BillBakerBlog.com

Holy Sh*t: I Haven't Blogged In Six Weeks!

"If a blogger that nobody reads stops blogging, does anyone notice?"
- Anonymous

Someone asked me the other day: "There's so much going on? Why haven't you been blogging?"

My answers, in no particular order of importance, are:

- Lazy
- Actually was blogging about my buddy's bike race across the country over at http://robmorlock.blogspot.com/
- Lazy
- I'm so overwhelmed by the sheer quantity of incompetence, malfeasance, corruption and crime in the world that I don't know where to begin
- Lazy

So, in an effort to post something - anything -  to this blog to make it appear as if I am paying attention, here are some recent people/places/things in the news that, just by their mention, speak for themselves and require no additional commentary:

- BP
- Mel Gibson
- The entire Palin family
- The French national soccer team
- Apple public relations
- BP
- Congress
- Tiger Woods' golf game
- The world's dullest sport (soccer)
- A possible double-dip recession
- The Vatican
- All politics in South Carolina
- The housing market
- The hype around electric cars (all of which will fail)
- BP

So, if you've been living under a rock in the Hamptons all summer, I recommend that you google at least some of the above mentioned topics and get ready: You'll laugh. You'll cry. And then you'll crawl back under that rock.

See you after Labor Day.

The Annual Shareholder Letter Every Tech CEO WANTS to Write

Warren Buffett's annual letter to shareholders is out. It's a must-read for anyone who is invested, is thinking about investing, or thinks they know something about investing.

As we approach the annual report and annual meeting season, I am sure that a survey of most CEOs (with the possible exception of Warren Buffett) would reveal that they would choose their annual colonoscopy over this little ritual.

Technology CEOs, in my opinion, find the process especially irksome, given that they are busy dealing with the fast-paced world in which they compete.

In the plain-spoken spirit of Warren Buffett, I have taken the liberty of drafting a letter that CEOs of tech companies are free to use in their annual report this year. (You're welcome.)

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

Dear Shareholder:

Once upon a time, CEOs like John Jacob Astor, J.P. Morgan and Andrew Carnegie sat down once a year, put on their eye-shades, put quill to parchment and scratched out a letter to their buddies who also happened to be shareholders in their trusts and monopolies. It was their once a year obligation to blow smoke up the ass of the "owners" of their companies.

Then, they would go back to exploiting the American consumer and creating capitalism as we once knew it.

Good times.

Somehow, this anachronistic practice became frozen in amber and continues to this day, in spite of the fact that I am under no legal obligation to write such a letter.

Yes, it's true. There is no requirement for me to write an annual letter to shareholders, which may come as a surprise to you given the fact that just about everything else I do has to be immediately reported to the Securities and Exchange Commission. If I so much as think about buying or selling shares in MY OWN F-ING COMPANY, I have to get a permission slip from the Pope. Hey! Did I tell you I'm thinking about getting hair plugs? Of course I did! You can read all about it in an 8-K filing along with what I had for dinner last night, what brand of golf clubs I use and the regularity of my bowel movements.

I had a sense that things would change when we went public, but it never occurred to me that it would require me to build an in-law apartment over my garage for legal counsel. If I spent one-tenth the time on my business as I do talking to lawyers and signing my name, we'd all be enjoying robot housekeepers like Rosie on "The Jetsons" by now.

But not these days. Despite the fact that you can get, via the Internet, a real-time accounting of which sales person picked their nose during a cold-call, I still have to file an annual report and worse, spend actual time in person with you people.

Yep, Mary and Phil Gormley of Fresno get to come to a meeting and question me about whatever the f*ck they want, in spite of the fact that they own a total of 87 shares in their idiot son's 529 college savings plan.

Here - let me save you a trip: No, the board of directors will NOT consider your motion from the floor to ensure that our products are not contributing to the clubbing of baby seals in the Nunavut Territories. And yes, I realize that you think that in this post-AIG world, anyone who makes more than $18,000/year is overpaid, but I have already cashed the bonus check mentioned in the proxy statement and bought his and hers Tesla Roadsters. And as God is my witness, if you so much as raise your hand at the annual meeting, I will drive both of them straight up your ass.

FWIW - I am happy to report that we had a great year. We make software for chrissake. It's zeros and ones that we deliver over the Internet. That means about a bazillion percent margins.

