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For what it is worth, the Metia office in Seattle has used Kiva to directly re-invest the cash it raises for charitable purposes - admittedly they are motivated more by generous citizenship than self-interested capitalism - and I have heard nothing but good things from them about their experiences with Kiva and their microfinance experiment.

Great post.

It is interesting to reflect that it took a whistleblower's allegations and the public furore that was created, to make Mr Crosby think hard enough about the matter to consider perhaps he wasn't the ideal person to lead the FSA.

Without that whistleblower, presumably he'd have happily carried on certain in his knowledge that he had the ideal character and experience for the role...

Despite those apologies from Fred, Andy etc, the fact that Crosby had to be prised out shows the myopic attitude that still pervades the teflon coated upper echelons of the banking sector in the UK and the US. They simply don't see that they are fatally compromised and need to exit stage left.

Pete

Come on now...

We know what you want, what you really, really want...

According to AppSherpa the entire iPhone AppStore catalogue can be bought for just $31,870.

That'd be a lot of iPhone fiddling over the festive break.

Hell, put it on credit. Do your bit for Gordon and Alistair. Its like a public service.

Good for you Matteo.

Keep weeding them out :-)

Two answers come to mind:

- the biggest and most successful PE companies have the swagger of the investment banks, many of their staff come from investment banks, and they can play with their own capital, they just need to extend service offerings (where it makes sense)??

- or, how about the old investment banks will be replaced by different, newer investment banks??

I'm not endorsing this - but it would appear Richard Fuld has already suffered from a very direct 'thirst for vengeance' - see this CNBC story Lehman Boss Gets Punched Out at Gym  http://www.businessandmedia.org/printer/2008/20081006150152.aspx

Interestingly, a lot of the more measured callers to be heard on mainstream radio phone-ins, etc, would settle for an acceptance of responsibility and a level of contrition that has not yet been visible.

Pete

It'd be great to hear Apple's own perspective in a blog. Which makes it a bit of a bummer then that blogging is frowned upon by Apple.

I think Microsoft has 3,000 or so employees who blog. You see that must be why I get confused. Which one is the groovy open minded company, and which one is the uptight one, again?

Still, its always good to get a balanced perspective on these matters.

But Pete, everyone knows Apple has always had better adverts than Microsoft.

But then again its easier for Apple. They sell to a niche audience. For every one Apple customer, there are fifteen Windows PC customers. So, yes, its far tougher to be all things to all people (sorry, most of the people). 

That Steve Jobs has it easy. I guess he can only imagine how much more complicated life gets when you are really successful like Bill Gates. 

Roger Ehrenburg - one of Monitor110's backers - offers a salutary post (mortem) here - http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/InformationArbitrage/~3/339382767/monitor110-a-po.html.

Its worth a read. He cites and expands upon seven mistakes:

1. The lack of a single, "the buck stops here" leader until too late in the game
2. No separation between the technology organization and the product organization
3. Too much PR, too early
4. Too much money
5. Not close enough to the customer
6. Slow to adapt to market reality
7. Disagreement on strategy both within the Company and with the Board

There are some good points in there for anyone wanting to start a business.

Number 4 - is very true. Strangely I have always felt too much money can distort and confuse start ups from the task in hand: just get the product/service to work well enough a customer wants to use it, world domination can wait.

Number 3 - makes me smile. PR always gets the blame. Here its too much PR :-)

Nathan Gilliat, at the Net Savvy Executive, who covers social media monitoring and market intelligence, also has some comments here.