The UK/US Extradition Treaty

2008-07-24T23:18:00.001-07:00

This article is reproduced from the International Accountant. Issue 42. July 2008. The words of the article speak for themselves ....
To quote Ben Hayes of Statewatch

"Under the new treaty, the allegations of the US government will be enough to secure the extradition of people from the UK. However, if the UK wants to extradite someone from the US, evidence to the standard of a "reasonable" demonstration of guilt will still be required.

No other EU countries would accept this US demand, either politically or constitutionally. Yet the UK government not only acquiesced, but did so taking advantage of arcane legislative powers to see the treaty signed and implemented without any parliamentary debate or scrutiny.

Read on for the full article

The AIA has been campaigning this
month to give British businessmen
the right to be tried in the UK, and
is calling for Britain’s withdrawal from the
controversial ‘one way’ extradition treaty
which has placed a number of UK businessmen
in a frightening position.

The Chief Executive of engineering firm
Morgan Crucible, Ian Norris, is one of the
latest British businessman to be involved in the
ongoing wrangle over the UK’s hugely unpopular
extradition treaty with the US. After the
prolonged dispute over the fate of the NatWest
Three, AIA believes that it is time for the
government to sort out this travesty of justice
once and for all. AIA Chief Executive Philip
Turnbull has described the Treaty as “unjust and
failing to protect the rights of British citizens.”
We are in a situation where the US does not
need to show that an accused British citizen
has a case to answer, yet the UK must present a
case that can be tested by the courts in order to
extradite an American.

Introduced following 9/11 in an attempt
to speed up the extradition of terrorists, the
2003 Extradition Treaty has been used by the
US Justice Department as a fast-track way of
extraditing British businessmen. Furthermore, it
has not been ratified by the US Congress and it
is unlikely that it ever will be as the agreement
limits human rights and is, therefore, deemed to
be contrary to the American constitution.
AIA has suggested that the treaty has
been misused to target alleged ‘white collar
criminals’ in the UK even where there is no
clear causal link with the US. For example,
the NatWest Three were extradited in 2006
following their alleged fraud activities
involving the bankrupt Enron even though
their alleged crime was not directly linked to
the collapse of the US energy company.
In the case of Ian Norris, there was blatant
injustice. Following the retirement of the Chief
Executive in 2002, he was accused of conspiring
to fix the price of carbon brushes as well as two
further charges to pervert the course of justice.
Even though price fixing was not a crime in the
UK before 2002, the US authorities pursued the
charges. In fact, Mr Norris was not given the
opportunity to defend the case against him, as
under the treaty, the US authorities are able
to set out the charges without supplying any
evidence.

AIA believes that the treaty is quite simply
bad for trade between the two countries. It
reflects negatively on business in the UK, whose
citizens deserve to receive the same protection
as US citizens from the treaty. This is an issue
that AIA has followed with growing incredulity
over the last five years.

In a recent meeting with David Blunkett, who
was home secretary at the time of the renewal
of the treaty, AIA was told that the NatWest
Three’s “guilty plea indicated that the claims
made that they should not be extradited were
somewhat wide of the mark.”
Guilt or innocence is not the issue here, it is
the fact that the treaty is being used to target
alleged white-collar crimes and that British
businessmen are not being given the right to be
tried by British courts.

Despite attempts to restrict the treaty
to alleged terrorist crimes, and an ongoing
campaign by a national newspaper to change
the treaty so that British executives are tried
in the UK for British offences, the government
has failed to rectify the problem of this one-
way treaty. As the House of Lords has upheld
Ian Norris’ long fight to avoid extradition, AIA
believes it is time for the government to address
the issue of the imbalance in the transatlantic
extradition procedure. If the US is not willing
to ratify its side of the agreement, then AIA
believes Britain should withdraw its compliance.
Now is the time for the British business
community to join forces and challenge this
unjust legislation.

Nokia Buys Symbian, Possible Google Android Delays

2008-07-14T06:28:00.001-07:00
Nokia Buys Symbian, Possible Google Android Delays

I can't recall the exact specs - but something lke 200 symbian phones to every iphone - Android still to come .... still - Nokia gets pre emptive.
Seemingly in a response to growing competition from Apple and Google, Nokia is buying out Symbian Ltd and will open its mobile operating system for royalty free use. Nokia will pay $410 million to buy the remaining 52% share of the company .....
... with thanks to : MacRumours, for the source.

