Power in contract law typically refers to the bargaining strength of each contracting party in relation to the other. In assessing the relative bargaining power of each party, courts and commentators often consider factors specific to the parties, such as socio-economic status and education level. In this Essay, I suggest another factor that affects the power of the parties in negotiating or modifying their agreement, one that I refer to as the “background law.” The background law is the substantive law that governs the subject matter of the contract. This Essay focuses specifically on the background law of copyrights and the way it alters and affects the allocation of power between contracting parties. In certain circumstances, the background law of copyright has the potential to create or exacerbate two kinds of power imbalance—knowledge power and market power.

In this Essay, “knowledge power” refers to the advantage that a superior understanding of the background law confers upon a contracting party. I use the term “market power” to refer to the ability of a contracting party to establish and dictate business norms in a particular segment of the economy or within a particular industry. This Essay focuses on three bargaining pairs in order to explore how copyright law as background law can create knowledge and market power imbalances:  (1) independent artist and hiring party, (2) employee and employer, and (3) software company and consumer. The first two bargaining pairs involve the work-made-for-hire doctrine. The third bargaining pair involves innovative contracting forms and the freedom to contract.

Part I examines knowledge power imbalances using as examples the first two bargaining pairs. Part II analyzes market power imbalances using as an example the third bargaining pair. A recent New York Times article discusses one of the bargaining pairs analyzed in my Essay, that of an academic employee and an educational institution employer. As the Internet provides a new marketplace for teaching materials that previously had no market value, it makes the issue of who owns academic work more important. As the NYT points out, “The marketplace for educational tips and tricks is too new to have generated policies or guidelines in most places.” The background law of copyright, however, may act as a contractual gap filler in favor of the school district employer.

Article Author: Nancy S. Kim

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Hello Friends here we come up with the Latest Agri Commodities updates from various parts of the country.

Govt Decides Against Rice Imports

Govt decides against rice imports:

In a calculated move to signal categorically to the world market that India was not in a desperate situation with respect to rice, the government said on Friday that it will not import rice for now.

The immediate implication of this move is that retail prices of rice, up 15 per cent over last year, will remain firm at least until early next year.

Rice output is estimated to have dropped 15 million tonnes due to poor monsoons this kharif.

The government has, over the last two days, put in place strictures that will force traders to report purchases of more than 10,000 tonnes of rice in a bid to check prices.

Punjab has also imposed stock holding limits on traders and millers for both rice and pulses.

In Other major Commodities Updates we can see how Government has bowed down to demands of Farmers after their mass protest in capital this week.

Government to amend new sugarcane price rule:

The government on Friday said it would amend a new sugarcane pricing rule, bowing to protests held in the capital by farmers demanding higher prices for their produce.

The government would delete the contentious part of the new cane pricing rule, Railways Minister Mamata Banerjee told reporters after a meeting of senior ministers.

Cane farmers believe the new cane price rule, which puts the onus on state governments if they decide to raise the cane floor rates fixed by the federal government, will curtail their bargaining power.

Earlier, Farmers from Uttar Pradesh (UP) state in northern India, which produces almost half of the country’s cane, have been on warpath for about three weeks to press for higher prices, forcing Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to consider changes in fixing cane prices.

Note : For More Latest Industry, Stock Market and Economy News and Updates, please Click Here

Porter’s 5 forces analysis is a framework for the industry analysis and business strategy development developed by Michael E. Porter of Harvard Business School in 1979. In this post I will investigate the strategic impact of my chosen case-study ‘MotelRocks.com‘ in each of these ‘five force’ areas.

In 2001, Porter published Porter, M., (2001) Strategy and the Internet, Harvard Business Review, March, pp.62-78, where the five forces model was updated to take account of the impact of the Internet. This update will allow us to take a more relevant approach upon investigating our ‘e-store’.

The first force ‘The threat of substitute products and services‘, this entails the existence of a close subsitute product, which may increase the propensity of customers to switch to alternatives. Motel’s sole product is Clothing. There are an uncountable amount of clothing web-stores online, but what makes Motel so appealing is that it uses it’s own unique designs which are, at this time, incomparable to the fashion of any other online clothing store. For this reason, I believe the integrity of Motel’s product is yet to be under major threat of a substitute, but fashion as an ever-changing medium, means it’s originality may well come under threat at any given time.

