Covered this week; Paul Allen, dies at 65. A tribute from Bill Gates… How Sears went from gilded-age boom to digital-age bankruptcy… To woo Uber, a top Wall Street banker moonlighted as a driver… Banksy’s ‘Girl With Balloon’ becomes ‘Shred the Love’… Tim Cook wants Bloomberg to retract that Chinese spy chip story… Google+ properly eulogized… US student loan debt crisis, mapped…
October 15, 2018
Paul Allen, co-founder of Microsoft, died today at 65. Being an Apple guy, Mr. Allen was just always a part of the evil empire to me, but an extraordinary life all the same. For some personal effect, give a read to Bill Gates tribute…
When I think about Paul, I remember a passionate man who held his family and friends dear. I also remember a brilliant technologist and philanthropist who wanted to accomplish great things, and did. Paul deserved more time in life. He would have made the most of it. I will miss him tremendously.
October 16, 2018
So many of my life’s memories included Sears & Roebuck in some way, shape or form. Sad to see yet another American institution that couldn’t adapt to the times…
In 1973, the company, by then the largest retailer in the country for years, moved its headquarters to the Sears Tower. The Chicago landmark was the tallest building in the world for 25 years. In 1988, Sears tried resolve some of its financial difficulties by selling the structure, but it failed to find a buyer. Amid slumping local real estate values in 1994, Sears transferred ownership to two lenders. The building was renamed the Willis Tower in 2009.
October 17, 2018
Rich people attempting to get richer.
I’m guessing Michael Grimes makes more money than most of us. He’s a technology banker at Morgan Stanley, meaning he works with some of the most highly valued companies around and probably sees a fat multimillion-dollar salary. Despite this, Grimes still reportedly spent years driving an Uber car–not because he needed more money, but because he wanted a leg up on the other banking competition who are vying to help take the company public.
October 18, 2018
As the latest Banksy prank continues to play out… we find out that what happened at Sotheby’s last month wasn’t what was supposed to happen… at least partially… as it turns out, we’re still left with a result… which is to say that the sale ended up holding, the name of the work changed on re-authentication… and chances are, it became MORE valuable… clearly not the outcome Banksy sought, but an outcome all the same. What makes this video so great is that we get to see the caper going down shot from the perspective of those that were in the know.
According to Banksy, the street artist who created the work — and who organized the prank to destroy it — wasn’t planned. In a clip posted to YouTube on Wednesday, Banksy suggested that he had meant for the painting to be completely destroyed at the auction in London on Oct. 5, but that the plan had been foiled when the shredder unexpectedly jammed.
October 19, 2018
This has been an intriguing story, an important story… and one where knowing the truth would appear significant. With this latest twist, you either believe Tim Cook and everything is fine, or you don’t and something else is going on.
Bloomberg Businessweek insists that its story, which claimed that hardware maker Supermicro hid chips on server motherboards designed to enable malware to be installed on the computers, is true. Supermicro, Apple, and Amazon, which also allegedly spotted the spy chips, have all denied the claim.
October 20, 2018
I was a bit flippant in reporting the demise of Google+ last week. To make amends, I post this proper explanation and eulogy from Mike Elgan for Fast Company.
For casual users, though, it was the least rewarding network. Thousands or millions of users gave Google+ a try, only to conclude in a day or two that it was a “ghost town.”
October 21, 2018
As America continues to eat its cake… some sobering news…
America’s past decade of economic growth is a lagely a narrative farce, created by those choosing to focus on the good parts of the economy — namely, the stock market and job numbers — while sweeping one sign of increasing inequality after another under the rug. But a new map released by the Washington Center for Equitable Growth offers some grim insight into the ways that we’re totally, totally screwed.