Where Have All the Prospects Gone?

2008-07-14T06:26:00.001-07:00
An interesting article on the 'problem formally known as "the pipeline has dried up"' ... Jill Konrath on Sandhill.

First - a short list of why do they go away - but a much longer and more interesting list on what to do about it.

Opinion : Where Have All the Prospects Gone?

Passed on - with thanks to : SandHill.com

Open Source Content Management

2008-06-03T12:46:00.001-07:00
Just came across Alfresco ... providers of Open Source Enterprise Content Management (CMS) including Web Content Management ... check them out.

Folk Music and Web 2.0

2008-05-29T12:30:00.001-07:00
This analogy just appealed to me ....

Thanks to 'Anon' for this insightful comment ... about the morphing world of users and audience:

"The metaphor I keep coming back to on this is Folk Music. If you look at an open mic session, the "audience" turns up and sometimes, some people join in. People start by foot tapping, after a few ales they might pick up the courage to play an instrument, sing along at a table or even grab the mic. The boundary between audience and artist is practically non-existent. They are also playing, improvising and "remixing" copyright free music. Most importantly, you don't have to do anything, just by being there you feel as if you are participating. Internet participation and the movement from audience to user is creating a new "folk" or "people's" culture."

passed on - with thanks to : Modern Marketing - Blog by Collaborate PR & Marketing: By The People, For The People

Generations need warp drive to cross parallel universes

2008-04-14T00:26:00.001-07:00
CEO of Expert Alumni sounds out on Gen Y in the workplace .....

SOMEHOW THERE HAS TO BE UNDERSTANDING BETWEEN X AND Y CAMPS

"Today's business world is characterised not just by dire skill shortages, but also a shift in the priorities of employees. Those who are known as Generation Y (born 1978-98) demand more from their employers than their predecessors. Flatter hierarchies, sophisticated technology and strong values are driving changes in how employers successfully attract and retain good people of all generations."

passed on - with thanks to : The Energy Journal

What Cloud Computing Really Means

2008-04-09T04:04:00.001-07:00

"Cloud computing is all the rage. "It's become the phrase du jour," says Gartner senior analyst Ben Pring, echoing many of his peers. The problem is that (as with Web 2.0) everyone seems to have a different definition."

"Cloud computing is at an early stage, with a motley crew of providers large and small delivering a slew of cloud-based services, from full-blown applications to storage services to spam filtering. Yes, utility-style infrastructure providers are part of the mix, but so are SaaS (software as a service) providers such as Salesforce.com. Today, for the most part, IT must plug into cloud-based services individually, but cloud computing aggregators and integrators are already emerging."

Read more at What Cloud Computing Really Means to understand the full picture.
passed on - with thanks to : The New York Times

The Top Three McKinsey Articles From Last Quarter

2008-04-09T03:58:00.001-07:00
Seen them before - read them before - but in case you haven't ...

Leadership And Innovation

Eight Business Technology Trends To Watch

Making Talent A Strategic Priority

Command and Control Enterprise ... I'd like you to meet UGC.

2008-04-07T07:56:00.001-07:00
Trawling the net over the weekend - and thinking about one of my pet hobby horses - the seemingly contradictory idea of empowering the enterprise with these wacky and way-out concepts of blogs and wikis and 'UGC' and IM and You Tube and Facebook and and and ...

Except I don't think it is contradictory - it is what will happen - and in some lucky enterprises - IS happening.

A couple of posts caught my eye ....

ZDNet reporting on John Chambers from Cisco talking about the importance of collaboration to 'all things Enterprise.'

In fact the article even opens with

“The future is all about the power of “we” and how to collaborate with Web 2.0,” said Cisco CEO John Chambers,

Pretty straight forward huh ? However - read on and you will see that he highlights the essence of the challenge ....

"However, breaking down those hierarchies won't happen overnight. Organizations managed by command and control aren't about to give the keys to the kingdom to the IM, Facebook generation."

So here's the thing. One of the companies I am working with is Expert Alumni. Check them out.

In their words ...

