Happy New Year

Best wishes to all for a healthy, happy and prosperous 2010! Have fun tonight!

The Impact of New Technology

Think about the change we have all seen in the last 5 years. It's been incredible and it's all driven by developments in technology - in essence the ability for any information to be digitized, stored and served up to anyone at a cost that keeps lowering! What fascinates me is that technological change is advancing upwards at about a 10% angle. What this means is - "we ain't seen anything yet"! Change is gonig to cintinue and affect us all in positive and not so positive ways! And I can't wait!

An Amazing Kindle Experience

Guess what? I got a Kindle for Christmas! It's really, really neat! It was opened on Boxing Day and before I knew it, two books were downloaded as was a free 2 week trail for The National Post. The next day, my wife spotted an interesting book in the Sunday New York Times and wondered whether it might be available on Kindle. The title was entered and within 30 seconds the book was downloaded on the screen. See the link at the bottom of this post! What's most intriguing is that for most of yesterday Fran was reading the book on my Kindle and had finished it by the end of the day! What a remarkable experience!

eBook readers are going to revolutionize the book industry.! They are easy to operate, instantly give you what you want, the tablet is easy to read - even has 4 different type sizes - and makes the reading experience very simple. Amazon says that on Christmas Day, they sold more eBooks than paper books. Imagine what this means for textbooks! Students will never need to buy a book again - they will all be available electronically!

And this is just the start. eBook readers are in their infancy. Imagine what is to come!

Here is an interesting article on this topic.

Amazing Disruptive Successes of Apple

Apple led by Steve Jobs has been incredibly successful in inventing new ways for consumer to live their lives! First, it was access to music with iTunes and the iPpod, next the launch of the Apple retail store and its devotion building a long term customer relationship by offering a superb customer experience, then the iPhone and apps for the iPhone and now plan, according to reports in the Globe & Mail, to launch a new competitor to cable and satellite TV. It would offer TV shows from participating networks streamed over the internet for a monthly fee! Imagine your favourite TV shows available on any screen hooked up to the internet for one monthly fee!
Whether this is the service, one has to believe that Apple will continue to turn existing entertainment businesses upside down with their intuitive and innovative new product developments. I can't wait to experience them!

The End Of Traditional Christmas Cards?

Has anyone noticed a decline in the # of Christmas & Holiday cards received this year? Last year, at our office, the cards we received the tops of two filing cabinets! This year, as of today, the number totals 15 about one quarter of last year! A similar trend has happened at home! On the other hand, the number of ecards has increased so this is obviously becoming the accepted way of wishing happy holidays to friends and business associates!! Ecards are free, sent without any postage cost, have virtually no impact on the environment and can be as elaborate as one is creative - not a bad substitute! My sense is this is a positive trend!

Too Much Profit?

The Globe & Mail reports that the Ontario Government is considering selling all or part of some of our Crown Corporations. One of these is the LCBO. The LCBO's revenue in 2008 was reported to be $4.3 Billion and yielded a whopping Net Profit of $1.4 billion or32.5% of revenues. AND this does not include the duties and taxes that are payable to the Federal Government! Whilst the LCBO may serve residents of Ontario well, it is a monopoly and has no competition. I only wish that private enterprise like Interwood could show even a quarter of the % return of the LCBO! The total amount of money paid to all levels of Government needs to be published and every resident and tax payer in Ontario needs to see and understand the contribution that the users of the LCBO make to funding our various levels of governments!

What One Tonne of CO2 Looks Like

Most of us would be aware of the controversy around CO2 that is emitted by many things – one being petroleum that gives us our gasoline, heat, air conditioning and so many other things. I have often wondered what it might look like. Finally, someone has visualized it – at the Copenhagen Climate Conference this month! Here’s the link!

It looks like a smaller version of a square hot air balloon. The visual impact is startling. According to The Nature Conservancy's calculator my household generates 77 tonnes of CO2 each year – the average American family generates 110 and the average of a 4 person household globally generates 2.2 tonnes of CO2. Imagine what 77 balloons would look like!

Quite a picture!

In my mind, anytime we can do to reduce this would give all of us a cleaner and healthier world

What A Different Holiday Season This Year!

What a difference a year makes! This time last year, the global financial world had fallen apart, the US was in a major leadership transition from an unpopular president, H1N1 was a looming major threat, Canada's government had been prorogued and I remember thinking what more could go wrong.

This year is so different - the end result is much calmer, more secure and confident state of mind for everyone as the holidays approach and that's something to remember. Most of the time, these "disaster's" have a habit of righting themselves!