Rodrigo A. Sepúlveda Schulz

A business class airline between Paris and New York

I had never seen anything about this company, but I just saw an ad of the NYTimes. Interesting concept. It's a reasonnably priced airline on a single line, between PARIS and NEW YORK :)

Occam Capital takes Mandriva out of chapter 11

I had missed this announcement: just going through some old blog posts (I hardly read any now). Occam Capital has invested in Mandriva. Good stuff. I know the team at Occam pretty well, and the founder of Mandriva as well. Interesting mix.

And I remember discussing the possibility of this deal a very long while ago on the phone... The challenge is huge, but there are a few possible strategies to make Mandriva standout vs. Ubuntu (the main challenger) to the 2 US-based firms: Redhat and Suse / Novell. Not to forget of course the development of Redflag and other minor distributions.

Challenges include:
. proper positionning in the B2C, B2B or B2G (government) markets (Ubuntu is very B2C. Should Mandriva go B2B ?)
. simplicity of product offering, installation and support for a large-range of hardware
. proper support services, the killer B-model in open-source
. marketing efforts to develop the brand

Opportunities include:
. an alternative to US-based software vendors for international governments
. a low-cost alternative for new markets
. exclusive deals with manufacturers (not PCs... as they are mainly in the USA, but Asia, and also set top boxes, mobile devices...)

Any other thougths are welcome: I've stopped using Fedora and Mandriva, and have moved on to Ubuntu for its simplicity, but it's mainly a B2C proposition.

Update: Codor has more and Didier has mentionned it too.

Sarkozy at Bercy rally: not a word on Europe and climate

I've just spend 2,5 hours watching French Presidential candidate and aristocrat Nicolas Sarközy de Nagy-Bocsa, mayor former mayor of Neuilly-Sur-Seine, and former Interior Minister, deliver his speech at his last campaign rally.

Of course we have to recognize that he has a talent for public speeches (great speech writer I suppose, decades of preparation) and that the organization was great: French flags everywhere, stars, singers, cameras. A great show if you are into show business. A great speech if the only thing you are listening to is his tone of voice and ambitious determination.

Now you had to listen carefully to what he was saying, and to what he was not saying. Here are my notes:

1) he does not assume his heritage in the past government

• most of the French government was sitting there, and shown repeatedly on camera. I wonder when his team has held power for the past 5 years, how can he talk about change ? When he hits on opposition for their incompetency, how can he talk about public ethics and moral and not assume his own team failure ?
• he is of course president of the largest political Party in France (over 300,000 members) and most of his team in the government are his close advisors. Why is it that this team has not produced all the results he is aiming for ?
• he was of course Minister of Interior, and as such, in charge of laws and institutions such as the police; how come the crime rates after 4 years into the job full time are just back to the rate of the previous Socialist government ?
• he said "I feel free from my past"; easy...

2) he had to hit hard on the left just to exist as an alternative to the right

• I wonder why when you are trying to run hard to become President of all the French people, how can you hit so hard on about half the population and stigmatize them with no values, laziness, negligence in public spending ? Shouldn't he be trying to present his program, and the future he is trying to build ? Bring everyone together ? Of course at the end he called the center and the extremes to vote for him. Not to share his ideas and support him. Bad tactics...
• He repeated almost 20 times the heritage of 1968 in France, and how it had created the state of France today. Most probably was he trying to associate the current left-wing candidate with that 1968 spirit ? Put her as a member of the past ? Hum... that was about 40 years ago... There have been many governments since (Pompidou-right, Giscard d'Estaing-right, Mitterand-left with left & right governments, Chirac-right with left & right governments). Bad argument, easy but shallow.
• He repeated several times the bad impact of the 35 hours week in France. Well many would agree there. But his team was in power for the past 5 years, they could have tried to abolish it ;)... to do something instead of just talking about it... Obviously this would make him loose the election. For a man that talks about action... bad example again.

3) he has a dialectic of a populist right-wing politician

• of course, it's easy to say that he has met with French people of all walks of life. And ? So has every candidate. It's easy to say that he is attuned to their sorrows. and ? what were the proposals ?
• back to his usual rhetorics of Work, Dignity, Authority... Good stuff right ? expect that they are usually delivered by a filthy extreme-right. It's better of course that he talks about it too... just make sure he doesn't go to that side too fast.
• and just to make sure he was the heir of General de Gaulle, he mentionned him a couple of times, how left-wing folks called him a fascist in 1958 (great lesson of History today... maybe the man should live in modern times :) + a camera on Philippe de Gaulle, the son of the former President (with dubious extreme-right sympathies)
• he talked also about how the left is not representing workers anymore, and how he feels close to them...
• finally, he had to make an allusion to Jeanne d'Arc, a French martyr, but - unfortunately - the icon of the extreme-right in France. An invitation to the right-wing I suppose...

4) he fell into the usual blah blah no-future promises

• did he say I long for "full employment", "the most prosperous country in the world" ? yep...
• and as the other candidate, back to changing electoral rules (proportional votes) at elections times. This is a national sport of changing the rules whenever there is an election. More, less... whatever suits them. I'd leave that promise as a no-future promise.

