Loading...
Symbols:
Get Seeking Alpha Free Stock Alerts by Email!
Get Free Stock Alerts by Email!
Transcripts
- Host Hotels & Resorts, Inc. F3Q08 (Quarter End 09/05/08) Earnings Call Transcript
- General Electric Company Q3 2008 Earnings Call Transcript
- DragonWave Inc. F2Q09 (Qtr End 08/31/08) Earnings Call Transcript
- Emmis Communications Corporation F2Q09 (Qtr End 08/31/08) Earnings Call Transcript
- Audiovox Corporation F2Q09 (Qtr End 08/31/08) Earnings Call Transcript
- Robbins & Myers, Inc. F4Q08 (Qtr End 08/31/08) Earnings Call Transcript
- Total System Services, Inc. Q3 2008 Earnings Call Transcript
- Tortoise Capital Resources F3Q08 (Qtr End 08/31/2008) Earnings Call Transcript
- Intraware, Inc. F2Q09 (Qtr End 08/31/08) Earnings Call Transcript
- LTX-Credence Corporation Business Update Call Transcript
-
Editor's Picks
-
Most Popular
- PIC: Market Rewards Insurers That Avoided Risk
- Venture Debt Firms: Crunch Time and Opportunity
- Exxon Mobil Appears at Lower End of Valuation Range
- Crocodile Tears and the LIBOR-OIS Spread
- Geopolitics, Politics, and the Financial Crisis
- Apocalypse Dow: The Search for Scapegoats
- Full list of Editor's Picks »
- Cramer Should Be Suspended »
- This Isn't a Bottom, It's a Disturbance in The Force »
- Bulls Take a Stand - Cramer's Stop Trading! (10/10/08) »
- Where We Go from Here: Best and Worst Cases »
- Sirius Shares Priced Like Stamps »
- Wall Street Breakfast: Must-Know News »
- Prefer a Yield - Cramer's Lightning Round (10/10/08) »
- 5 Reasons Stocks Will Keep Falling »
- 60% of Google Employee Stock Options Are Drowning »
- Back Room Deal? - Cramer's Mad Money (10/10/08) »
- Midstream MLPs Crashing, Present Opportunity »
Trading Center
Hedge Fund Jobs
Job Seekers: Search jobs by category, get job alerts by email or live feed, apply online See full list of jobs »
Employers: See all recruitment options, get applications online or by email Post a job »
SingHash
12 Comments
Treasury's Actions Not in Our Best Interest
The point of a free market economy is that fiscal failure is punished by corporate death. Yet the same hands that are begging for alms now will be ranting against government interference and "creeping socialism" the moment they're held accountable to the public.
Disgusting.
Record Companies Starting to Shun iTunes
Second, if it weren't available on iTunes, I wouldn't get it at all. Think of the huge numbers of "I want it now" consumers, and this trend is only going to increase. The"I'd buy it on CD" percentage of my iTunes purchases is about 2%.
The real problem for the labels is that this 'piecemeal' approach is screwing up their accounting. Instead of buying albums from 10 star performers, I'm buying singles from a hundred.
And finally, the environmental cost of those CDs should be considered. Not that computers are free of environmental sin, but every download I buy is one less bundle of CD, case, plastic, paper, and sales slip. It's a fraction of a reduced trip to the CD shop, complete with burning gasoline, wasted time, and parking fees. And as an earlier poster noted, I'm just going to rip the thing in iTunes anyway.
Chafe away, labels. You deserve it.
Steve Jobs Isn't Dead Yet!
...and with all due apologies AND compliments on an interesting article regarding said "succession question", I have to note that the Holy Grail skit in question ended with the lines:
(Arthur enters with squire Patsy)
Customer (John Cleese): Who's that, then?
Cart Master (Eric Idle): I dunno. Must be a king.
Customer: Why?
Cart Master: He hasn't got *^#! all over him.
*****
All of which might apply to Mr. Jobs, come to think of it. Just think of the options backdating scandals, the prosperity of the stock, and the fact that the company is wildly profitable even in the harshest of economic climates. The man, clearly, does not have &^@! all over him, and that makes him a king, dunnit?
Are Glorious Days Ahead for Microsoft?
