Moving again?

Someone said to me the other day that I must hold some kind of blogging record. I don't know about that. But I do move the thing around, that's for sure.

In an effort to tie my own blogging activity (a) to that of others with whom I work and (b) to connect the latest roll of posts to our company's new web site, I've moved the "What am I thinking" blog to the Burris Ideablog. You'll find much of the same sort of thing, just under a better looking graphic face.

All of us have had considerable input into the new burris.com, but the way it looks is primarily the work of our own Eric Gordon. Visit now and often.

Blogging in times of crisis

OK, so let's say you're a CEO blogger, having established your blog for one purpose or another. You've built a relationship with your customers on the back of the products or services you deliver, which many think are good enough that they'll buy more than once and pay you willingly for the privilege.

Then something goes bad. A necessary recall, for instance, or some questionable behavior is reported. The press is knocking at the door, your colleagues, customers and employees are starting to wonder what's going on...

If you're not a blogger, what's your platform for getting out the truth?

I've been in the marketing and communications business for over 30 years, a blogger for more than three years, and I just had this blinding glimpse of the obvious about one of the values of blogging. It gives you an outlet, access to your audience, to tell the truth, to give the background, to fill in the blanks, so that you can at least control some of the information.

Arik Hesseldahl of BusinessWeek has written on several occasions (in order, here, here and here) recently that Steve Jobs should blog. Not only about the possible options backdating scandal, but also about new products, flaps over trademarks, the music business - about anything that would allow him to tell more of the story.

So maybe blogging isn't only about working out for myself what I'm thinking. Even with a small audience, it's a platform for the truth and the rest of the story.

36 Hours in Charleston

In the New York Times today, an updated look at what I call one of the top 5 cities in America. Click on the title above, or go here.

The wisdom of Buffett

Last night I read Warren Buffett's letter accompanying the 2006 Annual Report for Berkshire Hathaway. I look forward to it every year, so I poured a glass of Cabernet, settled onto the sofa, put a pillow between my fiery laptop and my legs and gave my undivided attention to the sage's latest.

Here are the highlights (for me, at least):
p. 4 - When writing about an Israeli-based company, which Berkshire acquired in 2006, ISCAR, "the maker of consumable cutting tools that are used in conjunction with large and expensive machine tools," Buffett wrote: "ISCAR makes money because it enables its customers to make more money. There is no better recipe for continued success."

p. 12 - Buffett is tireless in promoting the businesses Berkshire owns. Sometimes with humor. In writing about improved performance at NetJets, he says that "at Berkshire, and at a number of our subsidiaries,
NetJets aircraft are an indispensable business tool. I also have a contract for personal use with NetJets and so do members of my family and most Berkshire directors. (None of us, I should add, gets a discount.) Once you've flown NetJets, returning to commercial flights is like going back to holding hands."

And later (p. 22) when outlining the plans for the annual meeting, Buffett says this about shopping among the Berkshire companies with displays for shareholders: "Stop by the NetJets booth at the Qwest to learn about viewing these plans. Come to Omaha by bus; leave in your new plane. And take all the hair gel that you wish on board with you."

p. 17 - One of the dominant themes of this year's letter is management succession. "The good news: At 76, I feel terrific and, according to all measurable indicators, am in excellent health. It's amazing what Cherry Coke and hamburgers will do for a fellow."

p. 18 - He's subtle, but I think taking a dig at the inefficiencies of the federal government and its certain inability to qualify to run any of Berkshire's businesses. Here's a relatively long quote under the heading of "This and That":

"Berkshire will pay about $4.4 billion in federal income tax on its 2006 earnings. In its last fiscal year the U.S. Government spent $2.6 trillion, or about $7 billion per day. Thus, for more than half of one day, Berkshire picked up the tab for all federal expenditures, ranging from Social Security and Medicare payments to the cost of our armed services. Had there been only 600 taxpayers like Berkshire, no one else in America would have needed to pay any federal income or payroll taxes.

"Our federal return last year, we should add, ran to 9,386 pages. To handle this filing, state and foreign tax returns, a myriad of SEC requirements, and all of the other matters involved in running Berkshire, we have gone all the way up to 19 employees at World Headquarters.

"This crew occupies 9,708 square feet of space, and Charlie [Munger, Buffett's management partner] - at World Headquarters West in Los Angeles - uses another 655 square feet. Our home-office payroll, including benefits and counting both locations, totaled $3,531,978 last year. We're careful when spending your money.

"Corporate bigwigs often complain about government spending, criticizing bureaucrats who they say spend taxpayers' money differently from how they would if it were their own. But sometimes the financial behavior of executives will also vary based on whose wallet is getting depleted. Here's an illustrative tale from my days at Salomon. In the 1980s the company had a barber, Jimmy by name, who came in weekly to give free haircuts to the top brass. A manicurist was also on tap. Then, because of a cost-cutting drive, patrons were told to pay their own way. One top executive (not the CEO) who had previously visited Jimmy weekly went immediately to a once-every-three-weeks schedule."

Don't limit yourself to the highlights I've chosen to post here. There's probably no better way to get a dose of good management technique - and humility - than by reading the entire "Letter to Shareholders" for this or any Berkshire year. Here's the link to download the 2006 and all others.

