Gongol.com Archives: December 2018
December 19, 2018
Is the time right for a Facebook rival?
For all the sense this makes on paper, the network effects are too large to overcome. If Google couldn't do it with Google+, nobody is going to push aside Facebook on its own turf. Its only credible challenges come from paradigmatic shifts like Instagram.
China has eyes on Greenland as a military outpost
There's perhaps nothing more naive than believing that if the United States just keeps to itself, then everyone else will do the same and we'll all be happy. Constructive engagement with the world, according to rules and multilateral alliances, is the way to keep the future from looking like an authoritarian anti-liberal dystopia.
Elon Musk's "boring" tunnel project may just carry cars
Quite possibly no one in business history has ever needed a sidekick quite like Elon Musk needs one right now. Charlie Munger to his Warren Buffett. Paul Allen to his Bill Gates. Takeo Fujisawa to his Soichiro Honda. Musk has a million ideas and a bias in favor of action that is truly remarkable, but he needs a counterweight.
Targeted ads that burn the eyes
An ad for "transparent crystalline trousers" begs the question: Did Congress pass the Freedom of Too Much Information Act?
Thanks to non-Newtonian materials, hard hats might fit like stocking caps. Fittingly, the Australian company trying to launch the product is called "Anti-Ordinary".
The Mid-Atlantic accent isn't heard much anymore
Apparently it caused some confusion on social media the other day when people tried to figure out the geographic roots of the "Frasier Crane" enunciation
