Here in Silicon Valley, I see ads for ‘affordable’ loans all the time. But one day I took the time to read the fine print, only to discover that they were 40 year loans! A friend of mine (Steve) once remarked “Why not just give me a 100 year loan.” Well… check out this factoid from a great NYT article on the Japanese Real Estate bubble:

Take It From Japan: Bubbles Hurt – New York Times

Economists and real estate experts see other parallels as well. In the 1980’s, the expectation of rising real estate prices made many Japanese homebuyers feel comfortable about taking on huge debt. And they did so by using exotic loans that required little money upfront and that promised low monthly payments, at least for a short time.

A similar pattern is found today in the United States, where the methods include interest-only mortgages, which allow homebuyers to repay no principal for a few years. Japan had its own versions of these loans, including the so-called three-generation loan, a 90- or even 100-year mortgage that permitted buyers to spread payments out over their lifetimes and those of their children and grandchildren.

Well there you go… there really are such things as 100 year loans!

Merry Christmas!

So today I stumbled upon Feed Icons from digg. Is it just me or is there something peculiar about their site:

A mailing list?

No feeds?

How ironic!

FWIW, IMHO, the feed icon should not be any color other than orange.

So the WSJ published this chart today, showing where top-ranked professionals and executives live:

Hey I see Manhasset and I see Menlo Park. I know both of those places. (FWIW, Manhasset is where East Egg is, in the Great Gatsby.) Let’s take a quick look at two properties at around the same price.

First Menlo Park:

Now Manhasset:

Almost equivalent… almost.

Wow, it’s time to renew my car insurance already?

Crimminy is driving expensive! Gas, wear and tear, insurance, registration, taxes – $4 a day in Metrocard fares is cheap in comparison!

These are my car insurance ’settings’ at Allstate. What do you have? Would you recommend that I change anything in my coverage?

This plane suffered a crippling failure that was 1 in a billion. That’s bad luck.

The Crash of United Flight 232 by Capt. Al Haynes

Thank you, thank you very much. “Land” is a rather loose term for that. Anyone who has seen this video seems to have this one question in their mind, and that is: how did anyone survive an accident of that magnitude? I think there are five factors that contribute to the degree of success that we had at Sioux City: that is, luck, communications, preparation, execution, and cooperation. And I would like to talk about those five things today.

This is an amazing story of making the best out of a bad situation. Give it a read.

Media Orchard, by the Idea Grove

Here’s what Brian (pictured above) wrote back:

[snip]

Television is the ultimate 1.0, ‘We talk, you shut up and watch’ industry. That means the business model of local television news is fundamentally out of date. It’s based on the concept that you’re going to wait until 6:00, then we’ll show you some things you may or may not care about, show you some commercials, show some more stuff you may or may not care about, show you some more commercials by which time it’s quarter after the hour and lucky you, Scott, now we’ll tell you the weather. Of course, now you get the weather when you want it online or on the Weather Channel or by RSS or…

(Bold emphasis mine.)

Usually when you talk about a business model being out of date, you cite evidence of decline in ROI or some other financial metric. Saying that the interaction model with the viewer, or the content, is “old and busted” doesn’t have any bearing on the business model.

The business model is free services, sponsored by advertisements. Don’t get them confused.

YouTube – SNL Transit Video

SNL Transit Video

Classic