The second force is ‘The threat of the entry of new competitors‘. Essentially, a successful market will continuously draw in new firms or companies. As the amount of competing companies in a market grows, the resultant is effectively decreasing the profitability of the market. Motel itself could be described as a ‘new competitor’, until recently it relied solely on real world sales. Upon moving it’s store online, Motel has been pushed into the global market. Unlike in the ‘real world’, online stores do not need to build their reputation on hundreds of years of quality service and a name you can trust. The internet breaks down all barriers, and for this reason Motel has fast become established in the online fashion world, becomming a noted danger to it’s longer established rivals. This fast impact just would not be possible outside of the online world.

The third force is ‘The intensity of competitive rivalry‘. Industry competitiveness can be aggressive, whether through competing prices, or competing designs. In the real world, realistically, you need only compete with the firms contained in your own city. The internet is a global village. Every city, in every country around the world becomes your competitor. Although i’ve described Motel’s breakthrough into the global market as a positive, it also has a negative side. Motel has gone from having, what I would imagine as no main rivals, to coming up against every clothing store on the web. Despite having a somewhat original product design, it still needs to maintain competitive pricing, hard hitting marketing and work on developing a solid customer following, if it ever wishes to develop a firm standing in it’s industry.

The fourth force ‘The bargaining power of customers/buyers‘. In an online market the bargaining power of customers or buyers, is vastly increased to that of customers in the ‘real world’. Due to the ease of access, and competitiveness of e-stores, customers have a much wider choice, causing prices to be driven down. In the case of Motel, having a product that is described as relatively unique in the fashion world, gives them a slight edge over other competitors, most of which produce generic and widely available clothing, leaving them to be forced into aggressive industry competitiveness.  There isn’t as much demand on Motel to decrease their prices to a competitive level at this time, if customers want a Motel product, it will not be available any where else, and so customers have less bargaining power over the price.

The fifth and final force is ‘The bargaining power of suppliers‘. Outside of the internet, suppliers hold a sufficient amount of power over a company, in some cases being able to charge extortionate prices for unique resources. Similarly to the bargaining power of customers, internet suppliers are now vastly affected by the wider choice, increased commodification and competitiveness of the online world. Companies no longer need to rely on one supplier, but can choose the one best suited to their own needs.  The majority of Motel’s clothing is made from 100% cotton, this is not a rare raw material, and although we can’t be certain of Motel’s own supplier agreement, it would be safe to assume they are benefiting from the compeitiveness of online suppliers.

This story from the New York Times piqued my interest and has got my pondering the international transferability of a potentially profitable business idea.

The brainchild in question utilises social networking and web-based communities to build consumer bargaining power in negotiating cheap deals with retailers.  Now that in itself is not a particularly new idea, as buying clubs have existing before both online and off.

But this time round the business (here it is a mob called Groupon) focuses on using scale (and thus the promise of considerable bump-ups in customer traffic) to win over smaller scale suppliers of products and, increasingly, services.

This coalition building on both sides of the buy-sell equation helps to shift this intermediated relationship from one of virtual bullying (i.e. “If you all back me, I’ll go and squeeze every last penny out that nasty retailer/supplier by playing them off against their hapless competitors”) to almost an altruistic act of matchmaking and local boosterism (“Let’s all hang out and help out that nice new entrepreneur down the road build up some clientele… but at a group discount”).

In a world of Facebooking, Tweeting and web-based micro-entrepreneurs, how long until someone starts knocking on doors around Melbourne promising such love-ins?

(I eagerly await a comment now telling me of such a start-up).

Students from my Strategic Management classes (and those taught by my colleague Tom), will be familiar (if not sick of) the champagne example we use to illustrate and explore the Five Forces framework.

We spend quite a bit of time trying to untangle that likely dynamics of the relationship between the numerous (but geographically confined) growers and the champagne houses who transform their grapes into the bubbly bottled stuff.

This recent piece in The Economist sheds some light on the recent state of affairs. Faced with a recent slump in demand for their product, the champagne-makers have been stockpiling output, and are now bargaining fiercely with the growers (seeking effectively a 50% cut in prices in the upcoming round of contract negotiations). Faced with such a situation, growers’ profits can only be hurt (with a commensurate boon for the makers).

