I wouldn’t say that I agree with all Minxin Pei‘s presentation content, but it is very interesting to watch because of the economic facts that he marshals and I like the way he puts China’s growth in the context of growth of the US in the late 19th century. Key numbers | facts Chinese economy [...]
Mary Meeker became famous as a dot.com era analyst alongside peers Jack Grubman and Henry Blodget. Unlike Grubman and Blodget she managed to avoid being thrown under the wheels of the bus, so is now the elder stateswoman of the digital economy. Mary and her team at Morgan Stanley put together good thoughtful state-of-the-nation presentations. [...]
Left Foot Forward asked me to critique the broadband plans within the new UK government administation’s programme at the end of the last week. It seemed timely to wrap this in with a quick post-election review of the digital economy act. When I kicked the tyres I found that it was essentially more of the [...]
Many of the people that I have worked with over the years give me strange looks when I explain how much we owe technological advancement to 1960s counterculture from the beatniks onwards. I have discussed Stewart Brand here before a number of times, a peer of Brand’s is a man called Richard Stallman who has [...]
In the UK, the internet industry has become a lobbyists football. From the Digital Economy Bill and the music-mogul entertained holiday in Corfu that Lord Mandelson denied to Labour prospective parliamentary candidate Richard Mollet‘s leaked memo it is obvious that there is a political and commercial will to cripple the internet and turn Digital Britain [...]
When the Sex Pistols played their last concert at the famous Winterland Ballroom in San Francisco John Lydon’s final remark to the audience was “Ah-ha-ha. Ever get the feeling you’ve been cheated? Good night“. I was reminded of that phrase when I looked at data by the SASI Research Group (University of Sheffield) which shows [...]
A couple of interesting consumer behaviour studies crossed my desk recently regarding ethical consumerism. It seems that ethical consumerism is similar to other types of consumers such that those people who drive poorly because they have a safe car. It also changes the dynamics and the trade-offs for governments trying to encourage green behaviour such [...]
I am not particularly political by nature and the different political parties leave me a bit cold. Aside from Part V of the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act of 1994, I have never felt the need to pay attention to political goings on in the UK. In many respects, I pay more attention to [...]
Octopus is a smartcard payment and ticket system rolled out in Hong Kong on the local mass transit system what the locals call the MTR. However the card system is also fast becoming a local electronic payments system covering everything from the 7-Eleven convenience store purchases, cinema tickets and a Happy Meal at the neighbourhood [...]
I recently wrote a guest blog post with my colleague Nick Osborne for progressive (Nick tells me that means left-of-centre, politically speaking) blog Left Foot Forward: The Digital Economy Bill is legislatively flawed. Nick was particularly concerned about inconsistencies in the legislation and constitutional issues. I thought about different issues regarding media economics and technological [...]
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