Rating agency questions US creditworthiness. Maybe these mysterious rating agencies will become history if they take on the USA. Because one thing is clear: as soon as the free market economy, so propagated by the USA, hits the USA itself, they are terribly sensitive. As long as the rating agencies only drive unimportant (from the USA's perspective) European states to the brink of the abyss, it's completely irrelevant.
wirtschaft
"Moreover, the long announcement was only made in cases where the call center agents had the impression that the caller thought they had reached the German Railway. For all others, there was a short announcement." - fascinating, this call center operator has invented a telepathy interface? Because the price announcement comes before you speak to the agent (who is so expensive that you could gild the conversation time with him). More at 11861: Operator of the Bahn information number sues against shutdown - Golem.de.
Due to the boom: Business association wants to shorten vacation - taz.de - Summer slump pusher.
Give madness a chance!: I won't shop at Thalia anymore!!! - "nice" how Thalia behaves. The store has been suspicious to me for a long time anyway, because interesting bookstore, that's different. One reason why I buy more and more on the internet is the simply abysmally boring selection of "literature" in local large bookstores. Unfortunately, small bookstores in Münster limit themselves to children's literature, women's literature, esotericism, and religion - and I don't know why I listed esotericism and religion separately. In any case, not what I want to read. And with all non-German books, almost all bookstores here are so bad at ordering that Amazon becomes the urgent option out of the motivation "I want to get the book this year" in January. Maybe someday self-publishing and local printing will bring some movement to the situation - and hopefully also a chance for small, well-sorted, and competent specialty bookstores again. Because actually, browsing in a bookstore is fun when the sellers actually know what they're talking about and don't just sell in the bookstore because they earn too little in the perfumery. But that is probably more of a utopia for Münster.
Deutsche Bank fined for banned bets - but Uncle Ackermann said the Deutsche Bank had nothing to do with the financial crisis! He wouldn't have lied, would he!
Dow Falls in High-Speed Drop - WSJ.com - "Several market watchers said they heard a major firm may have accidentally released an errant program, where a trader accidentally placed an order to sell $16 billion, instead of $16 million, worth of e-minis, the futures contracts tied to equity indexes." - holy cow ...
The dark side of Dubai - a somewhat different story about Dubai. If you strip away all the ostentatious buildings, you're left with a dictatorship based on wage slavery and deception. And now the place belongs to Abu Dhabi.
Minimum Wage Ruling: Postal Service Provider PIN Wants to Lower Wages | tagesschau.de - great how the entrepreneurs immediately reach into the pockets of their already poorly paid employees. Somehow, the new swimming pool has to be paid for. Tariff-secured 6.50 in the East and 7.50 in the West? That's not security, that's an insult. For such an hourly rate, the entrepreneur assholes wouldn't even say good morning. So much for the social responsibility of entrepreneurs - the next time Merkel talks about it, remind her how willingly employees are ripped off by these supposedly social employers.
CDU also received a donation from the hotel industry - and it's immediately clear why hotels don't even think about passing on the lower taxes to customers, not even in part: all those donations have to be refinanced first!
Google Voice Blog: Google welcomes Gizmo5 - completely passed me by: Google has acquired Gizmo5. For a long time, it was a competitor to Skype, based on SIP instead of proprietary protocols. The company's founder was the same Michael Robertson who also founded mp3.com, mp3tunes.com, and Linspire - and often came across as somewhat dubious (especially the winding up of Linspire is still under discussion, as the shareholders largely came away empty-handed). Incidentally, Gizmo5 also used ejabberd for the IM infrastructure - that's how I stumbled upon it.
Dutch DSB-Bank bankrupt - the outrage of the bank owner is almost cute, as he gets upset about the cheeky savers who actually wanted their money back! And then the financial supervision, which dares to keep an eye on him!
Post cuts 560 jobs due to Arcandor insolvency - this clearly shows that something is seriously wrong in our economic world. Companies and CEOs claim entrepreneurial risk for themselves - but in reality, it is now 100% borne by the employees. A large company like the Post loses a major customer and immediately jobs are cut as a result. Instead of finding new deployment opportunities and new customers for the Post, the risk of contract negotiations between Arcandor and Post is shifted onto the employees. However, they do not receive a single cent more on their paycheck for the risk they bear. What exactly do people like ex-Post CEO Zumwinkel use to justify their high salaries? This certainly has nothing to do with a social market economy.
uninformation.org: Arbeitswelt 2.0, or: The Dot-Com Death is Back! - just read it, just follow the links, just think about whether you shouldn't pay more attention to more solidity as an employee in the world of work.
Deutsche Bank sues Lehman Brothers - will Ackermann still sound so arrogant? But it's probably just peanuts anyway ...
