CDOQ

MacWorld 2008 is over and one of the innovations Apple unveiled is the movie rental service . The basic idea is that now you can rent movies without leaving your couch using you Apple TV remote. You can play the rental movies on your TV, on your computer with iTunes, and on Apple products-iPhone, iPod, etc. The rental cost is $2.99 or $3.99 or $4.99 per movie depending on format and movie. Also, rentals are valid for 24 hours after you hit play for the first time after the download and rental automatically expires in 30 days if you don't press play. Now, let's apply the innovation adoption principles , I wrote about more than a year ago, to explain why the movie rental service will not be adopted widely. It is ironic that I used an Apple innovation-iPod to explain the innovation adoption principles and now I am using the innovation principles to explain why another Apple innovation-digital movie rentals (AMR) will not be adopted. For our discussion, we will consider movies ...

A year ago, I had talked about evolution of Starbucks on this blog. The main idea was that it would be very difficult for Starbucks to be successful going forward with its centralized control structure. Since then Starbucks stock has gone down ~40% and the CEO, Jim Donald was fired last week and Howard Schultz returned back as the CEO to replace Jim Donald. Although I get some sense of satisfaction that I was able to predict things correctly, it bothers me that most companies still don't understand Complex Systems (go to NECSI to learn more about Complex Systems). To understand Starbucks behavior we must have understanding of the environment (economy, customers, competition, partners, vendors, etc.) Starbucks is operating in and how the environment is influencing Starbucks behavior. And, how the relationship between the parts of Starbucks-customers, employees, management, vendors, stores, technology, etc. gives rise to the collective behavior of Starbucks. Instead of explaining h...

There are painters who transform the sun to a yellow spot, but there are others who with the help of their art and their intelligence, transform a yellow spot into the sun. -Pablo Picasso (1881 - 1973)

The only strengths people recognize in people around them are usually what they perceive to be their weaknesses. Furthermore, people fail to see strengths in others in areas they think that they are very strong. For example, when I was doing marketing, my "bosses" recognized only my analytical/financial skills. Now that I am in finance, my "bosses" only recognize my marketing/messaging skills. Now, why is that? One explanation may be that people operate under the assumption that if I am the "boss" in marketing, I am better than everyone else in my team in marketing. And, this may be due to the sense of security most people need psychologically.

How will people behave if there were no consequences to their actions?