Results for “markets in everything” 1895 found
Ad-blocking software markets in everything
…Adblock Plus has become the internet’s advertising sheriff. That’s because its software, by default, allows some ads through its firewall—ads it deems “acceptable,” meeting a series of strict criteria it came up with in conversation with internet users around the world. The criteria essentially eliminate most of the ads on the market today, rolling back ad technology to the 1990s: text only, no animations, no popovers, no placement in the flow of text. In the two months since I’ve installed the software, I don’t recall seeing any ads that meet the criteria.
Websites must apply to get “whitelisted,” and an Adblock Plus employee then works with the site to make sure that the selected ads comply with the criteria. Ben Williams, a spokesman for Eyeo, told me that 700 publishers and bloggers have been whitelisted. The whitelist is how the company makes money. Eyeo charges large for-profit publishers a cut of ad revenues to be on the list, a scheme some critics have called extortion. Williams declined to say who is paying or how much, but the Financial Times recently reported that Google, Microsoft, and Amazon were among those paying Eyeo for their acceptable ads to appear to Adblock Plus users.
There is more here, from Michael Rosenwald.
Will ad-blocking, over time, decimate the free web?
Hurrah for Singapore birthday markets in everything
Rolls-Royce will be celebrating Singapore’s 50th year of independence with a special bespoke luxury car, the first time the carmaker has commissioned a car to celebrate the anniversary of a country.
Based on the Ghost line of vehicles, the limited edition “SG50 Ghost Series II” bears the red and white colors of Singapore’s flag. The white exterior will feature red trim, while the interior seats are dark red in color, with the city’s iconic half-fish, half-lion Merlion symbol stitched into the four headrests.
Unfortunately only one model will be released for sale, for $290,000. And that is not all:
Singapore’s independence day falls on August 9, and is slated to be the country’s biggest anniversary celebration ever. Other brands that have released special products to mark the day include Jaeger-LeCoultre’s Singapore Special Edition watch, a Singapore Airlines plane bearing a special motif, and Ayam Brand’s specially designed sardine cans.
The story is here, and perhaps I will be blogging Singapore a bit more as the country’s fiftieth anniversary approaches. Who would have thought?
Markets in everything sandcastle butlers those new service sector jobs
Building the biggest and the best sandcastles is an absolute must for children on beaches.
Now a travel company is stepping in to secure the all-important bragging rights for them – by launching the world’s first sandcastle butler service.
From Disney castles to favourite TV characters, the talented concierge staff will be on hand to transform a simple mound of sand into anything guests’ imaginations can conjure up.
Oliver’s Travels, a family villa specialist, is introducing the VIP service at selected destinations in Europe.
When guests book the service they will first get a sandcastle brainstorming session with the butlers in order to create an elaborate sand design.
Potential meteor shower markets in everything
Skywatchers hoping to see a shooting star may soon be able to order them on demand.
A group of Japanese scientists say they have a shooting-star secret formula — an undisclosed chemical mixture packed into tiny, inch-wide balls that the team hopes to eject from a satellite to create on-demand meteor showers, AFP reports.
A Japanese start-up company called ALE is partnering with researchers at multiple universities to create the artificial meteor showers, which will cost around $8,100 per meteor for buyers. The researchers said the manufactured meteors would be bright enough to be visible even in areas with light pollution, like Tokyo, assuming clear weather.
The story is here, from Sarah Lewin, and for the pointer I thank Michael Komaransky.
Forager markets in everything
Apparently the institutionalization of small-scale food foraging is part of the new food chain for restaurant supply, and it has become an “intensely secret” and “ultracompetitive” world:
FreshDirect, the online grocery-delivery service, offers packs of foraged lambsquarters for $4.99 each. Chef David Waltuck, who’s bought ingredients from foragers at his New York restaurants since the ’70s, says the picking operations have gotten more sophisticated to keep up with the market. “Foragers sell to purveyors now,” he says. “It became more of a business. Back in the early days, there was nothing like that.”
