Woolworths Goes Down The Pan

The news that Woolworths has gone down the drain came of no real surprise to me. They've been stuck in the dark ages since the development of the Internet. Their business model was fundamentally weak. Their big stores throughout the country were a completely useless business model. As they were not selling items of stock, their stores looked more like the local pound shop than the Woolworths that the traditional brand used to represent.

Why didnt they just take advantage of e-commerce when it was all kicking off?

Back to the Garage of Innovation

Wired recently posted a really inspiring article Back to the Garage: How Economic Turmoil Breeds Innovation

The article states that for the bravest inventors economic turmoil breeds innovation. One of the most inspirational stories is Bill Hewlett of HP who built the pocket calculator during the 1969-1970 depression.

Tom Siebel is a shining example - according to the article he sold Siebel Systems to Oracle in 2005 and is now working on a project that is underwraps.

Only time will tell whether the conditions are right or not. But as I like to think when there is an opportunity there is no time like the present.

Online fraudsters 'steal £3.3bn'

Symantec released these figures after looking into the internet underground economy.

BBC stated that:

"Symantec research indicates that there is a certain amount of collaboration and organisation occurring on these forums, especially at the administrative level," it said.

"Moreover, considerable evidence exists that organised crime is involved in many cases."

As the internet becomes more collaborative credit card details and personal details are always going to be under threat. Surely though it is also up to ISPs and companies to help stop this happening. E.g. employee these criminals to help stop other criminals. They could open up their security script to a limited number of people and get them to work collaboratively to plug the so called holes in the system. This would then hopefully make a more secure web.

BBC News Story here

Reuters Quit Second Life

Is Second Life Dead?

That indeed is the question. I'd really say that it might be a good thing for the users of Second Life and the employees of Linden labs.

Why?

Because ultimately Second Life has a very strong community that I'm sure will ride out the financial crisis. With more and more people staying at home rather than going out, perhaps their second life will be much more virtuous. I'd say second life still has a great potential to expand and develop, there is so much going on in the world economy that a second life would appeal to all, no mortgage. Only problem is whilst your living in your second life it won't stop the bayliffs coming in to remove your household furniture.

But will IBM and other digital companies start to withdraw? Perhaps Reuters are just the first of many to move.