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Gary Secondino's Weblog
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Saturday, February 9, 2002
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Anyone who thinks Enron executives can't be all bad didn't see them before Congress Thursday.
Say what you will about Skilling, he doesn't want for self-confidence. With an aggressive swagger, looking like the homelier brother of Peter Jennings, Skilling stepped right up to the microphone -- you could almost hear him thinking, "the Fifth Amendment is for pussies" -- and acted as if everyone in the world who thought there was something wrong with Enron was nuts.
Enron's bonus list. The "retention bonuses" totaled more than $55 million.
[Salon.com]
"I don't know whether Ken Lay is going to testify. What I do know is that his attorneys have told us that we should prepare for a hearing in which he will testify," said Senator Byron Dorgan, D-N.D.
"I don't think there is an Enron type of story, but there are certainly a variety of very commonly used techniques in technology companies that exaggerate a company's profits," said Howard Schilit, director of a Maryland-based accounting watchdog, the Center for Financial Research & Analysis.
In some cases, investigations have already begun.
On Friday, telecommunications company Global Crossing Ltd. GBLXQ.PK found itself the focus of two separate federal investigations after allegations of improper accounting. The company has denied improper accounting.
iSay - We all know there are many ways to bend the numbers with creative accounting. Euphemism's for LYING, CHEATING, AND STEALING.
 9:35:08 AM comment
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Imagine if one company held the right to collect a fee each time an Internet user clicked on a Web site link and jumped to another Web page.
iSay - What are they thinking? This may be a calculated risk they are willing to take. The company must be in financial need because this appears to be an act of desparation. Unfortunatly for them it is doomed to fail because of the plethora of prior art which will diminish BT's position and ultimatly show that BT should not own hyperlinking. Also I think this suit is incredibly bad public relations for BT. This is just starting to play out in the media. If I were running BT I would call off the suit immediatly to cut my losses.
8:56:10 AM comment
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Friday, February 8, 2002
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iSee - Caroline Estes is organizing a mass protest of a new Austin police policy to ticket women who flash their breasts at the upcoming Mardi Gras celebration on Sixth Street.
iSay - Would somebody please Blog this?
8:31:37 AM comment
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The four one line entries below are the results of testing Simple Cross-Network Scripting, a feature in Radio Userland. If you want to know more read about the fast easy way to Web Services, XML-RPC.
7:31:05 AM comment
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2/6/03; 2:23:46 PM
7:17:20 AM comment
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Tuesday, February 5, 2002
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If you've read iSeeiSay and before that London2000 for any time you've noticed that I write about the music business in a "wake up" voice. As I don't have many regular readers (as far as I can tell) and only 24 members of iSeeiSay who I seldom hear from, I've started thinking about my writing voice and how I might change for the better on Gary Secondino's Radio Weblog.
First, thanks to Dave Winer and the Userland team the technology that I use to write the weblog has been getting progressively faster, simpler to use, and adding amazingly more powerful features almost daily. I'm impressed. Second I haven't written enough about me to create a sufficient weblog identity. There is my resume on line but that is only a portion of me. Third I'm growing into a comfort level with the technology and the concept of personal open weblog writing. So let me tell you about me.
My two daughters are the people to whom I am closest. Both are married and live in different states than I do. We have what I think is a good parent and adult children relationship. We three have an easy time talking and genuinely enjoy one another's company. My mother is living in nursing home in another state and I miss her. My 23 year marriage ended 12 years ago and I remain alone but not lonely.
One huge facet of my life is Art with a special focus on music. My earliest influences came from listening to classical records on my Grandmothers Victrola, and my AM transistor radio pumping out pop music of the late fifties and early sixties. When I was 11 years old I asked my Dad to buy me a guitar. He didn't believe I was really interested in putting in the effort to learn how to play the instrument and turned me down. But he did offer me a deal. If I got the money together and bought a guitar he would pay for my music lessons. I thought about it and decided I really did want a guitar and so started looking around for ways to earn extra money. Odd jobs and errands were all that was available to an 11 year old boy so it took me the better part of a year before there was enough cash to even start shopping.
This story will continue in installments. Next: Gary gets a guitar.
I'm traveling for several days and will return on Friday.
FYI again: my domain email is temporally unavailable.
