Homeland Security opening private mail

Man.. what a bunch of crap. Read this:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10740935/

Now our government is reading our mail. In this case, a retired 81 year old history prof. This is really getting bad.

VC & Media Companies: Same Business?

I've noticed over the last several months a lot of similarities between venture capitalists and the media worlds of recording companies and the TV/Movie industry. I'm in the process of raising money for the startup I founded (a podcasting company called ClickCaster at www.clickcaster.com) so I've talked to many VC's of late and, having spent a substantial amount of time in past lives around the media business both directly (as VP of technology at Viacom Interact and SVP of Technology at Paramount Digital Entertainment) and indirectly (as director of the Apple Electronic Media lab at Apple Computer) they act, from a business perspective, in very similar ways.

It's a hit's driven business. And it's a 'front the talent money, take the bulk of the profits at exit' approach from both the VC side and the Media business side.

Think about it. A VC fronts the startup company X dollars (say it's $1m). They then take a significant percentage of the company and integrate themselves tightly with the management of the company (usually through reporting systems and seat(s) on the board of directors). They have ALOT of say in what goes on in that company once they've put up the money. They continue to feed money, as needed, into that company, taking larger and larger percentages until they (almost always) have a majority control. When the company finally is sold or goes public (becomes 'a hit'), the VC takes the bulk of the profit and, usually, a nice multiple of their investment. The founders generally do OK, but only OK and sometimes they don’t do very well at all.

Now, if the VC firm is lucky, that happens with 1 of 5 investments they do. 1-2 will break even, 1-2 will totally fail and be written off. Sounds scary doesn't it?

Well, the Movie guys have been doing it for 100 years. And the recording industry for 50. And they seem to be doing reasonably well at it. Their hit rate is more like 1 in 10 as well. They’re still consistently profitable.

They 'front' the musician or the producers of the movie/tv series the money to create the programming. In the case of the recording industry, they front, say $1M to a hot act, and they then write a contract that charges the musician for every expense the record company incurs related to that musician. If the record makes, say $5M, the musician might get $500-$1M of that (due to the contract that give the majority of the profits to the recording company.. sound familiar? Kind of like how a VC has the majority ownership in the startup companies it invests in). So if that album gets hot and makes allot of money, it's unlikely the musician (on the first record deal they do, because they often sign off on onerous terms without knowing any better) usually ends up making no money and often OWING money (on that initial $1M 'front money') to the record company.

Pretty slick.

And if you really think about it, their mining the same thing: Intellectual Property and creativity (both required in large doses to create successful media and successful startup companies, especially in software and high tech). So it's really no surprise that their models, at the core, are very similar.

Now, the VC I’ve talked with to date haven’t been anywhere near the level of ‘slick’ (term used loosely) as record executives I've known and heard about in the past. They have been as a whole decent and honest folks, at least, so far (I haven’t closed a deal with one yet). But the similarities between the two businesses are strikingly similar in many ways. They are, in the end, investing money in high risk/high reward scenarios with a ‘play the numbers’ approach that cycles the ‘talent’ through at as high a rate as possible for as high a return on investment as possible.

I’m not saying this is bad (or good). I’m just noting that if you want to get an insight into how the VC community really works, you might consider looking at the recording industry or movie industry for cues.

Just my 2 cents, and, of course, I could be completely off my rocker here.

RED HERRING | Google Sued for $5B

RED HERRING | Google Sued for $5B

This is one of those things that makes me wonder about the legal profession.

These guys are called patent trolls. They buy up obscure patents from various places, then they sue companies for money. Usually, the 'firms' are made up almost entirely of lawyers.

I'm not defending (or condemning) Google here. But I am reasonably sure that Google didn't steal any patents. The nature of our patent system encourages this kind of activity and I can't say it's good.

Big companies like Motorola and IBM often patent the hell out of pretty much any idea they can. They have offsite weeklong patent parties with 20 engineers and a couple of lawyers that do nothing but come up with potential patents once an idea or technology they've been working on takes shape.

They then use these patents to shut down competitors (rarely) and more often, they 'cross' patent with other patent holders when there's a possible dispute. It's actually a clever way of protecting their own IP (we'll share with you if you'll share with us). As large corporations go, it's almost altruistic (well, not really, but sort of).

But these patent trolls are evil. While I was a general manager at a CLEC (Competitive Local Exchange Carrier) company awhile back, my group was served by one of these firms. We were (by phone company standards) small. They were going after small weaker companies trying to get us to settle to set a precident that would then allow them to go after the big boys once they had some wins in their court. In this case, it was for 'transmitting multimedia over cableTV infrastructure'. Isn't that called 'TV'?

Hmmm.. think of the ramifications if they won that one. I left the company before it was settled (and yes, we decided to fight it rather than lay down). But the fact remains: it's a form of predatory legal action that's more than a little distastful.

And more importantly, it's something that kills innovation and destroy's American companies ability to invest and create new technologies. And yea, it's an American problem because our patent laws support it.

Student Arrested for transporting.... baking flour

Philadelphia Inquirer | 12/30/2005 | Editorial | Flour, not coke Philly cops didn't rise to the occasion

OK.. this is nuts. Girl in Philly get's arrested and detained for THREE WEEKS because she had 2 condoms, filled with flour (used as a squeeze like stress reliever by she and her dorm buddies during tests) in her suitcase.

