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Author Alasdair White
There is something horribly fascinating about watching normally intelligent people submitting to the ‘herd instinct’ and engaging in actions that are self-evidently wrong. Irrational behaviour builds on irrational thinking that is itself based on incorrectly drawn conclusions. And once the cycle is started, it becomes a destructive vicious spiral. Such behavioural patterns occur in a large number of situations but never more so when driven by politicians who feel, just because they are politicians, that they have superior intellects and are so much better informed that the ‘common man’ and so much more able to make decisions that are best for everyone. This delusional attitude is supported by some journalists who have equally unfounded self-delusions.
And this is exactly what is happening with governmental reaction to the financial institutions and the mess they have made of their economic value and the economy as a whole. The extraordinary thing is that the UK government is not alone in its idiocy – other governments around the world are going down the same path in the sublime, but ridiculous, belief that if all governments agree then they must be right. Read the rest of this entry »
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Author Alasdair White
In the wake of collapse of the banking system, it is understandable that we want to make sure that is does not happen again. Politicians, those who are ostensibly elected to act on our behalf, are the ones who have to take the responsibility for finding a solution – not because they are knowledgeable and competent in the field but because it is the responsibility of politicians to act at a national and supranational level, a level at which we, as individuals, simply cannot. Unfortunately, the world’s politicians have assumed that they are competent to act directly (i.e. they are knowledgeable and have the skills in the field), rather than accepting that their role is to seek considered and thoughtful input from those that do know what they are talking about and then to mange the process so that a solution is found. The result of assumption of competence has been a rush by politicians to develop policy and enact law – and to get it spectacularly wrong!
Nicolas Sarkozy, the President of France and a member of the G20, has recently called for a tax on financial transactions as a method of reducing risky behaviour amongst bankers. This is profoundly flawed as an idea Read the rest of this entry »
Author Alasdair White
This is a slightly edited version of part of my input to a discussion on a publishing forum.
People seem to either love or hate the big publishers and either support or are contemptuous of the self-publishing fraternity. Publishing is a business and there are simply two different business models here.
The big (traditional) publishers are operating with a very well established but inflexible business model that relies heavily of bringing out as many books as possible so that they obtain volume-based market share. Their competitive advantage is their professionalism, their financial clout, and their access to the book-retailing sector combined with their extensive market intelligence. Their competitive disadvantages are their incredibly slow product development cycle (the time it takes to bring a new book to market) and their very poor product acquisition strategies (how they actually find new authors/books that will give them market share or the greatest publicity).
The small publishers (and that is what self-publishers are) have a more flexible business model that Read the rest of this entry »