šļø LongForm
Want to reduce the noice and just focus on things with a little more meat - the this category is for you. Like so much on this site we have a ‘WIP’ as i take some out - and put some in - but safe for at least starting in 2026.
People Last
You probably know that we publish articles to the People First Publication on Medium. We just published an article on politics and venture capital funding.
People First is not a politically driven group, but in modern America, it is increasingly hard to keep politics out of business as the two seem to get rammed against each other over and over again.
This article falls into three parts, the first referencing a politically oriented post, the second from a venture capitalist and the third my thoughts about the connection between the two.
Start Up Culture
Dan Lyons shared a video about working inĀ the new tech start-up bubble on his blog.
This made me smile...
So Long - And Thanks For All The Fish
And So ... The end of the River Experiment.
What You Need To Know About Uber
This last post highlighted a recent article about the likely failing of Uber .... it was one of a series. The full set can be found here:
... and lots more on the topic of Uber
Essential reading for all.
... even better - Part Ten - Can Uber Ever Deliver - The Uber Death Watch Begins
Uber Is Not Natural And Needs To Die
This article neatly and concisely summarises everything that I dislike about Uber.
If you follow me, you will know that despite my interest in platforms and their obvious role as a significant future of Marketplaces, Uber stands uniquely in the #FAIL bucket - and would have been in the dead bucket years ago - if anything in the world was at all fair and reasonable.
This is the latest in a highly detailed series that dives into the underpinnings of Uber ... and it really does make you wonder about those VCs that have invested in them.
For those of you who are late to this series, the underlying reason that Uber is not a bona fide tech success is that the fact that it has cars available at affordable (cheap) prices is solely the result of massive, unsustainable investor subsidies. There are no network economies in running any transportation network because beyond a baseline service level, there is an inherent tradeoff between service frequency (size of fleet and staff) and profits. UberĆ¢ā¬ā¢s app is trivial technologically and does not create a barrier to entry or confer scale advantages.
Read The Whole Article Here Ć¢ā¬Ā¦ Read on for some pertinent quotes:
The think tank taxi deregulation campaign blocked discussion of industry reforms based on economic evidence of potential impacts on efficiency and welfare with an emotive/tribal battle framing that precluded compromise.
Ć¢ā¬Ā¦
Twenty-two of the pieces were published by pro-corporate/libertarian/objectivist oriented advocacy groups that received major funding from Charles and David Koch
Ć¢ā¬Ā¦
Uber adopted the think tank propaganda approach almost word-for-word as the foundation for its market control battle Uber needed to establish the image of a battle between cutting-edge technologists fighting to disrupt a backward industry so that people outside of its core of supporters would view Uber as the heroic good guys.
Ć¢ā¬Ā¦
Despite UberĆ¢ā¬ā¢s transparent interest in destroying all incumbent operators in order to establish global industry dominance, Kalanick insists Uber is just trying to increase competitive options.
Ć¢ā¬Ā¦
Uber insisted that the emergence of an unregulated, Uber dominated industry had nothing to do with multi-billion dollar subsidies but was strictly the result of the free choices of consumers in a competitive market
Ć¢ā¬Ā¦
But as law professor Eric Posner points out, Ć¢ā¬ÅĆ¢ā¬Ā¦[this] is a response that any monopolist could makeĆ¢ā¬Ā¦But whether or not Uber does overcharge people now, sooner or later Ć¢ā¬ā once it displaces taxis and dominates markets Ć¢ā¬āit will.Ć¢ā¬Ā
Time To Find A New Coffee Place
Voice Ads - And Not What You Are Hoping For
Google Tests Waters of Voice Ads on Speaker
An unprompted promotion highlights balancing act the tech giant faces between monetizing new search formats and usersĆ¢ā¬ā¢ ad tolerance
I love that expression ' user's ad tolerance ' ... do they not read the news? We have already that we have zero tolerance - hence the rise of ad blockers.
File under another reason not to buy Amazon and Google tech ... and stick with Apple ... a company that makes its money from what it makes - not the people that use what it makes.
Oh - and that caption? Jeez - Alexa might be able to recognize word patterns - but it doesnt understand anybody!
John Philpin - The Other One
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Listen - I’m Going To Tell You A Story
It was a few years ago now, you can tell, because I had to get up from my chair, walk to the kitchen and pick up the phone.
Hello .. John Philpin
.. and those were the last words that seemed to make sense in this particular conversation. The following is paraphrased, my memory is not that good.
Oh hello, we are calling to see if you have any commentary on the recent developments in Gainesville.
Sorry, could you repeat that?
Oh yes, we are following up on some recent developments around the murders in Gainesville, and calling to ask if you might add any perspective.
Iām sorry .. what kind of perspective?
Well given your involvement at the time, we were thinking ..
Sorry. What involvement?
Is that John Philpin?
It is.
P H I L P I N ? (Spelling it out).
Yes.
Well given your connection to ..
Iām sorry, I think you have me confused with someone else.
But you are John Philpin ..
Yes. Tell you what if you give me your number, I will look into who it might be and get them to call back.
.. number exchanged and I sat down.
In 2024 if you Google āJohn Philpinā, you will indeed find that there are two of us, but back then, there wasnāt a Google ā¦ I know kids .. hard to believe. There was something called āAlta Vistaā and Yahoo - but nascent at best.
In all honesty, I canāt recall exactly how I went about the next step. We had Compuserve - and of course at Oracle I had access to the ‘real’ ‘internet’ - but - there still has to be something at the other end to be found for a āsearchā to work ā¦ so this was going to be tough.