Furthermore, our customers love our products. And why wouldn't they? Most people these days would rather sit huddled in front of their computer than risk exposure to sunshine and actual human contact. I mean - why grow an ACTUAL garden or do ACTUAL work when you can play "Farmville" 18 hours a day?

This is all very good for us. We have become so efficient in delivering our digital equivalent of heroin that we laid off 99 percent of our workforce in the past 12 months. This has vastly improved our margins even more. 

So who is left at the company? Me, our CFO and a couple of interns who water the plants and tweet sh*t about our products a couple of times a day.

Seriously. I'm smarter than you. I'm the one writing this letter. Just take my word that your investment is safe and let's not go through this dumb-ass kabuki theater ever again.

Sincerely,
Your CEO

Haiku Friday - The Week Ending January 29, 2010

Photo: Cornelia Baker

Picture this: You've been President of the United States for one year. In that relatively short period of time, you've gone from being the savior of the country to being despised by the right, excoriated by the left and abandoned by the middle for a state senator from Massachusetts.

BUT - you've got a chance to reconnect with the people in your first State of the Union address. Everyone will be watching and the news media will have nothing else to report on...

D'OH! That motherf'er Steve Jobs has to go and introduce his new thingamajig on the SAME F'ING DAY as your big address! Maybe HE should be president of EVERYTHING, if he's so smart!

But at least you have a whole new way to see how fast your poll numbers are dropping. Heck, you can take that Apple iPad to bed with you in the White House and watch your popularity drop in real time.

Anyway, it seems President Obama can't buy a break. Better to write a few haiku than to curse the darkness. That's our motto around here.

Toyota screws up.
Its cars just can't seem to stop.
Ford and GM laugh.

Steve Jobs saves the world.
A new thing for us to buy,
except we're all broke.

Obama's address:
"We have nothing to fear but
that a-hole Steve Jobs."

Alito mouths off.
"Not true" he says to the prez.
They should have a beer.

Ford posts a profit!
Toyota is imploding!
It's Bizarro World!

If you own a Toyota, if I were you, I would run out this weekend and trade it in for a Saab. It looks like that august car company will stick around after all and, stopping a Saab is not the issue. It's keeping them running that gives all us owners agita.

Haiku Friday: The Week Ending January 22, 2010

It figures. Haiku Harry takes a few days off and the world of news erupts in a cavalcade of "It has to be true, because no one would believe it if you made it up.":

- John Edwards is now a confirmed douche bag;

- Ted Kennedy is trying out for the Olympic gymnastics team in his grave;

- The Supreme Court has declared that Goldman Sachs and Coca-Cola have the same speech rights as you and me (because that's what the framers of the Constitution had in mind, I'm sure.)

In spite of a grueling travel schedule, Harry managed to cough up a few Haiku hairballs to commemorate a momentous week in the news.

Edwards is a dog.
Dips his wick, makes a baby,
then lies about it.

Scott Brown wins in Mass.
Democrats are freaking out.
G.O.P.? High fives!

The Supreme Court rules:
Big biz can buy elections.
Democracy lost.

If the week's news has pretty much destroyed your last vestige of faith in this country, consider helping one that needs to be rebuilt from scratch. Make a donation to the charity of your choice to help Haiti.

My Favorite Blogs and News Sites of 2009

I read a lot of stuff on the Interweb. There are so many good writers and sources of useful, entertaining and humorous material out there.

After careful refection as to which sites I regularly read, I have decided that my all time favorite for the year is... this one.

That's right. I love reading my own blog, if for no other reason than if not me, who else will bother to read it?

But, I certainly want to acknowledge and send a shout-out to the runner-ups. Perhaps they could aspire to depose my own blog as my top pick for 2010.

In no particular order:

- CBS News, Coop's Corner: While I miss Charlie Cooper at CNET, he has a special flair for pissing off anyone who thinks Sarah Palin is the bee's knees. What's not to like about that?

- CNET's Webware: Always useful and helpful information on Internet-y stuff.

- BrandFlakesForBreakfast: My friend Darryl Ohrt's fun, pithy and quick-reading source for all things advertising, branding and social media.

- New York Times Well blog: As a barely competent amateur triathlete, it's nice to know I have company and to find all sorts of helpful information on how not to get any slower than I already am.

