What constitutes a gadget? The dictionary definition would be a small mechanical or electronic device or tool, especially an ingenious or novel one.
When I started writing this blog the gadget section focused on personal digital assistants such as the Palm PDA and Sony’s Clie devices. Or the Anoto digital pen that allowed you to record digitally what had been written on a specially marked out paper page, giving the best of both experiences.
Some of the ideas I shared weren’t so small like a Panasonic sleeping room for sleep starved, but well heeled Japanese.
When cutting edge technology failed me, I periodically went back to older technology such as the Nokia 8850 cellphone or my love of the Nokia E90 Communicator.
I also started looking back to discontinued products like the Sony Walkman WM-D6C Pro, one of the best cassette decks ever made of any size. I knew people who used it in their hi-fi systems as well as for portable audio.
Some of the technology that I looked at were products that marked a particular point in my life such as my college days with the Apple StyleWriter II. While my college peers were worried about getting on laser printers to submit assignments, I had a stack of cartridges cotton buds and isopropyl alcohol to deal with any non catastrophic printer issues and so could print during the evening in the comfort of my lodgings.
Alongside the demise in prominence of the gadget, there has been a rise in the trend of everyday carry or EDC.
While everyone from from organised criminals to Chinese government hackers were robbing governments blind during the COVID crisis, in the UK the scandal surrounding PPE Medpro seems particularly egregious. The tale of PPE Medpro goes back to the VIP programme that the UK government used to secure PPE through politically connected companies. PPE Medpro was one of the companies who benefited from £10 billion squandered on these PPE purchases.
Michelle Mone with former Spice Girls singer Mel B
PPE Medpro got contracts through the VIP programme after a Michelle Mone, a member of the House of Lords lobbied on their behalf. Mone had previously set up a successful clothing brand with her first husband, then moved into diet pills, fake tanning products and even an aborted cryptocurrency launch.
In return PPE Medpro is alleged to have paid Mone £29 million, the subsequent investigation led HSBC to freeze her bank accounts.
China
China risks 1mn Covid deaths in ‘winter wave’, modelling shows | Financial Times – China is easing restrictions after the Chinese COVID protests. 1 million is on the low end of numbers I have heard quoted. However, it is also politically evocative. The Chinese people have been constantly reminded that 1 million people lost their lives to COVID in the United States and the communist party ensured that just 5,000 people have died in their country.
Germany confronts a broken business model | Financial Times – Chief executive Martin Brudermüller announced that BASF would downsize in Europe “as quickly as possible, and also permanently”. Most of the cuts are expected to be made at the Ludwigshafen site. BASF is not alone. Since the summer, companies across Germany have been scrambling to adjust to the near disappearance of Russian gas. They have dimmed the lights, switched to oil — and, as a last resort cut production. Some are even thinking about moving operations to countries where energy is cheaper. That is triggering deep concern about the future of German industry and the sustainability of the country’s business model, which has long been predicated on the cheap energy guaranteed by a plentiful supply of Russian gas. Constanze Stelzenmüller, director of the Center on the US and Europe at the Brookings Institution, has said Germany is a case study of a western state that made a “strategic bet” on globalisation and interdependence – based on this experience why would you want to ‘bet’ on China or any other authoritarian country? Once the basic industries like BASF go, the higher end industries will follow
Auction sales slide in Hong Kong | Financial Times – Six-monthly auction sales in Hong Kong have had their worst results since 2018, with this season marking the third consecutive drop, according to ArtTactic. Its analysis finds that the October-to-December evening sales made a total of HK$1.7bn ($220mn, before fees), a fall of 34 per cent since the equivalent sales last year and more than 50 per cent down from their peak in spring 2021 – this is interesting given how much has been invested in the past couple of years by the major auction houses into Hong Kong
How Do Korea’s 1% Get Rich? – The Chosun Ilbo (English Edition) – The wealthy prefer deposit and savings accounts as the best short-term investments over the next year now that interest rates are high. But they pointed to real estate, both to let and for use as their own homes, as the best investment over the longer term. Their hopes for gold and jewelry or bonds also increased.
Being a creator and relying on YouTube ad revenue sounds like rather like being a musician and relying on Spotify. For reference £1 is worth about ₩1611 at the time of writing, which means they make less than £50/month. This anecdotal evidence fits right in with an analysis piece in the FT – The Lex Newsletter: the cratering creator economy | Financial Times
The US Army’s Land Warrior programme was in development for some 33 years. The idea behind it is that better informed soldiers who are connected to support assets can do more with less and survive.