"As half of the current workforce is planning retirement over the next 10 years, an experience gap is being created. This is not a short fall but according to industry observers, consultants, strategists and business leaders alike, it is a gap of unprecedented proportions.

In the past 40 years, corporations have enjoyed a balanced workforce at every level, with succession occurring fairly naturally. People have been moving through the system and as individuals leave or retire, their replacements have not only brought the same level of experience, but have added value. This is no longer happening.

We now understand that the experience gap is too big to fill naturally and that the ad-hoc succession planning of the past is not enough. This situation is worsening as Baby Boomers retire."

The point is that those 'old' guys at the top - and in the middle - and at the bottom are retiring. They are retiring at a rate that is unprecedented. The skills gap is extraordinary. Talk to the Energy industry about the shortage of people they have. Or wonder who will keep - all the old computers going when the people that know how they work have retired - and the new guys are only learning about mash-ups and XML and ROR ... you get the point.

You see - I think that the "Organizations managed by command and control (who) aren't about to give the keys to the kingdom to the IM, Facebook generation" ... need to understand that if they don't those Gen Ys will simply go somewhere else that they are understood - or even start it up from scratch - they sure aren't going to spend their time sitting in the cubicles that their 'forefathers' sat in ....
Which brings me to the point - why wouldn't a C and C organisation try out a little bit of self organising collaboration. What do they have to lose?

Everything I would suggest - if they don't.

Microsoft Gives Yahoo Ultimatum

2008-04-07T06:11:00.001-07:00
Microsoft playing hardball !!

Microsoft Gives Yahoo Ultimatum: Sign Deal In 3 Weeks Or We Cut Bid

ANALYSIS: In this ultimatum Microsoft makes a compelling case that Yahoo's board is violating its fiduciary duty to shareholders by not even engaging with Microsoft. This, combined with the threat of a bid cut, will likely prompt Yahoo shareholders to turn up the heat on Yahoo's board and management. It will also likely prompt Yahoo's board to do some real soul-searching, in which the directors ask themselves again whether they really want to continue down this path.

passed on - with thanks to : Silicon Alley Insider

A critique of Apple's marketing to Windows users

2008-04-04T13:54:00.001-07:00
Have to say - speaking as an Apple zealot - and loving these ads - I have to agree ....

A critique of Apple's marketing to Windows users

".... "I'm a Mac" ads aren't really marketing at all, they're just there to cater to zealots. If Apple was truly serious about reaching Windows users with its Web site, he says, the company would post the ads in both QuickTime and Windows Media formats, giving users a choice of which to watch (or better yet, sniff out the platform and play the correct one automatically). No plug-ins required.

Ted's right. While Apple may be delighting its existing customers by delivering streaming media in QuickTime, its purpose with the "I'm a Mac" ads isn't to evangelize the benefits of QuickTime, but to sell Macs. Apple shouldn't require that prospective customers install special software (even if that software is free) in order to view marketing materials."

passed on - with thanks to : Z Trek

How Do You Value A Good Brand ?

2008-03-31T23:32:00.001-07:00
If ever you were wondering - 'just what is a brand worth ?' ... read on....
Interesting brand questions - and results ...

passed on - with thanks to : Broadchannel

Flash and Java on the iPhone

2008-03-28T12:03:00.001-07:00
I just love this kind of stuff ... don't you ?

I mean the kind of stuff when people leap on band wagons without THINKING !!!!
Flash and Java on the iPhone - Similar Problems, Similar Fate

"It turns out, however, that they hadn't. [Ed - thought] All they had done was follow the live blogging of Apple's March 6 event and, on hearing that the SDK beta was being released that day, signaled their PR department to announce the impending arrival of Java on the device. Not once did they stop to think whether it would actually be possible or not. They had no clue how they would do it and yet there was Eric Klein, vice president of Java marketing for the company, making a public announcement about it.
Right on cue, and as if to ensure that no one would miss the joke, Adobe CEO Shantanu Narayen announced that they were working on a Flash media player specifically for the iPhone (full article available only to paid subscribers) and would leverage the power of the SDK to bring it to the device. Apparently, he too had overlooked the limitation of unforeseen applications on the iPhone when Steve Jobs was announcing it onstage. Thankfully, they'd realized that it wasn't going to be as simple as just wishing for it and had issued a retraction by the next day, along with the assurance that they still intended to have a nice chat with Jobs about this little issue.
Seriously, how hard is it to pay attention, people?"
Passed on - with thanks to : Apple Matters

