Being destructive....but in a good way

There is a theory that I remember reading about several years ago...a theory that seems to make more sense given my experiences of the last several years. This one comes from an Austrian named Joseph Schumpeter and is called Creative Destruction.

In essence it states that as economies evolve older and staid technologies and companies will be destroyed in favor of the newer ones that are more able to respond to the current circumstances. Think of it as "natural selection" but seen through the lens of business school. The theory also reminds me of the great CS Lewis story that everyone loves to tell at church....the one that talks about how God turns our little comfortable cottage into a mansion.

The theory is painful for those getting pushed out but no one can argue that the newer results aren't better then the originals. Some examples:

• Polaroid cameras were cool but today's digital cameras can do so much more. Polaroid was late in seeing this and as a result suffered.
• I can imagine that manufacturers of the early horse carriages must have been pretty ticked off when Henry Ford and others gave us those darn automobiles. They died but life became better.
• Newspapers have diminished in importance and have given way to blogs, cable TV, and the internet. People get their news in different ways and the print media has to evolve or die.

I have seen this trend in the realm of marketing. Companies can't afford to keep large marketing teams but they still need specific marketing work. As a result they turn to trusted partners that are experts in their specific realm. This trend will only increase with time and I am trying to ensure that I am in front of the trend.

The moral of the story? Change is good if you are willing to adjust. While there are a few things that remain as solid as stone, think values, remember that most everything else is in a constant state of flux. Adapt to the change or become a doodoo. (Quite literally)

Style that howls....literally

Who needs to look to the New York runway to get the latest in fashion? All you need to do is find a gas station gift shop on a lonely stretch of road to find the look that might just give a second life back to the mullet.

The vastness that is the Grand Canyon

I went up to St. George to celebrate the upcoming nuptials of Norm Wahlstrom. Since I was driving alone I decided to make the most of it and visit the lonely North Rim on the way up and the South Rim on the way back. (Interesting Trivia: Did you know that the N. Rim is at 8,500 feet and gets only 400k annual visitors while the S. Rim is at 7,000 feet and gets 4.4 million annual visitors.)

The view was spectacular but it is really difficult to capture the vastness that is the Grand Canyon without a super cool wide angle lens. My attempt to stitch together several pictures to make a panorama created a shot that looked more like a patch work blanket then a seamless view of the park.

Randomizer Volume V Series II

Because the thoughts keep coming and they are more then likely random. Plus I needed a breather from the immigration talk.

• Here's an excerpt from "The Eight Pillars of Greek Wisdom" regarding modern distractions and how the absence of them helped make Greece great. "The absence of artificial distractions permitted the mind to focus, and the scarcity of complexity let the most essential issues stand out....life was lived on a more human scale....Entertainment did not, as it does today, constantly saturate the consciousness r assault the eye with hyper stimulation....ours is a society deprived of the chance for deep thought. Unlike the problem faced by the prisoner in Plato's cave, our problem today is not too little light, but too much, a light so glaring that we cannot see what is real." Can I get an amen?
• U2 is now officially at the "Steven Spielberg" phase of their career. What do I mean? I mean that the supreme nature of their past work has granted their contemporary work a certain immunity from criticism. They once pushed the envelope and created a new paradigm. Now their work is fairly formulaic and the torch for ground breaking innovation has been passed on to another generation. We still love you but we've come to stop expecting a new Achtung Baby.
• We've been watching Mad Men on Netflix. It has singlehandedly taken the golden and some naive sheen that I had of pre-Vietnam America. Evidently AMC has set out to make the "American Dream" look as self absorbed, empty, and decrepit as possible.
  
• A few photos from the Mogollon Rim that were taken on a recent camping trip. Not many people realize this but there is some incredible country that is just an hour or so outside of Phoenix.

Mexican Immigration Post #1: Addendum: Required Reading

The following are several books that help shed some light on the Mexican culture, border culture, and Mexican politics. There are several others worth noting but I've found these to be the most accessible and descriptive.

1. Labyrinth of Solitude, Octavio Paz: This is a classic piece of literature from the Nobel Laureate that really delves into the psyche of the Mexican people. If you can understand this you can really get a better understanding of the hopes and fears of the nation.
   
2. True Tales from Another Mexico, Sam Quinones: A great read that helps illustrate the different subcultures within Mexico through crisp chapters depicting such subject matter as Chalino Sanchez, Jesus Malverde, and mob justice.
   
3. Bordering on Chaos, Andres Oppenheimer: Though slightly dated it reads very well and allows you to look at Mexico from a more macro lens. It covers the major events that have shaped Mexican politics and culture over the last 100 years. Some of the insights into things like the Mexican Peso crisis of 1994 read as fast as anything put out by Grisham.
   
4. Distant Neighbors, Alan Riding: A slightly drier book in the same vein as "True Tales." Each chapter explains an event, culture, or mentality that is absolutely critical to understanding Mexico.
   
5. Batos, Bolillos, Pochos and Pelados, Chad Richardson: Written by a professor and former Stake President in my South Texas mission this book takes a more academic look at the impact that immigrants have had on border communities, particularly the Texas Mexico border. It is a great sociological read that helps elucidate the fascinating mosaic of people that make up border communities.