A Fix To The Global Slowdown - War is not the answer

Nobody wants to say it, because nobody wants to be the bad man. No one wants to utter the solution that humans have always resorted to whenever it came to systematic risk to the foundation of their economies. Yes, no one wants to shout out the three letter word: War. The number of "legitimate" insane politicians is in decline folks and the rest of the leaders have polished up their acts. So unfortunatelly this time around we can't wait for another Hitler to rally the world to another hopeless cause like "ruling the world", well because... there aren't many of them.

War tradionally creates this bust and boom wave and does two things efficiently. Kill half the population and creates millionaires that ride out the "recovery". It is sad that humans can't get passed our simple animalistic instincts.
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Ubiquitous Symbols

This is an excellent article about India's competition for the best design for its currency: the Rupee. It got me, of course, to investigate the origing of the other ubiquitous symbols such as the "$", "£", "€" and of course , the "@"

Interesting little sniplets!

Egypt and the Global Meltdown

The einsteins at the IMF believe that the world is going to contract this year (no shit, I thought that we are going to be allright this year). Ireland is contracting at least by 6% and Brazil contracted by 3.4% in the last Q08. Malysia is spending $15Bn and what are we doing? a $2.7Bn package. Me and you know how they are going to put this together!

The Gated Internet

Here is a trend for you that I would not have thought remotely possible. A recent Nielsen report found that people in the UK are spending more time on Social Networking sites than EMAIL?

More interestingly, the report found that a quarter of Facebook users are above 50 years old and that the fastest growing age-group is the 35-49 segment! I would have thought that the youngest generation is supplying the growth fuel but it probably means that all youths are already on Facebook and MySpace :-)

You can choose your battles, but wars will be fought!

Face your troubles head on! You can't get away from problems by dodging the bullets. You can convice the shooter to give you time to smoke your last cigarette, but when the moment comes to meet your Maker, nothing will stop that bullet from harming you. You can choose your battles, but wars will be fought! 

The lesson is inspired from reading my new book "Peter the Great" 

2009 - A Year of Change

2009 is a year of change, 2009 is my year of change. With change comes confusion, and a relentless feeling not to change. This is especially true when that change would leave far from our known shores. Change also makes oscillate from one end to the other which inevitably makes us commit error. Mistakes can be avoided, some argue, if we move slowly. Obviously the largest time wasted is seldom lost in change but about deciding and planning the move. The problem is that when we decide to change, that move has to be filled with commitment to the new path and cannot be done half willingly.

Wust El Balad - Egyptian New Wave

This weekend, I discovered Wust El Balad's self titled album. What a wonderful album. It is tight, as they obviously been playing together forever, it is adventurous, bold, a little commercial but still a break from the normal Egyptian music.

 This is the new wave and WeB are definitely the leaders of the pack that includes fantastic breed of bands such as Eftekasat, Nagham Masry, El Door El Awal, Sahara, ... These bands are great, but you can't get WeB tunes out of your head. This is the kind of band that can break major fan bases around the Arab world. They need a world class A&R company and then, they can go places. 

Jay Leno on the Financial Crisis

A classic Leno. I loved the 6th!  read more »

Real Estate Tax Law

A boring stub, but just wanted to document it !

 

The Ministry of Finance announced that the calculation of real estate taxes will begin
by estimating the rental value of both residential and non-residential properties. For
residential properties, 30% of the rental value will be deducted as maintenance fees followed by
EGP6,000 as an exemption per unit, and taxes will be calculated as 10% of the remaining
amount. For non-residential properties, 32% will be deducted as maintenance fees and taxes will
be calculated on the remaining amount. (Al Ahram)

On Being Aware

I cannot stress the importance of one being

a

w

a

r

e

It is probably the best advice anyone could give on how to start being successful

"Know Thyself" 

Yes, and don't forget to aim high, life is too short for modest ambition! 

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