Isaac Garcia's Blog

Circuit City Closed

Good riddance to a worthless company.  You will not be missed.

May Circuit City Burn in Hell

Circuit City is going out of business. It is about time.

Good riddance to a worthless company with worthless employees with worthless attitudes.

Burn in hell. Good riddance.  I have no mercy for Circuit City nor the employees that contributed to and perpetuated their horrific customer experience and service.

There Will Be No Web 3.0

Ted Dziubia is at it again with the best one-liner of the year:

"Still Waiting For That Twitter Business Plan"

(Source Ted's Blog)

Auto Bailout

The only thing worse than the automakers running their own company.......is for congress to run the automaker's companies.

Ivy Leagues Are Overrated

[Only] 10% of CEOs currently heading the top 500 companies received undergraduate degrees from Ivy League colleges...

"One reason more Ivy League alumni aren't CEOs may be that many have traditionally chosen careers in investment banks and at big law firms, where they could earn big sums quickly and wouldn't have to start in entry-level management jobs."

(Read more here...)

[no offense to all of my HBS friends out there)  ; )

It's the Housing Bubble, Not the Credit Crunch

Dean Baker writes the truth:

"It's the Housing Bubble, Not the ***** Credit Crunch!"

Circuit City Files for Bankruptcy

I don't want Circuit City bankrupt - I want them completely out of business.  I want them erased - from existence.  While in Chapter 11, they can continue to provide horrific customer service - this time with even less recourse.

(In case you missed it - here is my Circuity City rant.)

Newt Gingrich Says "Lets End Adolescence"

I understand that New Gingrich is a polarizing figure in America - but I have to say that he is *much* more "in his element" when he is a professor, lecturer, thinker, writer and futurist. 

Over the years, I continue to be impressed by his approach to big problems like education, healthcare, climate change, intellectual property growth in the US and technology. 

Last week he wrote an article in Businessweek called "Lets End Adolescence." 

What resonated with me was a reflection on my childhood, er....adolescence.  Every Summer, beginning at the age of 14, I worked as a Brick Mason's Helper.  This meant, I was on the crew that made the mud/mortar, stack the bricks/blocks, built the scaffolding, cleaned up the site and everything else.  It was HARD, HARD, HARD work.  To date, the hardest physical labor I've ever done in my life.  I did this for 4 summers and I learned a tremendous amount about business, work, labor, working smarter, how to use physics as a means to move cement bags and wheel barrows of mud that weighed more than me.

My point is - there is nothing wrong with work at a young age - and I think there is a TON of value in it.  A career at 13 might be pushing it too far - but hard, back-breaking Summer work in my early teens kept me out of trouble, taught me core work ethics that have stayed with me to date, paid me money and motivated me to go to college.

Working next to men in their 40s and 50s who did the same hard work as I did was a strong motivator for me to "think past the money I was making that summer" - even at the age of 14.

Looking back, many of the the lessons I learned at 13 while working construction comprise many of the foundational ethics that drive me as an entrepreneur today.

GM and Chrysler Discuss Merger

Now, how in the world would that make anything better?

Isn't that like trying to breed two dead cats?

(source via Breibart)

Lessons from Japan

1. "The first phase is what the US is now experiencing, and that is mainly coming from the liquidity crisis. FRB has provided a credit line close to $1 trillion and major institutions are now at the mercy of this facility."
2. "The second phase comes mainly from working out the bad assets. They face the problem as the write-offs far exceed the equity and they can not raise fresh capital from the market as their share price falls to a meaningless level."
3. "The third phase is characterized by the massive failures of operating companies. This is because survived financial institutions are under severe surveillance of the Government and they can not easily extend loans to traditional customers, or corporations."

"What I am not sure is if the Americans are addressing the right issues with the right priorities and sequence, and how long it will take to get back to “business as usual”. It has taken Japan 15years."

(source Kenichi Ohmae via Financial Times)