Retailers aren’t looking forward to the holidays. Analysts predict sales will be flat, about the same as last year. Last year was bad — the biggest decline in Christmas shopping since 1970. But, once again, I think the analysts are going to be wrong. I think sales will be worse this year. (more…)
Whenever you write an e-mail on a sensitive topic, leave the “To:” line blank until you’re absolutely sure you’re ready to send it. That way, you’ll never have to worry about accidentally transmitting a message before you have everything phrased “just so.” (more…)
A recent study found that 2008’s media coverage of the financial crisis was all about big government and big business. Small-business issues merited just 5 percent of the total.
Newspapers and magazines and television experts were almost entirely focused on the auto industry, bank bailouts, and stimulus plans. And most of the research and reporting was done in New York or Washington. Very little of it was done out here where most of us live and work. (more…)
A few weeks ago, we told you about Eastern European criminals installing “skimmers” to steal personal information from ATMs. Now, it looks like those thieves won’t be trying their scam in South Africa… at least, not for long.
Cameras trained on cash machines detect when somebody tampers with the card slot. And then the troublemaker gets a face full of pepper spray from nozzles on the ATM. The idea is for police to rush to the scene and arrest the incapacitated thief. So far, however, only maintenance personnel on their rounds have been hit.
A promising approach. But some kinks still need to be worked out.
(Source: The Guardian)
With 370,000 industrial workers, Japan has the most robots in the world. But even these tireless workers are not immune to the recession. A 40 percent decline in production in Japanese factories means many robots are dormant, while orders for new robots have fallen by almost 60 percent.
The upside (at least if you’re not a robot)? Employers are eliminating robot positions before laying off human workers.
(Source: Popular Science and The New York Times)
From the annals of unnecessary scientific research and “that’s quite a reach” conclusions…
University of Edinburgh psychologists have determined that you stand the best chance of getting back a lost wallet if there’s a picture of a baby in it. They “planted” 240 wallets on highly trafficked city streets, and were pleasantly surprised to find that almost half of them were returned. Even more surprising, the rate of return appeared to be connected to the photos the researchers had inserted in the wallets. Eighty-eight percent of those with a photo of a baby were returned. Fifty-three percent of those with a photo of a puppy were returned. Forty-eight percent of those with a photo of a happy family were returned. Twenty-eight percent of those with a photo of an elderly couple were returned. And only 15 percent of the wallets with no photos at all were returned.
The researchers believe the overwhelming response to the photos of the baby reflects a compassionate instinct toward helpless infants that evolved in humans to ensure the survival of future generations. (Right!)
(Source: Times Online)