Chris Capelluto put together a good accessible history of the programme.
Burning chrome
About a decade after the rise of cyberpunk developed as a literature genre, the defence thinkers realised the potential of modern technologies that would have sounded similar to Case’s cyber deck in Neuromancer.
Head up displays, small but connected and powerful networked computers and connected weapon sights of the Land Warrior programme have taken over three decades to fulfil the original vision. Technology takes time, while Land Warrior has taken three plus decades; artificial intelligence is taking a lot longer again.
Human factors
Even now the Land Warrior programme isn’t completely sorted. The Microsoft Halolens AR displays are said to cause debilitating nausea, headaches and eye strain. More than 80% of those who experienced discomfort suffered symptoms within three hours of using the Land Warrior AR headset.
The wearable computer of the Land Warrior programme is an Android powered Smartphone sized device, but would be using very different networks. The network is both the strength and the point of weakness in the Land Warrior programme.
How the networked structures of Land Warrior will fully affect military culture and power structures will be interesting. All of it will be creating tensions in the millennia of ‘hard-wiring’ humans have had since before the dawn of civilisation as we know it and the impact will be much deeper than just the physical tiredness from head up display googles.
Just think about the benefits and ills of social media, or how the world has shrunk through video calls. In my parent’s lifetime, people leaving their homes in Ireland to emigrate to the US or Australia used to have a wake at their leaving. In some respects that departure was a form of death. That is very different to the relationship that I have with family and friends around the world now. Changes coming through from Land Warrior might be equally deep over time.
A lament for the age of apathy | Financial Times – Turnout in the US election of 1996 fell below 50 per cent. In Britain five years later, it was the lowest since the Great war. Most pop culture either side of the millennium wasn’t even allusively or allegorically political. You can read Jane Austen — goes the old line — without knowing that Napoleon was cutting through Europe. You can watch Friends without knowing that America has a government. The peak of the apolitical age was Big Brother, which, in sealing contestants from the news, didn’t disrupt their lives much. – I think a large amount of society still live in that bubble
I was watching this video and I could it imagine something similar being done to describe the luck of many market towns in the west of Ireland with the identikit feel
The video below is a good run down on the short term aspects of the current state of the UK economy. However UK productivity has been going wrong for decades. Several reasons:
The UK relies on services rather than manufacturing – While the UK was in the EU, those factories that remained imported more productive workers from the east. With Brexit the manufacturing and warehouses went east instead along with income tax revenues
The UK has a serious skills gap, there isn’t the prevalence of night colleges any more
The UK has been declining in automation. The classic example is trying to find an automatic car wash. During the 1970s and 1980s these were all over the UK. Now you get a bunch of people with buckets. UK warehouses are much less automated than most other places. This is partly down to several decades of short termism that Will Hutton wrote about back in The State We’re In circa 1995
Brexit has permanently re-eingineered supply chains around the UK
Too much UK investment has gone into real estate, you only have to see all the developments in London and Manchester
Universities are now developed for the benefit of foriegn students rather than domestic talent growth, innovation. And the universities are over leveraged in property development and are likely to go under if there is a reduction in foreign students or a rise in interest rates
Epson to End All Laser Printer Sales by 2026 – ExtremeTech – quietly chosen to stop selling laser printer hardware by 2026. The company will instead focus on its more environmentally-friendly inkjet printers, according to a statement obtained by The Register. Although the company stopped selling laser printers in the United States a while back, it had maintained the line in other markets, including Europe and Asia. Consumers will no longer be able to purchase new Epson laser printers as of 2026, but Epson has promised to continue supporting existing customers via supplies and spare parts. Epson itself claims its inkjets are up to 85 percent more energy efficient than its laser units and produce 85 percent less carbon dioxide. Interesting move, western companies would be virtue signalling the hell out of this.
Really impressive piece of technology and engineering by Sony. But I can’t work out why it was done. By this time Citizen, Casio and Sony were already making LCD televisions. Back in the day Sony used to some products, just because the engineers could. I also love how this looks like a miniature version of a Sony 14″ portable TV circa 1984, even down to the homage to the Trinitron branding.
