.com, by Adding Sweeteners.

Furthermore, they approved it by a hefty margin. That will put pressure on the House of Representatives. As well, apparently the whips were not in full force when the last vote was held in the House. I suspect that will not be the case this time. It would be a fiasco if it was voted down in the House again. Let’s see.

And speaking of potential fiascoes, the U.S. Vice Presidential debate is tomorrow night, too. 🙂

Stunning dance “that could have been painted by Balthus” or lots of bare naked guys! Take your pick!

There are two ways you can approach this work by  Daniel Léveillé Danse – La Pudeur des icebergs/Modesty of Icebergs that will be appearing at Toronto’s Harbourfront Centre  DanceWorks. You can either see it as a work in which:

‘Léveillé delves into the body’s mysterious relations; the trace, the surge, the thrust of movement and its inexorable fall realized in a stunning dance “that could have been painted by Balthus”  (as described by Jennifer Dunning  New York Times.)’

– or you can think –

“woo hoo! lots of really good looking bare naked guys dancing on stage!”

And if both of those things appeal to you, then by all means, click on the link above and buy tickets!

Seriously, DanceWorks hosts some great dancers and performances. Regardless of who it is and how much clothes the performers wear, you will be in for a great evening of dance.

The influence of Mad Men on fashion

Mad Men will influence our current culture in many ways, and one of those is fashion. I noticed this earlier this year when in at least a few places, the skinny ties of the 1960s started appearing in some stores.

In this blog posting at style.com, Maya Singer chats with Michael Kors about his thoughts on the show and how it is affecting his work, among other things. One quote he made, in reference to the clothes at that time, really can apply to any era, and that is:

‘clothes are supposed to FIT’

The capital letters are his, but I agree with his emphasis.

It’s an interesting conversation between Kors and Singer…you can pick it up here: it’s a mad, mad, mad, mad world

P.S. Love that photo, by the way: the strength of the show’s art direction is strongly illustrated with this one group shot of the characters.

Another global problem: China’s Milk Scandal


While much of the world is focused on the financial state of the world, another problem spreading globally is the contamination of Chinese milk with melamine. You might think: that does not affect me because I only drink locally produced milk. While this is true, much of the world eats processed food, such as Cadbury chocolate, and these and other foods do move around the world.

While the people of China are suffering the brunt of this, it is something to keep an eye on. The NYTimes.com has a number of stories on it, and you can access them easily here: china milk scandal – NYTimes.com Search

The Post It Note Reading Series

The Post It Note Reading Series is a collection of stories told on…yes, Post It Notes.
 
Good illustrated stories on 2X2 yellow stickies. Some of the site is NSFW, ironically, but the stories are worth seeing at some point in your day. Perhaps you will be so inspired that the next time you are trapped on a conference call, you will whip out a pack of that ingenious product from 3M and get cracking on the next Les Miserables!

Be your own prognosticator with pollster.com

Pollster.com is already one of the leading sites for polling, especially this year’s presidential election.

One thing they have in particular that I found impressive is the ability to chart your own data. Let’s take this chart here for Florida: 2008 Florida Presidential General Election: McCain vs Obama. As for today, it shows McCain 47.9 and Obama 46.4. Now, if you study political blogs like I do, you might want to exclude certain polling results from the analysis. Clicking on Tools > Filter, you could exclude all Internet polling if you felt such polling was inaccurate. (Internet polling for this sample is done by Zogby, who in some circles have a not great reputation). So you de-select Zogby.

Now the numbers shift a little to McCain 47.7 and Obama 46.3.

You could even de-select everyone but a certain poll (e.g. CNN/Time) and see what the result are with that (McCain 48.0 vs Obama 45.1).

Once you are happy with it, you can even embed the graphic on your site.

They have a number of good features on their site, but this one is getting alot of press, and alot of embedding on blogs. A good example of how to drive traffic to your site if you offer a great feature.

The Financial Meltdown is a global problem

Besides the American banks, I have also heard of banks in the UK going under. According to Paul Krugman at the New York Times, there are also banks in Iceland going down. Glitnir Bank there has taken a massive infusion of euros from the government of Iceland in return for 75% of the bank.

I suspect we will see more along the way.

Meanwhile, tomorrow, the dead cat bounce we saw on Wall Street today should be over and plummeting prices should resume.

Good times!

Which Linux Distro is for you?

If you are new to Linux and find yourself stuck between wanting to use it and not knowing which Linux (distro) to use, consider this article, Lifehacker Faceoff: Battle of the Linux Distros

It’s pretty highlevel, and it isn’t going to tell you to go with one over another, but if you want to get started and know at least a few things before talking to your local Linux guru, take a look.

