terça-feira, fevereiro 15, 2011 David Barradas 0 Comments

No one plays the lottery if there are no winners
Seth Godin

segunda-feira, fevereiro 14, 2011 David Barradas 0 Comments

Why cities should be building upBesides making cities more affordable and architecturally interesting, tall buildings are greener than sprawl, and they foster social capital and creativity. Yet some urban planners and preservationists seem to have a misplaced fear of heights that yields damaging restrictions on how tall a building can be. From New York to Paris to Mumbai, there’s a powerful case for building up, not out…..
Mumbai’s traffic problems reflect not just poor transportation policy, but a deeper and more fundamental failure of urban planning. In 1991, Mumbai fixed a maximum floor-to-area ratio of 1.33 in most of the city, meaning that it restricted the height of the average building to 1.33 stories: if you have an acre of land, you can construct a two-story building on two-thirds of an acre, or a three-story building on four-ninths of an acre, provided you leave the rest of the property empty. In those years, India still had a lingering enthusiasm for regulation, and limiting building heights seemed to offer a way to limit urban growth.
But Mumbai’s height restrictions meant that, in one of the most densely populated places on Earth, buildings could have an average height of only one and a third stories. People still came; Mumbai’s economic energy drew them in, even when living conditions were awful. Limiting heights didn’t stop urban growth, it just ensured that more and more migrants would squeeze into squalid, illegal slums rather than occupying legal apartment buildings.
Singapore doesn’t prevent the construction of tall buildings, and its downtown functions well because it’s tall and connected. Businesspeople work close to one another and can easily trot to a meeting. Hong Kong is even more vertical and even friendlier to pedestrians, who can walk in air-conditioned skywalks from skyscraper to skyscraper. It takes only a few minutes to get around Wall Street or Midtown Manhattan. Even vast Tokyo can be traversed largely on foot. These great cities function because their height enables a huge number of people to work, and sometimes live, on a tiny sliver of land. But Mumbai is short, so everyone sits in traffic and pays dearly for space. , not out

sexta-feira, fevereiro 11, 2011 David Barradas 0 Comments

Those who promise us paradise on earth never produced anything but a hell.
Karl Popper

quinta-feira, fevereiro 03, 2011 David Barradas 0 Comments

　
College a waste of time and money for kids, FTHere is what's wrong with college.
First, and foremost, it's too expensive. To send a kid to college you need from $200,000 to $400,000. That's insane. There's no way the incremental advantage they get from having a diploma will ever pay back that amount. Perhaps for the first time the opportunity cost (a phrase I remember from Economics 101) of college does not equal the extra profits generated by the degree.
Second, I don't believe in a balanced education. Most colleges require students to take a smattering of art, maths, sciences and so forth. Taking 10 courses a year on wildly different topics, with enormous homework responsibilities, not to mention droning, boring professors for at least eight of the 10, is the surest formula for creating complete non-interest and inability to remember anything in any of the topics covered. What a waste of $400,000.
And third, there are far better uses of time. One reader asked what her kid should be doing instead of college. Here are some of my responses:
1. Working - not just a labour or service job, but there are internet-content jobs out there. I have high school and college kids working for me who are making over $50,000 a year from writing gigs on the internet. Scour Craigslist for opportunities, your favourite blogs, or websites related to your favourite interests. Companies are dying for good content. Create your own blog, get yourself noticed, build relationships with other content companies and communities.
2. Take half the fee for one semester, give it to your kid, and tell him or her to start a business. Not every youngster has entrepreneurial sensibilities, but it's always worth trying once. The cost for starting a business is next to zero, so it's a viable alternative. What business should they start? For one thing, now that Facebook and MySpace have open development platforms, try out a few applications for these platforms; for a few hundred dollars you can outsource development of these applications to India, and get your friends to start trying them. Make sure they are viral (that is, a message should appear "click here to get all your friends to try XYZ") and see which ones are a success. I mention Facebook and MySpace because every kid is familiar with these sites and comfortable with the subtleties, and it's this comfort that can create the best businesses.
3. Spend a year trying to become good at one thing. Whatever your child's greatest interest is, whether cooking, chess, writing, maths, there are so many resources on the internet available for learning that college is almost the last place a kid should go to pursue a passion. Intense immersion in a favourite topic is the surest way to become an expert in that field.

sexta-feira, janeiro 21, 2011 David Barradas 0 Comments

The best doctor in the world is the veterinarian. He can't ask his patients what is the matter-he's got to just know.
Will Rogers
US humorist & showman (1879 - 1935)

quarta-feira, janeiro 19, 2011 David Barradas 0 Comments

What Chinese parents understand is that nothing is fun until you're good at it
　
From, WSJ Why Chinese Mothers Are Superior

http://online.wsj.com/article_email/SB10001424052748704111504576059713528698754-lMyQjAxMTAxMDEwODExNDgyWj.html

Ps I am not a Chinese father, only in sports a bit.
PS2 from the same articleChinese parents believe that their kids owe them everything. The reason for this is a little unclear, but it's probably a combination of Confucian filial piety and the fact that the parents have sacrificed and done so much for their children. (And it's true that Chinese mothers get in the trenches, putting in long grueling hours personally tutoring, training, interrogating and spying on their kids.) Anyway, the understanding is that Chinese children must spend their lives repaying their parents by obeying them and making them proud. . To get good at anything you have to work, and children on their own never want to work, which is why it is crucial to override their preferences. This often requires fortitude on the part of the parents because the child will resist; things are always hardest at the beginning, which is where Western parents tend to give up. But if done properly, the Chinese strategy produces a virtuous circle. Tenacious practice, practice, practice is crucial for excellence; rote repetition is underrated in America. Once a child starts to excel at something—whether it's math, piano, pitching or ballet—he or she gets praise, admiration and satisfaction. This builds confidence and makes the once not-fun activity fun. This in turn makes it easier for the parent to get the child to work even more.

