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I don’t want to get on a rant here, but I’m just someone born very late in the baby boom. Frankly, I have more in common with Generation Y than with Generation X. But both generations have their faults. I saw this yesterday, while I attended Peter Kay’s presentation on crowd sourcing at the May 2008 HTCA meeting. Peter kept asking the audience what web services they had used. The number of hands got smaller with each service he named. Everyone had used Wikipedia. A few people knew about Twitter. Peter mentioned a few sites I had never used, like InTrade and IdeaScale.

I was the only person who raised his hand for Ning, the social networking portal that hosts TechHui and Peter’s latest project, HawaiiConCon.org. The Honolulu Advertiser’s article about the site is available here. and I mentioned TechHui in my billso.com post on 31 March 2008.

The generation gap

A few members of the audience got nervous when Peter discussed corporate wikis. I have heard and read similar questions as managers and academics struggle to keep up with the digital generation.

Tammy Erickson has a top 10 list on Business Week with some excellent comments about generational conflicts in the workplace.

More of the precious little snowflakes - and they’re so many of them in Gen X (the generation born between 1965 and 1982) and Gen Y (those born between 1983 and 1997) - need to wake up and smell the coffee.

It’s not Starbucks coffee.

It’s not even a maple nut crunch latte from the 7-11.

It’s Maxwell House scooped from the big blue can, brewed in a vat, simmered to the consistency of loose mud and served in a tiny styrofoam cup.

If you’re lucky, you get a little red plastic stir stick and some Coffeemate. Denis Leary would be proud of this coffee-flavored coffee.

And if you’re really lucky, someone made some Sanka because you can’t handle the caffeine.

Life sucks and it’s not fair

Many Gen Xers are hitting the ceiling in in their climb up the corporate ladder. There’s fewer CXO spots than there are Gen Xers. It’s not fair, but those stubborn folks in Generation Jones (born between 1954 and 1964) got there first. Their heroes are folks like Bill Gates, who would blow off his Harvard courses and try to make up the study time with end-of-the-term all-nighters.

It’s bad timing as the children of Generations X and Jones are going on to college and getting jobs. Members of Generation Y have feelings of entitlement and privilege that crash against a wall of indifference and disbelief in the real world.

The heroes of Generation Y are people like Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, who has bragged about skipping most of his Harvard art history course while he built a Facebook prototype. Zuckerberg passed that class after he built an online study guide that his classmates poured their notes and content into during the end of term reading period. Zuckerberg and Bill Gates dropped out of Harvard, but Zuckerberg got rich much faster. See this New York Times article for more details.

Helicopter parents

Gen Xers hate how the Generation Y calls their parents to ask advice about everything from class schedules to work responsibilities. It’s awkward when a college student’s helicopter parent calls a professor to intervene on their child’s behalf. It’s dumbfounding when this happens in the workplace. This 2006 MSNBC article about helicopter parents who manage their childrens’ job searches is a great example.

The current recession only makes matters worse for all involved. The home equity line is tapped out. No one wants to buy that piece of investment property that looked like a sweet deal 3 years ago. Bonuses aren’t as common at work anymore. This year’s vacation became next year’s vacation, and that’s just a maybe.

And yes, they’re buying Maxwell House and brewing their coffee at home.

Escape - if you can

There is hope. A few Gen Xers escape from corporate jobs to start their own small businesses. But many of the Xers are uncomfortable with modern technology. Text messaging and social networking are too much to handle. They can deal with their Netflix queue, but email is more their speed.

Members of Generation Y have kept up with the changes. Some Gen Xers are jealous that their younger Generation Y can navigate the Internet so easily and use online services to find new opportunities.

Some members of Generation Y are overwhelmed with communications options. Just read their blogs and feel their pain as they realize that everyday life is hard. ReadWriteWeb has a great collection of Generation Y links and RSS feeds, along with a video and some additional discussion.

But as I mentioned on 19 May 2008 in this billso.com article, many Americans don’t read blogs or send emails. To them, all of this conflict between generations may mean very little at all.

Images courtesy of Roadside Pictures and mark_the_legend_foster through a Creative Commons license.

Need some more time at the office? Perhaps you’ve got a project that needs several hours of tedious work. You could hire an assistant or a temp to come in and handle these tasks, but if that’s not an option in these economically challenging times, try virtual outsourcing some of your research, data entry, word processing or travel planning to a virtual assistant on the Internet.

Virtual outsourcing isn’t anything new. In September 1998, Business Week interviewed people at several US-based virtual outsourcing firms, and they discussed how their companies help small- and medium-sized businesses reduce their overhead expenses.

In 2006, this American Bar Association article discussed virtual outsourcing for legal firms.

You can even outsource your social networking, although that seems to defeat the purpose. Make sure the virtual outsourcing firm has some privacy guarantees.

This post at Elance has more details and a list of 25 examples.

Related posts on billso.com

• 9 December 2007: The mobile office in Honolulu
• 29 January 2007: Quiet time
• 21 August 2004: Reverse outsourcing
• 6 August 2004: Do NDAs mean anything in India?
• 1 June 2004: Irish IT staffers turn on their CEO after outsourcing announcement

From the Associated Press via Sports Illustrated and Forbes: National Football League commissioner Roger Goddell has announced that the league will enact and enforce tougher regulations regarding technology and spying for the 2008 season. The NFL has allowed radios for offensive play-calling since 1994, but mobile computer and video technology have advanced far faster than the league’s regulations ever anticipated.

