Carnival of the Capitalists - April 18, 2005

Carnival of the Capitalists - April 18, 2005 Edition - Edited by Brian Gongol

Editor's Introduction
Welcome to the Carnival of the Capitalists, a weekly compendium of the best in business and economics on the Internet. Due to the Carnival's considerable growth and some associated growing pains, this edition of the Carnival tries a brand-new layout and approach, which we hope will improve the reader's experience. Your comments and suggestions for improvement are welcomed. This edition is as "big-tent" as it gets, and is an experiment to see if the Carnival can happily keep itself both big and on-task. Carnival founders Jay Solo and Rob May have both weighed in on the subject. If the barriers to entry this week seem artificially low, please forgive that as the cost of this experiment. To join in next week, please use the CotC entry form. Next week's Carnival is scheduled for Peaktalk.

About the Host Site
Gongol.com variously supports or a wide range of efforts: A radio talk show on economics, a small business in the water industry, a web-design firm, a talk show about computers and technology, and a mass-market book on market thinking presently in the editing phase (interested publishers, please contact Brian Gongol). Links to news about technology and economics appear daily on the home page and in the RSS feed, and new research on economics and related issues appears about once a week.

How to Navigate This Edition
This edition of the Carnival of the Capitalists comes in three editions. All posts are identified by both the site's name and the particular entry, with an icon identifying the most suitable category to which it belongs and a brief summary. A minimum of editorial content has been added, but some favorites are marked as Editor's Choices. The guide to icons is at the bottom of the page.

Version 1: Traditional Carnival. Submissions are not grouped by category but are instead scattered about. No self-respecting carnival would place a dozen funnel-cake stands together, far away from the lemonade; so neither here are posts on marketing and sales or technology segregated from others about regulation or economics. Use the icons just like giant signs reading "Kissing Booth" or "Hot Dogs".
Version 2: Alphabetical Order. For people who can't live without order.
Version 3: Categorical Order. Forces those pesky icons into groups.

