The Atlantic has an interesting article outlining how the Grateful Dead discovered innovative marketing secrets almost 40 years before they became mainstream, specifically, one that is hotly contested today: giving away content and making money off of ancillary items. While some large organizations, such as the mainstream music and publishing industries, continue to sue their most loyal customers, the Dead were one of the first to realize that huge sums of money could be made if you simply cater to your core audience and give them what they want.
From the article: “They famously permitted fans to tape their shows, ceding a major revenue source in potential record sales…the decision was not entirely selfless: it reflected a shrewd assessment that tape sharing would widen their audience, a ban would be unenforceable, and anyone inclined to tape a show would probably spend money elsewhere, such as on merchandise or tickets. The Dead became one of the most profitable bands of all time.”
According to Wired Magazine writer John Barlow, the concept, which goes directly against traditional business models, is based on the notion that it is not scarcity that creates value: “in the information economy,“the best way to raise demand for your product is to give it away..What people today are beginning to realize is what became obvious to us back then—the important correlation is the one between familiarity and value, not scarcity and value.”
I just discovered this clean energy podcast by Tom Raftery of Spain. At about 11 minutes, in Tom makes some comments on my hydrogen article. He mostly supports my debunking of the hydrogen economy, although he does give a good example of how hydrogen creation can be useful in certain situations, such as storing excess power generation from wind production.
“The conceit that corporations must be treated identically to natural persons in the political sphere is not only inaccurate but also inadequate to justify the Court’s disposition of this case.” – Minority Opinion by Supreme Court Justices Ginsburg, Breyer and Sotomayor.
News outlets and the blogosphere are abuzz with reactions to Thursday’s Supreme Court decision that will allow corporations to fund political campaigns. The ruling, which overturns decades of legal precedent and legislation limiting the ability of corporations to influence the outcome of elections, may have broad implications for the political process in the U.S. News of the decision has drawn criticism from both the right and the left, many voicing the opinion that dramatically increased rights for corporations will significantly diminish the ability for individual citizens to have their voices heard.
In his weekly address, President Obama said, “I can’t think of anything more devastating to the public interest,” he said. “The last thing we need to do is hand more influence to the lobbyists in Washington or more power to the special interests to tip the outcome of elections.” Congressman Alan Grayson (FL) has already introduced legislation to combat the policy change. His “Save Our Democracy” Reform Package contains several strong measures, including a 500% excise tax on corporate contributions to political committees, and on corporate expenditures on political advocacy campaigns.
Although some claim that this most recent ruling will have only a limited effect on the political process, the decision certainly re-confirms the doctrine of granting constitutional rights, originally reserved for flesh-and-blood U.S. citizens, to corporate entities, which have held the dubious status of “legal persons” with rights since 1886, when another Supreme Court decision accorded it to them. This unexpected action by the Court re-opens the debate about about the wisdom of affording corporations such rights, and what effects this all has for sustainable business.
While Tesla Motors and other EV manufacturers have had recent successes and grabbed quite a few headlines, they still face a major hurdle: charging infrastructure. Without a fast and reliable way to re-fuel their vehicles, EV customers will be limited to those who drive less than 200 miles per day or those who can afford to keep the vehicle as a novelty. According to investment website the Motley Fool, 220-volt charging times are the Achilles heel of EVs, with the Tesla Roadsters’ current 200-volt unit taking approximately 4 hours to fully charge.
According to CEO Andy Kinard, Florida-based CCGI will not build its own charging technology, but will distribute chargers built by established player Coulomb. Its business model…is to sign contracts with businesses…that operate parking lots. The contract spells out revenue sharing between the parties, so parking slots will gain free EV infrastructure and lot managers will get cash from charging.
The article also goes on to say that CCGI will standardize on “J1772 charging hardware” and will go from 0 to 1,000 units by the end of 2010. While this would certainly be good news for Tesla, it is not entirely clear just how reliable CCGI’s predictions are.
However, what the article does not mention is that this is not the whole story for electric vehicle infrastructure. Some startups are focusing on an entirely different strategy. One such company is the Electric Vehicle Infrastructure Network (EVIN), and its business model circumvents the “chicken-and-egg” problem altogether.
According to non-profit marketing organization SmartPower, even though 80 to 90 percent of the public agrees that energy from renewable sources is better than energy produced from fossil fuels, and they are willing to pay $5 or $10 more per month for that energy, the market penetration of renewable energy products still remains below 5 percent. The company aims to change that by researching exactly what barriers consumers face when they are considering a clean energy or energy efficiency purchase, and then combining innovative marketing campaigns with grass-roots action to overcome these barriers.
SmartPower’s latest campaign is the Energy Smart Ad Challenge, offering a $10,000 prize for the best 30-second Public Service Announcement (PSA) promoting how young adults can save money by being Energy Smart through energy efficiency and conservation. The 10 finalist videos were posted on YouTube Friday, and viewers are invited to comment on how well the videos “speak to young people about being energy smart.” Each day, one video will be eliminated from the competition, presumably with the viewer input weighing heavily in the decision. As of this writing, the video titled “Generation”, (posted at the top of this article), was far and away the viewers’ favorite.
Prior to the crash of the housing bubble and the collapse of financial markets, many different types of companies we involved in creating new and interesting ways to separate Americans (“consumers”) from their hard-earned money, especially those companies involved in consumer finance. From cell phone carriers to banks, high interest rates and hidden fees were the name of the game, leaving customers too confused to sort it all out, with many simply giving up and paying whatever they were charged.
