iPod line arbitrage

I Just drove down El Camino in Palo Alto. There are only two people sleeping outside the AT&T Store there compared to many more at the Apple store on University ave and the hundreds sleeping outside of New York stores. Quick iPhone nuts, run over there. The Palo Alto Daily News has a picture of Robert Scoble sleeping with his son outside that store on University. I guess that is one form of father son bonding or proof that bloggers have a ton of time on their hands.

As someone who lives in Israel and cannot get an iPhone, I find this whole craze amusing. Steve Jobs as done a masterful job whipping up a frenzy around an item that does not have limited quantities. this is not a rock concert or World Series Tickets where supply is finite. It is a phone, of which they will make 10,000,000 and more.

Am I the only one who thinks this is nuts?

Scoop.co.il on OhmyNews

Scoop CEO Michael Weiss was interviewed by OhMyNews on the eve of the 3rd annual citizen journalism conference. Scoop editor Yossi Saidov participated in a panel chaired by CJ pioneer Dan Gillmor, Author of We The Media (I highly recommend the book).

Needed: Infrastructure to Drink More Coffee

Anywhere you walk in America these days you run into a Starbucks. If not a Starbucks, then a Peet's, Coffee Bean or Tully's and sometimes all of them on the same block. Meetings happen with increasing frequency at these $3 coffee shops. people are sipping (read: gulping and chugging) lattes, fraps and other foreign sounding caffeinated beverages all day, hopping from one meeting to another.

Today, I ran into a coffee infrastructure problem. I got invited to a meeting in San Francisco at Tullys on the corner of California and Davis. Having already been to a beverage meeting, I needed a restroom before starting the next meeting. Tullys did not have a restroom. No problem, I thought, there was a Starbucks across the street. But nope, no restroom in this Starbucks. Undaunted, I went to the Peet's across the street. No restroom there either. Worried that I would not be able to be properly social and drink in my next meeting for fear of exploding, I headed for an SF Soup company store but no restroom there either. Distraught, I went back to Tullys and a different cashier who directed me to Embarcadero Center 1.5 blocks up the street. I got there, found the restroom upstairs on the second floor. But, it was locked behind a code. Someone, thankfully (probably observing my distraught state at the thought of not being able to order another coffee in my meeting) pointed me to a door and a security guard who had the code (14690 in case you are in downtown SF) taking me out of my 15 minutes of hunting misery.

Relieved that I was able to properly socialize with a brewed cup at my meeting I headed back to Tully's, drank and finished my meeting in plenty of time to make sure that I had time to get back to the office before another rendezvous with a caffeinated beverage. Is this not an infrastructure problem waiting to be solved?

Local Call To God on the Iphone

A bit irreverent but thanks to Moshe for passing this on. Having been in the US for the last couple of weeks, I can attest that the anticipation is completely insane.

Whither The Case For Democracy?

George Bush professed to read Natan Sharansky's book The Case for Democracy and subscribe to its theories. That was behind his big speech about spreading democracy and his attempts to build democracy in Iraq. Well, America and Israel, can't have it both ways.

I am struck by the rush to embrace Fatah leader Mahmoud Abbas following the Hamas takeover of Gaza. Just a brief review of recent history. The Palestinians held a democratic election in the West Bank and Gaza about 12 months ago. In that election, Hamas won a clear majority. The voters repudiated the corrupt Fatah party and chose the "terrorist," clean-image Hamas that are so reviled in Israel and the West.

Well, since we did not like the outcome of that election, Both Israel and the International community cut off ties with the Palestinian government. That is certainly the right of the international community given Hamas' terrorist agenda. However, there is no denying that they were democratically elected. I therefore found it curious, that upon Abbas' unilaterally changing the government and pushing aside the democratic outcome, the US and Israel have rushed to embrace him? Is this a good idea? Did the Palestinians not vote with their hands against this regime? Is this really a stable democratic agovernment with whom one can make a deal as clearly described in Sharansky's Book? Is this consistent with the case for democracy in the Middle East?

Do not misunderstand me as supporting Hamas. I obviously don't. But, let's also not blind ourselves to the democratic choices of the Palestinian people and let's let democracy infrom our choices and our policies rather than following Emerson's famous line "A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds."

First Class Citizen Journalism

When we started Scoop, these are the kind of amazing first hand reports, we dreamed of. A citizen, dresses like a Charedi (ultra orthodox) and goes to the heart of the protest marches against the Gay Pride Parade scheduled for Jerusalem. Those who read Hebrew are encouraged to read Kuti Boim's first hand account of the protests, and the police's aggressiveness here. (if anyone wants to translate it to English, feel free to post it to comments and i will move it to main blog.)

Speaking of which, isn't interesting how both the Students, during their protest, and charedim, in their protest, complain of Police brutality. Worth some thought....

Conundrum

I happened to find this on the web at the virtual tourist site. It was too good to pass up.

Venture Capital-Scape

Marc Andreesen "penned" a great 3 part series on Venture Capital over on his blog. My reading his post coincided today with a VentureWire report that Israeli VC Pitango was close to a first close on its fifth fund and five other Israeli funds were out in the market. Israeli funds have tended to raise in waves since many of them were started at the same time in the early 90s.

Said today's Venturewire,

" Pitango is one of a handful of Israeli venture firms coming back to refuel this year. Others include Gemini Israel Funds, Giza Partners, Jerusalem Venture Partners and Tamir Fishman Ventures."

Marc's terrific, must-read 3 part series entitled "The Truth About Venture Capitalists" can be found at the links below:
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3

two interesting excerpted comments are:
From Part 2:

"When raising venture capital, remember that venture firms vary wildly in style and quality.

For example, some venture firms are very entrepreneur-friendly. Others are notoriously brutal.

Interestingly, financial success in the venture capital profession does not seem to be correlated to entrepreneur-friendliness.

Individuals (partners) within each venture firm vary wildly in style, personality, knowledge, experience, ability to be helpful, drive, and ethics.

Personally I'd recommend being more focused on picking the right partner than picking the right firm.

This is slightly counterintuitive advice -- and firm quality does matter -- but the partner is the person you're going to be working with. The other people at the firm you will see probably twice in the whole lifespan of your company."

And, from part 3:

"And that's why, from where I sit in Silicon Valley, there are probably 200 venture capital firms within 20 miles with likely over $20 billion of capital at their disposal chasing a very small number of good potential investments, despite terrible average returns for the asset class over the last seven years. I love this country."

Labor Primaries - Well Deserved

With the results of the Labor Party primaries in, and Ehud Barak the new Chairman of the Labor Party, I wanted to make one point. Well deserved. It is not that Barak deserved to win. But Ami Ayalon deserved to lose. Anyone that could welcome Amir Peretz into his camp deserved to lose.

In addition to my ongoing criticism of Peretz on this blog (and here, here and here), I am completing the riveting book by Ofer Shelach and Yoav Limor called "Shvuyim B'lvanon" (Captive in Lebanon) on the governments handling of the Second Lebanon War. Frankly, it is depressing. Aside from Peretz's glaring incompetency, uncovered in excruciating detail in the book, his obsession with figuring out how he could take credit for the early success in the war is sickening.

With Israel's penchant for recycling politicians, I fear that we will see Peretz again. I hope that while Barak unifies the ranks of the Labor Party, he locks out Peretz and sends him packing to where he came from: a rabble rousing labor leader. Actually, we could do without him there as well.