terça-feira, janeiro 18, 2011 David Barradas 0 Comments

Success is blocked by concentrating on it and planning for it... Success is shy - it won't come out while you're watching.
Tennessee Williams

segunda-feira, janeiro 17, 2011 David Barradas 0 Comments

Why Newton was wrong
Theory says that the past performance of share prices is no guide to the future. Practice says otherwise
http://www.economist.com/node/17848665

PS If you want to throw some business my way (thanks in advance) we have a product that plays this very well. Its Called BPI Universal Lux
BPIGLIN LX.
Last 5 years up 6,86% per year.
Isin LU0220378623
Min investment 250,000
Daily liquidity.
No lock-up's
No gates
No side-pockets

sexta-feira, janeiro 14, 2011 David Barradas 0 Comments

White-collar work is doomed: get your hands dirtyThe Case for Working with Your Hands: Or Why Office Work is Bad for Us and Fixing Things Feels Good [Paperback] 　
Why would anybody pay for a British architect or accountant, Crawford asks, when there are competent ones who charge less in China or India? Manual work resists outsorcing for a simple reason:it is tied to a particular location. If you need a haircut in Manchester, a barber in Bangalore is no use to you. And if you lavatory is bocked in London, you don't call a plumber in Taiwan…….if you want a job that is secure, you must throw over your desk, get out of your cubicle, and learn to use a tool.
　
　

quinta-feira, janeiro 13, 2011 David Barradas 0 Comments

When people start out on adult life, they are, on average, pretty cheerful. Things go downhill from youth to middle age until they reach a nadir commonly known as the mid-life crisis. So far, so familiar. The surprising part happens after that. Although as people move towards old age they lose things they treasure—vitality, mental sharpness and looks—they also gain what people spend their lives pursuing: happiness……...Could the misery of the middle-aged be the consequence of sharing space with angry adolescents? And older people tend to be richer. Could their relative contentment be the result of their piles of cash?
The answer, it turns out, is no: control for cash, employment status and children, and the U-bend is still there. So the growing happiness that follows middle-aged misery must be the result not of external circumstances but of internal changes.

http://www.economist.com/node/17722567


PS Just landed from Geneva. Good sleep in Geneva as usual (despite waking up at 3.30 am!), no noise. I friend booked a cab the night before and gave the guy the code for the condo. The taxi was inside the condo waiting for me at 4am!. Things work well there although pretty expensive (50 CHF).
In Lisbon we landed with big fog. It's amazing to land a plane with no visibility at all!.

terça-feira, janeiro 11, 2011 David Barradas 0 Comments

The idea that the government can grow the economy is seriously flawed. The economy grows on its own unless there are obstacles placed in the way. The best thing the government can do is remove those impediments, such as the high corporate tax rate, and allow the economy to send out new roots and green shoots. Water it periodically. Fertilize occasionally with organic material. And don’t overfeed.
　Caroline Baum

http://www.blogger.com/post-create.g?blogID=1255205710242367002&pli=1

sexta-feira, janeiro 07, 2011 David Barradas 0 Comments

MY LAST TRIP TO COSTCO

Yesterday I was at my local COSTCO buying a large bag of Purina dog chow
for my loyal pet, Jake, the Wonder Dog and was in the check-out line when
a woman behind me asked if I had a dog.

What did she think I had an elephant? So since I'm retired and have little
to do, on impulse I told her that no, I didn't have a dog, I was starting
the Purina Diet again. I added that I probably shouldn't, because I ended
up in the hospital last time, but that I'd lost 50 pounds before I
awakened in an intensive care ward with tubes coming out of most of my
orifices and IVs in both arms.

I told her that it was essentially a Perfect Diet and that the way that it
works is, to load your pants pockets with Purina Nuggets and simply eat
one or two every time you feel hungry. The food is nutritionally complete
so it works well and I was going to try it again. (I have to mention here
that practically everyone in line was now enthralled with my story.)

Horrified, she asked if I ended up in intensive care, because the dog food
poisoned me. I told her no, I stepped off a curb to sniff a poodle's ass
and a car hit me.

I thought the guy behind her was going to have a heart attack he was
laughing so hard.

Costco won't let me shop there anymore.

Better watch what you ask retired people. They have all the time in the
world to think of crazy things to say.

sexta-feira, janeiro 07, 2011 David Barradas 0 Comments

If you want a guarantee, buy a toaster.
Clint Eastwood

segunda-feira, janeiro 03, 2011 David Barradas 0 Comments

A systemic cleansing and detox is definitely the way to go after each holiday. It is the key to fighting high blood pressure, heart disease, cancer, and other health-related illnesses.
Lee Haney
PS Sunday I did a Bike ride with a small group with 3 of the best riders in Portugal. Hugo Sabido, Nuno Sabido and Sérgio Paulinho. Sérgio won 1 stage of the Tour the France last year (2010). He rides for Lance's Team. Hugo is a cronic top 10 finisher of the Tour of Portugal and Nuno is a top Mountainbike specialist. It was very nice that even for 1 day i was able to ride with them for 100 k.
I felt overweight comparing to them. I need a Detox fast.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/other_sports/cycling/8821968.stm

domingo, janeiro 02, 2011 David Barradas 0 Comments

It is not because things are difficult that we do not dare; it is because we do not dare that they are difficult.
Seneca
Roman dramatist, philosopher, & politician (5 BC - 65 AD)