Alan Hansen, ex-Liverpool soccer player and current BBC pundit expresses his interpretation on a situation currently affecting Everton here.

Manchester City, North-West rivals of Everton and recent beneficiaries of Middle-East wealth beyond imagination, have publicly pursued Everton defender Joleon Lescott. Lescott has been settled at Everton, a good solid team who perform just behind the ‘big four’ in English soccer, and compete in Europe in the coming season.

Yet Manchester City, who won’t be competing in Europe this season, are proving to be too strong an attracting force for Lescott. Rumours are that City will double Lescott’s salary, and a player at the age of 27 (footballers tend to last until their early to mid-30s) would surely jump at an opportunity at this stage of his career to double his money.

Hansen also suggests that the current impasse (Everton unwilling to sell, Lescott contracted) is indicative of the current state of player power in the English Premiership. Twenty years ago a player would have had little say in the matter and would have had to carry on playing at Everton – power was with the clubs. Now, Lescott supposedly has much more power.

The essential difference is that now, once Lescott’s contract is up, he can leave Everton without Everton receiving a fee, whereas in the past, any club seeking to buy Lescott even after his contract had expired would have to pay Everton a fee. Which is what makes Everton’s situation weaker since they will lose the player without compensation eventually, but they could cash in right now.

The upshot of the furore, short term, Hansen also reports, is that Everton were in disarray on the opening day of the Premiership season last Saturday, and were thrashed 6-1 at their own stadium by a rampant Arsenal.

Most girls want a man with the bling-bling
Got my own thing, got the ching-ching
I just want real love
Most girls want a man with the mean green
Don’t wanna dance if he can’t be
Everything that I dream of
A man that understands real love

Diriku mauk kasi motivasi di acara beauty class yang temanya THE BEAUTY IS YOU, terimakasih  ya Alloh waktu browsing maming kemaren diriku nemuin artikel ini jadi bisa buat bahan motivasi.

Baca nyoooooooooook…

Seorang wanita memposting sebuah pertanyaan melalui sebuah forum terkenal dengan bertanya:

“Apakah yang harus saya lakukan untuk dapat menikah dengan pria kaya?”

Saya akan jujur dengan apa yang aku katakan. Usia saya 25tahun. Saya sangat cantik, bergaya dan memiliki selera yang tinggi. Saya berharap menikah dengan pria kaya dengan penghasilan pertahun $500 ribu (+/-Rp.5,5M) atau lebih.

Anda mungkin akan berkata kalau saya termasuk perempuan materialistis, tapi kelompok berpenghasilan sampai dengan $ 1 juta pun masih termasuk kelas menengah di New York.

Permintaan saya tidak setinggi itu. Adakah pria di forum ini yang berpenghasilan $ 500 ribu per tahun? Apakah Anda semua telah menikah? Saya ingin bertanya apa yang harus aku lakukan untuk dapat menikah dengan orang2 seperti Anda?

Di antara pria yang telah berpacaran denganku, yang terkaya hanya berpenghasilan $ 250 ribu dan kelihatannya ini batas tertinggi yang pernah saya capai. Jika seseorang ingin pindah ke perumahan mewah di wilayah barat New York City Garden , penghasilan $250 ribu tentu tidak cukup.

Beberapa hal yang ingin saya tanyakan:
1.         Dimanakah kebanyakan para pria kaya bertemu & berkumpul? Mohon nama dan alamat    bar,  restauran dan gym yang sering dikunjungi.
2.         Rentang usia berapakah yang dapat memenuhi criteria saya?
3.         Kenapa wajah istri-istri orang kaya hanya terkesan biasa-biasa saja? Saya telah bertemu     dengan beberapa gadis yang tidak cantik dan kurang menarik, tapi mereka bias menikah        dengan pria kaya.
4.         Apa pertimbangan Anda dalam menentukan istri dan siapakah yang bisa menjadi pacar    Anda?

Terus terang, tujuan saya sekarang adalah untuk menikah.

