Category: Ashes of Time

“Don’t battle with your competitor, just make them irrelevant.“

The above interesting line is extracted from a book I am reading – “Blue Ocean Strategy“. Of course the book include many guidelines on how to do it, but I think first of all we have to plant one thing in our minds – we can no longer compete easily with other industry players by simply work harder and smarter. Be a follower (no matter how quick you are) sometimes are costly.

It is because there is lots of people out there are smarter than us, and some of them may even work harder than us. What matters now, in this economy, in our industry (i.e. eCommerce), are we have to find ways that our competitors cannot keep up with us. We have to win the war with creative, not combative approach.

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“How many designers does it take to change a light bulb?“

The answer is eleven. One to change the light bulb and ten to say, “I would have done it this way . . .”.

Not sure you understand the “punch line” behind this, but “how many xxx does it take to change a light bulb” is a very popular type of jokes in western culture. In the web you can find thousands of this kind of jokes and there is one shall directly affect our line of thinking …

How many forum posters does it take to change a light bulb? Answer :

http://www.canadiancontent.net/forums/about2748.html

According to the web page, one single forum post may spin off over 1,000 posts.

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No quotation this month, but a thought (from another book I am reading) that lead me think … we shall be grateful to those who work behind-the-scene diligently for us …

People seldom call their local power company to say, “Thanks for keeping the lights on today”. But if the power goes off, the screaming is immediate and loud.

The holiday weekend was not as peaceful as I hoped. So again, please extend your hand to those in need because of the South Asia Tsunami catastrophe. The tragedy also reminds us that we shall make full use of our every day, since life is very fragile as we all know it.

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That reminder is particular important these days as in a week or so, we will all start a new Chinese year. According to some fortune-telling masters, the year of Rooster is a year of:

” … Family and family interests are the number one priority of this year. This will also be a great year for creative ambitions and projects, as long as they are also have a strong, practical base. This year will bring big changes, new inventions and brand-new directions. Partnerships and joint ventures bring success …“

Not sure how many of the above “fortune-telling” will come true, but you know, you can certainly find one that suit your taste & needs in the Internet. On the other hand, there is one very good Internet website about how Internet evolved in the past 10 years, and how it will change our world in the next 10 years.

http://www.broom.org/epic/

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From the prediction above, you probably know that the producer of the Flash movie believe that after the browser, search engine and eCommerce – Weblog is the next big big thing. So how big is it nowadays, actually? You can check it out at:

http://www.businessweek.com/print/magazine/content/04_50/b3912115_mz016.htm?chan=mz&

Or surf to the fifth annual weblog award website and you can tell:

http://2005.bloggies.com/

And no, we will not left behind, as some of new projects / enhancements will be based on Blog technologies. And every night back home, I am cooking my own blog …

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If you have nothing to do during the New Year holiday, try spending some time with this 2001 movie “Life as a house” (starred by Kevin Kline, Hayden Christensen) – it is a movie that will touch your heart with a lot of great moments, and a few melodramatic ones as well. Be prepared with some tissues with you ….

Hmmm … one day we can all produce our own movie – “Life as a Website” …

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“If you’re not failing every now and again, it’s a sign you’re not doing anything very innovative.” – Woody Allen

In other words, don’t let failure scared you, try exploring new things all the time – it will pay off one day.

Around 55 years ago, a father and his son started a cosmetic cream factory. At the time, no company could supply them with plastic caps of adequate quality for cream jars, so they had to start a plastic business. Obviously, plastic caps alone were not sufficient to run the plastic-molding plant, so they added combs, toothbrushes, and soap boxes.

Then, this plastic business also led them to manufacture electric fan blades and telephone cases, which in turn led them to manufacture electrical and electronic products and telecommunication equipment.

The plastics business also took them into oil refining (as plastic is a by-product of oil) which needed a tanker-shipping company. However, the oil-refining company alone was paying an nsurance premium amounting to more than half the total revenue of the then largest insurance company in the country. So they started an insurance company to cover that oil-refining company.

