Faked Documents Cause Embarrassment

11:38:55 PM    

Elbert Hubbard. "Never explain--your friends do not need it and your enemies will not believe you anyway." [Quotes of the Day]

E. B. White. "Democracy is the recurrent suspicion that more than half of the people are right more than half the time." [Quotes of the Day]

Maybe this is how things should work.  11:24:34 PM    

And Best Screenplay By A Computer Goes To.... Last month the NY Times ran their article about how screenplay writers were making use of software that helped them "fill-in-the-blanks". They even compared it to how PowerPoint now helps millions of people churn out increasingly bland and look-a-like presentations. So, now, someone else has picked up on that story and decided to experiment with one of the screenwriting applications, and share the experience with the rest of us. The software sounds positively awful, as it tries to help develop characters by telling the writer such useful things as "you can't give character B a conscience, since character A already has one". It seems we've hit upon part of the "formula" for a successful movie: one conscience per script. [Techdirt]

This explains SO much. I wonder if there is a similar one for musicians.  10:37:50 PM    

We need soccer players, not football players!

Asking The Wrong Questions: What's Your Wireless Strategy?. Businesses get swept up in fads. We all know that. It's tricky to avoid it sometimes, but making sure that you're always asking the right questions for your business is a useful way to at least nudge you back in the right direction. At the same time, the "wrong" questions can throw you completely off track. That may be the case with the latest popular question: what's your wireless strategy? That's not the type of question a business should be asking. They should be focused on "what do I need to do to keep my customers happy?" or "how will I grow my business?". Presumably, a wireless strategy can be useful in answering those questions, but focusing simply on "what is your wireless strategy?" will push people in the wrong direction. It will make them create a wireless strategy because everyone else is doing it, rather than because it's the right thing for their business. [Techdirt]

Deciding what your strategy will be is entirely the wrong approach. Wireless is a tactic, not a strategy. It is a tool to accomplish something, to allow you to accomplish your goals, not a goal itself. My favorite sport in many ways is soccer. Soccer is almost all tactics, rapidly adapting to changing circumstances to find a solution to the problems. It selects for people that make correct decisions, instantaneously. If circumstances intervene (i.e. a pass with not enough weight) they adapt and devise a new tactic. The good players know what they are going to do BEFORE they get the ball. My father likes to think that they always score by accident because there is usually not a grand plan. As Jimmy Buzzard in the Monty Python sketch said 'I hit the ball first time and there it was in the back of the net.'

Compare this with football, where strategy overwhelms tactics to a large extent. I mean, tactics are very important, obviously, but every week the teams put together a huge document, the game plan, attempting to define a process by which you can win the game. But, again, the best teams are those that can adapt to the conditions. This is much what we see in today's business, social, political, etc. environment. Many try to develop a process that will permit them to win, no matter what. Those that can adapt rapidly will survive. It is the tactics that really determine this, not the strategy. It is the decisions, not the process.  10:36:58 PM    

Welcome to the New Travel. A bag inspected on a flight from Seattle to San Diego found that the baggage inspector had commented on the contents of his bag, which included some "No Iraq War" signs. The baggage inspector included the preprinted inspection notice in the bag, but also wrote a note: "Don't appreciate your anti-American attitude!" Robert Harrow writes about the Aviation ID System after the Senate Commerce Committee voted to support TSA disclosure of the system details and... [bIPlog]

Things are getting more and more nasty. Trying to prevent dissent will only hasten changes. As Princess Leia said:

The more you tighten your grip, Tarkin, the more star systems will slip through your fingers.

9:41:27 PM