Posts by Rich of Observationz
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Is she related to Marina del Rey?
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although China is very authoritarian, I don't think it's down to the ability of the Chairman to simply order things done - decision making, especially now that each administration serves two consecutive five year terms during which the successor administration is set and cultivated
It's one of history's greatest ironies that a system designed (mostly) by Lenin in order to enable communism to establish itself in the face of reaction from bourgeois and lumpen-proletarian elements has become the most effective means of managing late industrial capitalism.
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Hard News: Getting to the bottom of…, in reply to Andrew C,
Yup, once you make a tax loophole, it'll be used for all sorts of things. Like setting up a fishing charter business so you can buy a boat - you do two or three charter trips a year to put some runs on the board, but basically it's a hobby. Or indeed, building a couple of websites and then expensing your entire toy collection.
If a business doesn't work without a taxpayer subsidy, it probably wasn't that good an idea to start with.
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So anyone can start a post on OurTube. I never knew that...
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Hard News: Getting to the bottom of…, in reply to Gareth Ward,
I'm not sure how much of a component in production cost is labour - 25% maybe?
So if Foxconn were (somehow) required to comply with developed world labour practices, then that might send the price of a finished article up by 50-100%, depending on the amount of this that the distribution chain absorbed.
At those prices ($1500 for an iPhone. $6k for a Macbook Pro) the products would still be viable. People might not buy as many and as often, but they'd still buy them, right?
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Hard News: Nobody wanted #EQNZ for Christmas, in reply to merc,
I would image they intend to sell it cheaply to a good friend of the National Party. A few years down the track, they'll discover that the land can be remediated and new subdivisions built.
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I would like to own a Mac for the garage band program
I wouldn't bother - I found it deeply average compared to Ableton. Although that runs way better on a Mac than a PC with similar levels of grunt.
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Hard News: Getting to the bottom of…, in reply to Chris Waugh,
China wants to be what the US and Western Europe have been until now
So who will actually make things?
I'm guessing that a firm like Foxconn has a way lower proportion of headcount engaged in making powerpoints, mulling marketing strategy and schmoozing customers than a typical western firm. A bit like Ford in 1930 - mostly production line workers and a smaller cadre of foremen and draughtsmen.
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Hard News: Getting to the bottom of…, in reply to Russell Brown,
They were training a hell of a lot of programmers
The western geek community has developed, possibly unconsciously, some very effective strategies to fight back against mass-produced programmer teams in the developing world.
Software frameworks that minimise typing and maximise head-scratching (Rails, I’m looking at you, but Spring is almost as good). Non-existent or bogus auto-generated documentation. Wisdom that’s passed on socially, ideally through unconferences held in expensive western countries that wouldn’t give your average Vietnamese aspirant a visa, even if they could stump up the airfare. A culture that puts a premium on free time spent hacking (which is hard when your boss expects a 12+ hour day on chargeable work).
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There’s a massive emerging Asian middle class that will want these things
And they earn their money how? By working at Foxconn?
The classic model of embourgeoisment involves technology improvements being used to create (often unproductive) white-collar jobs whose holders identify with the ruling class.
That relies on a few things:
a. a sufficient rate of technological improvement
b. the business owners / ruling class tolerating the creation of said white-collar jobs rather than just hoarding the surplus profits
c. an adequacy of physical resources (fossil fuels, carbon sink capacity)We clearly don't have (c) anymore, and in states like China, (b) is pretty questionable. I'd even question the ability of the world to deliver (a) as education availability declines and innovation is increasingly stifled (and misapplied) by end-game government action.