But ā¦ BUT - you may not know this, but āPhilpinā is a pretty uncommon name. Uncommon like there may be 5 to 6 hundred of us - tops - around the world today. I can also tell you that 75% of them live in Pembrokeshire, Wales, or at least in South Wales.
Ok - I jest - but it is not so far off.
Donald Philpin - a cousin of my dadās - did some research back in the 60s and 70s and unpacked a family tree of sorts essentially connecting us all back to a āWalter Philpinā of Tenby, Pembrokeshire in the 1600s. (When I say - research - this was no internet search (see earlier google comment), this was serious - visiting parish churches, pouring through registers of birth, deaths and marriage and painstakingly putting it all together, by talking to family members. (Now THAT was commitment.)
Anyway, long story short (letās assume I used Compuserve) and tried to find this other Philpin. I failed. Kind of. I found an author called John Philpin - who was probably the writer this journalist thought I was. But - no way of connecting - no phone - certainly no email - even for the publisher - just an address in NYC, which IMHO seemed too hard. (Clearly I was no ‘Donald’.)
I also found a musician by name of šµFive Philpin and there seemed to be a connection to a John Philpin - and I am a music nerd anyway - so what the hell - I reached out to him through email that seemed to be associated with his music.
And nothing ā¦ for a few weeks and I then got an email from Five.
We exchanged emails - and I bought every CD he had ever released - ( I like to support āsmallerā musicians and hell - with the same last name as mine - of course I was.)
Asked him about John - and turns out John is his father - at the time Five was in LA / Seattle - and dad was over In New England. Anyway could Five connect me?
Five - āLeave it with me.ā
ā¦ delivering a result a week or so later, hereās Dadās phone number - give him a call.
I did.
We talked for a couple of hours ā¦ mainly around who both us ‘John Philpins’ came to be us ‘John Philpins’ .. and given the tightness of our Family tree, we tracked back to our mutual roots ā¦ in .. Pembrokeshire and and and ā¦
.. and finally I got round to telling him about the call from the news paper asking for a comment .. and there was a silence, and then .. (again ..paraphrasing)
I have no interest in talking to these people whose only job seems to be title tattle, so I wouldnāt bother getting back to them ā¦ but should they call again, I would answer their questions. They are looking to speak to John Philpin and gather āquotesā .. give them. Donāt let knowing nothing about the cases they call about get in the way .. make it up .. it would stand more chance of being right than some of what they write. Might be fun?
We chatted a little longer - said our good byes and moved on with our lives.
I never heard anything more from the journalist - or any other for that matter, so I never got to try out Johnās idea. I sporadically kept in touch with Five - had one more email exchange with John - but basically all our lives just continued, with this one tiny dent of connection.
What It Means To Be American
... it certainly explains why I am not Republican.
A couple of choice extracts:
Nearly six in 10 Republicans (57 percent) think that Ć¢ā¬Åa culture grounded in Christian religious beliefsĆ¢ā¬Ā is important to our American identity.
and
Forty-six percent of Republicans say that Ć¢ā¬Åa culture established by the countryĆ¢ā¬ā¢s early European immigrantsĆ¢ā¬Ā is an important part of what makes us Americans.
America Continues To Lead ...
... that's sarcasm folks ....
I have to say it took Battersea many many false starts before it got to here, but - it did get there. So maybe Philadelphia could adopt some of the ideas.
Oh that's right - America leads the world in thinking - and doesn't need to look outside of its borders for ideas.
That's how they always win the 'world' series and put themselves up on the pedestal of the global powerhouse.
What am I talking about? This.
Meanwhile - on a related topic - check out what you can do with an old cement factory.
Does The End Of The London Taxi Portend The End Of Everything?
First they licensed Uber, and I did not speak out - Because I was working.
Then the Trade Unionists and Taxi orgs called a mass demo, and I did not go -Because it was busy and I had to work.
Then, after realising our largest org was doing nothing, two drivers stood up shouting and rebellious...but they were expelled - I did and said nothing, just carried on working.
Then they asked for members to go to a branch meeting to vote against Judas and his WAGs - but I didn't go as I was working
When they finally took my Badge and Bill and handed it to an Uber driver - there was no one left to fight for me.
I just hope the apathy is not an indication of the broader topics of what is going on politically across the world. Whatever your political belief system ... the world gets the leadership it deserves. Just look at America. Trump won. Sure. Hilary lost. Sure. Hilary ran a bad campaign. Let's go with it. Trump stole the election. Whatever.
Here is what happened.
The voting population of America did not turn out in sufficient numbers to state clearly what they wanted.
As my twitter bio reads:
Power for the few will be assumed through the inaction of the many.
Uber [ No Longer ] Alles
To lose 1 senior VP in a week is never good. To lose two is very careless.
Add to the growing woes captured on this thread just this week.
But there's more ... check out this:
How Uber Used Secret Greyball Tool to Deceive Authorities Worldwide
Uber has for years engaged in a worldwide program to deceive the authorities in markets where its low-cost ride-hailing service was being resisted by law enforcement or, in some instances, had been outright banned.
The list of all the other crap - JUST - from this week can be found here.
Is Uber Trying To Get More Crazy and Confused Than The Trump Administration?
Interesting to see that when I wrote ...
as I tried to summarise everything that is going on at Uber that is wrong ... someone else had the same idea.
A great summary - though not a fan of the color scheme!
Uber - Liars or Just A U-Turn?
Remember when Uber said ... not us ...
As Gruber writes:
The message to other women at Uber is clear: stay silent or we will come after you.