5) preparing himself for the women support of Ségolène Royal

• I found it courageous of course to talk about the tragedies of the world: hunger in Darfour, ethnic cleansing in Chechnya, women lapidation in Muslim countries, Burkhas in islamic countries. Why hasn't he ever acted upon it before?
• but focusing on the fate of victimized women around the world and OFFERING THEM FRENCH CITIZENSHIP was a bit too much... Of course France has a long tradition in humanitarian aid, and should keep doing so. This felt to me just a bit too much.

6) what he didn't talk about

• I was shocked that there was not a word on Europe, the European Union, the European Constitution? is it of no interest to him ? That all his talk about National pride, love of France, of French soil... but nothing on the importance of the EU ?
• not a word on ENVIRONMENT, on the climate crisis. Clearly he's more of a G.W.Bush than an Al Gore...
• no real plan for Education. How he is going to encourage innovation, diversity, excellence ?
• no plan on solidarity ? I understand all the dialectic on security, on order and authority. On the value of labour, ethic (I actually agree on this), But is he going to help the most unfortunate, what are the measures ?

• Finally, I found it extremely amusing (but not surprising) that there was NO MENTION WHATSOEVER on Jacques Chirac, the current President, whom he betrayed nicely in 1995 when supporting Balladur, and who's daughter Claude he was a witness to at ther wedding... No mention of the current Head of State, on his side of the political spectrum, his political mentor ? He did mention de Gaulle though. Former Prime ministers Villepin and Raffarin were in the audience, but he did not feel it was appropriate, I suppose, to thank them for their work... Always best to shake the hands of the singers and TV comedians of stage...

I'm not voting for Nicolas Sarközy de Nagy-Bocsa. Indeed I can't vote. But I'm not supporting him. And on this nice Sunday afternoon, I read both programs in detail (Royal, Sarkozy).

She's maybe less experienced in ministerial jobs, and maybe less eloquent in public, but I believe Ségolène Royal defends better my values (education, Europe, public finance, solidarity, environment, entrepreneurial. culture) that are key to the future of my kids.

Just make sure you vote next Sunday. Debate is good. Let's have a lot of it.

Any recommendation for a flat screen ?

I've been looking for professional / consumer reviews of large flat screens:

* how the image looks on the LCD screens or Plasma screens on these specific models:
* best place to buy them
* pro / cons of each model.

Looking around, it's pretty easy to read the technical specs of each screen, to compare prices, but not to find lab tests. It seems that the best designs are with Pioneer, Samsung, Sony and Panasonic (follow the links for the models).

What's your recommendation ? Any good link ?

24 hours on the web

Details here

Royal / Bayrou debate, LIVE

Update: here's the debate in a 2 hour archive.

 

Original LIVE stream was here:

Quitterie Delmas will vote Royal

 

I am impressed by this girl: although I've never met her formally, I like the way she approaches her political career and how at numerous occasions she explains her choces.

At 29, she has put all of her energy behind a candidate she has chosen: François Bayrou. And even though her candidate didn't make it to the 2nd round of the French presidential election, she's more combative than ever in the newly announced French Democrat party.

In this video (source: Marianne2007.info), she explains again and again why she's involved. I like it when she says : "my generation has to be an actor of its future". She's running for parliament and I support her freshness.

Her ideas are limpid too:

"Si je ne vote pas à titre personnel Nicolas Sarkozy, c’est que sa dérive droitière durant la campagne sur le Ministère de l’immigration et de l’identité nationale et ses propos sur l’eugénisme font de lui un incroyable conservateur. Je suis déjà d’ores et déjà en opposition politique avec ses idées.

Plus grave, me battant pour le changement des pratiques politiques, je n’accepte pas les méthodes employées de pressions sur les individus, qualifiée « méthodes des Haut de Seine », les Français ont le droit à la transparence, les élus de choisir leurs positions en âme et conscience. L’attitude des sarkozystes depuis de longues années à l’Assemblée Nationale vis à vis de nos élus UDF est inadmissible. J'ai très mal ressenti ces pressions, ces menaces et railleries, et provoque chez moi un esprit de résistance.

Si je vote à titre personnel aujourd’hui Ségolène Royal, c’est que dans sa liberté par rapport au PS, elle démontre aujourd’hui qu’une refondation des appareils politiques est possible. De plus, je souhaite une réforme des institutions imminente, comme François Bayrou : séparation des pouvoirs, non cumul des mandats, proportionnelle, fin de la collusion politico médiatique.

Naturellement, je sais d’ores et déjà que le poids de la dette, les réformes qui ne se font pas sont une menace pour ma génération et les suivantes. Ce qui provoquerait si rien n’est fait une fracture générationnelle comme Bernard Spitz l’explique très bien dans son Papy Krach."

(emphasis mine).

We need more young politicians like her, don't you think ?

Aaah, this BUZZMAN is an amazing man

I apologize to the candidate for presenting this picture I got by email. Of course physical attributes have no place in a political debate, nor do personal attacks. Just very amusing in an inbox :)

No, I'm not a populist

On the comedy channel here: http://www.sarkozy.fr/home/

Mry & Rodrigo Show 44

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