Business Unusual

Sometimes you are the player, but sometimes you are being played. The impact that playing games is having on how we do business.  Photo by Sigmund on UnsplashSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The search giant is 23 years old, it is mostly amazing but doesn’t say don’t be evil anymore I have covered the ups and downs of Google a good many times for Business Unusual. It was the definitive disruptor to begin with but at only 23 it is now a massive global company with few that have not felt its effects although what its next 23 years will look like may not be as rosy. I am not saying it is no longer disruptive, instead like most if not all very large companies it begins to disrupt itself.  Image credit: bigtunaonline/123rf.com Audio credit: Robert SloanSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Air and rocks are everywhere, why not turn them into a battery?See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

As Apple moves away from its focus on hardware it is looking to improve the offerings it offers via software and services. Its pay services and ad network are two with Apple TV another big play. The other is the work to make their watch better as a health device. When SpaceX sends its first four private astronauts to space on 15 September for a three day mission in a low Earth orbit, it will be tracking how the astronauts are doing via Apple watches and surveys via iPads. Photo by Trac Vu on Unsplash See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The documentary on the 9/11 attacks in the US for the 20th anniversary is a good reminder of how freedom is viewed in different societies. It tracks the events that led to the attacks in response to US interventions in Afghanistan, the Middle East and other Islamic countries, the events on the day and then the long and lasting impact of the decisions to retaliate and invade and overthrow the governments of Afghanistan and Iraq. With the US withdrawing before the 20th anniversary effectively on principle following their longest war, it was hoped Afghanistan would continue as a free and independent country. It was hoped that the trillions of dollars spent to train and supply the government and military would set the country on a path to democracy. Before the US left, the Taliban had toppled the government and taken control of the country. They represent something very different to the US idea of Democracy, some wondered how did the US fail so completely, others might argue how did the US think it would ever be

OnlyFans can be described as a relatively new service made up of existing older services to satisfy the oldest service. It is a platform for content creators that has photos like Instagram, videos like YouTube, and posting and messaging like Facebook and Twitter. It charges a subscription like Patreon. Creators and fans can supply a wide variety of content across many subjects, but for the most part the content is adult related. Most of the creators are women, most of the fans are men and since the start of the pandemic it has allowed many adult industry workers to maintain or increase their income. It had grown to two million creators, had 130 million users and revenues of over $5 billion. Not bad for a company that was only started in 2016 and effectively has just 4 shareholders.  Fans are happy, creators are happy, owners are happy - what could go wrong?See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The speed and reach of global media including social media and the impact of influencers can make a gadget global in a very short space of time. Add the power of Chinese manufacturing and ease and speed it can be shipped and some toy cycles can be created in just a few days.  But too much exposure can make a must have toy, yesterday's news just as fast. image credit: UnsplashSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Apple will check your messages and photos, they say for good reason. If you own an iPhone, the first question is what does owning it even mean. Apple will not allow you to load unapproved apps. Apple only allows you to have it worked on by Apple approved service agents and in the US when the next iOS update is released it will scan your phone messages and photos. These might not sound like good reasons to want to buy one of the most expensive phones on the market, but the reasons for the update do make sense even if not everyone agrees. Audio Credit: Apple Image Credit: Marija Zaric UnsplashSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Could we solve the most common traffic violations by making our vehicles the law enforcer A TV show from the 90s called Beyond 2000 featured an insert on car technology that as a teenager I thought was a great idea and expected to be seen as standard by the time I was able to drive. A breathalyser built into the car.  To start the car you first needed to blow on the breathalyser. If you passed the car would start, if you failed it would not.  What if you got a passenger to blow for you? What if it was your child? That might work, but why would someone who is not drinking allow you to drive the car when you were over the limit. If you were willing to compel a child to blow on your behalf and then make them travel with you, you had bigger problems than just drink driving.  The makers, figuring that a willing plant at the departure point might blow for you, built in the need to blow again 5 mins into the trip. This also covered the bases for you having left thinking you were still okay only to get

Customer satisfaction is a relatively new concept, customer dissatisfaction is ancient.  We can trace the history of poor service to a person called Nanni. The shipment of copper ore that was ordered did not arrive on time and was of poor quality.  What makes this report remarkable is that it was sent by the unhappy merchant over 3500 years ago.  The clay tablet is held by the British Museum and because we are living in the digital age you can see it for yourself by clicking the link. Audio credit: TEDx Talks Photo by chaitanya pillala on Unsplash See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Let me tell you about the long and incredible series of developments that allowed a vaccine to be made available so quickly to deal with Covid-19. DNA is a library of everything your body might need to reproduce, build and look after you. It is a recipe book of sorts. RNA is a copy of a piece of it, a single recipe to make very important substances - proteins. For dealing with diabetes we need to add the protein insulin to allow us to function. If we could give you RNA we could create it for a short while, if we can fix the part of the DNA that no longer has the recipe we can fix the problem.  Fixing DNA is gene therapy. Lots of diseases relate to issues with DNA. It is a very promising field but only a small group of approved therapies have been devised.  For other uses, RNA can be used to produce antigens, proteins used by viruses that trigger the immune system. Once you know what the antigen protein is, you can look for the RNA code that creates it. Audio credit: TEDxBeaconStreet See omnystu