Site	Post/Essay	Category	Summary	Editor's Picks
Random Thoughts from a CTO	Rolling the Dice		Gambling is entertainment, but risk-taking is a necessary way of life, especially in business
DAtum	Chinese Noodles and Indian Chutney		As the economies of India and China grow, they could form a powerful combination
Blog Business World	Google Sandbox Theory Validated by Search Engine Giant		Evidence suggests Google puts new websites in a temporary penalty box to prevent them from manipulating the rankings
Conglomerate	The German Business Judgment Rule		Applying an ambiguous American standard for business judgment may not make sense for Germany
BaySense	A Suggestion for US News College Ratings		College rankings should include an unorthodox metric: Diversity of intellectual thought
The Internet Stock Blog	Seven Implications of Google		As Google tries to morph from search engine to answer engine, it will encroach on Yahoo's traditional stronghold
View From a Height	The Problematic Style Grid		Live blogging of a presentation on Morningstar style boxes that says those styles aren't what they represent themselves to be
Multiple Mentality	It's Not A Refund		One hidden cost of tax refunds: We tend to spend them unwisely, instead of using it well by never overpaying in the first place
Free Market Project	Government Sponsored Enron		The Fannie Mae scandal is almost 20 times the financial disaster Enron was, so why has it garnered just 3% of the same attention?
New Millennium Minds	Post Google Earth Coming to Fruition		Reviews the author's recent predictions about Google
Mad Anthony	Is My Car Properly Inflated?		A luxurious '88 Dodge Aries may have been more expensive in real terms than a brand-new PT Cruiser
JSLogan	Bad Business in the Fine Print		Less fine print: More sales
Political Calculations	Managing Difficult People		What to do with employees who can't live without their rageahol
voluntaryXchange	Trade, Love and Conversation		Free trade is like open conversation; the more of it, the better off most people are
Cap'n Arbyte's	Into the ACN Pyramid Scam		If 60 Minutes were this thorough in fact-checking and myth-debunking, it would still be a respected program
The Entrepreneurial Mind	VCs Getting Back in the Start-up Game		Sarbanes-Oxley is having the unintended consequence of putting a lot of venture capital on the table for start-ups
Pro Wrestling Impact	Understanding Your Fan Base		The largest number of exclamation marks in any CotC contribution, ever
Chocolate and Gold Coins	Magic in the Marketplace		To keep your Hydrox idea from being sold as someone else's Oreo, put a little magic into your process
The Electric Commentary	You Can't Spell "Hell" Without the "L"		Comrades! Let us rejoice that the Chicago Transit Authority is run by Communists with no knowledge whatsoever of the market!
Managing with Aloha	Working and Living with Aloha		When employees feel a sense of purpose in their work, they can see things others cannot
Half Sigma	Let's De-Socialize Our Health Care		HillaryCare? It's already here
One Billion Red Chinese and a Dog Named Liberty	Incremental Freedom		Freedom can be accumulated like compound interest; trying to get it all in one fell swoop can make it backfire
Media Stock Blog	Postal Rates, Netflix, and Blockbuster		Proposed rate increases will make DVD rental-by-mail more expensive, but by how much?
Catallarchy	Healthcare Questions		Anecdotal evidence that American health care works leads to more than four dozen responses in less than a week
Coyote Blog	The ACLU is a Little Late to the Party		The ACLU as a tax-protest group? Ah, but that's because Nevada politicians want to tax lap dances
Individ	Metals and Mining Stocks in the News		Prices for raw metals have been soaring lately; conditions appear favorable for that trend to continue
Drakeview	SBA Lending Program Going Strong		SBA loans and a mix of public and private money are helping small businesses grow along with the economy
pc4media	Freeeeeee Passes For Bloggers for Events		Blogs are emerging as a new marketing channel for events…and a way for bloggers to get free stuff
WILLisms.com	Federal Tax Revenues Up		Tax revenues are up significantly, but so is government spending. Exhaustive detail on spending trends. Most at fault: Entitlements.
Freedom's Fidelity	Property Rights - The Subjective Element		Fair market value is an inadequate measure for eminent domain compensation
Marketing eYe	How To Make Your Business More Efficient		Running a one- or two-person shop? Write an operations manual for everything you do.
Mobile Technology Weblog	Tag Your Library Book		How mobile phones can be used to leave helpful "digital graffiti" for yourself and others
Management Craft	Get Great Coaching this Week		Lots of people think they know how to coach, but they often don't. How to get better coaching.
Ogre's Politics and Views	Why Aren't Teachers Millionaires?		Argues that teacher pay is low because the government is involved
Alan K. Henderson's Weblog	Minorities Hit Hard by Estate Tax		Highlights recent comments from the National Black Chamber of Commerce about the "legacy-killing" estate tax
Mover Mike	Those Caribbean Banking Centers		Caribbean banking centers increased holdings of US Treasury securities by $11 billion in February. Why?
SMB TrendWire	Conversation: Stage a Business Coup		Podcast of a reading by entrepreneurship author Barry Moltz
Small Business Trends	SBIC Program: Stop the Bleeding		Why the government should stop trying to play angel investor and venture capitalist
Peaktalk	A Global Rethink		When a multinational goes overseas, should they sell their original product or change it to suit what they think are local tastes?
Lip-Sticking	Jane Gets Ornery		What women want: Convenience, simplicity, and lots of attention
Cold Spring Shops	I Deliberately Overpaid My Taxes		Is a simpler (but possibly higher) tax code more efficient than a complicated one with well-targeted benefits?
Interested-Participant	Germany Considers Minimum Wage		Germany may try to impose a minimum wage due to an influx of immigrant labor, but it won't solve Germany's bigger problem
Photon Courier	Strategy and Execution: Advice from a Field Marshal		Forget The Art of War: Read the advice of British Field Marshal Lord Wavell
EGO	Mobile Phones and Product Cycles		The mobile-phone market is changing too fast for the mobile-phone makers (NOTE: Some ads on EGO may be NSFW)
No Illusions	New Drugs for Third World Diseases: A Case of Market Failure?		The lack of treatments for diseases common to the developing world is a problem, but it fails the test for actual market failure
Talking Story	The Entrepreneurial Mindset: 8 Rules when you are “On Again”		Effective entrepreneurs apply scientific thinking (observe-hypothesize-test-repeat)…and it can work for anyone
Steve Pavlina's Blog	Entrepreneurial Freedom and Responsibility		The entrepreneur's task of balancing freedom with responsibility is a microcosm of how Amerca works, too
Rednersville Loyalist	Still the Lowest Prices in Town		If someone offers to buy your store, should you sell?
Gongol.com	The State of Market Thinking 2005		Four cases where markets are winning ground, and four where they're slipping

Guide to Icons

Law and Regulation	General Business	Marketing and Sales
Technology	Health Care and Social Services	Entrepreneurship
Economics and Finance	Education	Editor's Choice

Note to Future Hosts
If you want to duplicate this method of displaying the Carnival of the Capitalists, download the template (Excel format; for a free program that reads Excel files, visit my open-source programs page and download OpenOffice) and try it for yourself. Please contact me for help using the icons and formatting. Please save the icons to your own site in order to save my bandwidth. The icons are included in the spreadsheet template.

Reciprocal Links (Thanks for Your Courtesy)