Beneath the Peak

Freddie Hubbard, the trumpet player who appeared on such seminal jazz albums as Wayne Shorter’s Speak No Evil and Herbie Hancock’s Maiden Voyage, has died at 70.

Hubbard — who also played with Sonny Rollins, Art Blakey, John Coltrane and Eric Dolphy — was one of the rare artists whose work in the 60s and 70s still sounds fresh today.

According to Telegraph columnist Christopher Booker, 2008 was the year man-made global warming was disproved.

Here’s a sample:

Suddenly it has become rather less appealing that we should divert trillions of dollars, pounds and euros into the fantasy that we could reduce emissions of carbon dioxide by 80 per cent. All those grandiose projects for “emissions trading”, “carbon capture”, building tens of thousands more useless wind turbines, switching vast areas of farmland from producing food to “biofuels”, are being exposed as no more than enormously damaging and futile gestures, costing astronomic sums we no longer possess.

We’ll soon see annual reports from companies using a December 31 year end. It will be interesting to see if there is any decrease in the amount of space devoted to CO2 emissions and climate change.

Technorati Tags: climate change, global warming, Christopher Booker, the telegraph

Jeff Jarvis at Buzz Machine has an in-depth look at one of my pet interests: media literacy.

It’s an essential skill, especially given the ill-informed comments from entertainers and politicians that are often reported as facts.

In addition to understanding how the media works, Jarvis thinks we need to be able to create media. Here’s his list:

• knowing how to focus on a need for information and express that by crafting a query to find an answer
• knowing how to judge the relevance and reliability of sources -
  including the PageRank-like skill of judging sources on sources
• knowing how to create (and remix) content across all media types;
  knowing how to collaborate
• understanding the impact of facts on perspective and perspective on opinion
• understanding the impact of identity and anonymity
• understanding the relationship of pieces of information that make up a larger story via links
• understanding how to make and find corrections.

It’s a good list, to which I would add:

• having a basic knowledge of copyright law
• having the critical thinking skills and self-confidence to form a solid argument and speak out when the emperor needs a new tailor.

Technorati Tags: media literacy, Jeff Jarvis

Prof. Lawrence Lessig, who was in Hong Kong a couple of months ago for the launch of Creative Commons, has an interesting suggestion for the US Federal Communications Commission: Dismantle it.

Lessig notes that, like most bureaucracies, the FCC is inherently opposed to change and should be replaced with an organization, which he calls the Innovation Environment Protection Agency (iEPA), that would have a simple founding mission: “minimal intervention to maximize innovation.”

The iEPA would also, “protect innovation from its two historical enemies—excessive government favors, and excessive private monopoly power.”

Not being a resident of the US, I can’t speak to the applicability of Lessig’s ideas in that market. But they sure are needed here.

To understand why, consider our moribund electronic media market where:

• ATV, which is one half of Hong Kong’s terrestrial TV duopoly and  broadcasts into booming southern China, is reportedly losing HK$2 million a day.
• With 7 million people, Hong Kong has a stunted radio market, especially compared to comparably sized cities in other countries.
• Cable TV broadcasters like the Discovery Channel, BBC World Service and CNBC abandoned Hong Kong for Singapore, a city with half of Hong Kong’s population and a long track record of suing media outlets.

Instead of chasing the next fad — whether that’s wine trading, Islamic Finance or traditional Chinese medicine – our esteemed leaders should step out of the way and let some the the competition and variety that defines our print media find its way into the electronic media.

Hong Kong would be a better place for it.

Full points to Hospital Authority Chief Executive Shane Solomon for admitting that the staff of Caritas Hospital erred by not coming to the aid of a man who suffered a heart attack – and subsequently died — outside the hospital.

Hospitals rely on clear protocols and procedures that ensure staff know what to do and how to do it. But the lack of common sense on the part of the hospital receptionist, who told the victim’s son to call 999 rather than calling someone from the hospital to render assistance, suggests an organizational culture that values bureaucracy above all else.

The head of the hospital’s A&E department, Ng Fu, did little to dispel that impression in a media interview. “It is the responsibility of the paramedics to respond to such an emergency. The accident and emergency departments at Hong Kong’s hospitals are always busy. It is difficult for us to send a team out.”

Technorati Tags: Hong Kong, Politics, hospital authority, caritas hospital

While I was in Japan, I got stood up for a meeting near Ueno Station. Fortunately it was a beautiful winter morning and I had my camera with me, so I wandered over to Asakusa, which is home to the Senso-ji Temple.

Incidentally, reports of Tsukiji being closed to tourists may be inaccurate. A friend had visitors in town over the weekend who were able to visit the fish market.

I’m in Tokyo for a couple of days of meetings.

This sign, which is prominently displayed throughout the subway system, was too good not to share.

Apparently, bad manners in public is a growing problem.

Update: My friend John supplied this shot of the model for the poster.

This week’s Economist includes an extremely critical story about Thailand’s King Bhumibol Adulyade.

Tough lèse-majesté laws, which make it easy to prosecute anyone who criticizes or insults the king, mean this kind of reporting is rare in Thailand.

I’m told the person who wrote the story has already left the kingdom and this edition of the newspaper (as the Economist bills itself) is not on sale in Thailand.

The Bangkok Post and the Nation, Thailand’s two main English-language dailes, do not appear to have covered the Economist story.

While it’s a little early for year-end reviews, there are two things I’m glad I did this year.

The first is visiting the Tsukiji fish market in Tokyo. It’s something I’d been meaning to do since I first arrived in Japan in 1988. This week, officials announced a ban on tourists visiting the market after introducing restrictions on tourists visiting the live tuna auctions and sea urchin area.

I can’t really blame the authorities for their decision. Tsukiji is a collection of narrow alleys, rapidly moving vehicles, sharp knives and every conceivable form of marine life, many of which are delicate and expensive.

The market was originally a train station, and to say that it was never meant to accommodate throngs of tourists would be an understatement. It is expected to move to a new location that will probably be more tourist friendly, but without the old facility’s ambiance.

That said, it’s a loss for Japan’s tiny tourism industry, which is already being hammered by a strong yen and the financial meltdown that has reduced both business and leisure travel worldwide.

The second was seeing two Formula One Races, one in Malaysia and one in Shanghai. Both were a lot of fun, but with the effects of the meltdown on corporate sponsorship, not to mention race fans’ entertainment budgets, if F1 survives it is likely to be a very different sport.

Comments like this one, from F1 boss Bernie Ecclestone, don’t help much either:

“The trouble is the teams are basically run by technicians who should probably be at home playing with their PlayStations rather than spending fortunes to win races.”

If a couple of key sponsors follow Honda’s lead, Ecclestone may be reduced to playing with a PlayStation.

Update: Some reactions from the Japanese press to Honda’s decision here.

As I predicted last month, the financial meltdown taking its toll on Formula One sponsors.

In a move to save $216 million, Honda announced today that it was withdrawing from Formula One.

Who’s next?