The worst offenders, credit card companies and banks, have recently found themselves on the wrong end of legislation, the CARD Act of 2009, is intended to put a stop to some of the worst practices, such as excessive interest rate increases and unfair fee traps. True to form, this has not stopped the credit card companies from attempting to extract as much money from their customers as possible. According to Consumers for Competitive Choice, “…rather than react responsibly, the credit card industry has flouted the will of Congress and the Administration by moving quickly to raise rates, increase fees, and reduce available credit before the law takes effect next year.” In a completely new tactic, the credit card companies have decided to shift their focus to credit card transaction fees, an area that Congress has not yet addressed, and something that Consumers for Competitive Choice representatives feel we should all be very concerned about.
Headquartered in Indianapolis, Ind., Consumers for Competitive Choice, (C4CC) is a national alliance of consumer advocacy groups and private citizens who are committed to promoting maximum choice for consumers in communications, energy, health care and financial services. The organization has spun off a new project, called the Credit Card Con, to bring attention to the issue of credit card interchange fees. Last week, the company held a teleconference to bring attention to the recently released report by the General Accounting Office (GAO) on the matter.
AngelPoints, Inc. is a Sausalito, California-based software company whose mission it is to make it easier for large organizations to communicate, organize and measure their employee volunteer efforts. Their initial products, available since 2001, have mainly focused on corporate fundraising efforts, and are used by some of the world’s largest companies, like Toyota, eBay, Intuit and Hilton.
Ford Motor Company may not be the first name that comes to mind when you think about large corporations that are committed to sustainability. After all, the company is one of the oldest and largest industrial corporations around, and produces many of the large SUVs and trucks that are at the center of the current climate controversy. So it may be surprising for some to learn that the company actually has a very extensive sustainability strategy in the works.
For the sake of transparency, it should be mentioned that I am an occasional contributor to TriplePundit. We all know what we need to do to make our companies more environmentally friendly: use less energy, water, and paper, travel less and make less garbage. But yeah, it’s easier said than done especially if you’re in a carbon intensive business like manufacturing or energy production. What’s the company without a lot of time or expertise to do? Well, hire someone, of course! Who do you hire, and how do you know what to look for? Here’s the lowdown on the biggest and smallest players in the newest consulting game and how to separate the wheat from the formerly-unemployed-newly-rebranded “Sustainability Consultant.”First, you need to know what you are looking for. Different consultants have different kinds of expertise:
Sustainability Strategy
These are the guys to hire in 2 situations: first, you don’t even know what you need to know. They can advise you about all the different options available to make your business more sustainable and help you set sustainability goals. Second, these are the folks you want if you have made a lot of basic improvements like installing low flow faucets and energy savings devices, set the copier to default to double sided, and you’re looking for a way to integrate your sustainability initiatives into your overall business efforts. Because this step can seem a bit nebulous (what am I actually getting for my money?), this is the place to either take a personal recommendation (3P’s are at the bottom of the post) or go for the name. Many consultants are also writers of well regarded books on sustainability, like Hunter Lovins and Andrew Winston. In addition to being respected by their peers in the sustainability community, these folks have their own brand to protect, so they are going to do their best to make sure your company is well taken care of.
…a hitherto obscure macroeconomist who died over a decade ago. Many economists had never heard of him when the crisis struck… But lately he has begun emerging as perhaps the most prescient big-picture thinker about what, exactly, we are going through…Minsky was one economist who saw what was coming. He predicted, decades ago, almost exactly the kind of meltdown that recently hammered the global economy.
Minsky basically believed that the conservative fiscal stance which comes in the wake of a financial collapse, such as the Great Depression, would inevitably sow the seeds for the next crisis decades down the road. The main ingredients are time and short human memories, “Instability,” he wrote, “is an inherent and inescapable flaw of capitalism.” The article compares Minsky’s view to the one held by mainstream economics, that capitalism is self-regulating and self-stabilizing, known as the Neoclassical Synthesis.
“The conceit that corporations must be treated identically to natural persons in the political sphere is not only inaccurate but also inadequate to justify the Court’s disposition of this case.” – Minority Opinion by Supreme Court Justices Ginsburg, Breyer and Sotomayor.
While Tesla Motors and other EV manufacturers have had recent successes and grabbed quite a few headlines, they still face a major hurdle: charging infrastructure. Without a fast and reliable way to re-fuel their vehicles, EV customers will be limited to those who drive less than 200 miles per day or those who can afford to keep the vehicle as a novelty. According to investment website the Motley Fool, 220-volt charging times are the Achilles heel of EVs, with the Tesla Roadsters’ current 200-volt unit taking approximately 4 hours to fully charge.
Prior to the crash of the housing bubble and the collapse of financial markets, many different types of companies we involved in creating new and interesting ways to separate Americans (“consumers”) from their hard-earned money, especially those companies involved in consumer finance. From cell phone carriers to banks, high interest rates and hidden fees were the name of the game, leaving customers too confused to sort it all out, with many simply giving up and paying whatever they were charged.
Ford Motor Company may not be the first name that comes to mind when you think about large corporations that are committed to sustainability. After all, the company is one of the oldest and largest industrial corporations around, and produces many of the large SUVs and trucks that are at the center of the current climate controversy. So it may be surprising for some to learn that the company actually has a very extensive sustainability strategy in the works.
We all know what we need to do to make our companies more environmentally friendly: use less energy, water, and paper, travel less and make less garbage. But yeah, it’s easier said than done especially if you’re in a carbon intensive business like manufacturing or energy production. What’s the company without a lot of time or expertise to do? Well, hire someone, of course! Who do you hire, and how do you know what to look for? Here’s the lowdown on the biggest and smallest players in the newest consulting game and how to separate the wheat from the formerly-unemployed-newly-rebranded “Sustainability Consultant.”First, you need to know what you are looking for. Different consultants have different kinds of expertise:
