What’s New with Wu

Man has, as it were, become a kind of prosthetic god.  When he puts on all his auxillary organs he is truly magnificent; but those organs have not grown on to him and they still give him much trouble at at times.

Within 6 weeks of finishing my second draft of THE BOOK

I never get sick of Nick or Nora

Even outside the field of finance, Americans are apt to be unduly interested in discovering what average opinion believes average opinion to be; and this national weakness finds its nemesis in the stock market. It is rare, one is told, for an American to invest, as many Englishmen still do, ‘for income’; and he will not readily purchase an investment except in the hope of capital appreciation. This is only another way of saying that, when he purchases an investment, the American is attaching his hopes, not so much to its prospective yield, as to a favourable change in the conventional basis of valuation, i.e. that he is, in the above sense, a speculator. Speculators may do no harm as bubbles on a steady stream of enterprise. But the position is serious when enterprise becomes the bubble on a whirlpool of speculation. When the capital development of a country becomes a by-product of the activities of a casino, the job is likely to be ill-done. The measure of success attained by Wall Street, regarded as an institution of which the proper social purpose is to direct new investment into the most profitable channels in terms of future yield, cannot be claimed as one of the outstanding triumphs of laissez-faire capitalism—which is not surprising, if I am right in thinking that the best brains of Wall Street have been in fact directed towards a different object.

…

The spectacle of modern investment markets has sometimes moved me towards the conclusion that to make the purchase of an investment permanent and indissoluble, like marriage, except by reason of death or other grave cause, might be a useful remedy for our contemporary evils. For this would force the investor to direct his mind to the long-term prospects and to those only. But a little consideration of this expedient brings us up against a dilemma, and shows us how the liquidity of investment markets often facilitates, though it sometimes impedes, the course of new investment. For the fact that each individual investor flatters himself that his commitment is ‘liquid’ (though this cannot be true for all investors collectively) calms his nerves and makes him much more willing to run a risk. If individual purchases of investments were rendered illiquid, this might seriously impede new investment, so long as alternative ways in which to hold his savings are available to the individual. This is the dilemma. So long as it is open to the individual to employ his wealth in hoarding or lending money, the alternative of purchasing actual capital assets cannot be rendered sufficiently attractive (especially to the man who does not manage the capital assets and knows very little about them), except by organising markets wherein these assets can be easily realised for money.

There is a story in today’s Wall Street Journal about Google’s supposed abandonment of Net Neutrality principles.

As someone who dabbles in journalism now and then, I can see the obvious temptation that shapes this story.  It’s the Google - Heart of Darkness plot — Google, the company that does no evil, turns to the dark side.   It’s a tempting story.  I’ve even written versions of it myself.

On the other hand, you actually have to have the goods to have a story.  You need a Kurtz.  And as much as the story tries, there isn’t one here.

What the WSJ is on about is content caching; something that’s been going on for more than a decade.  If you have billions of users, like Google or even the WSJ, you need lots of cached copies of your content for it to deliver fast.  If you are a personal web-site (like this one) you don’t need caching.    Caching is one of the advantanges money can buy, but no one has ever suggested its an unfair advantage.

Nor is this anything new, even co-location.   AT&T, for example, has been offering services like this since at least 2000.      Its never been part of the principle net neutrality debate.

The emptiest part of the WSJ piece are the insinuations that Obama’s positions are changing.  While I cannot speak on behalf of the Obama team, there is just no evidence to suggest that.  None at all.   Except for a random quote from Rick Whitt saying that the Obama team has been quiet.  Well, more like, they are busy with other stuff — caching policy is priority # 8931 at best.

Now that’s what I call a honeymoon!

The Wall Street Journal’s Net Neutrality piece, as far as I can tell, is trying to drum something out of Google caching and a few things Larry (Lessig) has said about most favored nation prioritization.   Not news.

Okay so maybe this is a petty vendetta.  But today I had the unfortunate experience of eating at Applebee’s.  Reading the menu I began to feel ill.  I notice that dislike Applebee’s, TGIF & similar restaurants  and I am trying to figure out the reasons why.

This post , “why does everyone hate Applebee’s” gets at some of it:

TGIFridays. Houlihan’s. Bennigan’s. Chili’s. Applebee’s. Aren’t they all pretty much the same place? Sure they are. They’re all corporate chain restaurants that desperately want you to believe that they’re just an old-fashioned neighborhood bar & grill. If somebody blindfolded you and took you into one of them and then took the blindfold off and told you to tell them where you are, you’d probably be hard pressed to answer right away. They all have the same random knick-knacks pasted to the wall, they’re all staffed by the same sullen college kids who won’t be there when you go back in six months and they all serve the same $7.50 bacon cheeseburgers and the same chicken tenders with the same honey mustard dressing.

So I can’t say I’m thrilled about those aspects of Applebee’s.  But I think looking at their nutritional information (gleaned from 3d party sources) had an effect too. Here are the riblets that I gave some thought to ordering

Nutrition Facts
Serving Size 1 meal

Amount Per Serving

Calories 2027

Calories from Fat 1170

Total Fat 130.0g

200%
Saturated Fat 42.0g

210%
Cholesterol 390mg

130%
Sodium 2228mg

93%
Total Carbohydrates 106.0g

35%
Dietary Fiber 10.0g

40%
Protein 103.0g

There is a lawsuit against Applebee’s for misrepresenting the nutritional info on their “healthy” menu.

In April an independent laboratory tested the fat and calorie count
in various Weight Watchers menus at Applebee’s across the U.S.,
according to the complaint, and found that many dishes contain up to
three times the amount of fat and more calories than advertised.

“All of these companies appear to be taking advantage of customers who
pay attention to nutritional information when they eat at
restaurants,” said August Matteis, a Gilbert Randolph attorney for
Valiente.

The lawsuit alleges claims under Kansas consumer protection law and
the federal Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act. It
seeks classwide damages and injunctive relief.

http://www.bizjournals.com/losangeles/stories/2008/09/15/daily3.html