9:32:57 AM comment
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Monday, February 4, 2002
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If you are a Guitar God wannabe you probably are curious about how other GG's set up their rigs. Here's Guitar Geek with the answers.
According to Beast the band Limp Bizkit held a "Nationwide Guitar Audition" to find a new replacement guitarist, and he say's they proceeded to rip off the original, uncopyrighted tryouts from hundreds of guitarists.
iSay - Sounds like Beast is pissed and a bit paranoid. From reading his account I would guess that instead of setting out to rip off other musicians what you have here is a poorly organized, mis-managed event that got whacked by Murphy's Laws and of course lawyers who get paid to protect the record labels from every possibility imaginable. More to the point I think is how this badly handled event made people feel disrespected and dehumanized. The band Limp Bizkit will take the PR mess on the chin and the record lable will skate free because if the band complains the lable can always pull out another band that's waiting in the wings for their turn on the gravy train.
The Recording Company MO: "I'm very busy and important. It's nothing personal, it's just business ya know." The record lable does everything possible to make an unsigned musician think it is big and mighty because it holds the keys to distribute the music and the musician is a small and mostly insignificant part. They have the system set up to work on musicians insecurities and desire for a career.
Free Advice: Do not ever sign any document without fully understanding it and agreeing with it 100%. Get your own advisors, ask lots of questions, make yourself a plan. Do your own recording and distribution.
Update: There's a bunch of people on Fark.com just ripping Limp Bizkit apart. In particular somebody named Fred. Woah!
And from someone who accepts the recording companies bullshit:
02-03-02 10:38:40 PM Grizzlyjohnson I was at the SLC Guitar Center when this went down. The manager is a friend of mine so I watched some of the auditions on the closed circuit cameras from the back. I'm a tad too...old...to put it nicely...and slow to audition for Bizkit (if it was BB King or Jimmy Buffett I'd be there!). The person running the auditions was a record company exec, the band members never even put in an appearance until the jam later.
All I can say to the person who wrote this diatribe, though, is welcome to the music business. Contracts like that from record companies are exactly what you can expect for your entire career. The kind of pressure that you're under in a one minute audition is exactly what it's going to be like, if you can't hack that, you're not ready. Sounds harsh but simply put it's the truth. They got no time for prima donnas and whiners, you don't wanna get with the program, they'll find someone else. There are truly VERY few real artists out there are aren't expendable. Wes Borland wasn't.
Let me also put your mind at rest about the contract. That's pro forma record company bullsh*t. They have no interest whatsoever in 150 mediocre one minute solos from amateur guitar players. They're not even going to keep those tapes, and I doubt that anyone in the band even ever heard more than six or eight of them.
Further, I'd be willing to bet that Bizkit will not end up recruiting anyone from any of those auditions. That was a promotional tour, and nothing more. A chance for fans to show how much they love their Bizkit. If that had been for real they wouldn't have done it like that.
iSay - It's to bad this fellow hasen't thought a bit deeper about the music business. Good luck.
2:42:03 PM comment
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Web Services "hello" Test
Hello Dave!
12:01:46 PM comment
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The Underdogs Have Their Day
Adam Vinatieri's last-second 48-yard field goal gave the Patriots a 20-17 stunning victory over the favored St. Louis Rams last night, sealing one of the biggest upsets in Super Bowl history and completing one of the all-time worst-to-first stories.
New England has it's first pro sports title in 16 years! Wow, this is so sweet. After all the heart-breaks betwen this region and pro sports over the last 30 years since I moved here this is like a fine wine. That first surprise as the taste hits your mouth, then immediately the aroma fills your nose, and then the sensation of the swallow with all the after effects. It is way good.
This year my friend Linda cajoled me into joining her watching the Patriots after I expressed my reluctance about "wasting my time" on pro sports. This year has been the most memorable as together we watched the Patriots coalesce, navigate the obstacle course of pro team sports and learn how to become the team that could. The Patriots deserve every bit of the success and respect they now have. They fought together for it inch by inch.
CONGRATULATIONS!
Links:
Boston.com
Patriots.com
NFL.com
NYtimes.com
Vic Carucci on superbowl.com says "That was the greatest Super Bowl of them all."
ESPN on msn.com
Yahoo Sports
9:16:44 AM comment
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Saturday, February 2, 2002
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Report - The New England Partiots are at Superbowl XXXVI
I said last week those predicting *against* the Patriots will be eating their words. This week they've recognized the error of their ways and have come around to see the powerful momentum that drives the New England Patriots. So we all agree, right?
