“...General Motors acknowledged in its annual report on Thursday that its survival was in 'substantial doubt'...GM warned last month that its auditors, Deloitte & Touche, could raise concerns about its viability...Despite the notice, G.M., which lost $30.9 billion last year and has already borrowed $13.4 billion from the government, said that it still believed it could be viable and that it did not intend to file for bankruptcy protection….G.M. said in Thursday’s filing that it had no way to repay the loans right now and could soon become insolvent without at least $9.1 billion more aid.”
I know that these are troubled times in which we live. Just recently (according to Bloomberg.com), the Federal Reserve Board of Governors - which receives daily reports on loans to banks and securities firms - refused to disclose the names of the borrowers and the loans, alleging that it would cast “a stigma” on recipients of more than $1.9 trillion of emergency credit from U.S. taxpayers and the assets the central bank is accepting as collateral. The Fed itself has said that the U.S. is facing “an unprecedented crisis” in which “loss in confidence in and between financial institutions can occur with lightning speed and devastating effects.”
One of those devastating effects will no doubt be mass unemployment and the collapse of society as we know it. Haha, just kidding (I was unduly influenced by the last "30 Rock," when Tracy Jordan appeared on Larry King and helped bring down the Asian markets).
Efficiency and aggressiveness in one's search for a job during this recession are two tactics that I have no problem with, and which I would encourage the unemployed to adopt. However, a word of caution: don't spam your resume and a generic "cover letter" (delivered in email form) to EVERY EMPLOYEE of a software development company, from the customer relationship manager to the sales team, ESPECIALLY WHEN YOUR FACEBOOK PROFILE IS PUBLIC and the recipients of your unsolicited correspondence can see photos like the following (I obviously try to disguise the identity of the subject so as not to mock her, while still conveying the theme of the image and the importance maintaining some discretion in what you post to your Facebook profile, or at least how you manage public access to your FB content):
"To Whom It May Concern: My name is XXXXXXX, and I am currently working as a marketing/advertising coordinator...Thank you in advance for taking the time to review my resume, and please feel free to contact at any time to schedule an interview."
Hollywood’s dominance of the movie industry has been the subject of numerous studies. An interdisciplinary literature review in this thesis identified twenty different single or multiple factor explanations that try to account for Major studio dominance at different time periods but cannot comprehensively explain how Hollywood acquired and maintained dominance for nine decades. This thesis reviewed the economics, management and marketing literatures to identify existing theoretical explanations for the acquisition and persistence of market dominance. It then integrated existing theories identified within the business literature into a ‘theoretical lens’. This lens enables an historical analysis of Hollywood’s longstanding dominance of the movie business to be undertaken from a strategic business perspective. This thesis concludes that the Major studios rise to market leadership and enduring dominance can primarily be explained because they developed and maintained a set of strategic marketing management capabilities that were superior to rival firms and rival film industries. It is argued that a marketing orientation and effective strategic marketing management capabilities also provide a unifying theory for Hollywood’s enduring dominance because they can account for each of the twenty previously identified explanations for that dominance. The original contribution of this thesis is the development of a strategic marketing management lens and a set of guiding questions that can facilitate a strategic analysis of market dominance in any industry.
ID Code: 16687 Item Type: QUT Thesis Keywords : Department: Faculty of Business Institution : Queensland University of Technology Copyright Owner : Copyright Jonathan Derek Silver http://eprints.qut.edu.au/16687/
"If you are out and about late night on Saturday, March 14th - swing by the Firehouse Lounge - 2216 Penn Avenue. Kris (my hubby) and DJ Strobe will be spinning some Global House.
Snowboarding, cycling, working-out, going out, dancing without caring if I look like an ass, golf, driving German cars, Tennis, reading, movies, Studying, finishing my MBA, Emailing and Texting, spending time with family and friends, Traveling, running, Xbox 360, live music...Foreign policy, International Relations, foreign affairs, foreign languages, foreign cultures, sport, travel, Formula 1, Art, Music, cinema, Literature, economics, diplomacy, political risk analysis, intelligence, anything that appears in The Economist (except for Bagehot), IWC watches, watch appreciation in general, fountain pens (admiring, writing with, and - when I had money, collecting), philosophy, not being pretentious, imagining what it would be like to have a Rhodesian Ridgeback, cycling, writing, relationship building, finding new reasons to wear my still-new tuxedo, creating opportunities to toast with champagne, reconciliation, poetry, knowing enough about Steelers football to be conversant, building sustainable relationships based on trust, not being a wuss, properly addressing text messages, Truthiness, Stand-up Comedy (because you have to be able to laugh at the end of the day), proverbs in foreign languages (but FFS - if you don't know what they mean, just ask me first, ok?), etc...
Seriously though, right now I really am back into fountain pens - writing with my old ones and admiring the newer ones that I'd like to own. Collecting them is a different story, and will require the completion of the MBA, and then the securing of a salary commensurate with an MBA-level position in a pre-meltdown economy, but I did make a list of the brands I want in my collection, and some specific models from each range. I bought my first pen in 1995, a Waterman something-or-other that I still have (Thanks, Kat Campbell!!), and own a few nice examples of German and Italian models. I like my Pelikan M800, which is *Claaaassic* (inside joke: say "Claaaassic" in your best Danny Chew voice), and I really like the green Aurora Optima that was the third pen I picked up (around 2000 or 2001). Pens are cool because I am a romantic, and sometimes I fancy myself a writer so, if not typing, the writing must be done with an implement, and a fountain pen is a pretty neat tool for the job that blends simple functionality with incredible aesthetics...and I love my aesthetics! Not me, personally, but I'm a fan of sensory or sensori-emotional values.
But I'm definitely looking forward to Codemasters'new F1 game! And the guys who appear in the podcasts below are, too! (I love that it's OK to publicly admit to liking - and playing - car racing video games after age 15 - definitely one of the perks of being a guy)!
To bring it all back around, in case you were wondering, here is a picture of my first fountain pen, a Waterman something-or-other. Thanks, Kat!
From the NY Times,
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