"However the lack of erosion in its incumbent business (for 25 years!) means that its core earnings are very unlikely to change."
I'm thinking of a company that was dominant -- absolutely, unassailably dominant -- for about 25 years. Big, powerful, and the only place to be if you really wanted to do serious computing.
Unfortunately, their business practices landed them in a bit of hot water, and they spent over a decade under intense legal scrutiny. It came to the point where legal caution stifled agility. When new, disruptive technologies emerged, the company was pummeled, decimated, and marginalized.
Eventually, they reinvented themselves and recovered pretty well -- but the paradigm had changed, and there were lots of new, more interesting places to work.
The company was IBM; the time span was 1960 - 1985. Microsoft -- which itself was instrumental in IBM's near-death experience -- is doing a lovely job of following a similar trajectory.
The best thing Microsoft could do for its shareholders right now (and I am one) would be to shut it down, liquidate its assets, and return the money to its shareholders.
Microsoft's Cashback: Changing the Internet Industry Forever
The GOOD news is that this will hasten the demise of the common internet. I foresee cash-back retailers flocking to a their own TLD (top-level domain), while leaving the rest of the net less encumbered by their dreck. Think of the difference between a developing-world bazaar ("You buy Rolex, very good yes?") vs. high-end boutique ("Would sir like this Rolex? It's very good, isn't it?").
Eventually, cash-back will come out of the retailers' pockets, which means that they'll have to cut all the corners they can in order to survive. It'll be a race to the bottom for every vendor who chooses to participate. The boutiques, on the other hand, will do quite nicely, providing a pleasant experience and great customer service to those who are willing to pay a few extra dollars.
It's nothing more than a re-zoning of the internet, with MSFT paving the parking lots -- soon to be complete with potholes, derelicts, hoodlums, needles on the ground, and urine on the wall. Thanks, guys.
How Microsoft Could Kill Google on the Web
2. Would you watch a television show during which the station was airing free ads? I'm not an economist, but I think this qualifies as an example of "the tragedy of the commons". I think (hope!) that most people go to the internet for _content_, so lowering the barriers to entry for non-content seems to be counter-productive.
7 Reasons You Can't Kill Microsoft
Most PCs have Vista pre-installed. Even if a user downgrades to XP, MS still counts this as a Vista user. It would be more accurate to count the number of boxed retail copies that were sold.
Is GE a Buy?
Okay. I'll answer that question for myself.
* Forward P/E: 12
* Dividend yield well over 3% @ 52% payout
* Profitable business
* Diversified across sectors, industries, technologies, and geographies
GE has deep pockets to buy out distressed OR dangerous competitors during an economic downturn.
In my eyes, these characteristics illustrate a stock to promote sound sleep through any economic turbulence.
Microsoft and Competitors Continue to Waste Resources on OOXML
Microsoft and Competitors Continue to Waste Resources on OOXML
I've read parts of the standard (not all 6000+ pages, I'm afraid), and the detractors have a valid point: it reads like it's written by software engineers pretending to be lawyers -- or vice versa.
Free Coffee at Starbuck: a Taste of Things to Come
My suggestion: Raise the price, grind the beans, and get rid of the kids' stuff. Throw out the schoolkids and the suits-with-laptops -- they just take up space and don't feed the till. And give me a nice biscuit with my cup of coffee.
I have THI for my cheap (though truly tasty) fix, and SBUX for the deluxe experience. Different days, different dates.
Ultimately, SBUX is about drinking coffee; HS & co would do well to jettison anything that doesn't contribute to the coffee drinking experience.
Microsoft: Skip Vista, Buy the Stock?
Here's roughly how the story goes: when an influential stakeholder uses a Mac, it sends two signals. First, it becomes acceptable for other people to also have one. Second, business associates will have to adopt a greater degree of interoperability. Both of these phenomena lead to an accelerated unwinding of the network effect.
Certainly, a balance point will be reached -- AAPL's identity hinges on being slightly 'outside'. However, the blanket dominance of the monopolist will be broken, and people will use either platform (or Linux, or Solaris, or...) _because they want to_, and not because the herd requires them to do so.
Of course, I could be wrong. I sure was wrong when I bought equal-valued lots of MSFT and AAPL in late 1999!