Mark McCracken

It was surprising to me when I was scanning the European Renaissance's Wikipedia page that the Black Death, or Plague, has been linked to the beginning of the European Renaissance.

The Black Death took the lives of 25-40 million people in Europe in 1350 AD. Because that many people died, many possessions were left behind, such as land, clothes, house, furniture, and jewelry. Also, the lords of the lands were without laborers that died during the plague, so they had to hire workers, which gave money to the previously poor peasants. With this money, common people could now buy the previously expensive books and manuscripts that were being sold. This gave people the resources to actually think rather than work. Another result of lords losing their laborers was that power shifted from those lords to the working class and it is believed that this shift helped set up the economy for the Renaissance era.

There was also a movement away from spirituality to thinking about a person's time on Earth because of all the death in Europe. This kind of thinking could have impacted a number of future Renaissance contributors. So while the Black Death led to many losses in the 14th century, it also helped the Renaissance start up.

Posted by Mark T McCracken at 06:00 PM | Permalink

We have truly entered a new sort of "renaissance" without anyone really acknowledging it: the information renaissance. With all the new technology that is coming out seemingly everyday, we have entered a time when the public has become a producer of many things. The information renaissance really began with Thomas Edison's invention of the photograph, according to NextMark. Since then, we have become hungry for media. After radio and television was invented, a so called "dark ages" of information occurred. There were only a few channels on TV for a very long time.

Then, in 1980, the invention of the personal computer brought us back into the golden age. Soon after, ARPAnet became the commercialized Internet in 1988. Then came the first web browser, first comprehensive search engine, and the many social networking sites, among other technologies. As this has progressed, we have become more and more media starved. Before, we would get our news from either the newspaper or the 6:00 news. Now, there is the 24 hour news cycle where we can find out about breaking news at all hours of the day.

The social networking websites are an entity of their own. These websites offer inane details of people's lives, from celebrities to your mother. These sites have become very popular as we publish our own inane details to entertain our friends and family. We have become so infatuated with information that we wonder why that couple is not "Facebook official" and how can I appropiately show my love for the TV show "Scrubs"?

The information renaissance, however, is a great thing. Never before has our society had this much information and resources from sitting around in your own house. While there are many aspects of the information renaissance that are inane and insignificant, such as the social networking sites, there are many very good things that came out of it such as the ability to use search engines such as Google to search for information and even further, search the academic world using databases such as Academic Search Premier to scan academic articles. Websites such as Wikipedia have given us a knowledge base online. And that, in effect, is the greatest gift of all.

Posted by Mark T McCracken at 12:00 PM | Permalink

I believe Sense of Urgency by John P. Kotter has value, but I question some things about the book. The book first asks that managers and departmental workers all have a sense of urgency at all times instead of complacency. While I agree that complacency leads to some failures, being in urgent mode at all times seems unrealistic. It just seems impractical to keep up a sense of urgency at all times. It is a good idea to stay away from settling for the status quo, however, and if a company is going to jump into urgency, to avoid false urgency.

Some of the details of how to be urgent remind me of elements from the book Good to Great. The author wants managers and higher ups to discard everything that seems trivial and that is a waste of people’s time. Instead of those things, they must act on the things they are passionate about and to act with speed on those things. I think this is a valuable lesson in disregarding the little things and doing things that one is passionate about. Clutter and fatigue undermine true urgency. If a manager gets rid of the clutter, he/she can focus more on relevant things that they care about and avoid fatigue.

The advice the author offers does have much value. The case of the NoNos is an interesting one. Removing people who are actively sabotaging an incident is a must. Lightening one’s calendar to reduce stress and fatigue is also a practical measure. It seems like this book is just a bit obvious, however. Every business could use more urgency and focus. But what I think this book does well is to outline that you must eliminate small, trivial, stressful things and focus on important things that you are passionate about and to move with purpose and speed to get those initiatives implemented.