With the explosion in popularity, though, the foragers themselves have had to become even more protective of their wares. “You’re looking at limited resources,” says Matt Parker, a West Coast–based purveyor of foraged ingredients who works with a small network of gatherers and sells to restaurants such as Spago and Gjelina. “Foragers live and die by the seasons and what’s available, so of course they are protective of their spots — that’s how they make a living.” Parker sustains a roster of “seven to nine guys, depending on how reliable they want to be,” but none will reveal their “honey grounds” to him. Waltuck adds, “They might take you out with them, but they’ll blindfold you.” Indeed, when another prominent New York chef offered to send me out with his preferred forager in Jersey’s Delaware Water Gap, he agreed to do so only if I’d wear a pillowcase over my head for the entire car ride. Eventually, the forager got cold feet and reneged on the deal altogether.
That is from Edna Ishayik, via MR reader Jeremy Yamada.
Markets in everything 3-D printing arbitrage to curb rhino poaching
A San Francisco biotech startup has managed to 3D print fake rhino horns that carry the same genetic fingerprint as the actual horn. It plans to flood Chinese market with these cheap horns to curb poaching.
And this:
The company plans to release a beer brewed with the synthetic horn later this year in the Chinese market.
Markets in everything does this violate a zero profit condition?
Henceforth you will be tipped a rupee to pee at the right spot! The Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation (AMC) is toying with a new idea of paying people money if they visit the nearest public toilets.
This idea was first implemented in Darechowk in Katmandu in Nepal and had worked well.
In Ahmedabad, the AMC will implement the scheme in 67 nuisance spots in the city with a public toilet nearby. Once successful, the scheme will be implemented across all public toilets in the city.
The full article is here, and for the pointer I thank Mark Thorson.
Self-constraint markets in everything
For most people, weight is a private issue. That looks like it could be a thing of the past for anyone who gets a WiFi Body Scale that has come to the market. It is set up to auto tweet, or auto post to Facebook each time you step on it. Is this designed to keep people accountable, or just plain stupid?
This scale is retailing for just under $150 by a company called Withings. Previous versions of this scale allowed you to track your weight and other data such as heart rate and body fat percentage from your Apple Iphone. I guess they needed to take it a step further and allow you to auto tweet or facebook your weight for the world to see.
There is more here, via Fred Smalkin.
German magazine markets in everything
The Vangardist, a German men’s magazine, is printing an entire issue using HIV-infected blood in a quest to educate the public and eliminate misconceptions about HIV and AIDS.
Of course, there’s also the issue of taking this approach to raise the magazine’s literary and commercial value. The Vangardist‘s May issue is already being considered a collector’s item since just 3,000 copies featuring the HIV-positive ink blood have been printed.
There is further information here.
Craft beer markets in everything
Dogfish Head, for example, has Chicha – a native corn beer that is chewed by the brewers and spit out before being brewed (and boiled – so it’s sterile). The saliva, say the brewers, has enzymes that convert the starches in the corns to sugar.
Earlier this month, Barrels and Bottles Brewery in Golden, CO offered an extra special bitter that was brewed with Peeps, the colored marshmallow candy that marks the Easter season. (90 of them, to be specific.) And just last week, New Belgium teamed up with Ben & Jerry’s ice cream to announce plans to produce a Salted Caramel Brownie Brown Ale (which will go on sale this fall).
…The newly crowned king of stunt beers is Iceland’s Brugghús Steðja. In January, the microbrewery introduced Hvalur 2 – a 5.2% ABV seasonal ale that incorporates the testicles of fin whales into the brewing process. And, believe it or not, that’s not the weirdest part of the ingredient list.
“We consider this beer to be in perfect style of [the Thorri] season,” says Dagbjartur Arilíusson, Steðji’s co-owner. “We get fresh whale testicles from a fin whale and we smoke it in an old Icelandic tradition way, smoked with dry sheep dung.”
There is more here, via the excellent Samir Varma.
Breast milk markets in everything sentences to ponder
When Medolac Laboratories, a competitor of Prolacta, said last year that it wanted to buy milk from women in Detroit, it was accused of profiting at the expense of black women.
“We are deeply concerned that women will be coerced into diverting milk that they would otherwise feed their own babies,” the Black Mothers’ Breastfeeding Association wrote in an open letter in January. Medolac, which said it was working with the Clinton Foundation and wanted to encourage breast-feeding by making it financially attractive, abandoned its plan.