Zed on the banking crisis - "My problem with any bailout is that I’m not getting anything in return. I mean, I’d trade my tax money for bailing out a few banks if maybe I saw some CEOs get put to the guillotine. I am actually not joking about that. I think the quickest way to get the bailout approved is to drag the leadership of every bank in the country into a large stadium and begin beheading them on national TV. Then threaten to stop the beheadings if every American doesn’t donate fifteen-thousand dollars by Monday." - I love his style!
Ackermann warns against enemies of the market economy - this big-headed talk - meanwhile, the current great market economy only consists of a collection of "give me too, give me too" shouters after state grants. What does this have to do with the market economy? In a real market economy, idiots like Ackermann would now mercilessly economically perish from their documented incompetence. Only because, amusingly, the CDU has become the pioneer of socially tinged state subsidies for stupid bankers, they are saved from ruin.
Report: Digital police radio reaches only 3 KBit/s - insert roaring laughter - People, even GPRS is faster, and that wouldn't have required expensive new development. What kind of idiots are sitting at the decision-making tables? And which providers are so brazenly stupid to pull off such a stunt with taxpayer money? I mean, it takes two to tango - the dumb politicians and senior officials who let themselves be fooled - but also the company from the "free market" that has no qualms about ripping off the state for money for junk.
Million blunder: KfW transfer to bankrupt bank Lehman - somehow the bank crash is turning into a blunder crash. I mean, how stupid do you have to be to throw another 300 million at a bankrupt bank? "By accident"? "Technical defect"?
Bund buys back Bundesdruckerei - and why did the complete idiots in Berlin take 8 years to have these security concerns? What was all this nonsense for - apart from pumping huge profits into the coffers of Apax, who got their purchase price back with the refinancing?
Interview: "Öl-Spekulanten sind keine Preistreiber" - "The term 'speculator' is unfortunate. Financial investors enable us to see future expectations in today's prices. They show us that oil is becoming scarce. This way, we can already change our behavior today. Without such future expectations, we might only act from one day to the next." - sure, and burglars only show you weak points in your front door. And if you get shot, that only shows how toxic lead is. Because if we weren't regularly robbed, we might not even know that there are robbers out there. Or what? Who actually makes such talkers into "experts"? According to this windbag, should we now be grateful to the speculators who artificially inflate prices, or what?
Employers threaten lawsuit against wage supplements - I usually leave blogging for the weekend, but that stupid dog from the employers' association is really barking the last nonsense. Yeah, sure, let's best leave the support for Hartz IV recipients and blow all the money up the ass of the fat cats. I hope the nonsensical lawsuit happens and Karlsruhe shows the parasite its place in society ...
Wallraff exposes malpractices in bread factory - how to make a lot of noise with small bread rolls ...
Shamelessness - "First he fought for workers' rights, soon he will fight exactly these: The change of Transnet CEO Hansen to the railway management raises questions. His behavior during the privatization of the railway also now appears in a different light." - well, with such a workers' representation, you don't need a boss to screw you over anymore.
Was the scrap concrete used in the nuclear power plant? - "Several large buildings in Baden-Württemberg are said to partly consist of inferior concrete, including the interim storage facility of the Neckarwestheim reactor. The Ministry of the Environment sent experts to the interim storage facility last night to investigate the allegations." - uh, yes.
Telekom-Chef sieht Managerbezüge als angemessen an - another one of those blowhards who talk about the responsibility of managers. Where is the responsibility of Ackermann? Where is that of Esser? Where is that of Sommer? What have their alleged responsibilities actually resulted in?
Romanian union criticizes Nokia's "new form of slavery" - yeah, yeah, capitalism makes everything better. Or so. Hey, even Ford knew in the 20s that 40-hour weeks are the maximum and more hours don't bring any productivity gains. But what do today's CEOs care. Whatever can be squeezed out will be squeezed out. Regardless of whether only garbage comes out in the end.
Microsoft prepares to acquire Yahoo - urks. I only use del.icio.us and flickr.com from all the Yahoo clutter - and even those only for my Second Life avatar. But somehow it's probably time to switch.
Post-Konkurrenten klagen gegen den Mindestlohn - even more companies whose only business model is the exploitation and ripping off of employees. Heartless scum that just wants to cash in and then presents itself as the great job creators - unfortunately, work that does not secure survival for a full week makes no sense. And indirectly, these companies are only ripping off the state and thus the taxpayer, but they themselves complain about having to pay taxes. Disgusting.