Star Trek made the line that space was the final frontier famous. It is true. Everything humanity has ever done is contained on a tiny speck floating in space. Carl Sagan called it the pale blue dot based on the image from the Voyager 1 spacecraft that was taken in 1990 when the craft had traveled about 6 billion kilometers from Earth, the picture of the galaxy included Earth which was no more than a speck on the image. Less than an hour later Voyager would shut down its camera never to take another image.  It took all of human history to get us to having the first person breach the bounds of gravity and orbit the Earth just once in 1961. Yuri Gagarin represented the first living thing that had taken billions of years of evolution to determine how to rise high enough above the Earth to remain there.  Image & audio credit: NASA & Blue Origin Colin Cullis presents a weekly insert on the Money Show with Bruce Whitfield about the innovations and disruptions that are impacting on business and you

When Business Unusual first covered the story in 2018, unboxing videos were on the rise as creators and brands recognised the power of having their products demonstrated as videos to assist those thinking of buying their products to get a better sense of what they would be getting and tap into the excitement of opening something new.  In the three years since, his parents have switched to working on the channel full time. They have signed up for multiple merchandise deals with major retails chains and their 5-year-old twins now feature in the videos too. Colin Cullis presents a weekly insert on the Money Show with Bruce Whitfield about the innovations and disruptions that are impacting on business and you. © Pocket.watch Ryan KajiSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The Chinese Communist Party celebrated their 100 year anniversary on 1 July, as a political party they have ruled the country continuously for 72 years, longer than the USSR which broke up and every other nation with the exception of North Korea. In that time it has endured terrible hardships of poverty and little economic opportunity, a good chunk of it by its own doing. But it has risen to become the second largest economy and if measured by how many people were lifted out of poverty the most successful government in history. It has worked to rightfully reunify with Hong Kong and continues to work towards reunification with Taiwan.  You would be forgiven for thinking it would be good for those regions to be returning to such a successful country. China would describe the story that way, but some may see it as China calling a deer a horse.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Not everything will be ready, and many businesses will still have a lot to do to make sure they comply, but it is a big win for consumers and even a positive for businesses that can more easily do business with other countries that have also introduced similar laws. Photo by Marija Zaric on UnsplashSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

It looks like only some will get to enjoy it. Even if you enjoy your work, there are few who don’t appreciate the time away from work to enjoy the fruits of your labour with family and friends.   This is what weekends are for, it is as timeless as the commandment to rest on the Sabbath, so a hat tip to the faithful for getting us our first day off.   The second day required a few thousand more years. Farmers worked during the day, the “early to bed early to rise” wisdom comes from the farm, no holidays until the crops are harvested, then the mother of all feasts and a few days to recover before starting all over again. The weekend is such a new concept actually that even the French, who typically will not use English words accept ‘le weekend’ even if the official term is French for ‘the end of the week’.  It was fed up factory workers in the UK that convinced owners to give them a Saturday afternoon off probably because productivity dropped anyway and n

Guest: Zanele  Njapha | Unlearning Expert & Innovation Facilitator at TomorrowTodaySee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Dogs, bees and AI may help us find more infections faster than current testing. There is good reason to believe that a sensor that can work almost instantly, cost very little, does not need lab conditions and can be used repeatedly may be right under our noses. We can smell and recognise over 10 000 unique smells, not that you have made a list. Yet we take it for granted even as it quickly and effectively allows us to find or avoid so many issues. An even more effective solution can be found in the snouts and noses of fellow organisms that are far more sensitive. Dogs are way better than us, they take only a little training to associate a smell with a reward and are about 70% accurate  Audio credit: Vox Unexplainable Image Credit: © vladimirfloyd/123rf.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The boom in construction is unprecedented. Humans have built so much that the mass of our built environment probably weighs more than all the living things on the planet. From Forests to livestock and even us, the buildings we have created are now more massive. Life on Earth has been building for billions of years, humans far less so, in a book by David Farrier about how cities will fossilise he notes that just 300 years ago just one location on Earth was home to more than a million people. Edo in Japan, now there are over 500 cities greater than a million with Tokyo now at an incredible 37 million.  It is hard to get your head around a city that is two thirds the size of South Africa by population. Johannesburg takes up about 1600 sq km, Tokyo is 2200 sq km but is home to 35 million more people than Joburg.  While Japan remains one of the most built up nations on the planet, the progression is that all countries at some point head down the path to urbanise, densify and increase their big infrastruc

But what is the Metaverse? Audio Credit: New York Times Deal Book  Image Credit: Richard Horvath on UnsplashSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.