- Technologizer: Editor-in-chief and grand-poobah Harry McCracken is a veteran journalist in the technology industry. His experience, deep-knowledge and irreverent humor all come through loud and clear.

- CNET's Crave: I like gadgets. So does this blog. 'Nuff said.

- Woot!: If you don't know about Woot!, you should. They sell one item each day (not a single item, but many copies of the same item). It's always a good deal and if it sells out, tough luck. But even if you're not buying, the product descriptions are worth the read.

- Romanesko: I'm a media junkie. Have been for 30 years or so. This is my fix.

- Politico: I am also a politics junkie, but only to the extent that it's fun to watch these dim-bulbs step on their own d*cks over and over and over again. (In Larry Craig's case, that might have actually happened...)

- Scotus Blog: All about the Supreme Court. I only added it to make me look all erudite and because I needed one more in order to be able to use the nifty "Top 10" graphic at the top of this entry.

There are probably about a hundred more that I could cite, but these are the ones that leapt to mind in the 14 seconds I spent thinking about it.

I am happy to add others that you suggest, but that would require someone else besides me to be reading this.

Happy New Year.

The. Best. Advertising. Disclaimer. Ever.

We live in a litigious world. Buy hot coffee, spill it in your lap - sue the store that sold it to you. Buy a ladder, fall off - sue the ladder company.

These days, you can't buy a loaf of bread without some warning about how if you eat it too fast, you could choke and die.

This is especially true of prescription drugs.

If you watch the evening newscasts, you know what I am talking about. (I am pretty sure that without ads for prescription drugs, Katie Couric, Brian Williams and Charlie Gibson would be working for minimum wage and broadcasting out of a storage locker.)

You've seen the ads. "Take this drug for toe fungus, but be aware that you could start bleeding through your eye sockets, sweating diarrhea and get an erection that lasts three weeks."

I was recently amused by a new commercial for the sleep aid Ambien that shows an animated pill hovering over a woman's head as she sleeps, sprinkling particles of medicine directly into her skull. Underneath, the word "Dramatization" appears, just in case anyone thought that's how it actually works.

But nothing can compare to the Ambien web site. The home page has a photo of a giant, rotating Ambien pill with five people standing on it. Underneath, the disclaimers say "Not actual patients" and "Not actual pill size."

Yep. Some lawyer, somewhere, is making sure that people understand that a real Ambien pill is not the same size as one of those giant pool-party floats.

Of course, this begs the question: Those people may not be actual patients, but are they actual size? Because if they are, then that would be a pretty important side-effect of Ambien that we might want to know about.

Professors, Presidents and Police

So, tonight is the big kegger at the White House with President Obama, Harvard Professor Henry Louis Gates and Cambridge cop James Crowley.

Since most of us don't know any of these guys personally, it is difficult to understand what happened and who was in the wrong. (Clearly, someone screwed up here.)

However, I do count several cops as friends, including my closest friend of 30 years and here is what I do know:

Generally, people have encounters with the police on two occasions:

1. When they are a crime victim.
2. When they have committed a crime.

Both situations are obviously negative and something that most of us would endeavor to avoid.

So, cops see people at their worst, their lowest. The rest of the time they toil away in quiet obscurity, putting lives on the line and dealing with the dark side of society that, again, most of us would rather not touch.

Knowing the cops that I know and, based on the stories they tell, I tend to give them every benefit of the doubt. Sure, there are less-than-perfect cops, just as I am sure there are less-than-perfect Harvard professors.

But I throw my lot in with the guy who straps on a gun and a bullet-proof vest and puts himself out there every day, including just responding to a neighbor's call and making sure that the house of an ivory-tower intellectual with an agenda was not being robbed one summer afternoon.

Justice is Done: The Supreme Court Gets it Right

A couple of months ago, this blog commented on the strip search case that was argued before the U.S. Supreme Court.

In an 8-1 decision, the Court today ruled that, indeed, this girl's rights were violated by an egregiously over-reaching school administration in Safford, Arizona. The Fourth Amendment stands strong, at least in this case. The one dissent? Clarence Thomas. Time to punch his ticket.

I do not have kids, but I do have nieces and nephews. If this were to happen to any of them, I would be tempted to go see that school administrator and mete out my own form of punishment on him. Thankfully, there are laws against that. And, as the Supreme Court proved today - we are a nation of laws.

