On my recent trip to Hong Kong (which reminds me, I really need to get pictures from BOTH Hong Kong and Japan up for people who are not on Facebook) one of the people I met recommended the book "Hot Commodities" by Jim Rodgers. While on a business trip in Moline, I spent some time reading this book and as a result, have decided not to start investing in commodities.
I'm always skeptical of any book that starts off sounding like a sales pitch for some "hot new thing" and this book was no different. Jim's first chapter explains that you are missing out on a great opportunity to make a lot of quick cash if you do not start investing in this hot market. It sounds much like hyperbole . . .
To its credit, the book does touch on a number of investing strategies which jive with my thinking, including investing with a long time horizon. But, I will remain out of the commodities market with my personal investments because commodities do not fit with my investment strategy. The things that I really like about stocks, compared to commodities are:
1. With stocks, the intrinsic value of the companies I am investing in is increasing. Generally, companies are growing, developing new products, improving their operations, etc. An ounce of gold is an ounce of gold and will never change.
2. I do not wish to take the risks of timing the speculative whims of the market. Jim Rodgers flatly states that you make money in commodities because of speculation. Since there is no increase in the intrinsic value of any given commodity, the gains made are purely speculative. At best, success requires time and effort spent doing analysis that, quite frankly, isn't a good use of my time. (At worst--and most likely in my view--this is a game that nobody can win in the long-term.) Since the intrinsic value of commodities is not increasing, for every dollar (or euro, yen, etc.) that is won in the market, another is lost . . . and the brokerage houses are always taking their rake . . .
What are your thoughts on commodities? Are you investing in commodities? Have you made money? Have you lost it?
Sunday, March 29, 2009
Wednesday, March 4, 2009
Understanding the Financial Crisis
So, you want to know more about the financial/housing crisis? I've scoured the interwebs for you to bring you these three links:
1. This short video explains how the mortgage stuff happened . . .
http://vimeo.com/3261363
2. NPR's "Planet Money" podcast recently collaborated with "This American Life" on an hour-long special entitled "Bad Bank" which does a fair job explaining the collapse of the banking system:
http://www.thisamericanlife.org/Radio_Episode.aspx?episode=375
3. If you still need more, "Planet Money" and "This American Life" also collaborated last year on another hour-long special:
http://www.thisamericanlife.org/Radio_Episode.aspx?sched=1242
Do you feel like you understand enough about how financial markets, banks, subprime mortgages and corporate paper work? If not, what do you want to know? What do you read/listen to/watch to find out more about this?
1. This short video explains how the mortgage stuff happened . . .
http://vimeo.com/3261363
2. NPR's "Planet Money" podcast recently collaborated with "This American Life" on an hour-long special entitled "Bad Bank" which does a fair job explaining the collapse of the banking system:
http://www.thisamericanlife.org/Radio_Episode.aspx?episode=375
3. If you still need more, "Planet Money" and "This American Life" also collaborated last year on another hour-long special:
http://www.thisamericanlife.org/Radio_Episode.aspx?sched=1242
Do you feel like you understand enough about how financial markets, banks, subprime mortgages and corporate paper work? If not, what do you want to know? What do you read/listen to/watch to find out more about this?
Sunday, February 15, 2009
Book: Plugged In: The Generation Y Guide to Thriving at Work
Yes, the title sounds kind of gimmicky, but I heard about this book on NRP's Marketplace . . . and a mention on NPR lends anything quite a bit of clout with me, so I decided to pick up this book for some weekend reading.
Tamara Erickson's book is geared toward Y-Generation members who are soon to enter (or have recently entered) the workforce. The book is very approachable and can be read casually over a weekend. In the initial chapters, she defines what it means to be a member of the Traditionalist, Baby-Boomer, X and Y generations and describes the events that shaped each generation's perceptions during its formative years.
She then continues to describe how these differences play out in a work context, notably pointing out that Y-ers think about work as something they do, not somewhere they go. (I've commented before about asynchronous work, something that she seems to agree that the Y Generation is naturally able to do.) Other points of discussion include: relationships with parents, competitiveness, attitudes toward money and our natural ability to use technology.
I would definitely recommend this book to anyone under the age of 25 who is entering the workforce; it was written to help Ys understand how the working world works and I feel that it accomplishes this very nicely. Additionally, I think that this book is worth a look for those who work with Ys on a regular basis . . . we do need to learn to work with you, but you need to learn to work with us, too. :-)
Tamara Erickson's book is geared toward Y-Generation members who are soon to enter (or have recently entered) the workforce. The book is very approachable and can be read casually over a weekend. In the initial chapters, she defines what it means to be a member of the Traditionalist, Baby-Boomer, X and Y generations and describes the events that shaped each generation's perceptions during its formative years.
She then continues to describe how these differences play out in a work context, notably pointing out that Y-ers think about work as something they do, not somewhere they go. (I've commented before about asynchronous work, something that she seems to agree that the Y Generation is naturally able to do.) Other points of discussion include: relationships with parents, competitiveness, attitudes toward money and our natural ability to use technology.