Mobile Business Magazine - Smartphones to be 1 in 3 by 2013

2008-03-28T01:36:00.001-07:00
A little bit of market data that I just spotted ....
Smartphones to be 1 in 3 by 2013

passed on - with thanks to : Mobile Business Magazine

Mobile Business Magazine - Moto Splits

2008-03-28T01:32:00.001-07:00
So ... this one in today ....

'Moto Splits'
Motorola today announced plans to split the company into two separate entites: Mobile Devices and Broadband & Mobility Solutions in a "structural and strategic realignment of its businesses".
“Our decision to separate our Mobile Devices and Broadband & Mobility Solutions businesses follows a review process undertaken by our management team and Board of Directors, together with independent advisors,” said Greg Brown, Motorola’s president and chief executive officer. “Creating two industry-leading companies will provide improved flexibility, more tailored capital structures, and increased management focus – as well as more targeted investment opportunities for our shareholders.”
passed on with thanks to : Mobile Business Magazine
The question is ... why ? Given that :
..... "Our priorities have not changed with today’s announcement” ... “We remain committed to improving the performance of our Mobile Devices business by delivering compelling products that meet the needs of customers and consumers around the world.”

Just don't why it needs to be done in two parts - doubtless wise commentators will weigh in soon.

Selling Software in a Recession

2008-03-25T02:46:00.001-07:00
Steve Martin's Heavy Hitter Selling Is A Good Book - you should check it out.

In this new post, Steve highlights four important rules regarding whether you have a sale or not ...

If you cannot accurately determine who the Bully with Juice is in your deal and none exists, be prepared for no decision to be made. It takes a Bully with the Juice to make a major software purchase happen. This is a reality in today’s economy.
If there is a bully with the juice in your deal and this person will not meet with you, always assume they are aligned with someone else or are against the purchase from being made at all. Therefore, the deal is lost.
If a Bully with the Juice does exist but you aren’t able to identify the person, be prepared to lose. You are in a position of extreme risk because you have no idea which economic decision-maker you must win-over.
You MUST meet with the Bully with the Juice as early as possible during the selection process! This is the only way to know whether or not a deal really exists.

Read the full article to understand the context.

(Brought To You Courtesy Of ... Sandhill.com - thankyou Steve.)

Information Design and Visual Business

2008-03-23T14:08:00.001-07:00
Information Design and Visual Business - one for the Group Partner Network methinks ...

So - Mossberg says "If you're old, average, and fearful, stick with Microsoft's Windows until this summer"

2008-03-21T12:48:00.001-07:00
Mac Daily News

... so here's the question : If you're young, brilliant and rebellious - are the instructions any different ?

Entrepreneurial Companies and the Patent System

2008-03-20T11:59:00.001-07:00

Entrepreneurial Companies and the Patent System
(Via ... Feld's Thought's.)

Consultants

2008-03-16T01:17:00.001-07:00
Incoming EMail From Part Of My Network ....

Report from the National Audit Office (NAO) at the very end of 2006:

"following a long and costly analysis, that management consultants were of absolutely no use to mankind whatsoever, despite the £3 billion of public money we spend upon them annually."

Let’s be clear: it did not say that management consultants were sometimes of no use, but that sometimes they were terrific. It said, per se, management consultants are absolutely useless, full stop. In the three years leading up to the NAO report, spending upon ‘outsourcing’ to the likes of xxx and yyy (and surely those names should have given the game away) increased by 33 per cent.

There was one glorious example of outsourcing cited: Her Majesty’s Revenue & Customs outsourced the problem of needing to save £105 million in labour costs. This they did, successfully, to a team of management consultants who charged them £106 million.

Software Marketing in a Recession

2008-03-03T23:00:00.001-08:00
Vendors don’t have to slash budgets but they do need to reposition investments to emerge from a downturn unscathed.