Time flies … and nowadays they have chemical, energy, semiconductor, fiber optic, satellite and electronics industries … all started from a small cosmetic cream business.

This company is in fact called Lucky-Goldstar, and as you may know it from its’ another name – LG from Korea.

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“Fear less, hope more; Eat less, chew more; Whine less, breathe more; Talk less, say more; hate less, Love more; and all good things will be yours!” Swedish proverb

I actually thought that may be it is time to wrap this things up as it really occupies a lot of my time; until I saw the following line the other day in Pacific Coffee’s black board … then I thought … hmmm … may be there are more things to write … and the line is:

It’s not a matter of how good you are, it’s a matter of how good you want to be.

Yes, how good we want to be ? And how good / bad we are today ? In fact, it is the perfect time to answer these questions – i.e. no matter how bad or how good we are this year, it is time to plan and do something, to achieve “how good we want to be” next year …

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Then I came across another line when one of my friends asked me to critic her speech …

The difference between a successful person and others is not a lack of strength, not a lack of knowledge, but rather a lack of will. – Vince Lombardi

Oh how true it is … do you have the “will” to achieve the above ? And your personal goals ? Frankly not all of us have a strong will as most of us have some very good excuses on not doing the best thing, and some of us may simply want to have an easy life. If you have this sort of thinking then let me tell you, you really need to do your best, deliver the greatest and exceed any standards; then one day you will have an easy life. Life is not easy.

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In any case, December is a festive month and I wish you all have some good fun later this month.

But bear in mind, spend some time to think about how we all shall improve next year (and let me know if I can help, in any way), as the old saying goes …

War ship is safe in a harbour, but war ship is not build for that.

Who invented light bulb ?

I think most of you will promptly provide the wrong answer: Thomas Alva Edison. Truth is, the famous inventor’s 1879 debut of his incandescent light trailed others by decades. Check out here :

http://inventors.about.com/library/inventors/bllight2.htm
http://www.ushistory.net/electricity.html

So why does he get all the glory? Mostly because of what he did next – get his creation to the mass … Edison and his team of engineers spent years building the entire electric system, from light sockets and safety fuses to generating facilities and the wiring network. Only then did the electric light flare into the innovation that lit the world.

Same for inventing a light bulb, we need to get our services to the mass public, build the whole system and perfect the whole system … You, me, the colleague sit next to you and all other colleagues in the company, are working hard to create the next eCommerce magic …

Then, try another quiz …

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But, what is our competitive advantage ?

One possible answer is in the book “The five dysfunctions of a team” by Patrick Lencioni

“Not finance. Not strategy. Not technology. It is teamwork that remains the ultimate competitive advantage, both because it is so powerful and so rare.“

In the same book, it says …

“If you could get all the people in an organization rowing in the same direction, you could dominate any industry, in any market, against any competition, at any time.“

I suppose everyone of you have your own answers on your own competitive advantage and whether you are a team player … and of course I have an answer for myself and for each one of you as well … what I can say is our competitive advantage, in this regard, is still not strong enough. Let’s work harder, and together, to become a stronger team.

What a strong team can do and will do ? Somehow I found most answers in this gangster movie (one of my favorites) :

http://www.lovehkfilm.com/reviews/mission.htm

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There were three articles written by a Chinese chap 4 years ago, but still treated as bible on how to build an eShop. Kinda simple stuff, but still suggest you to read it (especially if you are the web developer) on the technology and ….. his writing skill.

http://www.devshed.com/c/a/PHP/Building-an-ECommerce-Site-Part-1-Building-a- Product-Catalog/

And of course, the book I mentioned in previous section.

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I am not fan of Superman, but when Mr. Reeve left the world couple of weeks ago, I searched his quotes / books / movie soundtracks on the web like crazy …

“As the old saying goes, you better know what you want because you might get it and you’ve got to accept it. Whether you succeed or whether you encounter adversity you always have to believe in your worth as a person. That’s what counts.” Remarks at a success seminar in Portland, Oregon, February 6, 2001 – Christopher Reeve