If you have the budget, why not

Epic System is famous for several things, most happily the way they decorate their buildings. They're completing two more: "Azland, loosely inspired by “The Chronicles of Narnia,” and Elvendell, inspired by “The Lord of the Rings.”" ... "Two more buildings, Rogue Planet, based on “Star Wars,” and Dragonfell, reminiscent of Game of Thrones, are scheduled to open in spring 2028." (I'm not sure the latter theme is auspicious.)

Buildings across Epic’s campus share a similar footprint, with distinctive staircases, conference rooms and office space for about 300 to 400 employees, often working on the same team. But their interiors, from digitally printed carpets to walls covered in fantastical vinyl designs, give each building — and sometimes each floor — its own identity.

...

Much of the variation between buildings comes from the decorations, with most having the same general layout of offices and conference rooms. Recent advances in digital printing have made it easier to produce customized carpet patterns and vinyl wall coverings, including carpet designs featuring pictures of ponds and lion faces.

“The price is the same, so why not get the fun one if you have the choice?” Schumacher said.

Planning

Do managers ever rubber duck their proposals? (with someone who does not report to them, of course). Also see rule 12. You can think of business or government decisions with unhappy side effects that should have been forseeable.

Odd

The book is nominally to be released on 18-June, though word is that Amazon started shipping already.

But "SuperBookDeals" claims to have it available already, second hand. I assume they won't ship until they actually get a second-hand copy, and thus delivery might take a while, but that's a curious business model. "81% positive over the past 12 months"

Shattered Sword was Parshall's book on Midway.

Bookstores

From From Anecdotal Evidence: an essay on booksellers from 1963

My own relations with bookshops began more than forty years ago and they have extended into many countries and to all continents. I have gone to bookshops to buy and browse. I have gone to them to buy books I wanted, and because I just wanted to buy a book, and much of the time just because I wanted to be among books to inhale their presence. My case is an extreme one, and there are perhaps few people in my generation, more or less in their right minds and heavily engaged wvith all sorts of duties, who have spent so much time in bookshops as I have. I have talked with booksellers of every kind, angular Brahmins, mad Ostjuden, motherly widows, elegant patricians, sweet mice, and cagy and distrustful touts.

The retail book trade in new and second-hand books in the United States is in many important respects in an unsatisfactory condition throughout much of the country. There are some bright spots here and there, but on the whole the situation depresses, even appalls me. And it seems to be getting worse. It is not just because of my having less time now and so many books already that bookshops have become less attractive to me. My heart still pants for them "as the hart panteth after the water brook," but all too often it pants without satisfaction.

It's worse in many ways now--Barnes and Noble and Half Price Books are the only survivors within miles of here. Online stores help keep some places afloat, though. FWIW, in one Wyoming store I bought from, books had two prices listed. One was for in-person sales, the other for online.

Measurement and management

It seems the famous Deming quote about measurement and management reverses meaning when you include the rest of the sentence: "It is wrong to suppose that if you can’t measure it, you can’t manage it – a costly myth." (The New Economics)

That's encouraging--the commonly quoted sub-phrase is pretty silly, and it seemed odd that somebody so smart would get it so wrong.

The most common enterprise in the world is families, which are almost invariably managed without statistical analyses. The parents may (should) keep track of the finances, but education and discipline and most of the rest are administered without recourse to spreadsheets.

"Coconut-picking machines"

"Supermarkets snub coconut goods picked by monkeys"

BBC reported that several British companies, panicked by PETA, have "vowed to stop selling" "any products sourced from monkey labour."

Male monkeys are able to pick up to 1,000 coconuts a day, Peta says. It's thought that a human can pick about 80.

It said it also discovered "monkey schools", where the animals were trained to pick fruit, as well as ride bikes or play basketball for the entertainment of tourists.

As usual, PETA describes the worst case as normative. That's when they don't outright lie: I read what they wrote of treatment of cows in Wisconsin--did they think we who live here don't have eyes?

I gather that the companies are perfectly happy to have humans do this harvesting instead--which is much more difficult and dangerous for a human than for a monkey. Priorities, you understand...

Wasn't there once an advertising slogan "Untouched by human hands?"