Posted by Mark T McCracken at 07:00 AM | Permalink

Plagiarism is a huge concern for people in any field, including scientists. Plagiarism is defined as "use or close imitation of the language and thoughts of another author and the representation of them as one's own original work." Obviously this is a gross penalty in academia, with all universities severely punishing students for plagiarism and being blacklisted as a scientist. This act severely hurts the works of others and is a black eye on the world of academia as a whole.

There is even plagiarism detecting software that can help the academic field find plagiarism.

This also brings me back to my point of characteristics of a master that can also be applied to professionals. Masters or professionals do not plagiarize. They are responsible for their actions and their reputation. As Dr. Jay Gillette says, the three concepts of a professional are reputation, reputation, reputation (following the real estate creed of "location, location, location"). If a professional gets a bad reputation, then that professional will not be favored for jobs or any sort of academic work.

Plagiarism does not pay off. It hurts both the individual and the academic field. Be honest and develop your own works.

Posted by Mark T McCracken at 12:00 AM | Permalink

There are many different ways to use digital content to one’s advantage. There are mobile applications, applications that are used on multimedia devices, and content that can be stored and purchased on the web.

Mobile applications are games or services that are downloaded or purchased from an application store and stored on a smartphone. The application then runs it’s specified function. This has been the most popular digital content resource recently. With the advent of the iPhone and other popular smartphones, application stores, or “app stores,” have been one of the most profitable areas of the digital content market. These applications range from simple games to services that monitor sports scores. In the early onset of Apple’s app store, Apple took 30% off the top of whatever an application’s developer charged for use of their application. In the first ten months, Apple generated $20-$45 million. However, many analysts are predicting that the app store will turn into a $1 billion revenue source for Apple. If $1 billion is for Apple, which only takes 30% off each application, then the vendors can get in on a lucrative market. Apple says the billionth application was downloaded on April 23, 2009 and there are as of November 2009, over 100,000 applications with two billion downloads in the Apple app store. An independent developer can have a desired application in as little as three months and can have enough income to build a developing team. Imagine what an established company with income and real money could do. MacResearch lists what it takes to have a successful application in the app store. They list:

• A large target audience, preferably every iPhone and iPod Touch owner
• An immediately-appealing app, to push the impulse purchase
• A low price, to help the impulse purchase... more
• A good icon and a good description, to help the impulse purchase... even more
• A well-crafted app
• Optional but recommended: a good marketing push in the first couple of weeks after launch
• Luck
• Money in the bank and/or a real job

With these criteria, a business can craft a model to successful development of applications I nthe app store. In the wake of this success, Verizon and Blackberry have released their own app stores that they are advertising heavily to compete with Apple. There are many opportunities in the mobile application world, but the key is to have a useful application that people want to use.

Another area that digital content is being used extensively in is in the multimedia world, such as the movie rental company Netflix’s partnership with Microsoft to bring their services to Microsoft’s popular Xbox Live platform. Xbox Live is a service Microsoft provides, at a one time fee, for their Xbox customers to connect and play video games together. This partnership began in Fall 2008 and benefits both parties greatly. Netflix gains access to Xbox Live’s twelve million members while Microsoft gets access to millions of Netflix members who may purchase a Xbox 360. Netflix experienced an increased profit margin of 45% with ten million more subscribers. Microsoft is seeking to make their game system a multimedia device that serves more purposes than just video games. They recently have integrated social networking sites Facebook, Twitter, and Last.fm into free downloadable applications. I believe agreements with Microsoft or Sony, with their Playstation 3, can benefit application developers if these companies see opportunity.

