Finally, Google spelling out focus on future with Alphabet to wide audience
peter Klein has an interesting Rand Journal piece (pdf) on conglomerates:
This paper challenges the conventional wisdom that the 1960s conglomerates were inefficient. I offer valuation results consistent with recent event-study evidence that markets typically rewarded diversifying acquisitions.In other words, today’s Google announcement isn’t as crazy as it may sound. Here is further positive evidence on conglomerates, and Glenn Hubbard also thinks the 1960s conglomerates were largely efficient. Here is some evidence, however, that conglomerates tend to be less innovative. Scharfstein and Stein are less positive more generally. Here is some evidence that the non-Google divisions will receive favoritism in the allocation of capital within the conglomerate. That all said, conglomerates are understudied in microeconomics, in part because they are hard to study.
The following link has been selected for the amazing minds inside the Gooogle Name Changers, alchemists and code breakers who tend to debate the distinction between naked capitalism and nudity ; -)
~ Naked is what you are when you haven't got your clothes on. Nude is what you are when you have intentionally taken your clothes off. Here's why the difference matters
Adblock Plus has become the internet’s advertising sheriff. That’s because its software, by default, allows some ads through its firewall—ads it deems “acceptable,” meeting a series of strict criteria it came up with in conversation with internet users around the world. The criteria essentially eliminate most of the ads on the market today, rolling back ad technology to the 1990s: text only, no animations, no popovers, no placement in the flow of text. In the two months since I’ve installed the software, I don’t recall seeing any ads that meet the criteria Ad Blocking
Hedge Fund Risks May Be Bigger Than Regulators Know, Despite Dodd-Frank International Business Times
A reputation for being "out-of-touch" was the impetus for digital change within the Australian Tax Office, according to interim CIO Jane King - and it's no accident the organisation has seen an overhaul of its executive ranks since the new approach was implemented. Shedding its old school reputation
The advent of artisanal cash
Saga of Bitcoins Classifications
Conservapedia gets schooled by evolutionary biologist Daily Kos. Worth reading for the quotes from a great takedown.