Haiku Friday - The Week of May 25, 2009

Here we are, on the door step of June. Ahhhh - June. What a great time of the year. Fresh-faced teens in their prom and graduation finery. Little league baseball in full swing. The first strawberries are on their way and the whole summer is laid out ahead of us, pregnant with possibility.

Of course summer also means whiny kids home from school with nothing to do, the stench of roadkill in the air and the ever-escalating cold war against disease-carrying ticks and mosquitoes starts in earnest.

But never mind all that bad stuff. After a week off for Memorial Day, it's time to get back to that favorite summertime activity - haikuin'. For those of you who no longer read or pay any attention whatsoever to the news (which, according to recent polls, is EVERYONE), here's a quick summary of what you missed while you were out in the backyard playing horseshoes:

Powell answers Dick:
"I am a Republican!
Now shut the f*ck up!"

North Korea nukes!
The United Nations meets!
And nothing changes.

Barack picks a judge.
If she's qualified and smart,
Limbaugh will hate her.

Newt to judge: "Racist!"
Coulter piles on, just for fun.
Um, kettles? You're black.

GM on the brink.
Bankruptcy is imminent.
Everyone loses. 

Sotomayor? Bad!
Why? Too many syllables.
Not good for haiku.

Have a great weekend, watch out for opossums crossing the road and remember to stock up on Fudgsicles and Nutty Buddies for the kids!

David Souter: "I Hate My Job."

I was thinking about Supreme Court Justice David Souter. (Why? No idea.) As you know, he is retiring after this Court session is over in June.

It has become evident that he didn't like Washington very much. In fact, it seems that he did not like his job very much. He recently referred to the Supreme Court sessions as an "annual intellectual lobotomy."

Wouldn't it have been nice if he had told us all 20 years ago that he didn't like the job? It's one thing when a middle manager at the Acme Wire Hanger Company hates his job. The worst that can happen is that his direct reports are miserable and a few sub-par wire hangers make it into America's closets.

But when you are one of nine people whose job it is to interpret the Constitution and enforce the laws of the United States, one would hope that you would at least acknowledge the significance of what you do for a living.

Suggestion to the members of the president's team and the Senate Judiciary Committee who will be vetting Souter's replacement: Ask the candidates if they actually want the job first. If the answer is "no", find someone else.

Vetting Frank the Fireman

Image: PLAYMOBIL USA Inc.

In re yesterday's discrimination case before the Supreme Court. (City of New Haven, Conn., threw out the results of the captain and lieutenant promotions test because not enough blacks and Hispanics passed):

When a firefighter is dragging my fat, unconscious ass out of a burning building, I do not care if that person is black, white, male, female, gay or straight. I just want to know they can do it. Municipalities should administer whatever tests that are necessary to ensure the best, brightest and strongest are working at and managing the fire (and police) departments. Just make sure everyone has the same access to the knowledge and training required for the test. After that, let the best man win (though I do think an all-female fire department would be hot...)

I always thought that this was a country of equal opportunity, not of guaranteed equal outcomes.

"Next, We'll Be Searching for Illicit Peanuts!"

Image: Fox Broadcasting

Far be it from me to criticize our public school administrators. They have to deal with cranky teacher unions, annoying parents and snot-nosed kids. (Not your kids, mind you.)

But me thinks the near gestapo-like tactics of one particular school administration should be swatted-down quickly and forcefully by the Supreme Court of the United States.

The Court is hearing a case today wherein a 13-year old female honor student was strip-searched by a nurse and a secretary for drugs, for no other reason than she was seen talking to a bunch of kids who might have had alcohol on their breath some time in the past AND on the word of some other kid who turned out to be a liar.

Needless to say, the administration at the Safford, Arizona, school found nothing. The girl, Savana Redding, was traumatized and ultimately left that school for another.

Read all about it over at NPR's web site.

I'm all for discipline and keeping kids safe in schools, especially in these undisciplined and scary times. But if some assistant principal wants to strip-search my kid (if I had a kid), he better produce stronger evidence than "that kid over there said so."

This whole case sounds like a bad decision by this administrator who, instead of admitting fault, dug in his heels and the school board and administration dug in right behind him and *presto*: six years later it's in front of the Supreme Court.

For those of you in the Safford, Arizona, public school system who need a refresher, here's a link to the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution. (And yes, this will be on the test.)