Author: Thaddeus Preston (Nick Waye)

Google #Fail

So Google Voice has been up and down all week. The same can be said with Google Buzz and Gmail too. Can’t post to Buzz, can’t refresh the feed. I think all of Google’s infrastructure has been f’ing up lately.  Maybe you should hire back all the Googlers who keep leaving for Facebook.

NY Jets

What is it with hot bitches and the NY Jets sideline?  Inaz Sines is now joined by Jenn Sterger as hot chick hanging out in the locker room and sidelines of NY Jet games. And you wonder why you get harassed?

Data “Trade War”

Stole that headline from Mike Arrington‘s post at Techcrunch because it’s apt for what is happening between Facebook and Google. Review: Google changed its terms of service for those who access its Contacts API. Essentially if you don’t share with them you can’t access there API. Dark clouds are forming and this could get ugly. Data as the new good and service of the future will start turf wars like this all over the web. Like capital flows across boundaries so does data across virtual boundaries via API calls. So in a way this is a textbook example of a trade war.

Social Media and the 2010 Elections

No matter whom you rooting for in this Tuesday’s elections one thing was evident, social media played a pivotal role in predicting the outcome.  With all the data produced from likes to retweets it was an easy tasks to predict U.S. House races with a nearly 70+% accuracy.  Even blatant attempts at austrturfing via Twitter show that social media has arrived. There were tons of maps mashups and real-time statistics that made this election the most social media centric election so far. I can’t wait to see what will happen in 2012.

U.S. Cyber Command “FOC”

I mean where the F was this command when I was in?  Seriously this is good to hear, but as a government contractor I can tell you exactly what this means. The contracts are in place (for the contractors and civilians to do the work) and the money is flowing.

While participating in a discussion on Google Buzz tonight about the growing Chinese financial influence on the world economic stage, I came across a wordy dissertation from a Nigerian website that stated a simple, but powerful premise. Nigeria, an India or China in the making?   My answer. Not at first glance, but as I dug deeper into the word salad I took away from it a call to the Diaspora and expatriates out there to come “home” and take what they have learned in self-imposed exile to build a new homeland. This has started to happen to a certain extent. In my travels around Nigeria I experienced a land ripe with opportunity and confident in its own future destiny. Many there (who can afford it) go abroad to acquire skills in University then, when the opportunity presents itself, return home to become business and political leaders. Even in Silicon Valley’s  large Indian expatriate community, some have begun to question staying after college or start-up blue sky exits. Sentiment has disturbingly begun to turn against foreigners in places from the U.S. to Europe. The H1B visa crisis here in the U.S. risks alienating future Indian (or any foreign)  born tech workers and entrepreneurs. This has a tendency to happen when economic times get rough as disenfranchised natives grow wary of those whom they conceive as alien interlopers. But this time when things get back to our new normal and advanced economies begin their growth and recovery those dependable (and increasingly necessary guest workers) may not be there. They might just decide to take their talents and go back to their homeland. That ain’t all a bad thing. For the world to recover from this latest economic mess we will need a broad based recovery from all corners of the globe. As the author of the post that inspired me Basil Jide Fadipe stated:

“Today, ‘all’ or nearly all are coming home to roost; the physical, intellectual and economic powers are now heading back home, jump starting, and in many instances re-oxygenating the corporeal and corporate India/China.”

In future posts I will explore this growing trend especially in Nigeria where I now have a renewed ancestral connection. As Africa’s most populous nation, Nigeria (and most of West Africa) is poised for growth because of its location and natural resources; particularly their people the most valuable resource of all. Africa is the final frontier for growth in the next century. The race between the BRIC nations (Brazil, Russia, India and China) for the natural resources to grow their economies will take place on the continent.

The impoverished but vibrant streets of Lagos, Nigeria



With many companies and financial institutions holding on to $Trillions of dollars in cash reserves, how can you get them to lend and spend? Simple. Make it costly for them to do so by debasing that value of those dollars forcing institutions to put that money to work in the economy. Sounds logical right? If the Federal Reserve goes through with its plan for quantitative easing round 2 (creating money out of thin air) then those huge cash reserves will buy a lot less. This intervention is necessary but sinister at the same time and may be fraught with unintended consequences. There has to be some kind of catalyse that forces companies and institutions to invest and spend because to put it bluntly consumers simply aren’t doing so right now and they can’t. I have personal experience with this myself. I am a little over-leveraged right now and in the process of saving and investing. Why?  Because that’s what you do when you spend more than you make (cough, cough, Washington). The term is called delerverging or debt reduction. There numerous reason why businesses aren’t spending, banks aren’t lending and normal folks aren’t shopping. Fear of the future. Regulations from TARP, Financial regulatory reform, Health care legislation costs, Mal-investment from the $800 billion dollars stimulus and the prospect of higher taxes next year have paralyzed the capitalist system. Not to mention the fact that they (the private sector) themselves have some deleveraging to do.  No amount of money being pumped into the system is going to make anyone part with their money as long as these uncertainties exist. And even if it does that money won’t be invested in the U.S.  Not until these uncertainties resolve themselves will money be parted with.  That may continue to force the Fed to print even more thus further devaluing the dollars these companies hold in reserve. It’s a dangerous game of chicken that may end in hyper-inflation. Who will blink first?   The Fed can only print so much before they reach their inflation target of above 2%. The private sector can only hold on to their reserves for so long before the devalued dollars they hold are worth less and hence lack the purchasing power necessary to do anything constructive with. It’s a good old fashion face-off with the future value of money at stake.