Terimakasih,

Gadis Jelita

Dan inilah jawaban dari seorang ahli keuangan dari Wall Street Financial

Dear Gadis Jelita,

Saya membaca email anda dengan sangat antusias. Saya yakin sebenarnya banyak gadis2 yang memiliki pertanyaan senada dengan Anda. Ijinkan saya untuk menganalisa situasi Anda dari sudut pandang investor profesional .

Penghasilan tahunan saya lebih dari $ 500 ribu yang tentu memenuhi kriteria Anda.Jadi, saya harap setiap orang percaya bahwa jawaban saya cukup kredibel dan tidak membuang waktu. Dari sudut pandang seorang pebisnis, menikah dengan Anda adalah keputusan yang buruk.

Jawabannya sangat sederhana dan akan saya jelaskan.

Kesampingkan dulu detil-detil yang Anda tanyakan.Sebenarnya apa yang ingin Anda lakukan adalah pertukaran antara “kecantikan” dan “uang”.

Si A akan menyediakan kecantikan dan si B akan membayar untuk itu. Kelihatannya adil dan cukup wajar.. Tapi ada permasalahan fatal di sini. Kecantikan Anda akan sirna, tapi uang saya tidak akan hilang tanpa alasan yang jelas.

Faktanya adalah penghasilan saya mungkin akan meningkat dari tahun ke tahun. Tapi, Anda tidak akan bertambah cantik tiap tahunnya.Karena itu dari sudut pandang ekonomi: saya adalah aset yangter-apresiasi sedangkan Anda adalah aset yangter-depresiasi.

Depresiasi yang Anda alami bukan depresiasi normal, tapi depresiasi eksponensial. Jika hanya ini asset Anda, nilai Anda akan sangat mencemaskan 10 tahun kemudian.

Dengan menggunakan istilah yang kami gunakan di Wall Street, setiap perdagangan memiliki sebuah posisi. Berpacaran dengan Anda juga memiliki “posisi perdagangan” . Jika nilai aset yang didagangkan menurun, maka kami akan menjualnya. Bukan ide yang baik untuk mempertahankannya. Begitu juga dengan pernikahan yang Anda inginkan.

Saya sangat kejam untuk berkata seperti ini, tapi untuk membuat keputusan bijak, aset yang menurun nilainya akan dijual atau disewakan.

Pria dengan penghasilan $ 500 ribu tentu bukan orang bodoh. Kami hanya akan berpacaran dengan Anda, tapi tidak akan menikahi Anda.

Saran saya lupakan mencari petunjuk bagaimana cara menikahi pria kaya. Usahakan agar Anda dapat membuat diri Anda kaya dengan berpenghasilan $ 500 ribu, lebih berpeluang ketimbang mencari pria kaya yang bodoh.

Semoga jawaban
saya dapat membantu

Tertanda,
JP Morgan

diriku shocking soda baca ini artikel, duileeee masa’ seeeee ckckckckckckc cuit cuit petok petok. Makhluk berburung udah pada nyerdas dikit yak..

sayang nya lelaki dengan penghasilan Rp. 5,5 MILIAR per taun a.k.a yang cara mikir nya uduk bisa dikasi jempol 4 ampe kaqi kudu di angkat jangan lupa rok nya diangkat juga ahahahah, lelaki yang begitu ntu masi kaum minoritas apalagi di negri kuh Indonesia Raya,

Yang Artinya,,, dirimu wanita..??? ayoooo..!!! angkat rok mu en kuras kantong makhluk berburung..!!!!!!!! ahahahaha astapilohhhhhhhhh jangan ditiru yak.

Diriku nyerdas dikitttttt :

Kali aja ada pemirsa yang butuh sedikit penjelasan kata2

• depresiasi artinye penyusutan, siape teuk ada pemirsa yang engga mudeng, apresiasi ya sebaliknya,,
• eksponensial arinye berpangkat

intinya, eh wanita hayuk lha kita sama2 ngebuat bargaining power kita jadi nyata. Kesian ama R.A Kartini en Dewi Sartika udah nyusah2 dari jaman bambu runcing masi naek daon biar kita kagak jadi kaum kelas dua.

Sekarang ini Udah kagak jaman lagi prempuan cuantek, nyekseh, rambut nye pirang tapi bloon..!!!!!!