There seems to be a lack of appreciation for economic trajectory that Hong Kong is on; inextricably linked in China
They don’t seem to understand the political trajectory Hong Kong is on
They aren’t the kind of talent that Hong Kong needs to plug losses in healthcare, education, social services and the creative industries
More developed countries aren’t likely to want ‘stepping stone’ Chinese people from Hong Kong. Their choices might be as limited as are on the mainland
This will only accelerate simmering nativist hostility and more Hong Kongers may leave via BNO visas etc.
If Hong Kong has been in a recession, what must the real state of the China economy be? Are they way worse than PMI and official numbers seem to suggest?
Finally, China has disliked Hong Kong being a vehicle for capital flight. With a greying workforce and declining birth rate will they dislike the talent flight of middle class Chinese through ‘stepping stone’ Hong Kong?
Ideas
Interesting viewpoint on Russia from author Ian Garner. You can find out more about his book here.
China’s puffer jacket obsession: Its not just Moncler and Canada Goose, homegrown brands are taking off | Campaign Asia – Domestic Chinese and international puffer jacket brands are battling for market share in the mainland. We take a look at which names are emerging victorious. China’s puffer jacket obsession: Its not just Moncler and Canada Goose, homegrown brands are taking offWhen temperatures in China started to cool down in early October, one of the biggest fashion trends to return was the puffer jacket. Alongside higher-priced brands like Canada Goose — which saw 20 percent higher sales compared to the previous year — homegrown puffer jacket labels such as Bosideng, Xue Zhong Fei, and Yaya all reported that their gross merchandise value (GMV) growth rate on Tmall exceeded 100 percent. Meanwhile, European brand Moncler sold out of its classic Maya coat on the first day of its debut on Tmall Luxury Pavilion in October.
Media
Why Hong Kong’s outdoor advertising is underperforming | Media | Campaign Asia – Based on a recent study by Hong Kong Baptist University, OOH ads are failing to capture people as they severely lack creativity. Dang, I feel bad for you son, that’s burn to the Hong Kong agency scene right there. Seriously though I would be curious about the methodology
The $300 Million Sneaker King Comes Undone – WSJ – In May, Mr. Malekzadeh’s fiancée—also the company’s finance chief—pushed for both of them to come clean, according to people familiar with the situation. Federal prosecutors a few months later charged the couple with bank fraud and Mr. Malekzadeh with wire fraud and money laundering. Customers claim they paid millions of dollars for shoes that never arrived. A court-appointed receiver is sorting out the remaining inventory of the entrepreneur’s company, Zadeh Kicks. Early last year, Mr. Malekzadeh collected orders for about 600,000 pairs of Air Jordan 11 Cool Grey sneakers months before they hit stores, netting over $70 million, according to prosecutors. He priced the sneakers between $115 and $200 a pair, cheaper than their expected retail price of around $225
In 2020 Forbes magazine described Yeezy’s rise as “one of the great retail stories of the century”. Yeezy influenced and inspired a multitude of other fashion brands. Kanye West and the Yeezy brand has been a phenomenal power in street wear. West collaborated with BAPE early on his career and Yeezy took off with the famous Nike collaboration output: Air Yeezy sneakers. Adidas reached out to West, after
Adidas has a plan to sell Yeezy sneakers without Ye – Because the company owns the designs it made with Ye, it can—and it probably will—sell the shoes, chief financial officer (and interim CEO until Dec. 31) Harm Ohlmeyer said on the company’s Nov. 9 earnings call. – They can’t use the Yeezy name though. Given that Yeezy is responsible for up to 40 percent of adidas properties according to some sources, this could end up being the best of both worlds for adidas. Kanye West was unhappy for a long time with the adidas deal, so unlikely to complain, and he may yet be able to use the Yeezy brand with another sneaker maker, for instance in China.
Opinion | How China Lost America – The New York Times – interesting piece by Thomas Friedman – the big take out for me is that China thinkers don’t realise that Xi Jinping doesn’t care due to his Marxist dialectic world view. Read also: The Return of Red China: Xi Jinping Brings Back Marxism – China is now breaking from decades of political, economic, and foreign-policy pragmatism and accommodationism. Xi’s China is assertive. He is less subtle than his predecessors, and his ideological blueprint for the future is now hiding in plain sight. The question for all is whether his plans will prevail or generate their own political antibodies, both at home and abroad, that begin to actively resist Xi’s vision for China and the world. But then again, as a practicing Marxist dialectician, Xi Jinping is probably already anticipating that response—and preparing whatever countermeasures may then be warranted – Kevin Rudd on China
Consumer behaviour
PR emails: I said yes to every single one for a day. Oof. | Slate – Could it be possible that the publicists are on to something? Is the daily flood of hopeless pitches actually a secret window into American ingenuity, optimism, and desperation—not to mention a very interesting line of scientifically tested sex toys?
