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Berlin, Potsdamer Platz bei Nacht

[Foto: Hartmut Wiehr, 9-6-08]

Photograph by Walker Evans

Some Bosses don't Like Obama

CIO reported:

Mrs. Hillary Clinton Speaking

“My husband did not wrap up the nomination in 1992 until he won the California primary somewhere in the middle of June, right?” she said. “We all remember Bobby Kennedy was assassinated in June in California.”

“Earlier today I was discussing the Democratic primary history and in the course of that discussion mentioned the campaigns that both my husband and Senator Kennedy waged in California in June, in 1992 and 1968,” she said. “And I was referencing those to make the point that we have had nomination primary contests that go into June. That’s a historic fact.”

Friday was not the first time Mrs. Clinton referred to the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy in such a context. In March, she told Time magazine: “Primary contests used to last a lot longer. We all remember the great tragedy of Bobby Kennedy being assassinated in June in L.A. My husband didn’t wrap up the nomination in 1992 until June. Having a primary contest go through June is nothing particularly unusual.”

[source: here]

The Brooklyn Bridge - opened on May 24, 1883

"Celebrating an Engineering Marvel, Born in Tragedy":

Fortschritt

Die IT-Fachpresse war schon immer dadurch gekennzeichnet, daß Redakteure und freie Autoren den Auftrag hatten, die weißen Flecken zwischen den Anzeigen mit Text zu füllen. Das war manchmal wenig Text zwischen all den vielen Anzeigen, die das große Geld einbrachten.

Heute liefern die Anzeigenkunden über ihre Presseagenturen auch noch die Texte, damit die vielen weißen Flecken in den immer dünner werdenden Ausgaben halbwegs gefüllt aussehen. Redakteure und freie Autoren lassen sich so auf relativ wenige Exemplare reduzieren, einigen von ihnen gelingt es immerhin, im direkten Auftrag der IT-Industrie ihre Existenz zu fristen.

Eine Branche wird so ihrem Begriff entsprechend umgestaltet: abstrakte Kapitalvermehrung. Wie die zustande kommt, ist letztlich egal. Mal mit mehr, mal mit weniger Text.

Dell: The Greenest Company in the World ...

"Dell Responds to Excessive Packaging Claims

Following up on a story we covered on excessive packaging from Dell, the company has posted a response and outlined steps they are taking to address the issue.

The way Dell choose to respond to this issue is interesting. As soon as the stories began appearing on various blogs including this one, a representative from Dell was posting comments indicating they were concerned and looking into the matter. The company also provided some information on what happened and assured readers they would follow up.

Just over two weeks after the story broke Dell did follow up as they promised. The company posted yesterday on their Direct2Dell blog. Todd Dwyer, Dell's Community Liaison - Environment explains in the posting how the company is concerned about the excessive packaging issue and taking steps to insure it will not happen again.

Dell's public response is admirable. Contrast it to the approach other companies we've covered recently have taken, namely Whole Foods and Target who both opted not to provide information on issues.

Dwyer writes:

It's no secret that Dell aims to be the greenest technology company in the world. But on Earth Day last week, sites like The Consumerist, Gizmodo, and other blogs showed us that there's still more work for us to do.

Shortly after we read those posts, we had a team on the road to Dallas to meet with the vendor that shipped this flash drive to see how we can improve the process. End result, there's some easy fixes and some longer-term issues for us to address. Here's an outline:

* Immediate: Directive to use envelopes for small items such as these.

* Short term: Use of smaller boxes. We have requested an optimization analysis of product volume to box size.

* Short term: Implementation of Dell-defined volumetric metrics on void space in the package to be incorporated into our periodic vendor business reviews."

[source: here]

Intel Accused to Pay Dell and Others to Keep AMD out

heise online writes: "Processor manufacturer AMD has introduced new evidence in the anti-trust case against its competitor Intel, in federal court in the US state of Delaware. According to the Wall Street Journal, the evidence shows that Intel coerced and paid computer manufacturers like Dell, Acer, Gateway, IBM and Hewlett-Packard not to use any AMD products. Large swathes of the 108-page document that the court made public on Monday are blacked out to prevent trade secrets from being made public.

According to AMD, the new evidence is the result of an evaluation of 200 million pages of documents which AMD obtained from Intel and PC manufacturers in a discovery request. According to US press reports, AMD's legal counsel, O'Melveny & Myers LLP, claims that these materials contain documented email exchanges between leading PC manufacturer employees and Intel that demonstrate the illegal practice of crowding competitors out of the market. Intel denies all of the allegations and accuses AMD of using the courts to protect itself from legitimate competition."

[more]

"Change we can believe in!" (The Obama campaign)

Not only in the US the speech of politics is a weapon in the battle for voters: to say almost nothing and with that winning the election.

For example the Barack Obama campaign. The guy seems to be on the way to change politics in far Washington, DC. How and why?

"Yes, we can!"

Can what?

"Hope."

Hope for what?

"For change."

Or: "Change we can believe in!"

Can we?

Wired: Saving the Earth? Good for You — Just Be Sure to Watch the Bottom Line.

Zwischen Umwelt und Profit - die Industrie, nicht nur die mit IT zu tun hat, bewegt sich auf einem schwankenden Pfad, und der wird nicht nur letztlich, sondern sehr prinzipiell durch das P-Word bestimmt. Aus einem Wired-Artikel, der sich u.a. mit Toyota und General Electric beschäftigt:

"Few companies represent the emerging ethos of green business better than Toyota, the acknowledged innovator in fuel-efficient hybrid vehicles. But sales of its flagship Prius model were slow to catch up to the car's enormous development cost. For profits, the Japanese automaker relies on conventional trucks, including its popular Tundra pickup. And to protect its cash cow, the company has strayed more than once from the path of environmental virtue."

[source ...]