NO more tragedi PARIS HILTON or LEGALLY BLONDE

I never cared too much for love It was all a bunch of mush
That I just did not want Paid was the issue of the day
If my girlfriends got some game Couldn’t be more fly
Getting paid was everything But I’m not every girl
And I don’t need that world to validate me
Cause shorty got a job Shorty got a car
And shorty can pay her own rent
Don’t wanna dance if it’s not in my heart
Most girls want a man with the bling-bling
Got my own thing, got the ching-ching  I just want real love
Most girls want a man with the mean green
Don’t wanna dance if he can’t be
Everything that I dream of  A man that understands real love
I was a girl about the floss It was all about the cost
How much he spent on me? Seek for a man who’s got the means
To be giving you diamond rings
It’s what every fly girl Could want or even dream
But I’m not every girl
And I don’t need no g to take care of me
Cause shorty got a job Shorty got a car
And shorty can pay her own rent
Don’t wanna dance if it’s not in my heart, no no
And I’m not every girl
And I don’t need no g to take care of me, no
Cause shorty got a job Shorty got a car
And shorty can pay her own rent
Don’t wanna dance if it’s not in my heart

The strategic manoeuvring in the Australian beer market continues. Our most successful supermarket chain, Woolworths, just bought 25 percent of listed Western Australian micro-brewer Gage Roads.

Woollies own the most successful big-box alcohol retail chain in the country – Dan Murphy’s – plus several other liquor chains, and a very large pub business. Shoring up some supply in the fastest growing segment of the beer market – boutique beers – certainly makes some sense.

Owning (or at least having a very strong say in the operations of) one growing brand may give Woolworths even more bargaining power versus any other brands that establish strong recognition in this market (i.e. “look, if you won’t drop your prices to us, we’ll just stock more Gage Roads”…).

The announcement to the market about the purchase indicated that Gage Roads would “contract brew” 350,000 cases a year for Woolworths. That equates to 6.3m litres. The brewery’s website claims they currently have the capacity for “3.5 million litres per annum, scalable to 7 million”. Clearly Woolworths are buying pretty much the whole lot.

This is virtual backward integration by Woolworths. Might we consider the Gage Roads brands simply as a private label now? Will Wesfarmers reply with a similar move for Coles?  And will Woollies do the same on the East Coast (shipping all that beer across the country might cost them a bit)?

The last couple of days has seen topics of a few previous International BS Blog posts back in the news. In reverse order of when we last spoke about them:

1. The spotlight has been turned on supermarket bargaining power again. Instead of Belgian chain Delhaize, this time its Aussie giant Coles who is squeezing its long-suffering suppliers even more:

“Buyers from Coles have been contacting suppliers to tell them of a 4 per cent increase in trading terms, the percentage of the cost of each item the supplier must pay back to the retailer. For many suppliers, this figure was in the mid-teens but it is being pushed closer to 20 per cent.”

Not a huge surprise in a virtual duopoly, particularly when Coles is under so much more pressure to economise than Woolworths.

2. Australian high-end menswear fashion house, Herringbone has been rescued by a German suitor. As we noted back in December, it is a lot harder to target this segment when incomes are under pressure. van Laack presumably scored these guys at a bargain, another instance of the scope to rationalise (and internationalise) in the current economic crisis.

3. And finally a firm we’ve lauded as the prime mover in the electronics hardware and software retailing pace, JB Hi-Fi has made some waves this week, entering both the ASX100 (i.e. the largest 100 listed firms in Australia by capitalisation) and Australia’s top 20 most valuable brands, both for the first time. Being a highly efficient, low-cost producer in the current climate seems a winning strategy indeed.

I just had an interesting conversation with my boss regarding some candidates we have been seeing from a local company that is having serious struggles.  Many of the candidates that are coming across my desk have no pressing interest or need to leave this company as anyone left within the company has been employed there for many years.  Many candidates are opting to wait for the company to go under or become profitable again, but are sending out feelers to agencies and applying for jobs incase the right opportunity comes along.

In light of this, I pose the following question:  When you are ‘entering the job market’ are you entering the market on your own terms or because you have to?

