A few days ago I noticed a tweet by Tim O’Reilly about car sharing. Turns out that GM’s going to use OnStar to let car owners rent out their cars when they’re not being used and Ford is going to contribute cars to ZipCar. Interesting to see two of the Big 3 getting into car… Continue reading Car Sharing
Category: Business
Contrasts
Right now I’m reading Empires of Light. It’s the fascinating tale of how the world was electrified. Not “electrified” in the sense of “the Beatles are coming to town!” but rather, literally, why I can flip a switch and the lights go on in my house. This tale could be utterly pedantic – for instance,… Continue reading Contrasts
The Not So Humble Convenience Store and Vending Machines
When I was a management consultant we would read briefs written from other teams around the world. The Japanese teams were always raving about both the convenience stores and vending machines in Japan as world leaders in retailing. Given that your average bodega in North America contains questionable food of uncertain age and most vending… Continue reading The Not So Humble Convenience Store and Vending Machines
The (Mobile) Elephants are Dancing
It has been a fascinating few weeks in the device-side of the mobile internet. A ton of major events have happened. It worth looking at them all to try and figure out the patterns and understand what’s going on. Item 1: Blackberry unveils preview of OS 6 Blackberry released a video showing what their new… Continue reading The (Mobile) Elephants are Dancing
Commoditizing Dog Food
It’s always refreshing to see someone take their own advice (aka eating their own dog food). Last week Facebook announced their Open Graph initiative. It’s their hugely ambitious attempt to take over the web. In a nutshell, the idea is that you Facebook will be used to log you on to all websites and all… Continue reading Commoditizing Dog Food