Vouchification: March 2009 Archives

We Are The Boring Middle

By vouchey on March 24, 2009 5:30 PM | No Comments | No TrackBacks

Boy, was I excited to read Malcolm Gladwell's new book, "Outliers". His first book, "The Tipping Point" was awesome. �Really got me thinking. �None of it was really new�stuff, but it was written well and presented in such a way that you couldn't help but think about how many opportunities there were in life. �All you had to do was seek the tipping point, and the future was yours.

"Blink" had a similar empowering message too: "Don't over think problems," Gladwell told us. "You know the answer from the get-go anyway, so just go with your gut."

But I had the opposite experience with "Outliers": it was an incredible bummer. If there ever was a book that made me feel like there's no hope for my future, this was the one.

That's not to say that Gladwell didn't write a good book. In fact he makes a pretty strong case for his thesis: Truly successful people are rare because they benefit from cosmic accidents that bring them resources and opportunities most humans will never obtain. Bill Gates had limitless access to a high-powered computer as a pre-teen in the 1970's, teaching him the secrets of computing at an early age. As part of an early tour The Beatles were forced to perform three times a day, seven days a week for a year, tightening their act and letting them experiment with lots of different styles in a short period.

Continue reading We Are The Boring Middle.

Insolvent or Illiquid? That is the Question.

By vouchey on March 21, 2009 12:07 PM | No Comments | No TrackBacks

My apologies to The Bard.

But really, all this stuff about AIG bonuses, whether or not bank executives deserve they pay the get and all those other issues is just window dressing. What we really want to know is: Are the nation's largest banks insolvent (out of money) or are they illiquid (just waiting for their asset values to go back up)?

Here's the scenario: 80% of the nation's assets are housed in our 20 largest banks. All of those banks had either directly invested in mortgage-backed securities (either the regular kind or the kind heavily sprinkled with sub-prime mortgages) or have invested in funds that dealt in mortgage-backed securities. �Those banks have hundreds of billions of dollars of assets locked up in those securities, or bonds.

The optimist says: Those mortgage values are just temporarily down. �When housing prices go back up in a couple years, they'll be equal to or higher than they were before the crash, and banks will be able to sell their mortgage-backed securities and get their money back. �That's illiquid.

Continue reading Insolvent or Illiquid? That is the Question..

My Presentation On The IL-5 Special Election Results

By vouchey on March 20, 2009 12:11 PM | No Comments | No TrackBacks

My friend Sean Tenner has volunteered to organize the Lincoln Chapter of Organizing for America. Last night they held their inaugural meeting and Sean asked me to present a talk on the results of the March 3rd Special Democratic Primary election for the IL-5 Congressional seat.

The race had 12 contenders and the winner was Cook County Commissioner Mike Quigley, with a scant 22% of the vote - only 12,100 votes in total. The turnout was probably one of the lowest I've ever seen.

The April 5 special general election will probably have an even lower turnout. But if you live in the 5th, go vote Democratic. �I know I will. Early voting is open until April 2nd, Monday-Saturday.

Selling The News

By vouchey on March 15, 2009 10:10 AM | No Comments

If you're in the media business in Chicago, you probably either attended or have heard about the Chicago Journalism Town Hall held on February 23.� The meeting, which featured some of Chicago's celebrity reporters as well as some upstarts like Chicago Huffington Post and Chi-Town Daily News, centered on how to save "journalism".�

There was little discussion of the business of news or why people should ever pay for news. Instead, most of the talk was about the expenses side of the balance sheet, as opposed to the revenue side.

But a room full of editors and reporters, who focus on gathering news rather than selling it, shouldn't be expected to figure out how to save the news business.

That's why Scott Smith and I decided to put together our own town hall - The Chicago New Media News Town Hall.

Our conference will focus on who is willing to pay for the news and what they want. We need a new system. This conference is meant to elicit some of those ideas. "New Media" is in the title because Scott and I (as well as many others) believe the future of profitable news media will be on-line.

But also, we want to avoid the value judgements about "journalism" and what is "news" that pervaded February's meeting. �Moving forward, we want to define the term "news" broadly by using the dictionary definition, "1: a report of recent events 2: previously unknown information." �Scott and I, and many of those in the news gathering business, believe that news is what the consumer chooses it to be. �It can be the latest development in the commodities markets, it can be pictures of the latest wizz-bang gadget, or it can be details on the sale of the Chicago Cubs.

Whether or not people are currently paying for these kinds of information they are certainly consuming it. Now let's figure out what they're willing to pay for and how to get it to them.

Interested?�Here's the proposal Scott and I are shopping around. �We'd love to get your feedback.

Watermelons

By vouchey on March 14, 2009 12:33 PM | No Comments

We worked for days and nights on The Great David Letterman Assembly my senior year of high school. Brent, Steve S., Steve D., Matt, Andy, TJ, David, Laurie, Greg, George, and probably a few that I'm missing. �It was probably the best 45 minute assembly anyone at Latin School ever saw. �Really. �Hilarious. �And this video, a parody of Letterman's famous watermelon drops, is all that remains. �And the sound sucks.

But man, the payoff is good on this thing. �Enjoy.

My Dismal Hobby

By vouchey on March 14, 2009 10:27 AM | No Comments | No TrackBacks

Every person has a hobby or love that nobody else understands. I have an uncle who collects clocks. Friends who still obsess over Star Wars trivia. They delve into the trivia and�minutiae�and spend countless hours mastering the details of their hobbies and wish for more time to pour into their specialty.

Mine is macro economics.

Yes, it's true. �

I'll spare you the details on how this affair first started and then burst into flame, but suffice to say, every time there's a surge in oil prices, a currency crash or banking debacle, I seek out every last scrap of information on the crisis to understand why it happened and try to�divine�what comes next. I follow Paul Krugman closely, have read Stiglitz, read blogs on bond markets and all kinds of esoterica, and wish I had the math chops to really delve into the tough stuff.

This whole economic crash business has been a great time for me.