By Glenn Gow, Crimson Consulting Group

Are we in a recession? Maybe, maybe not. Many of you have worked through the most recent recession of 2001 – 2003. For most of us, and particularly those of us involved in software marketing, “bad” doesn’t quite describe how bad it was. Anything purchased by, or influenced by IT was hit hard.

This time will be different. Software won’t get hit as hard – but it will suffer along with the rest of the economy. Vendors that shape their marketing strategy for the downturn will emerge stronger when economic growth returns.

During the current slowdown, it is likely that business software will be less impacted than other sectors. IT spending will likely grow slowly; it will probably not decline. Consumer markets are likely to be harder hit than business-business (B2B) markets.

Many enterprise software solutions are accurately positioned as improving efficiency and productivity. Hardware providers have a harder time defending that argument (can you say, “virtualization?”) Another saving grace is that for most of us, the U.S. market represents a smaller percentage of overall revenues and profits than in the last recession.

Smarter Marketing During a Downturn
Let’s assume that at least the U.S. economy will be in a recession and that as software marketers, we need to work within that reality.

Historically, software companies cut marketing first and deepest. However, for most companies, this is a mistake. To quote one of my Harvard professors, John Quelch, “It is well documented that brands that increase advertising during a recession, when competitors are cutting back, can improve market share and return on investment at lower cost than during good economic times.” It’s my contention that this applies to marketing investments as a whole, not just advertising.

Here are some tips for how software companies should alter their marketing strategies, just in case a recession is reality.

1. Spend smarter
You may spend less on marketing. Not because marketing should be cut first or most (it most certainly should not), but rather because your company may cut budgets across the board. In fact, by showing how you intend to spend smarter you will make it easier to fight for your resources (see no. 6 below).

By “spend smarter”, I mean create a clear-cut justification for the investment. While you won’t always be able to measure the ROI (this is marketing after all), you can have your people create a compelling business case for each investment. Then, when it comes time to justify the investment, you will have established sound business reasoning behind it. And that’s what the CEO and CFO need to see in a recession.

For example, consider the costs of certain tradeshows and contrast those with investing in blogs, podcasts, webinars, wikis, blogtracking, and online communities. Consider what you spend on print and non-web media advertising and examine web advertising even more closely. Chances are, now may be the time and the opportunity to do something you always wanted to do anyway.

2. Double-down on your current customers
Sure it’s more fun to get new customers, but it’s more practical in a downturn to provide better value (and get more in return) from your current customers. When customers make decisions in a downturn, they’re more likely to go with a trusted source. If they’re more likely to go with you, then you want to make it even more easy and obvious for them to go with you. Market to them. Enable your sales teams to be more effective with them. Ask current customers what they need from you. Care for them and they will be even more likely to stick with you if the going gets tough.

For example, is your license renewal team thinking about how to strengthen the relationships you have with your current customers, or are they just focused on selling maintenance and support? How can you reengineer their goals to contribute to this objective? Imagine if they became facile at consultative selling, or at the very least identifying where else in the organization your company could add value.

More importantly, now is the time for strategic account planning, and driving activities via a coordinated effort into your major accounts. Do your teams really understand the key business initiatives being driven within those accounts and how to create a value proposition that addresses their key business initiatives?

3. Outsmart your competitors
You have an opportunity to win market share from your competitors in a downturn. If you pay close attention to what’s happening in your target markets and how customers are reacting to a recession, you can act early and often with changes in product (if you can change it quickly), price, and positioning (especially as perceived needs change).

For example, in the last technology downturn, software companies became very creative in their pricing schema, creating many variations of software-as-a-service (SaaS) that enabled them to sell when their competitors were stuck in an old paradigm.

Positioning is often the easiest to change. If you coordinate gathering input from your strategic account selling teams, you’ll have invaluable information about what your key customers are looking for. You can modify your messaging to address the patterns that emerge from these discussions, before your competitors know what hit them.

4. Invest in Growing Market Segments
In every downturn there are market segments that grow faster than others. It’s your job as a marketer to help your company see and understand these market segments, and determine if you can quickly win business in these fast-growing market segments. These may be segments you’re already selling to, but not particularly focused on, or they may represent new segments – and new opportunities for your company. At the same time, you want to reduce your investments in the segments that will get hit the most in the downturn.