The article, by Andrew Pollack, is interesting throughout. And here is Wikipedia on the history of wet nurses.
For the pointer I thank Pam R.
Mexican markets in everything, James Bond edition
Mexican government officials were allowed to make casting decisions and changes to the script of the upcoming James Bond movie, after giving the film’s producers millions in financial incentives, according to a report based on emails leaked in the Sony hack.
The government reportedly offered the makers of the upcoming “Spectre,” directed by Sam Mendes, $14 million in exchange for four minutes of the film portraying the country in a positive light.
Emails released from the Sony hack, published by tax policy website Tax Analysis, show that the studio was concerned that the film’s costs had spiraled, to a gross budget of $300 million, making it one of the most expensive movies ever made. Executives pressured the filmmakers to make changes to the script that would keep the Mexican money coming in.
“You have done a great job in getting us the Mexican incentive,” wrote Jonathan Glickman, president of MGM’s motion picture group, in an email to the film’s producers. “Let’s continue to pursue whatever avenues we have available to maximize this incentive.”
…emails revealed that Mexico asked that the character of a Mexican governor, who was the target of an assassination, be replaced with an international leader, and that Mexican police be replaced with “some special police force” instead.
A further $6 million was said to have been achieved by means such as replacing a cage fighting scene with footage of Mexico’s popular Day of the Dead festivities, and highlighting Mexico City’s “modern” skyline, the Telegraph reported.
There is more here, via Fred Smalkin.
Markets in everything, hunting mutant animals edition
More than 99.9 percent of all wild gnus, also called wildebeest, from the Afrikaans for “wild beast,” have dark coats. But this three-year-old golden bull and his many offspring are not an accident. They have been bred specially for their unusual coloring, which is coveted by big game hunters.
These flaxen creatures are the latest craze in South Africa’s $1 billion ultra-high-end big-game hunting industry. Well-heeled marksmen pay nearly $50,000 to take a shot at a golden gnu — more than 100 times what they pay to shoot a common gnu. Breeders are also engineering white lions with pale blue eyes, black impalas, white kudus, and coffee-colored springboks, all of which are exceedingly rare in the wild.
“We breed them because they’re different,” says Barry York, who owns a 2,500-acre ranch about 135 miles east of Johannesburg. There, he expertly mates big game for optimal — read: unusual — results. “There’ll always be a premium paid for highly-adapted, unique, rare animals.”
…No one disputes that there’s money to be made in rare big game. Africa Hunt Lodge, a U.S.-based tour operator, advertises “hunt packages” to international clients traveling to South Africa that include killing a golden gnu for $49,500, a black impala for $45,000, and a white lion for $30,000.
There is more here, and for the pointer I thank Kaushal Desai.
Indonesian markets in everything
When a listing for a house in Yogyakarta, Indonesia, appeared on a real estate website with the headline “RUMAH DIJUAL: Beli Rumah Bisa Ajak Pemiliknya Menikah” (HOUSE FOR SALE: Buy the house and you may marry the owner”) many people assumed it was a joke.
But the house’s current owner says the above ad, which is featured on property website rumahdijual.com, is completely serious.
Below the listing price of the house (Rp 999 million or about US$76,500), the ad reads: “Offer of the century!!! Buy the house and you may marry the owner (terms & conditions apply). Only for serious buyers and without negotiation.”
China pigeon markets in everything
This is also not new news, but it is new to me:
In May 2013, Chinese businessman Gao Fuxin set a new record, paying 310,000 euros ($351,000) in an online auction for a pigeon named Bolt, after Jamaican sprinter Usain Bolt.
It seems also that the pigeons, before a race, are given performance-enhancing drugs. But:
Expensive birds such as Bolt are simply too valuable to race. They’re put out to stud after being auctioned. “In pigeon racing, blood is everything,” says Mike Ganus, a breeder and racer in Granger, Indiana, who sells about 500 birds a year to China. “If you don’t have the genetics, you won’t have a winner, no matter what you do.”
The full story is here.