"Often state laws on customer notification may compel companies to disclose [data] theft… . “But if you don’t have a legal obligation to disclose, why would you voluntarily disclose and put yourself in the crosshairs of that kind of litigation?” Mr. Meal said. “Companies think they are doing the right thing by disclosing but instead end up being viewed as the problem.”
This view (WSJ) seems remarkably short-sighted to me. 

Quiche is good, man!

“What about the quiche?” Inspectah Deck wonders out loud, as he scans the menu at an Israeli restaurant in downtown Manhattan. “You know, I get teased for eating quiche when I get around my Wu-Tang brothers. ‘You eat quiche?!’ Quiche is good, man!” 

Wu Tang is forever (or, 20 years old), this story is incredible.

Arian Foster is going public!

[Updated] That will make him the first publicly traded athlete football player [see below].  Which is both interesting and crazy: 

On Thursday, Fantex Holdings will announce the opening of a marketplace for investors to buy and sell interests in professional athletes….  It will have its debut with an initial public offering for a minority stake in Arian Foster, the Pro Bowl running back of the Houston Texans. Buying shares in the deal will give investors an interest in a stock linked to Mr. Foster’s future economic success, which includes the value of his playing contracts, endorsements and appearance fees.

Foster, via Fantex, is selling a 20% equity stake in his future earnings, offering a little over 1 million shares at $10 apiece.  This places the present value of Arian Foster Inc. at about $51 million.  I’d take the under, but this is still fucking cool.  

Investing in Arian Foster is also totally ill-advised, for a variety of reasons.  But it’s a smart move on Foster’s part to cash out a fraction of his equity, since the future earnings of an NFL running back are extremely uncertain.

Update: according to ESPN, boxer Sugar Ray Robinson and golfer Rich Breem have sold stakes in future earnings to investors; it’s not clear about the nature of the investment, so Foster still might be the first publicly traded athlete. 

Also, here’s the prospectus.  Starting on page 81 Fantex outlines how it came up with the valuation, though there aren’t a lot of hard numbers.  Skepticism is warranted.

Robert Schiller is a stud

This summary of his contributions is worth reading.  Here’s one of the more interesting parts: 

Shiller’s solution to the problems in the housing market has been to make the market better—he created with Case and Weiss–the Case-Shiller Index. For the first time, it’s possible to see in real time housing prices and compare with averages over time and it possible to buy options and futures on the index which will help for forecasting. Moreover, it’s possible that in the future insurance products can be built based on local versions of the index–thus you could insure yourself against big declines in the price of housing in your neighborhood.

Shiller’s housing index is also a window into how macro markets could also be used to create livelihood insurance, a type of private unemployment insurance. Moral hazard and adverse selection make it difficult to protect any single individual from unemployment but indexes in the unemployment rate of dentists or construction workers could be used to provide some insurance for workers in these fields when conditions in their entire industry are poor.

even expert financial aid analysts can be financially innumerate at times

Leading education site Higher Ed Watch (under the umbrella of the New America Foundation) thinks Georgetown Law’s Loan Repayment Assistance Program (LRAP) is a pyramid scheme.

They write:

On the surface, it seems like Georgetown Law is taking a loss on students who go into public service. But the truth is far more sinister. Georgetown loses little if any money from this scheme because the school simply includes the cost of the loan repayment program in its tuition. And since the federal government issues loans for whatever amount Georgetown charges, students just take out more loans to cover that cost.

See the problem? Neither Georgetown nor its students are financing the program. You are, as a taxpayer by providing them with access to unlimited loans and unlimited loan forgiveness.

Simply put, this is incorrect.  Which is too bad, because I’m a big fan of both Higher Ed Watch and the New America Foundation.  But they missed a key step, as I pointed out in the comments.  (Though for some reason my comment is now ”awaiting moderation,” even though it was up earlier).  In any event, here’s what I wrote:

Read More

130806, interesting take on Bezos

I’ve been terrible at the photo-a-day concept lately so figured I might as well post some actual words.

Thought Henry Blogdet’s comparison between digital commerce and digital media was interesting:

"Well, for one thing, digital news and ecommerce businesses can be something that no traditional competitor can be: Infinitely broad and infinitely deep. Stores and traditional media properties are limited by space constraints: They either have to be specialized, like Best Buy or Automotive Week, or, generalists, like Walmart or the current Washington Post. Digital businesses don’t have those constraints. They can be both broad and deep.

"Another similarity is that digital news and commerce businesses can be deeply personalized. Just as every return visitor to Amazon sees a different front page, every return visitor to a news site can be presented with a different story selection.

"A third similarity is that, in commerce and media, you don’t have to own the whole market to do well. Tech businesses tend to be winner-take-most. Media and commerce, meanwhile, are vast, fragmented markets in which a small share can eventually become a big business (so you don’t have to totally dominate to win)."

Read the whole thing, it’s worth it: http://www.businessinsider.com/why-jeff-bezos-bought-washington-post-2013-8#ixzz2bCHPj3iR

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