For example, in this potential recession, we see a slowdown in consumer spending, primarily in the U.S. How many of your market segments are dependent on consumer spending? How many are more dependent on B2B transactions? How much of your marketing effort is focused outside the U.S? Do you know which markets outside the U.S. are likely to grow the fastest?

Now is the time to know what is happening in each segment upon which you focus so you can make marketing investment decisions with “all the lights on”.

5. Support your channel
The average reseller has fewer than 10 employees. They will be hit more significantly in a downturn than virtually all software companies. They could be running scared.

These partners will turn to the vendor that supports them in a downturn. Extend financing to them. Provide more generous offerings in training, more sales attention and better technical support. Give them high quality leads. This is what they want the most and this is what they’re the worst at doing for themselves.

Finally, consider dropping those channel partners that you always knew weren’t going to work out anyway and recruit better partners.

6. Fight for Your Resources
As I’ve argued before (see ”CMOs as True Leaders”) it’s marketing’s responsibility to drive strategic issues. In a recession, this becomes even more important. When the CMO is not deeply involved in strategy, marketing is likely suffer from a knee jerk reaction to the challenge of cost savings.

This often means a disproportionate cut to marketing budgets and marketing headcount with disastrous results. First, marketing winds up playing a less important role, strategically. Second, a pendulum-swing of dollars and people begins, which makes it very hard to recover once the economy does. Third, the company ends up short-handed, completely reactive, and outsmarted by competitors and wishing it hadn’t made the cuts it had. It’s marketing’s responsibility to fight for its resources, and doing the five items above will help you win that battle.

From The HBR - early 2006

2007-09-22T09:06:00.001-07:00
Like all revolutions in thought, this one began with anomalies, strange facts, odd observations that the prevailing wisdom could not explain. Casino gamblers, for instance, are willing to keep betting even while expecting to lose. People say they want to save for retirement, eat better, start exercising, quit smoking—and they mean it—but they do no such things. Victims who feel they’ve been treated poorly exact their revenge, though doing so hurts their own interests.

Such perverse facts are a direct affront to the standard model of the human actor—Economic Man—that classical and neoclassical economics have used as a foundation for decades, if not centuries. Economic Man makes logical, rational, self-interested decisions that weigh costs against benefits and maximize value and profit to himself. Economic Man is an intelligent, analytic, selfish creature who has perfect self-regulation in pursuit of his future goals and is unswayed by bodily states and feelings. And Economic Man is a marvelously convenient pawn for building academic theories. But Economic Man has one fatal flaw: he does not exist.

The Full Article at HBR

HR Trends

2007-09-14T23:26:00.001-07:00
My thanks to Fred Lange - HR Architect for this nougat ...
A roundtable for a group of execs met recently to discuss HR trends.
The following is a result of that meeting, 30+ conversations with
other HR execs and some recentpublications.
What are their top concerns ?
Healthcare Costs – Group Ins. anticipated annual rate increases 15-20%
Productivity – Connecting Profitability to People (doing what matters)
Balance – Increase in Work/Life Demands – 24/7 access
Graying – Retirement of Large Numbers of Baby Boomers
Workforce of the Future – Euro/Asia/America Economy
Talent – finding the skilled workforce (US workers 70% in companies
of less than 100 employees)
Ethics - Social Responsibility, Ethics, Capitalism (China & Brazil
challenge capitalism rules/regs)
Green - Man versus Earth, Green, Sustainability
Interesting side bar, more than half the HR execs said they were
working on increasing the "purpose" profile of their business in
their employment branding in response to boomers and Y'ers demand/
interest in finding companies that serve a purpose. (e.g., three
bottles of wine to choose from and labels read: first choice -- the
ingredients; second choice – the bouquet of flavors; third choice –
founding brothers contribute ¼ profits to breast cancer in response
to the loss of their beloved mother. Boomers and Y'ers take third
choice, and if it taste okay, they will buy more).

Opportunity

2007-09-14T13:42:00.001-07:00
Love this - thank-you Lorraine ...
"There is no security on this earth: There is only opportunity."
Douglas Mac Arthur

Dubai Trivia

2007-09-13T09:54:00.001-07:00
My thanks to Tom Powell for a little bit of Dubai Trivia ...

