I remember walking around GangNam, in Seoul, where I passed a fashion store. The store and the exhibited clothes appealed, so I walked in for a closer look. I liked there shirts. They used a surprisingly comfortable material, which just felt good. But there it was, a shocking slogan: Made in Downtown LA, Organic. Gosh, another anti-globalization environmentalist. No, I can't support this company. I left the store feeling a bit sorry for the missed shirt.

Half a year later, today. I'm reading about this guy, Dov Charney, who runs a global fashion company focusing on the needs of the young, well-travelled crowd that he calls the “world-metropolitan culture”. While reading I figured this company called American Apparel, is the one I visited in Seoul.

From The Economist:
DOV CHARNEY courts controversy. The 37-year-old founder and chief executive of American Apparel, the largest T-shirt manufacturer in America, has been called a brilliant businessman, an amateur pornographer, a Jewish hustler and a man with a social mission. He is admired for single-handedly creating one of America's most successful fashion retailers, for devising his company's sexually suggestive approach to advertising and for treating his workers much better than his rivals. He is also envied, loathed and criticised for all of these things.
Read the entire Face Value.

This article and an interview by Charlie Rose showed me that Mr Charney is a likeable person, indeed a capitalist and very much pro-globalisation. The Economist calls him The Hustler. An aggressively enterprising person. A go-getter.

I guess I can return to GangNam and buy that Shirt without a guilty conscience.

PS.: I wanted to show a picture of Mr Charney. But American Apparel has a beautiful Photo Collections where I stumbled over a picture of Ji-Sung, an employee from the Seoul store, which I liked better.

Labels: Asia, Economics

I would like to run the Vienna Marathon on April 29th. After reading about marathon training and talking to Lutzi -my trainer- I came up with the following schedule:

Week	Mo	Tu	We	Th	Fr	Sa	So
8.-14.Jan		10km		8km	8km		14km
15.-21.Jan		10km		8km	8km		15km
22.-28.Jan		10km		9km	8km		16km
29.-4.Feb		10km		9km	9km		17km
5.-11.Feb		11km		9km	9km		18km
12.-18.Feb		11km		10km	9km		19km
19.-25.Feb		11km		10km	10km		20km
26.-4.Mar		11km		10km	10km		21km
5.-11.Mar		12km		10km	10km		22km
12.-18.Mar		12km		10km	10km		23km
19.-25.Mar		12km		10km	10km		24km
26.-1.Apr		12km		10km	10km		25km
2.-8.Apr		12km		10km	10km		15km
9.-15.Apr		10km		8km	8km		14km
16.-22.Apr	4km		4km		4km
23.-29.Apr	4km		4km		4km		42km

Additionally Lutzi recommends noodles, potatoes, fish, eggs, chocolate and bananas. Which sounds like my current diet anyway.

Labels: eat+drink, Incentives, Patrick

Mr. Bethe was a leading figure in quantum physics. He won the Nobel Prize in 1967. At the age of 93 he gave a lecture called Quantum Physics - Made Relatively Simple. I'm glad Cornell University brought it online. It's a joy to watch.

Watching his lecture, one can see he still enjoys quantum physics. 93 years and he still likes his job! To me, that's even more impressive than his Nobel Price.

Forget state pension. If your country signs you up automatically, opt-out. Get a job you like, and enjoy it till the your end. You may safe some money for latter. But stay away from state pension. This pension money will become hard to resist when you are 60. Forcing you to quite in the middle of your career. Don't take that risk. Act now. The less money in your pension fund the better.

Labels: Economics, Incentives

Writing down goals gives focus and motivation. Telling everyone about it, motivates even more, by inducing peer pressure.
Here is my take for 2007:

1. Finish Master of Science (MSc).
2. Find new customers for software projects.
3. Run a marathon in less than 5hours. First chance, April 29th in Vienna.
4. Improve derbaum.com so actual people care to read.
5. Enjoy doing so!

Yes, I changed my goals during the year. So what? Things happen, one needs to adapt.

Labels: Incentives, Patrick