This is an important question to consider because there is a big difference between those who enter the job market on their own terms or those that are forced into the market.  This is especially true in today’s employment market, as the supply of people exceeds the demand needed and the supply is increasing week by week. 

If you are searching for a job while you are still employed you have a bit more ‘bargaining power’ then someone who is not employed.  Now there are always circumstances that lead to layoffs and people taking time off, but there is always a small stereotype that exists when reviewing resumes of candidates who are not working (especially those who have not been working for a while). 

When you are unemployed – you are forced into the market.  This situation can lead to you accepting a position that is not your ideal position, but more importantly it allows the company giving you an offer to make you an offer that is less then your desired salary.  While the company will still give you fair market value, it may be on the lower end since they know you are not working.

If the opposite were true, and you entered the market on your own terms, you are less likely to get that lower offer from a company because you already have something to keep you going.  You are likely to get a salary increase or an equivalent offer because the company issuing the offer needs to give you a reason to leave your current employer.  Offering you less money – more times then not – is not the best way to attract someone to your new company. 

This post is written as a realization that candidates should evaluate their current situation with respect to how stable it is.  If it is not the most stable situation, maybe candidates should consider looking within the market on their own terms, rather then being thrown into the market by a corporate layoff. 

Searching for a position because you would entertain a change is a MUCH different search then searching for a position because you NEED a job.

It is rare that we see public demonstrations of what we verbose academics call the appropriation of quasi-rents. But just such a scenario is playing out in the Belgian retail arena.

In early February Belgian supermarket chain Delhaize (the 33rd largest retailer on Deloitte’s list) ceased stocking around 300 products from Unilever, the world’s 3rd largest fast-moving consumer goods giant (behind Nestlé and P&G). This represents a sizable majority of the 480 products usually stocked (and includes such brands as Dove, Sunsilk and Lipton).

This move springs from Delhaize’s unwillingness to match Unilever’s price demands and also the retailer’s desire to not stock some of Unilever’s less popular brands.

This is exactly the sort of scenario transaction cost economists get all excited about. There are a series of relationship-specific investments in place (in brands and locations) leading to small number bargaining. This means firms are want to hold up the other party in an attempt to extract the quasi-rents from the situation.

Put differently, this is the bargaining power of suppliers/buyers element of Porter’s Five Forces at work.

It is a little unclear who triggered this. Supermarket chains are often chastised for squeezing suppliers and there is a feeling that the current climate is escalating this tendency. On the other side of the equation, giants such as Unilever are typically viewed as less susceptible to such pressures due to the enormous breadth of their offerings. The fact that this breadth is a stumbling block in this standoff is enlightening. Delhaize would seem to be trying to shift the balance.

Currently, the data coming out seems to indicate that Delhaize is been hurt by this decisions with customers showing considerable loyalty to the brands rather than the retailer.

It is worth noting that Delhaize is only pursuing this approach in one national market at the moment, and that market is less than a quarter of their business. Perhaps they are getting some practice (or testing the waters) before trying it on a bigger stage (such as the US which constitutes almost 70% of their sales).

Go To HOME

Telecom products and software service provider Sasken Technologies Ltd may have to look at lowering prices by up to 5 percent in Jan-March quarter, Chairman and CEO Rajiv Mody said on a conference call on Monday.

“We did not have any pricing pressure in the last quarter, but we expect some downward pressure in the quarter starting January,” he said adding some of its top 10 customers are insisting on price cuts.

Recession in India’s key software markets and global turmoil in financial markets has hit the mid-cap IT companies the most as their smaller size gives them less bargaining power with customers while negotiating for contracts.

Its revenue growth this year may be less than 10 percent in dollar terms, Chief Financial Officer Neeta Revankar said on the call. Its net profit for the December quarter doubled to 79 million rupees, it had said earlier on Monday.

In October, the company had said it expected a 10 percent rise in dollar revenue in the current financial year as it did not see much of a slowdown.

The company, which had invested in facilities and technology aimed at the automotive segment, plans to stop further investments in the sector, Mody said.

“We are stopping our investments in the automotive segment, keeping the slowness in the automotive market segment itself and keeping the current environment in perspective”.

Sasken has had capital expenditure of 200 million rupees in the first nine months of this fiscal and does not have plans to make significant investments in the last quarter, Revankar added.