A third area for digital content is online marketplaces such as Amazon.com. Amazon.com started out as an online bookstore then they moved on to sell more than books to where they sell just about anything now. Amazon recently introduced the Kindle, a device that downloads eBooks from Amazon and other vendors that can hold 1,500 books. The Kindle is in direct competition with other similar devices by Barnes & Noble and Sony. The Kindle is also an application in the app store, which is finding more universal appeal on the iPhone rather than buying the rather expensive Kindle. However, the Kindle saves money for the company and the customer because everything is digital rather than shipping a physical book. Also, eBook sales are expected to reach 28.6 million units by 2013. Another area that is emerging is the concept of a digital content online marketplace. Some sites, such as tidwit.com, are intermediaries between artists and content. They take an artist’s content and sell it online for them for a cut of the profits. This makes a common hub for artists to sell and communicate about their art. No forerunner has really emerged in this area, so an investment here could lead to a product that becomes a household name like Amazon or eBay.

In conclusion, I believe there are many opportunities in the area of digital content. If T.A.P. has a specific area that they have expertise in, they should follow that. The app store seems to have the most potential; it is only growing larger and more profitable. Also, competitors see this success and launch their own app stores, so there are many opportunities in this area. The online multimedia applications would be agreements with specific companies that would be very successful, but they would have to provide a service that the agreeing company could see as being very popular. The final point, the online content marketplace, is a relatively untouched area that if someone could take hold and boost a company, they could have a huge advantage in that field like eBay and Amazon enjoy now. Basically, it all comes down to what content you have and what others perceive is the value of that content.
 
Reference List
TidWit - http://www.tidwit.com/WhatIs.aspx
http://www.mediafuturist.com/2009/11/the-future-of-digital-content-and-telemedia.html
http://www.instat.com/abstract.asp?id=27&SKU=IN0904509ID
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/25680004/ns/technology_and_science-games/
http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/08/06/11/apples_app_store_could_emerge_as_1_2b_business_by_2009.html
http://news.softpedia.com/news/App-Store-Applications-Barely-Making-Any-Profits-112589.shtml
http://www.apple.com/ca/press/2009_04/app_store.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/App_Store
The business model for iPhone applications - http://www.macresearch.org/business-models-iphone-applications

Posted by Mark T McCracken at 11:00 PM | Permalink

I have enjoyed fantasy football for many years now. Fantasy Football is a stats based game that is based on American football. Basically a user creates a team consisting of various offensive players along with a team defense. Based on how the players perform in games, users can win and lose by how they "draft" these players. Many different websites operate fantasy football leagues, such as ESPN, Yahoo!, and the NFL itself.

However, many have pointed to fantasy football as distracting workers from work. Managers should be careful to make sure that not too much time is spent on fantasy football. It can be highly addictive as a game that one can compete against friends with.

However, because of fantasy football's widespread popularity, managers can also use this Web 2.0 technology to raise morale in the workplace as well as build relationships within the workplace. If a boss likes American football, then he/she can find a common ground to connect with employees.

So fantasy football has its advantages and disadvantages. A manager needs to control this kind of game while maybe using it to connect with employees.

Posted by Mark T McCracken at 09:00 PM | Permalink

I believe The Search has value in terms of looking at a new company that has widespread recognition. In the first few chapters, the author outlines how Google started, how a search engine works, and the history of search engines. This is mainly just background information about how search has evolved over the years and how it works.

The next few chapters outline Google as a business. In this section there are references to some of their newer programs such as AdSense and Froogle. AdSense helped Google earn a large part of its income. This set of chapters also outlines how Google “transformed our culture.” I agree that Google and other search functions has lead to changes in the way people access and look for information, but I believe he is over exaggerating quite a bit. Google has only transformed with our culture as we go to the information age and our “have information now” approach. Google also is described as trying to avoid being perceived as being evil. The author talks about how Google has so many functions now, they can find you on a map through your telephone number.

The next section details initial public offering and its future. Google is assured to be run by the same two people who started it, because they have ten times the shares of any other shareholder. Then, Google’s future is seen. They have many applications that are being tested everyday, so Google is not going anywhere. I am actually testing out the beta version of Google Wave, a more live version of Google Docs.

Basically, I see this book as being more of a history of Google and how it impacts us. I already knew the majority of this information from when I was an undergraduate, so I did not find the book useful, but I could see how it could have value.

Posted by Mark T McCracken at 08:00 PM | Permalink