NBC Nightly News now available on the Internets

Brian Williams just announced on the broadcast that starting Monday, NBC Nightly News will become the first national newscast to be available in its entirety over the web. Every evening starting at 10pm Eastern, the broadcast will be available to Internet viewers, with Internet commercials replacing broadcast commercials.

I am the only person I know in the "below 30" category that regularly watches one of the "Big 3" newscasts and I think this is a big step by the broadcast news industry in its attempt to reach out to younger viewers. The move will "unhinge" viewers from either having to either be home at 6:30 or set the VCR to tape. Waiting until 10pm to stream the broadcast also resolves concerns on the part of the affiliates that the web will cannibalize the local stations.

Dole Kemp ninety six!

One of the things I like about being on a college campus is the variety of speakers that regularly come to campus. After my strategery class today I went to Dey Hall where former Republican Vice Presidential candidate Jack Kemp gave a talk on revitalizing America’s cities. His talk was the standard "in praise of low taxes and less government regulation" talk he’s been giving for the past fifteen years. He referred to Hong Kong as an "anti-poverty machine," citing it as an example of how an environment of low taxes results in wealth creation.

I had with me my copy of Trusting the People. The book had been autographed by Bob Dole during a New Jersey rally in 1996 where I elbowed my way to the front of the crowd after the stump speech. As the Senator walked by, I waved the book in front of him, he grabbed it, reached for his pen while a Secret Service agent held the book open, and signed on the first page. After today’s talk I introduced myself to the former Congressman and he autographed the book as well.

So now my copy of Trusting the People has a the first page with "B. Dole" in the middle and "from Jack Kemp (old #15)" toward the bottom. It’s going to be quite a collector’s item.

Thoughts on Rosa Parks

One of my dearest readers pointed out that I have neglected to comment on the passing of Rosa Parks and her special place in American history. While most Americans will place her alongside Dr. King as an important catalyst of the civil rights movement, the person that comes to my mind when I think of her is someone name Jeannette Rankin.

 

Jeannette Rankin was the first woman elected to the House of Representatives. She was also an extreme pacifist and voted against the resolution to enter World War I. She served for only one term but spent the next twenty years active in the political process. She was elected to Congress once again in 1940 and the following year, she cemented her place in history as the only member of Congress to have voted against America’s declaration of war against Japan following the attack on Pearl Harbor.

 

Both women shared the courage to go against doing what they were expected to do. Both also lived into their nineties.

Turning once again to Ebay

This past week I once again was asked to shell out major bucks for something I don't particularly care for, something that will go unused, and will become completely obsolete after about seven weeks or so.

I had to buy textbooks.

I tried to be smart this time by not buying any of the optional ones. I figured since I don't even do all the required work, I am not going to do any optional work! I found a couple of deals on Ebay. The local bookstore sells used copies of the marketing textbook used for $105. I got a copy (a softcover internaional edition) on Ebay for $35 (all Ebay prices include shipping). For operations, there is a novel we have to read that the store sells used for around $15, some enterprising second years are hawking theirs for $10, I got mine on Ebay for $4.25. Unfortunately I was unable to replicate my success with our strategery class. The textbook for which is a brand new fifth edition that sells for $57 and second years are pricing their used fourth editions for $35. I figured I may as well buy the new one since we used this text for another class down the line.

Watch me next year as I try to sell some of these books to the next first year class at prices higher than what I bought them for! ;)

Reporting from inside the "MBA Bubble"

One of the things that I am still getting used to is how when you're in an MBA program (or any other type of graduate school with an intense amount of work load), your work load is such that you stop paying attention to the news and other stuff happeninng around you.

This past Wednesday morning I was studying when I looked at the web at around 1am and saw that the White Sox had won the World Series. My initial reaction was that I was not even aware they (is that the appropriate pronoun when referring to a sports team or should the word be "it") was in the World Series. Then yesterday I was talking to some students and they were completely unaware of the indictments (or even of the surrounding controversy) handed out in Washington yesterday morning. Then this morning I watched the tape of this past week's Apprentice and was completely blown away by the ending in which all four contestants in the boardroom were fired (since no one from the boardroom got to go back to the suites, I wonder how the folks in the suites will find out who got fired in the beginning of next week's episode).

this is one of the unfortunate realities of being in graduate school.

In the wee small hours of the morning

Fifteen percent of my marketing grade will be decided in the next few hours as I compose a 750 word write up of HBS 9-596-036, better known to MBA students as the Land Rover North America case. 750 words is really not a lot, a year ago this month I was getting started on my Darden application essays and one of them was to write my life story in 500 words or less.

In the past I have always been confused about the Land Rover/ Range Rover brand, not certain as to which is the name of the brand (ie Ford) and which is the name of the model (ie Five Hundred). After spending the past three hours reading, I now know better. By tomorrow I should be able to tell you anything you would ever want to know about the difference between the Range Rover and the Discovery.

Dressing appropriately for the occasion

One thing you learn in business school is the importance of presentation, and often this means wearing the right gear for the event you plan on attending. Currently, I am having trouble figuring out what to dress up as for the MBA Halloween party tomorrow night. Making matters more complicated, I will be going striaght there from an Intervarsity meeting where the guest speaker will be the most popular professor at UVA. I can just imagine Ken Elzinga asking me "what are you up to here at Chapel Hill" as I am standing there in front of him in my clown suit holding a batch of balloons and a clown noisemaker.

This morning I put on a costume of a different sort. I dressed up for a lunchtime workshop put up by a big name consulting firm that had a recruiting presentation last night. Not having time to iron my semi-wrinkled shirt, I put on a blazer to cover up some of the imperfections. Unfortunately all this work was in vain for the recruiters from the firm did not show and had not bothered to inform the Office of Careers Services ahead of time.