Much has been written over the years about bargaining power issues within the music business. Record labels have consistently been portrayed as exercising an unhealthy level of control over the livelihood of their signed artists. The rock pantheon is littered with tales of bands and songwriters ripped off by the greedy “man behind the desk with the cuban cigars” (as Tim Rogers would put it).

With the big labels’ declining control of recorded music (due to filesharing etc), emerging artists have deemed them less relevant. Artists have some scope to got it alone using myspace and direct contracting with distributors.

It looks like the emergence of the various successful video games built around playing along to your favourite tunes – i.e. Guitar Hero, Rock Band (and their various sequels) – have pushed the power balance further away from the big record labels and towards the musicians themselves.

As this article discusses, the game producers are most interested in dealing with the artists, and the record labels appear to be holding little sway in getting their artists’ tracks on the games. Also, it would appear that most of the bigger royalty streams here (use of image, bandname, and the publishing of what is, in effect, a cover rather than the original recording) reside outside of most artists’ contracts with their record label (i.e. it is the artists and their publishers who are getting much of the cash from this).

So, record labels can only sit around and hope that a band’s presence within the Rock Band playlist might significantly boost record sales. The labels have very little bargaining power with the games companies. As an analyst says in the article:

“There are literally probably 2 million songs out there, and fewer than a 1,000 were used in these two games combined in these last two years…If Warner wants to say we’ll take our 20 percent of the market and go away, a lot of bands are going to leave the label if they think they can get better exposure by being on these games.”

This is another instance where a whole link in the Value Chain has been disrupted by technology and shifting consumer behaviours. The record labels underestimated the impact of digital download technology on their sales. And now they look to have missed the boat on potent promotional tool which they should have had in their arsenal. Watch this space for artists taking back even more control in the future…

http://Consulting.WanHart.com

Tanpa kita sadari ‘negosiasi’ sudah menjadi bagian dari kehidupan sehari hari kita dalam berkomunikasi, baik itu dengan suami, istri, ayah, ibu, teman, kolega dan atasan kita.

Keunggulan cara, gaya, fakta, informasi dan metode berkomunikasi yang efisien dan efektif dalam mendapatkan apa yang kita inginkan dari lawan bicara kita adalah kunci yang utama.

WanHart Consulting akan membagikan dan mendiskusikan cara-cara, gaya-gaya, fakta-fakta, informasi yang relevan dan metode komunikasi untuk mendapatkan hasil negosiasi yang efisien dan efektif.

Cakupan pelatihan Advance Negotiation WanHart Consulting adalah:

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3. Membaca bahasa tubuh dan pesan tersembunyi lawan bicara anda
4. Mengenal MATERI pembicaraan anda
5. Meningkatkan nilai jual anda (increase your bargaining power). Mengurai, menyusun, menampilkan dan menyimpulkan informasi dan materi pembicaraan anda.
6. Menghitung konsekuensi dan antisipasi dari keberhasilan dan kegagalan negosiasi anda
7. Menggunakan Rational (data) dan Emosional (hati) secara seimbang

http://Consulting.WanHart.com

MUDGE’S Musings

Distracting as the events of the day can be, when we get right down to it, the dire rumblings of our deteriorating economic state cannot be deflected for long.

Almost official

Last Thursday, our scholarly if modestly effective Chairman of the Federal Reserve, Ben Bernanke, finally said what he’s been hinting at for months: the economy hasn’t seen the floor yet.

Bernanke warns of worsening economy

By MARTIN CRUTSINGER, AP Economics Writer Thu Feb 14, 11:07 PM ET

WASHINGTON – Using words like “sluggish” and “deteriorated,” Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke gave a starkly pessimistic assessment of the nation’s economy on Thursday and signaled that the Fed will cut interest rate cuts further if needed to combat the adverse effects of a prolonged housing slump and a severe credit crisis.

He stubbornly won’t call this elevator plunge a recession, but his prediction for growth later in the year comes with substantial caveats.

Bernanke said that in his own economic forecast he did not predict a recession but a period of sluggish growth “followed by a somewhat stronger pace of growth starting later this year” as the impacts of the Fed’s rate cuts and the $168 billion economic stimulus package of tax rebates begin to be felt.