Dubai, UAE - Burj Dubai, the world's tallest building developed by Emaar Properties, has now surpassed the height of the world's tallest free-standing structure, CN Tower in Toronto.At 555.3 metres (1,821.85 ft), Burj Dubai has now also scaled 150 livable levels, the largest number of storeys for any building in the world. The tower already holds the distinction of being taller than Taipei 101 in Taiwan, which at 508 metres* (1,667 ft) has held the
tallest-building-in-the-world title since it opened in 2004. Burj
Dubai now surpasses the 31-year-old record of CN Tower, which at
553.33 metres (1,815.5 ft) has been the world's tallest free-standing
structure on land since 1976.

"Burj Dubai is setting new world records in construction of super
tall buildings, and the accomplishment of being the world's tallest
free-standing structure is another defining moment for the
multinational team of over 5,000 people who are using their
collective intelligence to make this iconic structure a symbol of
human achievement," said Mr Mohamed Ali Alabbar, Chairman, Emaar
Properties. "This architectural and construction master-piece is
truly an inspirational human achievement that celebrates the 'can do'
mindset of Dubai."
When completed, Dubai's landmark tower will be the tallest structure
in the world in all four of the criteria listed by the Council on
Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat (CTBUH). The council measures height
to the structural top, the highest occupied floor, to the top of the
roof, and to the tip of the spire, pinnacle, antenna, mast or flag pole.

CTBUH, the acknowledged source of information based at the Illinois
Institute of Technology, measures the height of a building from the
sidewalk level of the main entrance to the structural top. This
includes spires but not television antennas, radio antennas or flag
poles. Burj Dubai is billed to scale past the KVLY/KTHI television
mast in Blanchard, North Dakota, which at 628.8 metres (2,063 ft) is
the world's tallest mast and technically qualifies to be the world's
tallest structure, even though it is stabilized with a series of guy-
wires.

More than 320,800 cubic metres of reinforced concrete and 63,300
tonnes of reinforcing steel have been used in the tower's
construction so far.

Burj Dubai became the tallest free-standing structure in the world in
just 1,325 days since excavation work started in January, 2004. More
than 5,000 consultants and skilled construction workers are employed
on site, and the world's fastest high-capacity construction hoists,
with a speed of up to 2 m/sec (120 metres/min), move men and materials.

Structural steel work for Burj Dubai will begin soon, and cladding
work using a high-performance system has been completed on several
levels. The primary cladding materials of reflective glazing,
aluminium and textured stainless steel spandrel panels and vertical
stainless tubular fins accentuate the tower's height and slenderness
to the eye.

Emaar Properties has teamed up with South Korean construction major
Samsung Corporation, New York-based Project Manager Turner
International and global engineering consultancy Hyder Consulting to
develop Burj Dubai based on the design of internationally admired
architect Adrian Smith and Skidmore, Owings & Merrill of Chicago.Burj Dubai will be at the centre of Downtown Burj Dubai, a US$20
billion, 500-acre downtown development billed as the most prestigious
square kilometre on earth. The tower will feature residential,
commercial and retail components including the world's first Armani
Hotel and Armani Residences, exclusive corporate suites, a business
centre, four luxurious pools and spas, an observation platform on
Level 124 and 150,000 sq ft of fitness facilities.

Bridges Beyond Bridges

The UK/US Extradition Treaty

Nokia Buys Symbian, Possible Google Android Delays

Where Have All the Prospects Gone?

Open Source Content Management

Folk Music and Web 2.0

Generations need warp drive to cross parallel universes

What Cloud Computing Really Means

The Top Three McKinsey Articles From Last Quarter

Command and Control Enterprise ... I'd like you to meet UGC.

Microsoft Gives Yahoo Ultimatum

A critique of Apple's marketing to Windows users

How Do You Value A Good Brand ?

Flash and Java on the iPhone

Mobile Business Magazine - Smartphones to be 1 in 3 by 2013

Mobile Business Magazine - Moto Splits

Selling Software in a Recession

Information Design and Visual Business

So - Mossberg says "If you're old, average, and fearful, stick with Microsoft's Windows until this summer"

Entrepreneurial Companies and the Patent System

Consultants

Software Marketing in a Recession

From The HBR - early 2006

HR Trends

Opportunity

Dubai Trivia