Three friggin weeks?? And this was in 2003. She's now suing the City of Brotherly Love for half a mil (WAY low if you ask me).

I love my security and safety.. Really I do. But I love my freedom more, and this is getting truly stupid.

Bush running hundreds (maybe thousands?) of wiretaps that most leading legal scholars say is illegal (regardless of his 'my authority is the US constitution' argument).

The NSA dropping browser cookies into anyone's computer that visits there website that tracks where you go and what you do on the internet (without asking, and with a 20 year expiration date).

A quickly written law (The Patriot Act) that, although done with all the best intentions, opens doors that really, truly, should not be opened.

Monitoring and tracking peace demonstrators (something I don't personally take part in... but what if I was walking by when they were taking pictures? Guess I'm one of em.. guess I'm going to be monitored, tracked and followed now)

Detaining people, without even charging them, for years. CHARGE them with something, for god's sake. If they're such a threat, you've got to have something on them to charge them with.

This shadowy stuff is more than a little scary.

I could go on.. but I won't.

Maybe I'm over-reacting. OK.. yea.. I am, but only a little.

This hit me because this is very real world, with a very innocent person being detained for carrying flour that 'might' be drugs (or something..)

I see a link between this kind of behavior from our police and other governement authorities and their increasing over reaction to anything seen as a threat. It's carrying over into average people's lives in a very negative way. See my earlier post:

http://scottsphotolife.blogspot.com/2005/11/denvers-police-state.html#links

on the women who refused to show her 'ID' while riding on a public bus and was arrested.

Why did this happen? Maybe because...She's asian. It was WHITE POWDER. It might be drugs...maybe something else?? Ask: If this was sept. 10th, 2001, think it would have happened? Three weeks in jail? I doubt it. Overnight detention maybe. Maybe.

They should call in the CSI guys on TV. They can do highly complex DNA tests in, like, what, 15 minutes?

Seriously though, a test like this should be simple and fast. "Opps.. you're right.. flour.. sorry bout that"...

Old Ben Franklin nailed it when he said:

"They who would give up an essential liberty for temporary security, deserve neither liberty or security"

Time to buck up and accept that we cannot protect against every possible attack, every threat to our security. Time to realize that our freedoms must be protected as much as our security. And most importantly- time to realize that WE, the citizens of the country, are not the enemy. These are trends, and they are not good trends.

The balance is out of whack. WAY out of whack. To our leaders: Get it together. Find some reasonable balance. Be smart about security, but don't crush, or even dent, the freedoms this country was founded on.

A disconnected week

Whew... well that was interesting.

I took a week and turned off my cell phone and disconnected my email and just lived in the 'natural' world for a change. You know.. cars, restaurants, coffee shops (without a computer), hanging with people that didn't care about computers or web 2.0 or podcasting or much of anything I work on all day

Everyone should do it.

Amazing how we can get totally wrapped up in our worlds and forget about all the other extraordinary things out in the world.


End result? I've decided I'm doing the wrong thing with my life. I was meant to be a Anime/Manga artist (even though I have no idea if I can draw). So, guess I better learn fast. Either that or an erotic portrait photographer. Can't get a good read on which one just yet.... Maybe another week off.... hmmmm

What goes around....

Weird how things come full circle if you give them long enough.

Here's something from today's Wall Street Journal:

AT&T to 'Reintroduce' Itself
With a Big Campaign

By DIONNE SEARCEY
Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
December 29, 2005; Page B4

In a bid to re-energize one of the country's best-known brands, the new AT&T Inc. plans to kick off a massive ad campaign on New Year's Eve.

The campaign, which includes television commercials, billboards, airport signs and a theme song by the rock band Oasis, comes a month after SBC Communications Inc. acquired AT&T Corp. and decided to keep the historic phone company's moniker. Executives said the new campaign is bigger than any marketing buys in the history of both SBC and the old AT&T.

AT&T won't say how much it is spending on the campaign, which is being handled by Omnicom Group Inc.'s GSD&M and Rodgers Townsend. Advertising experts estimate it will cost $800 million to $1 billion.

This got me to thinking: This 'new' AT&T is one big honkin company. And, as big companies go, they have only one primary goal: Increase shareholder value.

How? By growing their sales and revenue. How to do that? Good products and BUYING OTHER PHONE COMPANIES. I yell this because, damn it.... they're gonna buy all the other phone companies and reconstitute AT&T! MaBell wants to live yet again.... Even the US governments anti-trust department can't stop her long term.

You heard it here first. Heh.

A very personal iPod accessory

Tell me that your iPod isn't becoming a very personal part of your daily life.

This 'accessory' is available for your iPod now. Plugs in and vibrates/pulsates to the beat of the music.

This is what I call PERSONAL entertainment.

Thanks to the engadget guys for clueing us in on this. More from them at: http://www.engadget.com/entry/1234000727071936/

Here's my del.icio.us tag cloud!

http://del.icio.us/scottgconverse?settagsort=alpha

My Del.icio.us tag list. If you're not a del.icio.us user, think about starting. It's a great way to quickly 'tag' things of interest so you can find them later. I use it half a dozen times a day to mark things I don't want to lose track of, and, it ranks them for me over time showing me what my thought process flow is in a semi-graphic highly alpha mannor. Cool stuff.