I would definitely recommend this book to anyone under the age of 25 who is entering the workforce; it was written to help Ys understand how the working world works and I feel that it accomplishes this very nicely. Additionally, I think that this book is worth a look for those who work with Ys on a regular basis . . . we do need to learn to work with you, but you need to learn to work with us, too. :-)
Tuesday, February 3, 2009
Sick Days
CNN recently posted a piece entitled: “Don’t go to work if you’re sick – please!”
http://www.cnn.com/2009/LIVING/worklife/02/02/cb.do.not.work.sick/index.html?eref=rss_topstories
My mother and I probably disagree on this strongly; she prides herself on only having taken 2 sick-days during her 25+ year career as a nurse, whereas I take the view that you should stay home whenever you’re feeling under-the-weather, so that you don’t infect your colleagues.
In my view, the best sick-day policy is as follows:
- If you’re sick, we don’t want you infecting the rest of us, so you get the day off, free.
- Don’t abuse #1.
This is more-or-less the policy that John Deere IVS uses for sick days. (If you’re sick for more than 3 days, I believe that you must either go on short-term disability leave or take vacation. This policy deincentivizes coming to work sick. Of course, it requires a bit of trust in your employees . . . but if you don’t trust your employees, why are you still their employer?
What is your employer’s sick leave policy?
Tuesday, January 27, 2009
Location-Aware: The Future of Social Networking
Well, now that NPR has done a story on location-aware cell phone services, the urban-dwelling, latte-sipping, 30-something professionals will be talking about it, so I'd better throw my two cents into the mix. (Disclaimer: I am a total NPR junkie, so don't take offence to my characterization of NPR listeners.)
What?
For the non-latte-sipping crowd, when I say "location aware," I'm simply talking about using GPS (Global Positioning System) data in different applications, usually on a cell phone. For the most part, this is currently limited to simply reporting your location and drawing a map.
My experiments with location-aware social networking.
About three years ago, when location-enabled cell phones started to become available in the United States, I played around with Mologogo, a very bare-bones application which took my cell phone's GPS position and published it to the web. Unfortunately, it worked only on a limited number of Nextel and Boost Mobile (Nextel's pre-paid service) phones, so I had to buy a Boost Mobile prepaid phone for this one application. The application did nothing more than report my location to a website. Unfortunately, Mologogo was very buggy and, while it provided an interface to integrate with my own applications, I wanted something more out-of-the-box.
Things have improved (but only marginally) since then and I've moved on to Ipoki, which reports my location to a website and my Facebook profile, without much trouble on my part. Ipoki also has the advantage of running on my Sprint phone, so I don't have to carry a THIRD cell phone around. The current application crashes frequently, which is annoying, but somewhat tolerable. If you would like to follow me, feel free: http://www.ipoki.com/maps/aaronhurd. I'll make no guarantees about keeping Ipoki on.
My Complaints.
Unfortunately, both of these applications suck battery life. I have no idea what my current phone (HTC Touch Pro, Sprint) will do, but it's been my experience that most GPS applications require a persistent connection to the Internet, which drains a phone battery in about two hours. An application running on a mobile phone is of limited utility if it must be tethered to the power grid.
Other than battery life, here are my top feature requests:
The Future.
As social networking becomes more location-aware, we will certainly see some interesting things happening in the future. Here's an abbreviated list of my predictions:
What?
For the non-latte-sipping crowd, when I say "location aware," I'm simply talking about using GPS (Global Positioning System) data in different applications, usually on a cell phone. For the most part, this is currently limited to simply reporting your location and drawing a map.
My experiments with location-aware social networking.
About three years ago, when location-enabled cell phones started to become available in the United States, I played around with Mologogo, a very bare-bones application which took my cell phone's GPS position and published it to the web. Unfortunately, it worked only on a limited number of Nextel and Boost Mobile (Nextel's pre-paid service) phones, so I had to buy a Boost Mobile prepaid phone for this one application. The application did nothing more than report my location to a website. Unfortunately, Mologogo was very buggy and, while it provided an interface to integrate with my own applications, I wanted something more out-of-the-box.
Things have improved (but only marginally) since then and I've moved on to Ipoki, which reports my location to a website and my Facebook profile, without much trouble on my part. Ipoki also has the advantage of running on my Sprint phone, so I don't have to carry a THIRD cell phone around. The current application crashes frequently, which is annoying, but somewhat tolerable. If you would like to follow me, feel free: http://www.ipoki.com/maps/aaronhurd. I'll make no guarantees about keeping Ipoki on.
My Complaints.
Unfortunately, both of these applications suck battery life. I have no idea what my current phone (HTC Touch Pro, Sprint) will do, but it's been my experience that most GPS applications require a persistent connection to the Internet, which drains a phone battery in about two hours. An application running on a mobile phone is of limited utility if it must be tethered to the power grid.
Other than battery life, here are my top feature requests:
- Integration with Social Networks AND Privacy Settings - I do not want to share my location with just anyone and I want to be able to integrate with Facebook.
- Updates to Twitter, Facebook, etc., based on location. - If I am at Stomping Grounds in Ames, I want my Facebook status to read, "Aaron is at Stomping Grounds in Ames." Even cooler would be time-based updates, so if I'm at John Deere between 5:30 a.m. and 7:30 a.m., my status can read, "Aaron can't sleep, so he's gone to work early."