However, he also said there were significant downside risks ranging from the threat that the housing slide could become even more severe, the job market could deteriorate more than currently expected or that the credit squeeze will intensify. He said the Fed would be monitoring the economy closely and would “act in a timely manner as needed to support growth and provide adequate insurance against downside risks.”

So, interest rates will plummet further, in an effort to convince lenders to resume lending.

And with all those foreclosures out there, bargains abound.

[Please click the link below for the complete article -- but then please come on back!]

Bernanke warns of worsening economy – Yahoo! News

Why now?

Robert Reich, academic and politician (served as Secretary of Labor in the first Clinton administration), wrote last week in the NYTimes a useful explanation for our present crisis, and why the George III $150billion “rebate” is an inadequate fix.

Totally Spent

By ROBERT B. REICH |Published: February 13, 2008 |Berkeley, Calif.

WE’RE sliding into recession, or worse, and Washington is turning to the normal remedies for economic downturns. But the normal remedies are not likely to work this time, because this isn’t a normal downturn.

The problem lies deeper. It is the culmination of three decades during which American consumers have spent beyond their means. That era is now coming to an end. Consumers have run out of ways to keep the spending binge going.

The only lasting remedy, other than for Americans to accept a lower standard of living and for businesses to adjust to a smaller economy, is to give middle- and lower-income Americans more buying power — and not just temporarily.

Reich’s key point:

The underlying problem has been building for decades. America’s median hourly wage is barely higher than it was 35 years ago, adjusted for inflation. The income of a man in his 30s is now 12 percent below that of a man his age three decades ago. Most of what’s been earned in America since then has gone to the richest 5 percent.

And what the rich spend their money on, remarkably enough, doesn’t stimulate the economy in the way it needs now.

And, he points out that the three ways that American workers compensated for the shortfall have finally come up empty. We sent our wives to work; we work longer hours than most workers in developed countries; we’ve borrowed ourselves into foreclosure.

[Please click the link below for the complete article -- but then please come on back!]

Totally Spent – New York Times

He has some useful ideas for stimulating the economy with a larger tax credit for workers at the bottom.

And, Reich concludes, we need stronger unions (ex-Labor secretary, after all), and easier means to create and join them.

Which brings us to…

Unions: the people who brought you weekends

In the course of researching this post, happened on a quirkily interesting blog not previously encountered, The Politics of Debt, a new member of our blogroll.

By Franklin in Economics, Economy on February 14th, 2008

… [T]he current extremely low inflation rate, hits Americans much harder than previous higher inflation rates did. Why is that?

The answer is painfully simple, in 1973 24% of the American workers belonged to a Union, in 2006, only 12% did. The numbers among factory workers are even worst, and they dropped from 38.9% in 1973 to 11.7% in 2006.

These numbers count for the increasing gap between the needs and wants of salaried workers and the means to obtain them.

This is based on sound economic principles as follows: The traditional economic theory assumes that salaries will remain high enough for workers to decide to go to work, and if they go too low, workers will refuse to work for that salary. The reality is that for that to actually work you need that the worker has 0 liabilities (no debt), enough savings to endure without work until a better opportunity shows, and there needs to be full employment.

So, with some useful charts and graphs our blogger concludes what Robert Reich does, that our individual bargaining power is nonexistent, and we suffer because of it.

So, to answer the question of why inflation hurts so much, it is because you relinquished your bargaining power when you left the Unions.

You may not like the local chapter of your Union, you may not like traditional Unions at all, but you will have to find a way to increase your bargaining power if you don’t want to lose every chance to realistic well being.

[Please click the link below for the complete article -- but then please come on back!]

The Politics of Debt » Why Current Inflation Hurts So Much?

Short term fixes from Washington look good to the folks back home, starved as we are for good news, but they are not nearly enough to prevent 95% of us from sinking to a permanently lower standard of living.

Unrestrained capitalism led to the unions in the first place; of late capitalism has once again been unencumbered, investing its treasure overseas while paying obscene bonuses to its rapacious CEOs.

Will hard times see the rebirth of the moribund American labor movement? Conditions would seem to be pointing there.

It’s it for now. Thanks,

–MUDGE

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