Long Time No Post...

I haven't posted in a while, mainly because I haven't really had anything worth saying. Today I want to talk about a couple things; the first being something I recently encountered regarding growing a new business, and the second refers to some of the interesting things that companies are dong today.

My cousin owns a business in Pickering, Ontario. He has had it there for 6 years, and was in Ajax for 10 years prior to moving to Pickering. Some short time ago I was reading Profit magazine (kind of a Forbes for new Canadian business') and in it they named Pickering as one of the best places to grow a business. This sounded like great news for my community and for my cousin. Less than a month ago the City of Pickering instituted a new by-law, which is essentially a cash grab that wasn't thought out by the Politicians (the cocks). The By-law mandated that he (and all businesses) remove any form of advertisement banner, and should they wish to use advertisements of this sort, they must apply for a permit to temporarily display this advertisement banner. Bullshit. Can't smoke in a bar because it endangers other health - legit. Can't speed because it endangers others lives - legit. Can't shoot Stephen Harper in the head because I don't choose who lives - (semi) legit. Can't use a banner to advertise (grow) your business? Horseshit! what is this By-Law protecting us from? Here's an idea. shut down every single small business and everyone go over to Government Motors and insert tab 'A' into slot 'B' and drink labatt blue, or head over to OPG and do whatever it is their 20,000 employees do. What a load of rubbish. We'll call it the Country of Corporate Canada Policy, or CCCP for short.

Second - companies that rock. When I purchase a security, one of the many things I like to see is Market share relative to the company's control of supply. One company that has this trait in spades is Google, but its more than that. I genuinely love the company, the corporate culture, the products, the business model - all from a company that most think is nothing but a search engine. If you have been a Google supporter as long as I have you would laugh at the amount of things Yahoo, and Microsoft have ripped off from them - and still executed poorly. These guys have 85.78% market share which is massive and therefor control its supply - next to no competition. Who the hell uses yahoo to search something? Who can stand that horseshit Bing, and what is with that name...Bing - are you trying to hide the fact that the real company name is Microsoft and everyone knows your product sucks? Hang on. Microsoft, they have enormous Market share, but (a BIG but) there are no other viable options right now. Ask anyone who does real work on a computer (myself included), you cannot do work on a Mac - period. Macs are more of a cult thing that's "cool", its a toy not a productivity tool. don't get me wrong there are a lot of cool things about iPods, iPads, iWhatevers; but as a business tool they blow. The only reason Microsoft still kicks with their massive market share but shit product is because there are no other options. But Google...when Google's new OS comes out...well lets not speculate. So what else are they doing? Everyone out there knows the company is a dream to work for... I mean come on - games room, laundry room, chilling lounge, couches to nap on, 17 free gourmet cafeterias, gym - you can live there literally. But everyone knows that, and all 19,835 staff members love it. Here's something you didn't know though: Google allows staff members to allocate up to 25% of their time doing self-interest projects (basically whatever the fuck you want), but over 50% of Googles products have originated from this time. Look at the pic below. You also may or may not know that there is a town in California (where the Googleplex is) that has complete and total free wireless coverage provided by google. Here's their new project though: fibre Internet to your home. Yes, google is the market leader in providing you with Internet service that is 100 times faster than current cable/DSL solutions. Every politician is signing up to make their town or city the test subjects, and one town in Kansas has actually re-named itself - see pic below.

Google: search engine, email, blogging, youtube, phone service, Internet service, web page development, web browser (easily the best out there, as i fumble with this piece o shit IE, ya fuck firefox - its for university kids that get too many popup blockers and toolbars in their IE, still crap and I can prove it), soon-to-be OS, online picture storage, and much much more.

Market Share Prices:

Apple Computers (AAPL): $210.19
Microsoft Corporation (MSFT): $28.49
Google Inc (GOOG): $555.20

If you know anything about stocks, from an investment standpoint the above means nothing, but from a user's point of view - there is a reason why a portion of Google is worth nearly 20times more than Microshit.

I could really go on all day and give you a lot of really research and number to show you why Google dominates Bill Gates's POS, and crushes that Vegan crack-head Steve Jobs's junk - but I'm bored, I will however address all comments I see.





Link for Bigger Picture: http://createordie.de/cod/news/Google-als-Infografik-054148.html

Monday Medals

Olympics is over - thank god, this is one situation where "the chase was better than the catch". Television will resume regular programming, radio stations will stop giving their opinions no one gives a shit about, and people will stop calling me to come watch the Canada vs. Randomcountry game like I enojy watching Hockey... All this is great but MOST importantly; people will stop sending me those f*&%ing chain texts that originated in some random place and say to pass it on - NO! You stupid shiteaters, NO; those "chain" messages were started by your service providers (i.e. Bell, Telus, and Rogers...fuck Wind, Solo, fido etc.).