The three-time NFL champion New England Patriots have been the subject of intense scrutiny after a staff member was caught videotaping defensive coaching signals during the team’s 2007 season opener. The NFL and Senator Arlen Specter (R-PA) are each investigating multiple allegations that the Patriots had been videotaping opposing teams since coach Bill Belichick was hired in 2000.

Former Patriots employee Matt Walsh recently sent 8 video tapes of Patriots opponents to the NFL office for analysis. According to Mike Fish of ESPN, at least one tape included offensive coaches from another team. Previously, it was believed that the Patriots only taped defensive coaches.

What about the FCC?

Most of the discussions I have read about the so-called Spygate scandal have missed an important legal point. The NFL depends upon large multi-billion dollar contracts from US television networks for a significant portion of the league’s revenue and market power. Every regular-season and post-season game is televised. The NFL also owns and operates its own television network, which carries 8 regular season games, many pre-season games, and a 24/7 stream of interviews, documentaries, replays and other NFL content. See this article from CBS Sports for more details.

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has specific regulations on how sports may be broadcast in the United States. One key rule is that live televised sporting events must be “free of artifice”. In other words, games cannot be rigged or fixed in any way.

This is one reason that professional wrestling broadcasts use a great deal of taped and edited content. Pro wrestling is marketed as , not a sporting event.

“When we met with [the] commissioner, the discussion was how we proceed in an era when technology is expanding exponentially,” Indianapolis Colts president Bill Polian said. “The question is how do we keep on top of that. This is far less about what happened in the past and how we deal with it in the future.”

From the New York Times comes Michelle LaBrosse’s account of her laptop’s travels. After she was injured, LaBrosse ended up checking her laptop computer as luggage on a flight to Chicago.

From her description, it sounds like she takes packs a lot in her bags when she travels. Maybe she should read this New York Times article about packing light.

In any case, when she arrived at O’Hare, her computer bag was missing. Never made it to the baggage carousel. No big surprise. Frankly, I’d never check my laptop computer on an airplane.

A few weeks later, one of her assistants at Cheetah Project Management determined that the computer was being used by someone for instant messaging.

Turns out the computer ended up in Nicaragua. LaBrosse never got the computer back, but at least ahe figured out where it went… and she got the story published in the Times.

Photo courtesy of william c hutton jr through a Creative Commons license.

Related posts on billso.com

• 15 May 2008: Don’t check cameras in your luggage
• 2 May 2008: Never check your computer on a plane
• 11 March 2008: Using Facebook as a lost-and-found department
• 3 March 2008: Building the perfect laptop
• 30 September 2006: Don’t steal my laptop!
• 28 June 2003: Where’s my luggage?

The Microsoft-Yahoo takeover battle may be resolved soon, according to Wired:

One of the better insights came from Citigroup analyst Mark Mahaney, who handicapped the outcomes of the Microsoft-Yahoo war. Mahaney reckons there’s a 45 percent chance Yahoo sells out at a higher offer; a 40 percent chance Microsoft goes hostile; a 10 percent chance Microsoft walks away; and a 5 percent chance they both agree to the current price.

Yesterday’s New York Times had additional details. Saturday, 26 April 2008, was the deadline that Microsoft had set for Yahoo’s response to its recent purchase offer. According to this New York Times analysis, it seems unlikely that Microsoft CEO will abandon the company’s pursuit of Yahoo, because failure might send the wrong signals to the market.

Microsoft’s CFO, Chris Liddell, has led the company to spend more on acquisitions, and take on debt for the first time in the company’s 33-year history. He was profiled in Reuters article, which also discusses his management style.

To merge or not to merge

Microsoft doesn’t really need Yahoo, according to a recent research report. Michael Cusumano suggested in this New York Times article by Randall Stross that Yahoo is a poor fit with Microsoft’s enterprise software ambitions. SAP would be a better choice for Microsoft, especially after Oracle’s acquisition of BEA.

Another ZDnet report and this Wired article indicate that Yahoo has increased its severance packages for employees.

On 25 February 2008, Yahoo CEO asked his number two, Sue Decker, to join him on-stage at an important presentation, according to the New York Times. Decker has excellent ties with the advertising industry, and she was the real architect of Yahoo’s advertising business strategy.

Yang needs all the help he can get when facing nervous customers. At the event, Yang called Microsoft’s bid a “galvanizing event” for Yahoo managers, employees and board members. That’s some deep thinking… deep like a puddle. Threats of acquisition and unemployment can really command attention. The company’s plan to recapture its former dominance as an Internet portal is about seven years too late.

Photos courtesy of Carsten Knoch (top) and code_martial (bottom) through a Creative Commons license.

Related posts on billso.com

• 18 April 2008: Antitrust regulators would fight a Yahoo-Google combination
• 5 April 2008: Microsoft’s offer for Yahoo may disappear
• 17 February 2008: Shareholders may bring Microsoft and Yahoo together
• 4 February 2008: Microsoft acquistion of Yahoo faces roadblocks
• 1 February 2008: Microsoft makes offer for Yahoo
• 25 January 2008: Oracle, BEA and middleware