Category Archives: Economy

Is Google looking at a rough 2015?

Screen Shot 2014-12-18 at 10.09.15 AMInteresting read about possibly looming troubles for Google. I will say that in the past I used Google to look for products, but most of the items I found that way were from shaky looking distributors, or links to Amazon, where I found they had a very competitive price.

Perception is reality, my personal perception is that Amazon is a trustworthy enough for me to buy from them. Over the last few months I’ve simply quit Googling for products and checked Amazon first, and only using Google if I felt that Amazon didn’t offer the product or the price was more than I wanted to pay.


Google’s stocks have taken a dive recently. It was a rocky 2014 but the last month has seen a nose dive in stock trading value:
Screen Shot 2014-12-18 at 10.12.44 AM

That’s not all. As the Mercury News (headquartered in Silicon Valley) reported last month, FireFox has dropped Google as it’s default search engine:
http://www.mercurynews.com/business/ci_26971412/firefox-drops-google-yahoo-default-search-engine

Here is a link to an opinion piece on LinkedIn that discusses this further:

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/googles-very-rough-transition-nicholas

Facebook eats Gowalla, taking key contributors, killing the service

Well, here is it. Facebook is on the roll, making plays in the acquisition game. Note this report from Reuters:

Facebook grabs Gowalla team, but not technology

“While Facebook isn’t acquiring the Gowalla service or technology, we’re sure that the inspiration behind Gowalla will make its way into Facebook over time,” the company said.

The article also noted that the founders, and an undisclosed number of employees will be carried over to Facebook. Now, if it has been all or nearly all, they would have played that angle up. However, I believe they are just taking a few lucky and key souls along for the next ride and setting the rest adrift in the world of unemployment.

This is not just a guess, this is a common scenario in these sort of games of mergers and acquisitions. I’ve seen this happen with start-ups I’ve helped propel forward. In most of those cases, I was duly compensated, and in a few cases had the chance to enjoy the ride-along, if only for a little while.

Good luck to those that will undoubtedly get their Gowalla pink-slips, courtesy of Mr. Zuckerburg and Facebook.

For reasons far beyond this, I’ve already cut my FB usage down to a trickle, mainly using it for marketing my own ideas and soon to be publicly available products.

Corporation or LLC – that is the question.

I’ve always been one that is not at all comfortable relying upon a single source of financial well being. Since the early 80’s in one form or another I’ve owned and operated a business.

Early on I have a little Electronics sales business selling Cell Phones to the well-healed during it’s hayday. It was fantastic. Hardly work, get paid well, and live La Vita Loca.

I’d take a number of odd jobs during that time, driving computer mag tapes around Silicon Valley, installing car audio systems, systems administrator for a large multi-national corporation, Y2K mitigation for a number of organizations (not the least strange of which was the California Department of Corrections).

At any rate, as I said, I’m not one that’s comfortable with a single source of income, so I’ve been investigating business structures to determine what my next organization will look like.

I have plenty of experience being the President and CEO of a corporation, having ran one from 2000 to 2006. The structure offers a lot of advantages, such as dividing income between corporate tax concerns and personal tax concerns. Corporations also have the advantage of having ownership interest in other organizations. But there are also some disadvantages, not the least of which is very strict requirements and regulations on annual meeting, IRS and state tax filings, additional book keeping to track basis and stock ownership (plus managing different classes of stock).

I was really more of a burden than a blessing to myself, which is to a large degree why I terminated operation in 2006 and became a W-2 wage slave.

Since that time a number of interesting ideas have popped into my head. One of which are some software product ideas for the iPhone.

My intent at this point is to move forward on development of 2 concepts. One of which will have a pretty limited market, the other, I hope, to have a much wider market, and is a type of social networking application. The second of which I hope to see wide spread usage. The plan, is for the first app to fund development of the second. That is the plan.

Before I cut my first line of code, I wanted to know what type of organization I wanted to create. I need to have my business licenses in place, before I complete the Apple Developers Contract. They are quite clear that it won’t be approved for any shoddily / hastily created pseudo-company.

I’ve done some reason on the Secretary of State’s website, checked a few of the fee structures, and such, but my primary source of research on the business organization from has been from the book LLC or Corporation – How to Choose the Right Form for Your Business“. Author is Anthony Mancuso, Attorney.

It’s not a long read, about 250 pages, which I spend the last 5 evenings digesting. It’s rather repetitive, which was a little frustrating for me, initially. However, having completed the book I can understand at least one reason for it’s repetitive nature. If anyone were to pick up the book and *not* read the entire thing (why would you do that, well, sometimes I’ve been guilty of poaching the parts of books I need without taking the time to digest the entire tome) they would still get the frame of reference required to get useful information on the topic of interest. I’d say, it’s a modern writing method for the more ADHD nature of our society. In the end, it’s worth dealing with the repetitiveness. It has it’s place.

Another helpful part of this book is extensive use of examples. More than once I’d read the example 2-3 times to really grok the point, and that was very helpful. The last chapter is also dedicated to some ‘real-world-ish’ examples of business formation decision making. All in all, it was well worth the $25.00 price tag.

So, what did I decide to do? Well, an LLC is the type that I’ve decided to select for a number of reasons, but the primary ones I’ll list here:

  • Simplicity of formation
  • Limited personal liability for company debt
  • Pass-through tax advantages (this sword cuts both ways though)
  • Fewer operational requirements (no board of directors, meetings, etc.)
  • Simpler tracking of each owners basis in the company

So, with my new company name selected, and my form of business decided, it’s time to move forward with foundation of the company.