Anyways, no more speak of Olympics on this blog - I forbid it. The Market... well only been open for a little over and hour and everybody is in the green (yes!), but that is probably because I support my own stocks! Purchased two pairs of Nike kicks over the weekend (peace out 4 yr old F1 Pumas...man where they comfortable) and in addition my boy Jay C supported by buying a minutemaid drink (owned by the one and only Coca Cola: KO) and so did all the manga-cakes at the bars last night - danke.

You know those Canada Goose jackets everyone is rocking now... you see them a lot, its one of those things that I just waited too long to get now everyone has one - especially Queen's Students (about 84% of the population), but thats the way it works over there: one person starts then slowly, it becomes the scene from that movie Inside Man - everyone looks the same. note for future: record fashion trends in Kingston and buy shares in increasing trends. No way in hell there would be a Lulu Lemon store in Kingston, if not for Queen's kids (shut up! I'm not praising you, you tit - get a real job and purchase something without your Dad's credit card, or start your shit business with a REAL bank loan, not Mom & Dad's money so you can see what life is really like - because you have no f#$%ing clue. Full Stop.)

Wow - I'm an angry person, but I like it. Anyways! My solution to wanting this jacket is similar to all my other glorious solutions - go euro with it. I've done this plenty of times, and either get replicated (never duplicated) or praised for it. So I found me a company that makes these Canada Goose coats look like Biway specials, enter Fjällräven. No link, no picture of the coat I'm getting - nothing. I've learned my lessons. Now, my fingers are hurting from typing on a Monday. My coffee is finished I'm going to roll up the rim and go for a dart. Peace! FUCK COMMERCE!

Late night = Late morning

Well, here I am; strolling into the office at an exceptional 11AM... Late night last night with 2 of the boys whom I haven't seen in quite some time. One of the greatest things about working for this firm is the flexibility in terms of time. As long as you are filling 40 hours throughout the week and keeping it more or less to 8(ish) per day - nobody cares, thus a lot of people have different 'personal' schedules.

Enough of that; now, the markets...good thing yesterday's post was before they opened because I took a huge hit on all my big boys (GOOG, AAPL, RIMM, GS, NKE, KO, etc.), but today is looking up! with RIMM kicking ass at a solid 2.63% up from yesterday, but all in the portfolio are green - meaning no losses today, but lets see what happens at 4:30PM. Hmmm...what to speak about engineering related... I am trying to post each day, but there isn't always something super interesting to post about - yesterday I designed a small chamber for a co-worker who has a submission date coming up... The accountant next to me is annoying when she argues back and forth with the Project Controls specialist... I guess today is going to be slow, I'll make revisions to the chamber design as per the structural and projects leads, and I'll continue modifying my Watermain model to annotate the field verified information - nothing big today, its a Tuesday....right...?

Cool Shit. I want to start posting cool shit about once a week, as I come across it - This is completely bias because its shit that I think is cool and/or new. Now it won't be the same day every week because that will force me to post anything. No cool shit next week? no post. This will also save me on days when there really isn't anything to speak about.

This Weeks Cool Shit: The new Audi RS5. Why it's cool? because I'm an Audi nut, its fast powerful and sexy. Period. Biggest problem - pricing. Some German will be shot at dawn for his mistakes - but goodness it is a glorious machine, I anxiously await the Nurburgring time and Jeremy Clarkson's review (the only two things that matter in the end). Now I want to talk about the pricing problem with it. It's $104,000 USD. Why is that a problem, aside from it being out of 85% of the population's grasp, is what it offers. It's supposed to be the M3 killer (as in the new V8 E92 model, not the straight 6 E46). The M has a 4.0L V8 under the bonnet pushing out 414hp, while this has the 4.2 V8 you see in a lot of Audi cars, just this one is tuned a little bit otherwise, you might as well save 40k and buy an RS4 (another super machine) This car does not compete with the M3, the price difference is over 20k, and therefor are in different financial leagues, will the Audi beat the m3 regardless of finances? Likely, the all wheel drive will help in power circuits, but in most courses the M differential in the real wheel, high revving M3 will be something hard to topple. We shall see what JC thinks though. Image will be attached to this post. Well let me knock off the day, my father's birthday today, I'm still groggy and can use some caffeine. Hopefully the markets do well, and Americans stop trying to sue each other for everything.

Early Morning Market

So; post number two today, a little earlier than the last one (although it says posted at 8:49 - it a'int true). I have about 20 minutes before the markets open this morning, so I figured I'd get this post out of the way before my day actually gets going. No I am not a Stock Broker, Day Trader, Futures trader etc., I simply dabble; and yesterday (as you might tell by the tone of my post) was not a good day for any bluechip or tech stocks.

