The impact of globalization in Canada. Implications everywhere:
Tag: Globalization
To no surprise globalization is bringing the world closer together and thereby making commerce “smaller” and faster as global financial markets increase the efficiency of established information systems. Recent growth of internet penetration has changed dramatically. Today China has more internet users than America has citizens.
Consider this form IF you can image everyone you know connected, literally everyone in the USA — then you would see China has surpassed our population. With almost 75% of Americans connected implications are huge since China has only 20% of its population connected. I blogged about this impact with YouTube in March.
Original graphic
Tags: Internet Users, China, population, internet growth, internet, economy, trends
I’m not sure why it took so long to read Malcolm Gladwell‘s latest book Outliers: The Story of Success but I’m sure glad its just as enjoyable as his books The Tipping Point and Blink. As defined scientifically Outliers is an observation that is numerically distant from the rest of the data. Gladwell not only shares compelling stories regarding outliers, but shines in conveying the impact of globalization for math students, airline pilots and more importantly control tower operators in NYC.
Gladwell shares that “The Story of Success” is really interesting when you dig deep into statistics. Gladwell addresses this with hockey players. Yes, hockey players. There is something amazing about playing a game on ice. Hockey requires speed and grace. The fact that its not played on grass, sand or wood makes you wonder if there is “one talent” shared by the best hockey players in the world.
Researchers found that great players actually all fall within birth dates ranging from January to April for hockey and even for most soccer teams. And as Gladwell points out the best hockey players like Gordie Howe, Bobby Orr, Wayne Gretsky, Steve Yzerman, Mario Lemiux and Dominik Hasek all have birth dates that allowed them to play against kids a year younger than them — and to no surprise they were handpicked (at some early stage) to further develop their skills.
Gladwell has taken an interesting angle regarding “success” in what some might even call perfection. Gladwell tells the story of Bill Joy who not only happened to be at the University of Michigan at the right time (to study computing) but more importantly, took the time to spend countless hours learning and programming when he received access to the mainframe at school. Actually Gladwell adds up those hours in his chapter called “The 10,000 hour rule” and points out that ‘talent’ can be achieved in 5 years when you practice 5.5 hours everyday. Once you cross that measurement you have positioned yourself for success. Joy invented BSD Unix and Java.
The same 10,000 hour rule even applied to The Beatles who “had to play for 8 hours” in a strip club in Germany before crossing the Atlantic and ultimately rock n roll fame. Can you imaging some chap telling his wife he saw them play for hours and hours…funny, but true. Wonder what the impact would have been in America if word had gotten out about how they perfected their music?
Think the internet is still the wild west? Think again. In a new update of Who Controls the Internet?: Illusions of a Borderless World law professors Jack Goldsmith and Tim Wu share how the long arm of foreign governments still can stretch the illusion that the internet (and thereby globalization) are shrinking the world.
On the surface you may believe — even in 2009 that you can still say anything, do anything or hack any computer around the globe without impunity because you can hide inside the internet.
Goldsmith and Wu challenge Tom Friedman’s (The World Is Flat 3.0: A Brief History of the Twenty-first Century) position that globalization is opening up communication in countries that have long suppressed their citizen’s ability to speak freely.
China for example. Or think about the European Union. Is the EU able to dictate how Microsoft releases software? Think again. When Microsoft published it’s passport technology it was rejected by the EU. Rather than pay a fine Microsoft added the tougher security standards dictated by the EU for all customers worldwide. Those standards are even tougher than those used in America.
Can France tell Yahoo or eBay what products to sell? They can and they already do. This book is written from a legal standpoint since both teach at the Law Schools of Harvard and Columbia respectively. Is it strange to see government control over the internet? Would this be different if today was September 10 2001? Goldsmith and Wu share their insight to the way Law helps and hinders the internet. From simply selling memorabilia to cybercrime you learn gaping holes exist even today to prosecute offenders and criminals.
The “I Love You” virus that cost US companies millions of dollars originated in The Philippines, but since there is no law against this type of crime in the The Philippines the US was unable to arrest the known hacker. Similar rules apply in Russia. When the FBI arrested a hacker who extorted millions from US companies, Russia did not acknowledge this type of crime and did not agree to extradite, so the FBI was forced to release the criminal.
Goldsmith and Wu share the legal case between Yahoo and the country of France that forced Yahoo’s online store to pull Nazi related memorabilia even though Yahoo is an American based company. But Yahoo’s remote offices in France proved to the key error Jerry Yang overlooked. Yahoo has stumbled a lot lately.
Its all in the timing. The global economic crisis has placed my latest read Hot Property: The Stealing of Ideas in an Age of Globalization into a pretty unique light. Regardless of the delay in the US economy the impact of globalization, technology and good old corporate espionage has impacted the world’s stage in manufacturing and distribution.
From aspirin to automobiles with computer technology stolen right in the middle. Author Pat Choate, an economist was the 1994 University of Oklahoma Arthur Barto Adams Alumni Fellow. He has also written Agents of Influence: How Japan Manipulates America’s Political and Economic System.
The core arguments focus on the use of historical legal patents and technological advances of foreign companies competing against American interests by stealing. Today its known as corporate espionage. The end result: the US government does not protect companies in today’s global marketplace.
This book will leave most Americans frustrated. Globalization has changed the way people and business must evolve to simply stay in business. The auto industry is a timely example of how America lost this business to global competition.
The old assumptions in American business do not work today. When you innovate and invent, patents will protect your dedication and hard work against competitors around the globe. How wrong Choate proves this idea is today.
Hot Property will quickly show you how far from the truth the real-world works … against you. Reminds me of T-shirts I see around the Univ. Wisconsin-Madison campus: “Don’t let school get in the way of your education”.Choate illustrates how major American companies like GM, Microsoft and Cisco are powerless to stop Chinese counterfeiters. To remain a “favorable company” in the Chinese market, American companies sacrifice their own development, technology and employees while trying to gain business in China. It is somewhat amazing to see the RIAA use it’s legal arm against elderly Americans for downloading an MP3 file but turn a blind eye to the stunning levels of piracy in China.