binarray2000

* Gawda and Leffler are obviously hackers. Pretty good ones: Out-program the competition and get more performance (transactions) out of a smaller computer system than their larger competitor who has a much larger (and more expensive) system.

* CEO Rosen has realized that "ticketing isn't about the bands or the fans, it's about the venues". Thus, they have protected the essence of their business, their customer - the venues - by signing long term contracts with them. Bands and fans come and go, venues are here to stay (and be served).

* They have installed right CEOs throughout the decades: In the beginning the already mentioned Rosen who has set the right agenda, "cutthroat" Azoff who has led them thru the major merger and DOJ negotiations and Hubbard who says that he "can't turn on a dime like a startup" but is willing to change when major change is necessary.

* Never change the running system. Yes it isn't the system that fans (and bands) want but it is able to stand their rush like no other. Great quote from Andrew Dreskin, Ticketfly’s CEO and cofounder "A large-scale concert on sale is, in essence, a denial-of-service attack".

* I, once again, am reminded of the following principle: It's not the innovation that wins, it's the leverage. If the innovation IS the leverage then innovate. If it's not, what is it? In the beginning, Ticketmaster was innovative with (ironically) their computer system. While they still use it as leverage, they in the mean time have another, much bigger one: Ties with major venues.

Indeed, enough... we don't want to be remembered anymore that he would advise us to save money in good times so we can spend it when the times get bad. And we're spending it in both good and bad times.

Favorite quote: "Incubation is a business of stupidity. If we don’t feel stupid, we’re not pushing ourselves hard enough."

JS is a new Flash? Joking aside, it's impressive what you can do in 1k JS. And, let's hope all browsers will start to utilize the GPU as MS has demonstrated in the IE9 preview.

1. Until there is real analysis of the ground you cannot predict its size and value.

2. There's still a problem of how to export all that minerals from Afghanistan. Even with peaceful and unarmed population, the country doesn't have any notable infrastructure (trains, harbor), many of those areas are in mountains etc.

1. Yes, the "products" of the three industries (Films, Books, Music) with low(er) sales are transferable. But that has only become the case in the last 10-15 years. Prior to that it was harder (with movies and music: both being distributed on different media) or even impossible (books: being distributed on paper only; not counting audio-books) to separate content and media. Yet, over decades these industries have done everything to protect themselves.

2. If you try to copy the way some software works (by re-writing it) you can get sued. Damocles sword is always hanging above your head.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1984_(advertisement)

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=623823 for the discussion

On the level of your personal contacts, when you start up, you'll mostly not be (morally for example) supported in your intent by your family, friends, peers. Most Germans want a secure job, working hours from nine-to-five, their (circa) 30 (working) days vacations etc. And will most likely aim for that (or eventually fall into the safety-net of the social state) than risk starting their own business.

Second problem is your future: If you start a company and it fails many doors will be (in many cases firmly) closed afterwards making it harder and harder with every failure for you to start again.

I'd say that a safety-net everywhere (!) isn't good. Because, when you put safety-net everywhere, everything becomes overregulated. Favorite joke in Germany is that, because most garages don’t have windows and laws forbid working environments without windows, Apple, Hewlett-Packard and many other garage start-ups wouldn't be possible.

   H2O does it again.........!!!

   Although everybody thought that Syncrosoft and Steinberg
   had found the ultimate protection, we prove otherwise.

   We admit that it's getting harder and harder to do and
   this one may possibly be the last one we do.

   Due to the complex nature of the protection we thought
   of approaching it from another direction.

   The Emulation is now done on driver-level, which means
   that the Emu essentially mimics a dongle, look in the
   License Control Center to view the applications the Emu
   supports. By writing the Emu at driver-level we probably
   went beyond cracking an application. The amount of
   effort invested in this project is staggering, estimated
   at over 1500 manhours during cracking, developing &
   testing, and probably will never be done again.

   (...)

   Note to protection coders:
   Unbelievable way you transform an application. We
   estimate that between 30% & 40% of the application are
   wrapped in the script protection. Protection is one
   thing but this surely effects an application
   performance. You probably could get a performance gain
   of 50% without the protection!!

   Note to Steinberg/End-Users:
   It seems that our prior Release Note stirred something
   in the Audio Community (Yes, we can read). To get some
   of the facts straight we're going to reveal some
   secrets about the copy protection itself, and why we
   stated that it severely impacts performance.

   Info from Syncrosoft website:
   [QUOTE] "Syncrosoft's protection solution is different
   from mainstream software copy protection methods. It is
   based on a secure executer, the eLicenser, and the
   patented MCFACT technology"
   "At runtime, the transformed program code does not
   reveal its semantics. The eLicenser's crypto-services
   are called from time to time by the transformed program
   code."
   "The transformed program code is represented as tables
   in the computers memory. An adversary can not reverse-
   engineer or debug the tables, because a reverse
   transformation from the tables to original program code
   is not feasible. If the tables are manipulated, the
   transformed program code will crash or produce invalid
   results."[ENDQUOTE]

   So it's not crackable?...