I know, there are more distros than the ones here, but for new Linux users, these are good to know, even if they do go with something else.

City, Rediscovering the Center by William H. Whyte

A great book on life in a modern city is this, CITY: REDISCOVERING THE CENTER by William H. Whyte.
It’s also one of my favourites. Whyte, famous for an earlier book, The Organizational Man, had been part of a group that:

‘… studied the use of urban spaces for 16 years. This follow-up to The Social Life of Small Urban Spaces is an engaging look at the variety of human interactions which make “downtown” vibrant. Whyte looks at such diverse topics as pedestrian movement, concourses and skyways, sunlight and its effects–all from the perspective of a confirmed city-lover. His observations and recommendations can be read with profit and pleasure by professional planners and readers interested in what makes a city tick.’

I actually saw this book in action in Toronto. On Bloor Street near St. George Street was a small park that was semi-secluded behind of a series of low walls. Even though it was in a vibrant part of the city, no one ventured in there, likely because of it’s closed nature and the down-and-out men who occupied it (and who seemed to be fighting more often than not). After reading this book, I thought, if they tore down those walls, the space would open up and you would get more people using the space. (No public space should be dominated or controlled by one group, rich or poor, I believe.) Eventually the walls were torn down and that is what happened: the space was used by a much more diverse group of people and it was more peaceful.

Since that time more and more people have been rediscovering the city centre, in part due to the work of people like Whyte and Jane Jacobs. Anyone who would love to live in a city or who already does would get a much greater appreciation of urban life if they read this book.

The importance of landscaping in the city

I pass this bench all the time. I have never seen anyone sitting there. Ever.

In some ways, it is a pleasant place to sit: lots of grass, good walkways, closeness to the nearby apartment building. It gets both shade and sunshine.

Yet, there is also the omnipresence of the garbage cans and large container nearby that signal it is not really a place for leisure. Nor are there any trees or or flowers or anything to make it more pleasant for someone to sit there.

Perhaps people don’t sit there because there is a park nearby that also has benches to sit. That’s the point: those park benches are under trees and there is a playground and other things that signal to those in the area that this is a place to relax.

Imagine this place with trees and flowers and perhaps a table or another bench. And some way of making the garbage cans not visible. People might actually enjoy it.

The amazing costumes worn by Renee Fleming at the Metropolitan Opera

I wrote about the Metropolitan Opera’s opening night gala recently. One thing to note about it is the costumes, specifically those worn by Renee Fleming. No ordinary frocks were these. For the event she had costumes designed by no less than Christian Lacroix, Karl Lagerfeld and John Galliano. They don’t do things small at the Met!

Check out the nytimes.com slide show to see some examples of the work:

Fashioned for Renée Fleming – The New York Times > Music > Slide Show

Quote of the day

“One thing is certain. No one – no politician, no investment banker, no television commentator, no economist – should be able to say again with a straight face that here in the United States we just let markets do whatever markets do and everything works out for the best.”

– AFL-CIO’s John Sweeney

The Fall of AIG and it’s relationship to Drexel Burnham Lambert

This article, Behind Insurer’s Crisis, a Blind Eye to a Web of Risk in the NYTimes.com has a great rundown of how AIG crashed and burned. It turns out that much of the problem revolved around a unit of AIG known as AIGFP. As the article points out:

‘The insurance giant’s London unit was known as A.I.G. Financial Products, or A.I.G.F.P. It was run with almost complete autonomy, and with an iron hand, by Joseph J. Cassano, according to current and former A.I.G. employees.

A onetime executive with Drexel Burnham Lambert — the investment bank made famous in the 1980s by the junk bond king Michael R. Milken, who later pleaded guilty to six felony charges — Mr. Cassano helped start the London unit in 1987.’

What comes around goes around. No doubt some of the brains behind the subprime meltdown are already dreaming up new ways to leverage us into the next disaster.

Heck of a job, Mr. Cassano.

The Bailout: no one really knows what they are doing

I blogged about how no one really know much more than you do about the financial meltdown and what to do. As evidence of this, in the article, Bad News For The Bailout – Forbes.com there is this snippet:

‘In fact, some of the most basic details, including the $700 billion figure Treasury would use to buy up bad debt, are fuzzy.

“It’s not based on any particular data point,” a Treasury spokeswoman told Forbes.com Tuesday. “We just wanted to choose a really large number.”‘

We just wanted to choose a really large number.