Money is Debt

Situation: 

• You and Me are in a sealed room. 
• There is only $100 in the room, and I owns it.

Today:

• I loan you that $100 with a daily interest of 1%.
• You take the money.

Tomorrow:

• You pay me $100 and you still owes me $1.

Scenario 1. 

• You print $1 to pays me (effectively creating money out of the thin air) or...

Scenario 2.

• You declare bankruptcy...

Conclusion:

In the world today, we have countries that are both in scenario 1 and 2. Effectively, every countries are in debt globally. If I am in debt and you are in debt,... where does all the monies go to?

It takes courage!

If prosperity were easy, everybody around the world would be prosperous.
If freedom were easy, everybody around the world would be free.
If security were easy, everybody around the world would be secured.

THEY ARE NOT!!!

None of these are going to be easy.
But this is life.
It takes an extraordinary effort.
It takes extraordinary commitment.
It takes extraordinary strength.

Put your head down and get it done.

I'm switching to a Standing Desk

A standing desk is a desk conceived for writing and/or reading while standing up. Apparently, Wikipedia mentioned that in the 18th and 19th century, these desks were popular among the rich. Many famous people uses a standup desk such as  Donald Rumsfield, Gina Trapani, Marco Arment, and me. :)

Yes, starting today, I've decided to convert my home desk into a standing desk. Why am I doing this? I guess I'm "tired" of sitting on my bum the whole day both in the office as well as at home. I've done some research via Google and realized that it's a growing trend nowadays. Some even installed their desk over a treadmill.

What I've found so far is fairly positive. Firstly, sitting is the most "efficient" form of resting. This become a problem because you don't use as much energy as those who spend more time on their feet. This makes it easier to gain weight, and prone to health problems. Don't get me wrong. I'm still as lazy as ever. I just decided to insert an obstacle into my lazy life routine and "force" myself to lose weight. Hence, compared to standing, you have to tense your leg muscle, engage the shoulder and back muscles and often shift the leg from one to the other. All these burn energy.

Anyway, I've adjusted the height for the "desk" to be just right (whereby my elbow is 90 degrees bent when I rest my hand on the "desk").... and typing this article while standing up. Yes my leg is beginning to ache...

What are you willing to die for?

As part of the samurai bushido honor code, the ancient Japanese practiced Seppuku (also know as Harakiri) as a form of ritualistic suicide: to die in honor rather than submit to their enemies. These warriors are willing to exchange their life to defend their belief.

Beside Seppuku, there is also another ancient practice that was considered common practiced around the world even in today's modern world: self-immolation. This form of suicide by fire is often committed for political or moral reason as a form of protest. Self-immolation gained notoriety in 1963 when Thich Quang Duc, a Buddhist monk immolated himself in protest of the Vietnamese regime. As he burned he never moved a muscle, never uttered a sound, his outward composure in sharp contrast to the wailing people around him.

In 2011, a 26 year old man named Mohamed Bouazizi immolated himself in front of a Tunisian government building to protest the seizure of his livelihood (an unlicensed fruit cart). This Tunisian man's action has sparked a revolution around the nation forcing the nation's leader, Ben Ali to go into exile.

He'll never know he changed the world.

Putt's Law

"Technology is dominated by two types of people: those who understand what they do not manage and those who manage what they do not understand."



The above quote is from the book on the left. This seems to describe lots of manager in the world today. It seems that the competent person would rather continue doing technical work - hence they do not manage. Whereas the incompetent, who have already had to develop certain "skills" to mask their incompetence (otherwise they would have been discovered that they dunno nuts), find that those very skills are highly appreciated and rewarded as a manager in a technical organization.


This is street smart vs book smart. Nonetheless, this quote reminds me of HI.P.P.O. which stands for Highest Paid Person Opinion (in the room). Next time, take note of the person who make the decision in the room. Often time, they're the highest paid in the room. Complement this with Putt's Law, this would mean that they're also the least competent person making decision. 

China's succession plan.

I just learned that many of China's first generation of entrepreneurs are nearing retirement. Amongst the company affected by this "transitional challenges" are Haier, Huawei and Lenovo.

For the Shenzhen based Huawei - the world's second largest telcommunications equipment maker, several top executives such as Sun Yafang (Chairperson) and Xu Zhiping (President of Products and Solutions Division) has announced that they were planning to step down. Many more will be stepping down.
In return, the founder/CEO, Ren Zhengfei want his son, Ren Ping to take over as CEO and promote his daughter, Meng Wanzhou from senior finance manager to Huawei's CFO.

This is the company that almost swallowed 3Com. Is it wise to transform such a successful company into a family dynasty?

Music makes you high.

Apparently, research has found that listening to tunes that "moved" you can makes your brain to release dopamine. Even just anticipating the music is enough for you to get "high".

What we need is more music. Plenty of it. I guess we're all just drug addicts.

The slower you sell, the faster your customer buys.

Avoid selling your products / services too fast. 

1. Customers need to study the features and benefits during their learning phase. If you make a pitch too soon you’ll be out of sync with your customer’s buying process. 
2. Plus, if you made an early pitch, you forfeit the opportunity to help your customers to diagnose their needs.
3. The key is not to talk about the benefit of your products / services. 
4. Rather, get your customer to think about the value of having their problem solved. They will assign their own value to it.

Focus on differentiating how you sell. Build more trust by slowing down your sales process. Let your customers speed up your buying process. 

2011: Beginning of daily updates

Many people usually begin their New Year resolution before the beginning of the year. I think 9 days late isn't too bad to "catch-up". Anyway, for the year 2011, I will try to jot down something I've learn each and every day for the whole year. These knowledge will be things I didn't know prior.

January

1. There is only one factory in the US that make the official NFL football. The Wilson's Football Factory
2. Amongst all the usage of (sic), I can only remember 1. To quote archaic phrase/word as intended.
3. In Malaysia, 20% tax rebate only applies to films with 70% of the dialog in Bahasa Malaysia. I wonder if this mindset is due to Chedet's influence.
4. At an inquest, if a coroner couldn't determine if the victim is murdered or suicide, it meant Open Verdict, giving rise to the joke: He's not murdered. He didn't commit suicide. He just ...died.
5. Google Android's strategy evolves around advertisement
6. Apparently there are World tournaments for Rock-Paper-Scissor game
7. Bashashi is known as sliced horse meat in Japan. Yes, there are people who eat them, even in the US. 
8. and hippophagy is the act of eating horse flesh.
9. According to Michael Porter, what is good for the society is good for the business and it's not the other way round. Focus on helping the society and the profit will follow suit instead of profit at the expense of the society.