My Name Is Buddy

I didn't used to be a "cat guy." I'm not sure I am even now, though we have three cats (Bear, named after Barry White; Shadow, named because he used to follow Bear around all the time; and Zoom, who's faster than any four-legged animal I've ever seen). I must say, though, that I do look out for them, and they are a constant source of amusement. That's Bear, uh, sleeping, in the photo at the top.

I was interested in this NPR story about the latest Ry Cooder project, "My Name Is 'Buddy'." It's an allegorical tale about the Dust Bowl Midwest and the hard-luck, picaresque journey of "a farm cat who hooks up with a labor-agitating mouse and a blind preacher toad."

Give it a listen, a read, and enjoy one of the most inventive and talented musicians telling a wonderful story.

I bring this up partly because of two recent cat events that have come up. First, my friend Rick Hall told me that he has adopted a cat from his neighborhood. So I loaned him my copy of Willie Morris's little book, My Cat Spit McGee, the sequel to "My Dog Skip." And second because Neil MacKenzie's cat, also named "Buddy," recently passed after about 13 lives and, ultimately, cancer. What is it about cats that melts even the hardest people?

Dick Cavett's blog

I think one of the best short term blogs I've read recently was that of Dick Cavett on Times Select, the premium content channel for the New York Times. Here's a link.

In case you can't access it without paying for it - and in case you don't want to pay for Times Select - here are two paragraphs to treasure from his February 28 post:

"Tell me, are you too getting just a little bit fed up with our leader’s war? Isn’t everybody? Do you actually know anyone who thinks it’s all going to turn out fine? Except that chubby optimist Dick Cheney, of course, who thinks the Titanic is still afloat.

"And am I alone in finding our leader’s behavior at press conferences irritating? I mean that smirky, frat-boy joking manner he goes into while, far away, people he dispatched to the desert are having their buttocks shot away. It’s worst when he does that thing of his that the French call making a 'moue'; when he pooches his lips out and thrusts his face forward in a way that seems to say, 'Aren’t I right? And don’t you adore me?'"

Lunar eclipse

We missed the lunar eclipse last Saturday night. Although our sunset was magnificent, the other side of the horizon - where the moon was scheduled to disappear - was covered with clouds. Beautiful, but not conducive to seeing the sky's magic. I snapped a couple of digitals, however, of the sun setting. The earth can be a beautiful place.

Is social networking Web 3.0?

My friend Gordon Dalgleish and I had an email exchange today about social networking, building off a New York Times article from over the weekend. ("Social Networking's Next Phase")

I'm a believer. For a golf outing I'm attending in late March, I set up a Google Group for the guys who are coming in order to communicate to and among them. Eighteen of the 19 other attendees have signed up, and the smack-downs and trash talking are already starting to appear on the site for all the others to see.

Gordon is curious about the phenomenon of social networking, wondering if golfers traveling to the UK and other Perry Golf spots might participate. I believe so ... for several reasons:

• Many have not been before, and they would likely welcome advice about what to take, where to eat and the like from friends and strangers who have taken similar trips.
• Many have made the trip before, and in addition to sharing their experience, they likely want to live vicariously with others who have been to the same places, different places and so on.
• I believe they'll share photos, anecdotes and other information, both with those they plan to travel with and others planning trips now or in the future.

If "Web 2.0" is all about using the Internet to share data, "Web 3.0" is about community. The "social networks" that have been built up around dating and other topics will surely extend to golfers, who naturally want to share their rounds. (How many times have you been through all 18 holes of a friend's recent round?)

To see how far beyond "meeting up" social networking has come, visit Ning. I think this is getting serious.

OnBeing

This is so cool, I could just hang out and siphon off the expended energy from OnBeing to fuel my own ideas.

It started innocently enough. Our own Eric Gordon passed along a link on Apple's site about how The Washington Post is using video to tell some of its stories. ("About 50 of our reporters now have cameras with them," the profile says.) It's a cool story, using an interesting cinematic technique that combines stills with motion video and a staccato editing touch that suggests the passage of time.

So I go to the url Eric suggested, I watch the Apple profile, and I learn about something else altogether. In this, the era of user generated video content - of YouTube - there's still art in the simple set-up. Go to OnBeing (click on the title of this post to be transported), and prepare to be captivated.

The morning's obits...

My early morning usually starts with a quick scan of the email box, and the morning's email always includes a summary of the day's New York Times. Today's news brief included an obituary for Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr., the great, if liberally biased (admittedly so, I'm sure), historian of our age. Here's the photo that accompanied the Times's obit (article by Douglas Martin; photo by Jack Manning).

In fact, along with William Manchester, Edmond Morris and Stephen Ambrose, Schlesinger was among the most readable historians of our age. "Readable history" is what I call what happens when a scholar steeped in the movement of events of a time or era is also a writer looking to transmit character and interpretation. It's my favorite read, and it includes, at times, great biography (Taylor Branch's MLK series, for instance) and, sometimes, fiction (E.L. Doctorow's The March comes to mind).

Schlesinger was 89. To honor him - besides reading and saving the obitulary - I think I'll pull down and give a fresh read to one of his books. Any recommendations?