No matter how big the game I always decline to bet on sporting events. No moral statement here just for me betting raises my anxiety during the game above my comfort zone. But I know lot's of people love to "make it more interesting".
The best way I've found to watch a big game is with a group of friends or fans. Superbowl Sunday looks like that will be happening. Scream, yell, and party down.
2:26:38 PM comment
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FYI - My domain email is offline temporarily.
12:33:53 PM comment
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The sky-hook space elevator
Years ago when author Arthur C. Clarke wrote about this concept I was intregued because it seemed a most reasonable thing to do. It seems now that others agree too.
After Clarke wrote "The Fountains of Paradise," which included the space elevator concept, he was asked when such devices might actually come into use. His response: "Probably about 50 years after everyone quits laughing."
11:18:21 AM comment
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Enron and the Two Cows Philosophy:
With Enron, you have two cows. You borrow 80% of the forward value of the two cows from your bank, then buy another cow with 5% down and the rest financed by the seller on a note, bearing interest at twice the prime, callable if the market cap of your publicly listed company, whose stock you've put up as collateral, goes below $20 billion. You sell the three cows to your publicly listed company, using letters of credit opened by your brother-in-law at a second bank, then execute a debt/equity swap with an associated unit, so that you get four cows back, plus a tax exemption for five cows. To continue: The milk rights of six cows are transferred via an intermediary to a Cayman Islands firm secretly owned by the majority shareholder, who sells the rights to seven cows back to your listed company. The annual report trumpets that the company owns eight cows, with an option on one more. All of the above transactions are cheerfully blessed by your independent auditors, who, of course, served as consultants on said transactions, but only after the fact.
You're all set now to disclose, via press release and conference call with analysts, that Enron, a major owner of cows, will begin trading cows over the Web. Analysts proclaim Enron the prototypical New Economy company, bull the shares to the moon, enabling you to sell huge gobs of the stock and use part of the proceeds to buy a top-of-the-line shredding machine.
Lifted from fuzzyraygun.com
10:39:14 AM comment
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More on How Energy Deregulation Hits Home
NStar accused of skimping on maintenance to boost profits
BOSTON The attorney general has asked state regulators to fine NStar $22.5 million for skimping on maintenance in order to boost profits, leaving hundreds of thousands of customers suffering from power outages
iSay - Reminincent of the same results when the airlines were deregulated.
Bush Opened Door to Enron, but Not to a State in Crisis
By DIANNE FEINSTEIN
Dianne Feinstein, a U.S. senator from California, is a member of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee.
January 30 2002
Although prices for energy in California and the West have mostly returned to normal, the Enron bankruptcy continues to raise questions about the level of influence that energy companies had over the Bush administration during the California energy crisis and the formulation of President Bush's energy policy.
At this time last year, I wrote the first of three letters to the president requesting a meeting to discuss California's dire energy situation. These requests were denied. During this period, however, energy executives had access to senior administration officials, including Vice President Dick Cheney.
On the day I sent my first letter, Jan. 20, 2001, California was experiencing its sixth straight day of Stage 3 energy emergencies, meaning that energy reserves were less than 1.5% above demand. The streak would last 34 days and would involve several economically crippling and life-threatening blackouts. During this month, the average price for electricity was about 10 times higher than the typical price for energy in January. Natural gas prices in Southern California were six times higher than they were at the same time in 2000.
Meanwhile, energy companies--including ones that would help to craft the administration's energy policy--were reporting earnings for the year. Enron and its affiliates' earnings grew 97% in 2000 from 1999; Duke and its affiliates' earnings were up 226%; Reliant and its affiliates' earnings increased by 166%; and Williams and its affiliates' earnings grew 127%.
"The deregulation debacle" and "Power and the people"
Letters to Salon.com
Energy vultures
California's electricity crisis could have been avoided if profiteering power-generating companies hadn't blocked further deregulation.
e-Mag platts hopes to have THE LAST WORD about energy dergulation and what their vision of the future is. The cynical me can't help but think this is a paid propaganda piece.
The Heating Horror
A short three years ago the price of a gallon of home heating oil jumped by more than 80% in NYC.
8:36:17 AM comment
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Friday, February 1, 2002
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