- Automatic geo-tagging of social media content. - If I post a picture to Facebook from my cell phone, attach my location to it.
The Future.
As social networking becomes more location-aware, we will certainly see some interesting things happening in the future. Here's an abbreviated list of my predictions:
- Location data will be aggregated to provide general information, such as traffic reports (UC Berkeley is already experimenting with this).
- Advertising, advertising, advertising. Expect the US cell phone carriers to try to get location-based advertising on your phone any way they can. When you walk by Starbucks, they'll offer you a free ringtone with your latte.
- It will become common practice for parents track their children by installing software on their cell phones. (All major US cell phone carriers are currently selling this service.) This will quickly become obsolete as children learn how to disable these services. Cheating spouses, however, had better beware.
- Location data will be used to improve quality of service: Airports, for example, could use this data to map passenger paths through terminals, marry this data to flight schedules and use this to figure out which airplane should park where.
- People will be automatically informed when their friends are in the area, so that they can meet up in person. This will be a rare case of technology fostering real social interaction.
Sunday, January 18, 2009
Lessons Learned from Parents' Basement Flood
This weekend, I spent a significant amount of time clearing everything out of my parents' basement. About half of the stuff in the basement was ruined, but it taught two important lessons:
1. Backups are worthless, unless they are regular and stored off-site.
My parents faithfully backed up their financial data every week to a floppy disk, which they stored right by the computer. Unfortunately, the pipe that broke soaked their computer and their backup disks. We haven't yet tried to recover the data, but if we do, we will have dodged a bullet.
2. Paper records are a pain and often not needed.
Since everything had to come out of my parents' basement, I got exposure to the amount of paper records that they keep. Frankly, I think that people keep a lot more records than they need to. Whether it's a credit card statement or bank statement, the bank can always pull back statements (usually for a fee). I think that the headache saved by not needing to manage records is well-worth the $50 that I might spend pulling a few years of bank statements. Many paper records were destroyed; it will be interesting to see if they actually need them.
For the records that DO need to be stored, I generally scan and store these on my computer, and then sort through them once a year. I think that this is a good practice.
1. Backups are worthless, unless they are regular and stored off-site.
My parents faithfully backed up their financial data every week to a floppy disk, which they stored right by the computer. Unfortunately, the pipe that broke soaked their computer and their backup disks. We haven't yet tried to recover the data, but if we do, we will have dodged a bullet.
2. Paper records are a pain and often not needed.
Since everything had to come out of my parents' basement, I got exposure to the amount of paper records that they keep. Frankly, I think that people keep a lot more records than they need to. Whether it's a credit card statement or bank statement, the bank can always pull back statements (usually for a fee). I think that the headache saved by not needing to manage records is well-worth the $50 that I might spend pulling a few years of bank statements. Many paper records were destroyed; it will be interesting to see if they actually need them.
For the records that DO need to be stored, I generally scan and store these on my computer, and then sort through them once a year. I think that this is a good practice.
Friday, January 16, 2009
A Few Thoughts on Social Engagement
One of the things that I would like to do during this next year is to become more socially engaged. (I’m waiting to hear back from some interviewing that I’ve done at Deere before I become committed, because I’d hate to commit to something and then leave in a few months.)
At Deere, employees are encouraged to contribute to United Way (my thoughts about that are in another post) and to participate in build days with Habitat for Humanity. Habitat for Humanity is great, but when they push the religious angle, it really turns me (and several others) off. I really feel that promoting these two programs (at the exclusion of others) encourages employees to ignore the myriad ways in which they can contribute.
There are thousands of ways in which we can be involved in our communities, but we don’t encourage social engagement generally. I think that it would be great to get some sort of partnership going with a local school and have engineers tutoring math, or helping to teach language, or going to speak with classes. I’d love to go speak with German classes about where their language skills can take them. (I actually do this, on my own time.) A colleague suggested recently that Deere give a few “social engagement” days, in addition to vacation days, so that employees can contribute to their communities in ways in which they feel most comfortable. This is a great idea, and something that I think we should push at Deere.
What do you do to be socially engaged? Do you think that this is important?
At Deere, employees are encouraged to contribute to United Way (my thoughts about that are in another post) and to participate in build days with Habitat for Humanity. Habitat for Humanity is great, but when they push the religious angle, it really turns me (and several others) off. I really feel that promoting these two programs (at the exclusion of others) encourages employees to ignore the myriad ways in which they can contribute.
There are thousands of ways in which we can be involved in our communities, but we don’t encourage social engagement generally. I think that it would be great to get some sort of partnership going with a local school and have engineers tutoring math, or helping to teach language, or going to speak with classes. I’d love to go speak with German classes about where their language skills can take them. (I actually do this, on my own time.) A colleague suggested recently that Deere give a few “social engagement” days, in addition to vacation days, so that employees can contribute to their communities in ways in which they feel most comfortable. This is a great idea, and something that I think we should push at Deere.
What do you do to be socially engaged? Do you think that this is important?
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