A few weeks ago I ran across a fun game online called Urban Dead. The game is a simple low tech game that has zombies fighting human survivors in the city of Malton. Humans start out as one of several character types with different default skills and by earning experience points the humans can buy other skills. My first character was a medic and I earned experience points by finding people and healing them. Now I have earned the diagnose skill so I see what everybody's hit points are and I can find folks to heal much faster.
This game is very addictive but because the number of actions is limited to only 50 each day there is no way for the game to consume more then 10 minutes of time each day, but those 10 minutes have become a real fun break part of my day.
Give it a try, if anyone reads this blog :)
Tuesday, October 25, 2005
Monday, October 24, 2005
Are there American companies anymore?
After a recent speech by a Fortune 50 CEO I started to wonder if there are American companies anymore or if Global corporations are pretty much all that exist anymore. Now I know there are many small and medium businesses that do a high % or 100% of their business in America. What I wonder about is the Fortune 500, how many of them are actually benefiting their country of origin or even care about their home country. I see Walmart giving $23+ million to Katrina relief while other companies that once were American give the typical $1 million, despite having billions in cash reserves (I am not counting matching funds just direct corporate donation).
Global competition demands that we meet the price/demand curve on products and so many corporations have become global not because of desire but rather for survival. Companies like GM, despite being global, are still in financial trouble but most companies insist they go global to reduce costs and remain competitive.
We as consumers in our quest for ever cheaper prices have changed our buying habits to the point that we are global consumers.
What came first the global consumer or the global corporation? And if you are a global consumer can you really complain that average family wages where you live are dropping?
Global competition demands that we meet the price/demand curve on products and so many corporations have become global not because of desire but rather for survival. Companies like GM, despite being global, are still in financial trouble but most companies insist they go global to reduce costs and remain competitive.
We as consumers in our quest for ever cheaper prices have changed our buying habits to the point that we are global consumers.
What came first the global consumer or the global corporation? And if you are a global consumer can you really complain that average family wages where you live are dropping?
Tuesday, October 18, 2005
The daily 10 minute battle against evil is good for the soul
I recently started playing http://www.urbandead.com and it has become a quick fun part of my day. In this game every user is either a survivor trying to kill zombies or a zombie trying to kill survivors. I actually play several characters and because everyone is restricted to only 50 moves a day (you would be surprised how fast it goes) the game does not take much time. This game is extremely low tech but still a fun break during my day. I can't stop to fire up xbox during the work day but a quick 15 minute break to earn experience points and take care of evil is easy enough to do. Try it, it may be low tech but its still fun and you goal oriented people will love the ability to turn experience points into new skills.
Friday, October 07, 2005
People are a burden to corporate America.....
Dear Employees,
You are too expensive for us. Yes, we know that during tight employment times we drove up wages almost uncontrollably to fight for your skills, and we used to care about your welfare which drove up benefit costs, but now all that has changed. You see there are college educated people in other countries that will work for 1/10th of what we are paying you and there are tons of these folks available. They don't buy much as consumers but we know American consumers will buy lots of our stuff, if the price is cheaper.
The continued reduction in average family income in America is not our problem because we are lowering our prices to help your reduced wages still buy more. And please understand, as soon as we can find even cheaper resources elsewhere then the current employees in {Insert Country Here} we will abandon them as well. If all goes well we expect to automate 99% of your jobs in the next century and then we will not be bothered with actually having to employ any humans.
Signed,
Greedy Corporations
NOTE TO MARKETING COMPUTER: Please design marketing campaign to sell our products to robots, humans will be out of money soon.
You are too expensive for us. Yes, we know that during tight employment times we drove up wages almost uncontrollably to fight for your skills, and we used to care about your welfare which drove up benefit costs, but now all that has changed. You see there are college educated people in other countries that will work for 1/10th of what we are paying you and there are tons of these folks available. They don't buy much as consumers but we know American consumers will buy lots of our stuff, if the price is cheaper.
The continued reduction in average family income in America is not our problem because we are lowering our prices to help your reduced wages still buy more. And please understand, as soon as we can find even cheaper resources elsewhere then the current employees in {Insert Country Here} we will abandon them as well. If all goes well we expect to automate 99% of your jobs in the next century and then we will not be bothered with actually having to employ any humans.
Signed,
Greedy Corporations
NOTE TO MARKETING COMPUTER: Please design marketing campaign to sell our products to robots, humans will be out of money soon.
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