Wake Up

You know, sometimes you reach a point where you need to say something, maybe for some good, maybe just to vent.

I thought it was worth noting how the rumors I had seen for a week or so actually materialized pretty much exactly as reported on blogs and sites: Yahoo going down, Meg going out, and who knows what else. Lately it seems like all you can read about is how horrible 2008 is going to be for the economy (at least here it the US).

Anyone heard of the phrase, ’self determination’?

The more I read overall, the more sensitive I am to how great the whole online community, or perhaps the whole cultural consciousness is at prediciting events. A couple of years ago all you heard about was how the real estate market was heading downward, and it did. Now you see constant gripping about what a cold spell we are heading for.

Shining examples can be seen at Where Has All the Tech Sector Optimism Gone?, by Erika Morphy. Also check out today’s article by CNNMoney Editor, Paul La Monica, The Fed’s Stagflation Fear. That’s right stagflation, as in inflation combing with recession like Voltron to make stagflation, giving us a rosy future of counting pennies in 2008.

Hopefully, we will still be able to afford a Heineken for less than $10 a bottle because the price of gas could get so high, it could take $8 in transportation costs just to get the thing to the grocery store, and really my American dollars don’t do much in Euros anymore for the German bottler who needs more from us Americans.

To put this in perspective, there is an interesting project I heard about recently. Researchers are using bots to scan the internet, and then aggregate this information as a predictor of short term future (see UrbanSurvival.com, rated Forbes Best of the Web).

At first this sounds kind of mystical, but it’s not. When you consider we are determining our path as a group of individuals working collectively, then if you want to get a litmus test on the group, what better place to do so than on the internet? This actually makes a ton of sense, just like you hear rumblings of war before Germany invades Poland, or calls for change before the counter culture movements of the 1960’s, or seismic tremors before an earthquake or volcanic eruption.

If you are still reading at this point, then you may be saying, ’so what’? Or perhaps you are just disregarding this as a cycle out of your control. Nope, negative, get over that, grow up.

The problem is we have been building towards this for years. I burned out my credit cards after college. And what about everyone who cashed-out on their mortgage and blew the money? How about sub-prime lending? Back in 2004, I spent a week working at a Miami mortgage brokers office and personally saw the most reprehensible and unethical behavior I could imagine in business. The actions building up to this are all around, and we each have taken a small part in it.

Lastly, perhaps you missed this WallStreet Journal Article, Dire Year on WallStreet Yeilds Gigantic Bonuses. If you missed this, like most people did, let me show you the math for 2007. The big five firms, Goldman Sachs Group, Morgan Stanley, Merill Lynch, Lehman Brothers Holdings and Bear Stearns together produced the following numbers:

2007 Combined Profit: $11 Billion

2007 Combined Losses by Shareholders: $80 Billion

2007 Bonuses Paid to Executives: $39 Billion

Read that again, they paid more in bonuses than they made in profit.

The lesson is simple, we are all combining our actions to put ourselves into a huge hole. For years we have been looking to cash out, run up huge bills, finance everything, save nothing, and like the Federal Government, not worry too much about the bottom line. After all, things just keep getting better right? Just worry about you right?

Well, if you have followed me this far, then follow me to the end and wake up.

We can all do something about this piece by piece, one part at a time. 2008 does not have to be a horrible year. The reason I got into e-commerce was because it is a growth industry, constantly expanding. I am personally not going to pack it in. Each of us needs to strive to make things better. Maybe it’s by saving, maybe it’s by bringing that new innovative idea that will help your company produce profits in a new way, maybe it’s by getting out and volunteering for the presidential candidate of your choice. Whatever it is, make a decision, and do it. There are infinite ways to do something right now, but all of us need to realize that we can and we want to change this.

Wake up.

January 30th, 2008