You know I’ll be sure to post information on that once the State registration has been completed any my licenses granted, EIN number acquired, and finally the domain names registered.

Luggage shipped! – Canada Trip on schedule!!

Woot! Tankpack is supposed to arrive in time!!!!

If the bag arrives as scheduled and I don’t run into an installation issues, I’ll be headed for Kamloops B.C. very early Saturday morning.

Two day ride up to Kamloops, BC from Federal Way area and back. Stay the night in Kamloops and ride back with a few stops along the way. Approx. 11 hours each day.

When: June 6 & 7
Pace: Moderate, depending upon leg lead
Comments:
Experienced alternating leads to keep everyone engaged. Specific legs TBD.
Passport or Enhanced Driver’s license required, we’re going to Canada eh?

General Route – 300+ miles. Group is planning 11 hours travel time each direction.

View Larger Map

I received the order and shipping confirmation today.

Ordered: 1 Shipped: 1 BCK.TR6021 Bags-Connection “Vina” Quick-Lock Tankbag for SW-MOTECH Gascap Mounting System $134.99
Ordered: 1 Shipped: 1 TRT.00.475.110 SW-MOTECH Gascap Bottom Ring for Quick-Lock Tankbags & Camera Mount (Yamaha/Ducati/Triumph/Victory 5 $27.50

Number of Packages 1
UPS Service: 2ND DAY AIR
Weight: 4.7 LBS
Scheduled Delivery: 05-June-2009

Can Chrysler survive another merger?

Follows is an article written by good friend Marc Besso, regarding the proposed merger of Chrysler and Fiat.


Can Chrysler survive another merger?

There was talk that Chrysler couldn’t survive the merger, but it turned out to be completely wrong.  It was American Motors that didn’t survive.  That was in the late ’80s and you’d be hard pressed to find many in the auto industry (outside a few collectors & enthusiasts) that remember much about American Motors these days.

I remember them well.  They were the ones that brought Renault back to the United States.  What’s that you say?  You don’t recall Renault ever returning?  It was as a few, rarely-lamented models that sold under the AMC name for awhile; then as Eagles after the merge. (Alliance, Encore, Premier)  All badges whose mere names promised something the backing corporation couldn’t uphold.

It turns out Chrysler only wanted American Motors because they held the rights to the Jeep name.  Once Chrysler had control of that tasty morsel, the rest no longer interested them.  They did get Francois Castaing–a wily Renault engineer that worked his way up from the race team to head of Product Development…..or some such fancy title.  His replacement was even better.  One Bob Lutz; a man who truly was incredible in almost every role in his career.

Fast forward another decade and it appeared that another merger might create the world’s broadest model line-up and [possibly] the next largest thing in the automotive world.  Chrysler was going to merge with Daimler Benz.  Hallelujah!  Where do I sign up?  It must’ve been a matter of weeks before the running joke was “How do you pronounce Daimler Chrysler? Simple, ‘Chrysler’ is silent!”  Some believed it would bring the level of quality in Chrysler’s product up to the standard of the German companies.  Others, like myself, knew the effect most likely would be a downturn in the quality of Mercedes’ products.  Chrysler scored the equivalent of winning Lotto by getting a number of Mercedes-based chassis to build some very successful models on. (300 C, Charger, Challenger, Crossfire, Sprinter)  Mercedes got…..mostly, screwed.  They had a little fire sale of their own and pedaled Chrysler off to Cerberus a couple of years ago.  Bob Lutz had long since moved onto GM: Think rat & sinking ship. (He bailed on GM just a few months ago for much the same reason)  Bob’s no dummy!

Now the Fiat empire is offering (threatening?) to merge with Chrysler and become the global automotive giant it has always wanted to be.  They’ll instantly have the conduit to sell their Italian products in the American market again. (Fiat cut and ran from the US about the same time Chrysler first went broke and asked the US Government for a loan)  Enthusiasts got momentarily excited because Fiat is the parent company for Ferrari, Maserati, Alfa Romeo and Lancia.  That moment faded fast when they realized Ferrari & Maserati were already sold in this country….and the other companies didn’t really offer much they cared to own anyway. (Save for Alfa, who only want to sell the 8C Competizione @ $250K/ea — we want the Brera @ $25K)  There are already jokers saying things like: “If Fiat were meant to rule the [automotive] world it would be called Toyota.”

So, can Chrysler survive another merger?  Some could argue that’s the only thing they’ve ever done right.  Time will tell, but I don’t see this latest merger offering any long-term benefit to Fiat.  If there’s a benefit to be reaped from this merger it’ll fall to Chrysler.

It’s late and I need to get some sleep.  See me in another few years to find out how this latest merger works out for Chrysler.

~Mark

FreeCreditReport.com — NOT! (catchy FTC PSAs included)

Working with web scams on an hourly basis, I never paid much attention to those annoying ‘FreeCreditReport.com’ commercials.  They are annoying at best, bait-and-switch at worst.    What I’m happy to see is the Federal Government activly educating people about such ‘services’.

What I found this morning (thanks LinkedIn contacts) was this blog on the ITAC about two new FTC ads regarding services such as the one mentioned above.    You can go there for the source, but since these videos are public, and the FTC is trying to educate people, I’m embedding them here.

Enjoy!

AnnualCreditReport.com — Apartment ad

AnnualCreditReport.com — Restaurant ad