Railway announces job cuts after agreement with GDL - of course, Mehdorn, the (in relation to the total number of employees at the railway) small number of train drivers who now possibly have a normal working week (yes, more than 40 hours a week is not normal, Henry Ford knew that) and adequate remuneration, they of course pose a great threat to the competitiveness of the state monopoly railway (whose competitors are mostly also financed by municipalities or regions, as hardly any purely private investors can be found in this area). I'm currently trying very hard to figure out where the hell the railway in Germany (and it does run there, and thanks to the tracks it's not necessarily all that far away from it) is under such great competitive pressure that it has to pay so much attention to its competitiveness, so as not to be threatened by the evil train drivers, but certainly this master strategist Mehdorn will be able to explain this to me in a coherent manner. Or he's just talking bullshit. I believe the latter.
Minimum wage dispute: PIN lays off nearly 900 employees - of course has nothing to do with the fact that PIN was not profitable at all, for a long time. And of course has nothing to do with the fact that PIN belongs to the Axel Springer publishing house, which is currently waging a campaign against the minimum wage compromise (which was created between employers and unions!) in the Bild newspaper. Has absolutely nothing to do with it. And whoever believes that, I have a cheap bridge near Brooklyn to sell ...
Apple iPhone in Germany: Waiting for the Court - not that I want to defend T-Mobile greatly. But that Vodafone of all companies is making such a loud fuss is quite embarrassing. After all, they originally wanted to have the iPhone exclusively themselves, but apparently failed across Europe. And now they are complaining about the evil monopolists? What would they have done themselves if they had gotten the contract? Here, only a thwarted "monopolist" is complaining about another's gain.
"Spiegel": Evidence of Power Company Collusion - fits well, as the power companies are just trying to turn the price screw again ...
Is the inflation rate really alarming? - if "economic experts" dismiss the price increase of milk by saying that computers and TVs have become cheaper, then I'm not surprised at the miserable state of our society anymore. How mentally impoverished must one be to actually compare a product that almost everyone buys regularly with something that is rather a rare purchase? With these flimsy arguments, everything has been twisted into a "perfect world" for years. No matter how ridiculous it is upon closer inspection. Experts? Really? Sorry, I call such people blabbermouths.
Dot-com fever stirs sense of déjà vu - it's just Bubble 2.0 after all
Kirch is back on the big stage - because once cheating isn't enough for the DFL.
SWIFT withdraws EU data from easy access by the USA - they say. they plan.
Dolderer back at the top of Denic - one could have had the whole fuss cheaper and with less stress ...
Published email traffic incriminates anti-filesharing service provider - Bock. Gärtner.
Banned By Gaussian - a software company for a product used in the field of theoretical chemistry refuses to sell their package to scientists and institutions working on competing open source solutions. Note, only working on them, not copying anything from the commercial product or similar - it is not a violation of copyrights, but merely that these persons or institutions use or support a software alternative.
Zwangsausschluss von Aktionären verfassungsgemäß - well, there politics and the constitutional court pull together - a capitalist - string. Nice how it is suggested to major shareholders that it is a corporate participation and not a capital investment - in times when financial investors, for pure capital interests, strip mid-sized companies, such an idea is simply laughable.
Yahoo shareholders reject human rights proposals - "The shareholders of the internet service provider Yahoo have followed the board's recommendations and rejected two proposals at their annual general meeting (PDF file) that were intended to push the company towards greater human rights engagement. The proposals, supported by Amnesty International, demanded, on the one hand, resistance against censorship efforts in countries like China and, on the other hand, the establishment of a company-internal committee for human rights." - it's all about money, not about rights or the consequences of one's own greed. They just sell out dissidents to the governments of the countries where they smell big money. Doesn't matter, they're not shareholders.
Media-Saturn parts ways with lawyer Steinhöfel - "The new head of the company, Roland Weise, is concerned about a better image in the public eye and towards the competition."
Warner raises the stakes in EMI offer - Kids, don't mess up the DRM-free music with this nonsense.
100-Dollar-Laptop: Negroponte sharply criticizes Intel - with good reason. The way business is being attempted there is outrageous. This is probably the biggest danger for OLPC: the arrogance and selfishness of the capital-driven society of the rich countries.
Deutsche Telekom bids farewell to T-Com brand - one builds a brand for a lot of money. Then one crushes it and introduces another brand that again swallows money for advertising measures. At the same time, one wants to pay the service employees less money for more hours. So that one can squander more money on nonsensical marketing measures? The monkey dance that the Telekom is currently performing is simply ridiculous.
Friday 20 - It's about almost everything - why the Deutsche Telekom strike is more than just an attempt to save the company's employees. Much more.
Google buys DoubleClick - and how does that fit with "don't be evil"? DoubleClick is indeed the epitome of data snooping in the online advertising market.
Siemens manager spills the beans in corruption scandal - by the way, Siemens (yes, yes, ok, a subsidiary, namely SBS) has just received the contract for operating the new communication system of the Bundeswehr. Even the majority in the operating company for the project.