Anyways, so before the market opens and possibly disappoints and since last post was a wee bit pessimistic, I thought this one should be a little bit more uplifting. Engineering...hmm, well what can I say; if you like it and are in the field good for you, if you don't care and aren't in the field; get the f*@& off my blog...kidding, keep reading.
I keep writing this stuff and taking sips of my horrible work brewed coffee and think; anyone who tries this stuff for the first time will vomit, by I on the other hand have become...complacent I suppose...
Anyways; Engineering. So yesterday there was no work, or I should say very little work, and since I am a salaried employee (as opposed to hourly waged) I must hang around and log what's called Professional Downtime which basically means I am doing dick all and am not being charged out to a client (making the company a profit) so this is not a good thing. But by the same token, you can't invent work - it is supplied to you by senior staff members who put you on Projects. Yeah Projects...something we don't have a lot of at the moment. Why you ask? Well, Let me tell you, you eager little engineer you!

Remember not too long ago our friends to the south loused up the economy pretty bad - for everyone causing a global recession? Well although they are generally bad, it is good for our industry because the government injects "stimulus" funds into infrastructure, which theoretically; creates jobs for the masses. This is why sometimes our jobs (working for a Consultant; more on the different streams later) are labelled "recession proof". Not entirely true - here's why: Imagine a huge explosion that you can safely see and not get burned. Now imagine you are just far enough to not get burned by much to close to avoid the following shock wave (JPS analogy, copyright 2010, all rights reserved). We are now experiencing the shock wave; all clients (municipalities) have been given a deadline of which they MUST spend any and all allotted "stimulus" funds by. This caused them to take any work they may have had planned for 5 years down the road, brought up and rushed out. My opinion: any rushed job is a poorly executed job, and thus; the citizens of that city or region suffer with shitty infrastructure that may or may not get repaired, but will need it.

EXAMPLE:

Sole Sourced jobs: a job given to a firm with a proven track record and in good standing with the client, as opposed to the normal bidding process that most jobs are won through. Sole Sourced jobs are rare (from municipalities rather than private clients or high level government: DND) because they aren't "fair" to all consulting firms, so they are only performed on occasions where some kind of deadline warrants the need for speedious action.

Now, not too long ago we received an odd job from a client, which was; to review the technical details and designs for a job about to be tendered by another (fairly respectable) firm - which has never happened. Basically the client is burning any and all stimulus money they have for fear of a reduced federal budget...great! So, my company got payed a lot (enough for me to put a down payment on a home and buy a serious high performance German sports car) to have us "review" their work.. what? you don't trust your originally selected consultant? Pathetic.

Anyways, the market opened 4 minutes ago, time to read the news and see how much more money I will lose today... Until next time

Mo Money, No Problems?

Hello to who cares,

Maybe out of boredom, maybe out of interest; I have created this blog for anyone who cares for an insight into the world of Engineering at a large multi-national Engineering conglomerate. To keep my nuts out of a vice, I won't be mentioning my company name but suffice to say it is a big player in the 'world'.

The title of this Blog - somewhat of a double entendre: the change can mean either the relatively low income I receive, or the change we would all like to see in our world. It will all depend on the day and my mood.

If I could go back to high school, at about the time of selecting post-secondary education, would I do it the same? Definitely not, but everyone would do something different with the knowledge they have now right? The job I have DOES pay the bills, but it doesn't keep a smile on my face: something more important than one could think. Engineering kind of falls in the middle of "shitty job but wicked fun" and "shitty job but AWESOME pay" which may seem like a good thing, but let me explain:

When I went into this career (schooling) I was the semi-geek who watched all the construction related programs on TLC and Discovery Channel, and loved them (no i do not watch any of them anymore). In addition to that, I was told that this is a highly lucrative profession. The problem with the term "highly lucrative" is that it is all relative... A high school career counsellor who earns about 35-40k per year would assume ANYTHING over 45k is lucrative, which I admit, sounds not half bad...until you get into real life.

EXAMPLE:

Let's say you earn 50k per year before taxes, which will equate to approximately $2,800 per month after taxes. Now, you have car payments (because that $50k look OH so good when you signed on) of about $300, then insurance for say $200, then gas for about another $200. Are you as good at math as I am? because that leaves $2,100 for others, which sounds good, but I am far from done. You also have cell phone bills, food bills, rent, entertainment, plus all the other things that life has to offer. Assuming you spend NO money on entertainment you may be lucky to have $500 bucks at the end of the month saved, and that is nothing when you suddenly hit huge payments you never plan for such as a car problem, a large birthday, a vacation once a year - you'd be lucky to have saved $1000 dollars at year's end!

Now enough of my whining, point of the story - you want vacation time and fun go teach the 3rd grade, you want to make some scratch get an MBA. Some may say MBA's are a dime a dozen, anyone who says that doesn't have one and makes $12/hr. MBA's in them selves ARE a dime a dozen, but every MBA comes with an undergrad degree, which (some disagree) separates the runners from the riff raff. Any idiot can get a history degree and a MBA from a non-target, but someone with an Engineering degree and MBA, or the coveted JD-MBA (available at U of T ONLY in Canada) is a rarity and a better investment than Microsoft shares in the late 80's.

This blog has turned into the financial part of the "change" (as in pocket change), hopefully tomorrow is a little more optimistic and engineering related, after all this is the first post