Military hardware

Years ago I had it carefully explained to me that the most important things about military hardware were not superior quality or efficiency, but reliability, ruggedness, and ease of repair in the field. You wouldn't repair the jet's engine, but yank it and stuff a new one in to get the thing back in the air quickly. The sine qua non--can you use it for its job? If not, you don't really have it. By that rule our navy is quite a bit smaller than we say it is.

Cheaper things than jets--jeeps, guns, radios--were supposed to be easy to get back in working order while in the field.

I was never in the military, much less in combat, but the priority makes sense to me--even when you have to pay a premium for the product as a result.

It seems that principle is no longer a priority: "Increasingly, Captain Ekman argues, the Department of Defense is signing procurement contracts for equipment from generators to trucks to MRAPs that not only cover the purchase of the vehicle but strict maintenance regimens as well. These contracts often place restrictions on the maintenance of the equipment, requiring manufacturer-affiliated contractors to perform maintenance and repair instead of enlisted Soldiers."

Apparently we have no "right to repair" important chunks of gear. I'm trying to imagine the "return-to-factory." Or will Oshkosh field its own armed repair teams? I remember some sci-fi positing that corporations would field their own armies. This wasn't the way they described it.

Probably rules about repairs and warranties get waived in combat zones. But in the meantime our mechanics have no experience on the equipment. They'd be learning on the fly.

If the Pentagon decides to change course and force a "right to repair" in the contracts, maybe some of the rest of us can get it too--a lot of farmers are unhappy with John Deere.

Doing business abroad

CocaCola is "remodeling" in Liberia

That's what the headline says, and the story mentions that several times, but what they're actually doing is stopping local production in favor of importing the beverages. The remodeling is to make the plant a distribution center.

The press release requires translation, as usual. The newspaper provides one.

The statement continued: “The realities of the Liberian market have evolved and become more complex in the last few years. After a recent evaluation of our current business model in the country we recognized that it needed to be reorganized so that it can respond quickly to the evolving needs of our customers more efficiently and sustainably. Despite various other changes applied to date, the current business model remains unsustainable, so the company has decided to take steps to transform the facility into a distribution center to ensure the service to our customers.”

This means the company will no longer be manufacturing the beverage in Liberia but will import drinks for distribution in Liberia

"Since 1949, the bottling company which produces and markets Bonaqua, Schweppes, Burn, Fanta, Sprite, Coca-Cola, Coca-Cola Light, Coca-Cola Zero at its Liberia plant on the Kakata road, has been a fixture."

"the Liberian market is said to be flooded with low quality unregulated soft drinks."

Both the Ministry of Commerce and the Freeport of Monrovia have kept their eyes off the ball by allowing all kinds of beverages including Coca Cola rival, Pepsi and others into the market without duty, thereby allowing importers to price at or below the price of the locally produced product, which also limits the ability to take prices up.

... Priced in local Liberian currency to the consumers, all the ingredients are imported and priced in US dollars, to the company’s detriment.

Duty free? Interesting. That's not the rule.. I'll bet several people got a "small dash."

The Coke Facebook page is 3 years old.

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We used to buy Coke in 24-bottle wood cases, returning the empty bottles and the case for their deposits. Several miles of shaking over dirt roads in a hot trunk left the bottles too "trigger-happy" to drink, so we set the crate in the laundry room to cool off and settle down for a day while we used the last from the old crate. There wasn't always room in the refrigerator for a few. The temptation is obvious. When I tried the secret swap, I worried that my sister would notice that the bottle was warm, or that she would pry the cap slowly and be warned, but she was very thirsty and when she popped the cap off the spray hit the ceiling. Literally. (Mom was annoyed for some reason--though I don't think the spray hit her.)

It gives you a warm feeling when plans go just right, doesn't it? I wasn't worried about waste; I didn't like Coke anyway--Sprite was my preference. Or water with lots of ice in it. (We used Katadyn ceramic water filters--there was no chlorine or any other cleansing in the water. When it came time to clean the filters they were foul.)

A little space for liberty

Apparently at least one Dell call center in India gives technicians a little freedom to express themselves. The name one woman goes by is "Wishbringer," and she tells us that she is an "XKCD/608 certified technician." (That would be this, I think.) I like it.