   Now here is the explanation for what really goes on:
   Transformation is based on replacing ordinary machine
   code into tables representing results from calculations

   Example: Adding 2 numbers.

   Normal machine-code would look something like:

   Add eax, ebx

   This will take 1 CPU cycle to execute.

   Now comes MCFACT:

   1) Transform the first number into a table
   2) Transform the second number into a table
   3) Do allot of manipulation of these tables
   4) More manipulation
   5) Transform the Tables back to the numbers
   6) Add the 2 numbers

   This entire piece takes up hundreds of machine code
   lines and a lot of loops inside this code...estimated
   CPU-cycles <insert number greater than 1 here> No
   performance loss? We don't think so..........

   And this code runs all the time!!......The dongle in
   fact is only called 1 out of 10 times inside these
   scripts.........

   A good example is the protection build in the midi-
   part. This is entirely wrapped in the script-crap. Try
   moving a note and swirl it around.....you should notice
   a sluggishness in the movement.

   In fact u will notice an improvement in version 3.1
   prior to the 3.0 release. This is not due to
   improvements made by Steinberg (the midi-engine is
   still the same) but improvements made by Syncrosoft!
   (They optimized the script engine)!!!!!!!

   To give the end user some peace of mind: the scripts
   aren't built into the real-time audio-engine.....this
   is impossible because of the performance loss u would
   have from the MCFACT.

Why wait for the future... six months ago there was an affair regarding BND (German CIA) and Kosovo and this is what the German daily newspaper "Die Welt" writes about it. BTW, "Die Welt" is probably the most conservative newspaper in Germany and its reporting is actually quite pro-Kosovo-oriented. The subtitle "An act of revenge?" is most interesting for this discussion:

http://www.welt.de/english-news/article2806537/German-spy-af...

http://www.popsci.com/scitech/article/2008-12/why-does-war-b...

I suppose, the same (proportion of ~ 51:49) would happen in China despite birth control. The real problem is "Female Infanticide", due to bias in many "patriarchal" societies towards women as being somewhat inferior to men.

Consider this statement: "Highly skilled migration into Europe increases our competitiveness and economic growth," said Jacques Barrot, the EU's justice and home affairs commissioner. "Such migrants are always welcome in the EU."

But then you read "Those approved under the visa would also be offered wages at least 1.5 times more than the average gross annual salary in the country they will work in." Further, in no article concerning this topic could I find if someone can actually become a permanent resident and even a citizen of some EU country.

Let's face it, (almost) no employer (no matter if we are in recession or not) will pay that much (would you?). And (almost) no employee will be ready to live in uncertainty, from one visa renewal to the next one (would you?). But, that's how it should be: Voters should be sure that "immigrants will not take their jobs" and politicians can tell to the businesses "we are doing something".

If you are facing this problem "The EU's working-age population will shrink by more than 50 million by 2050, and many officials say only a steady influx of newcomers will offset the impact of low birth rates and an aging population." your laws must be more inviting.

One sentence from that paragraph "If you cannot bring fresh ideas, energy, and skill to a business--any business--then it will not succeed." perfectly describes what makes or breaks every entrepreneur (and her/his business). He probably reminded a few people who have "fresh ideas, energy, and skill" that there is another path to being an entrepreneur (taking over a company).

And it's the path taken by quite a few people. Warren Buffett (according to Wikipedia, Berkshire Hathaway - a textile manufacturing company - was in trouble before Buffett) comes to mind. Another example (especially for the last sentence: "Don’t worry about what the business does in terms of revenue right now; look at it as a start--a platform that over time can be morphed into what ever you want.") is Martin Sorrell (WPP, the largest advertising network was, prior to Sorrell, "Wire and Plastic Products plc" and made wire shopping baskets).

PS - Kudos to the OP, great blog that I didn't know of even though I visit and read inc.com quite often.

It doesn't mean "go home!", it's much subtler. But it surely does NOT show "interested in you, your life and your background".

> Germans probably don't expect that other people like it there.

(Danke für die Vorlage) If you live abroad a quick test for you: Imagine, in the country where you live, you get asked the same question(s)? How would you feel? And then (on the top of that) one of the natives even says we "don't expect that you like it here". Quite subtle...

Not a few of those who asked me that question (or the version you quoted) have lived in other countries and are otherwise open minded. Still, probably subconsciously, they see someone (even if s/he's white) as some kind of different person. Yes, US/CAN/AUS are different and that's why their birthrate is sinking but it will not get negative in the coming decades.