Really interesting commentary on how Adidas designed the mesh used in the 4DFWD running shoe that provides a similar energy transfer to the carbon fibre shank in Nike Air Zoom Alphafly NEXT% shoes that completely changed long distance running
Great video on how additive manufacturing’s unique properties can result in innovation. This heat exchange was printed from laser sintered aluminium alloy powder. The weight savings and increased thermal efficiency figures claimed are very impressive. The problem is using this technology at scale, or will it be niche like carbon fibre fabrication is now?
Some machines combine CNC milling machines with additive manufacturing capability, this hybrid expertise makes a lot of sense.
The US used shell companies during the Cold War to secure titanium from Russia. Now it seems that Russia has done similar things with electronics components for its smart weapons obtained from US manufacturers.
I remember catching Thirtysomething in between working and DJing on a weekend and during my evenings. What caught my eye at the time is that the show felt ‘bigger’ than other shows on TV at the time. It was down to Thirtysomething having talented directors and really good script writers who managed to tease the drama and storytelling out of everyday life events. It was the first show where I watched and learned how it was being created rather than being merely entertained by it. I had already taken a similar attitude to film thanks to Alex Cox’s Moviedrome series.
Promotional artwork for the series
Thirtysomething dealt with issues like ‘selling out’, having career disappointment and becoming a ‘corporate being’. The storylines included episodes where cast members were killed off or had cancer. It was also unashamedly aspirational; they were all university educated. Two of the main characters ran an advertising agency together, that would be later bought out – which brought its own troubles. Others were a successful artist, a successful photographer and a college lecturer.
In many respects Thirtysomething was a forerunner for the BBC’s This Life, which was the younger, hipper British cousin. There is something very ‘HBO’ about the feel of Thirtysomething despite the fact that it was shot for the network ABC.
The people went on to work on big Hollywood projects:
Looking back at Thirtysomething you realise that the problems that middle class America worry about have grown. Thirtysomething came from a middle class that was still striving and unashamedly white as was the later Friends. This Life had it easier being set in multicultural London rather than Thirtysomething which was set in Philadelphia. Thirtysomething had a limited release as a box set in the US. It is unavailable for streaming in the US or UK and doesn’t have the kind of following it would likely deserve, given the quality of the storytelling and the script writing involved. Much of this seems to be down to issues with music rights, which makes sense when you see tracks by The Who being replaced on the DVD releases of the original TV series of CSI.
Tracker software
In the early 1990s, tracker software packages that ran on the Commodore Amiga inspired a number of music producers, mostly bedroom producers. Some prominent producers used this set-up, notably drum and bass pioneer Micky Finn.
Tracker software is the grandparent of modern DAW software like Cubase which has replaced most outboard studio equipment.
Making Leatherman multi-tools
This video looks at the Leatherman multi-tool factory and the legacy of engineer Tim Leatherman who founded the company in 1983. In a globalised world, Leatherman is unusual in continuing American manufacturing.
The Ford Fiesta will be forever linked to my early driving experience. I started learning to drive in the 1990s. Back then leasing agreements and car finance weren’t really a thing due to high interest rates. (There is a whole other blog post that I should write at some point about the risk of sub prime car loans, but not today.)
Car insurance was cripplingly expensive. It was even more expensive when you had no no claims and three points on my licence for an accident that I still claim wasn’t my fault.
I also have a Dad who is a time-served mechanical fitter and all-round engineering wizard. At the time we had access to a garage with a vehicle pit, welding equipment and an engine hoist on the evenings and from Saturday afternoon on during the weekend. My Dad had good personal relationships with a number of people who ran scrapyards. You went in, tore the parts you wanted off the cars and took them to the owner and negotiated a deal.
One salvage yard took things a step further by tearing cars down themselves and selling the parts alongside the basics that you’d need for servicing and usually buy from a motor factors. They’re still going strong and still only do business in-person or over the phone. No fax machine, email or website.
My Dad had been servicing and repairing cars since the mid-1960s and worked repairing a wide range of tracked and wheeled vehicles for the likes of Bord na Mona and Massey Ferguson.
Driving bangers
The vehicles that I owned were nothing to brag about, but they were really, really cheap and at least one of them was really, really dangerous. The most dangerous car was a Fiat 126. It cost £150 and I bought it off a former colleague who I met working one summer repairing tools and equipment rented out for use on construction sites. Even in the early 1990s that was a ludicrously cheap car.
The engine was terrible, as were the drum brakes. The body work crumbled in a way that one would expect for a Fiat made in the 1970s. Drum brakes ‘fade’ with repeated use (like going through a set of turns), they don’t work particularly well in the wet and they were prone to locking up on occasion.
Because of the noise, dangerous brakes, exceptionally poor build quality and Russian roulette-like standing starts it was tiresome to drive anywhere for anything more than an hour. The lights were pathetic the wipers were ineffective and the all the rubber seals leaked.
But it also put a smile on my face more times than any other car that I have owned. It handled really well. You could go sideways around corners and still stay in lane. You had a ludicrously low seating position and an exceptionally direct gear change. As a young man with a complete lack of appreciation for risk, it taught me that small cars can be fun.
Also as a cash-strapped young man, I appreciated that paying less to run a car was a good idea, so I aspired to own a diesel.
Building a Ford Fiesta
Eventually, through my Dad’s contacts I managed to get the diesel engine from a Ford Escort van that had been rear-ended and a Ford Fiesta delivery van with a blown petrol engine. At the time a friend that I knew through scuba diving had done a diesel engine swap into a mark two Ford Fiesta XR2. My vehicle was much rattier.
A mark two XR2 very similar looking to the car my friend transplanted with a diesel engine. The only difference being that his had the ‘pepper pot’ alloy wheels. Picture by Kieran White on Flickr (creative commons licence)
We used the beefier Escort springs to handle the increased engine weight, but kept the Fiesta braking system and gearbox. So I had a diesel Ford Fiesta van. Over a weekend, we used a Makita jigsaw to remove the van panels were the windows should be. New window gaskets and rear side windows from a totalled Ford Fiesta mark one. In went the mark one seats and rear seat belts and I had a car.
The van was old enough that I didn’t need to pay VAT after converting it to a car according to the DVLA at the time.
The gearbox was less direct than my previous cars, the steering lacked the go-kart feel of the Fiat and there was more body roll, but the Fiesta was a good car to drive. It had enough power for confident standing starts at junctions and motorway driving was comfortable. The best part was the fuel economy, I typically got 70 miles to the gallon (over 29 kilometres per litre).
I read that Ford was getting rid of the Fiesta and I was reminded of my old car and the role that it played in taking me around the country and allowing me to earn a living before I had moved to London.
Why are Ford Motor Company likely to be binning the Ford Fiesta?
I suspect that it is down to a number of factors:
Consumers want the higher driving position of a crossover or SUV, super mini vehicles like the Ford Fiesta have fallen out of favour
Small vans no longer share the same body shape as their car equivalents. Ford has its Transit Courier small van with a body better designed to cope with large objects or small pallets. So there are less common tooling that they can use to mitigate for lower production volumes
Germany is an expensive place to built a small car, even in a highly automated factory
It makes sense to prioritise scarce components in crunched supply chains to vehicles that produce the highest profit margin
An electric version of the Fiesta would give only a limited range between recharges. Electric battery carrying capacity is directly proportion to the size of the vehicle floorpan and Fiestas are very small. BMW couldn’t get its I3 to work from a business and consumer offering perspective
The price point of an electric Ford Fiesta would represent poor value for money for consumers
Goodbye to the Fiesta
Ford of Europe put together a farewell video to announce the end of Ford Fiesta production.
https://youtu.be/UYcoJ5cU-v4
Ford of Europe
YouTube channel Big Car did a great history of the Fiesta that is worth watching. Until I watched this video I had no idea that the impetus to develop the Ford Fiesta didn’t come from within Ford of Europe, but from American executive Henry Ford II. Henry Ford II is most famous amongst gear heads now as being the executive who drove support for the Ford GT40 after talks had collapsed with Ferrari.
Hank Deuce as he was known was portrayed by Tracy Letts who acted opposite Matt Damon and Christian Slater in the movie Ford vs. Ferrari.
