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24 February 2011

Zanimljivi tekstovi

1. O šaolinskom kung fuu iz National Geographica

Over the past decade Shi Yongxin, the 45-year-old abbot, has built an international business empire—including touring kung fu troupes, film and TV projects, an online store selling Shaolin-brand tea and soap—and franchised Shaolin temples abroad, including one planned in Australia that will be attached to a golf resort. Furthermore, many of the men manning the temple's numerous cash registers—men with shaved heads and wearing monks' robes—admit they're not monks but employees paid to look the part.

And yet, whether a force for evangelizing or profitmaking, the Shaolin Temple has helped foster an undeniable kung fu renaissance, which has coincided with China's own resurgence as an international power. Nowhere is this more evident than in Dengfeng, a sprawling city of 650,000 just six miles from the temple gates. Here some 60 martial arts academies have sprouted over the past two decades and now boast more than 50,000 students. A drive down a main road passes some of the biggest schools. They rise like Vegas casinos, with towering dormitories adorned with murals of kung fu fighters, dragons, and tigers. 

2. Izuzetno zanimljiv članak o TV industriji u Rusiji, korupciji i tome zašto se neke rijaliti emisije tamo nisu primile:


The fundamental premise for most Western reality shows is what people in the industry call ‘aspirational’: someone works hard and is rewarded with a wonderful new life. The shows celebrate the outstanding individual, the bright extrovert. For the Russian version of The Apprentice, Vladimir Potanin, a metals oligarch worth more than $10 billion, was recruited to be the boss choosing between the candidates competing for the dream job. Potanin goaded, teased and tortured the candidates as they went through increasingly difficult challenges. The show looked great, the stories and dramas all worked, but there was a problem: no one in Russia believed in the rules. The usual way to get a job in Russia is not by impressing at an interview, but by what is known as blat – ‘connections’. Russian society isn’t much interested in the hard-working, brilliant young business mind. Everyone knows where that type ends up: in jail like Mikhail Khodorkovsky, or in exile like the mobile phone billionaire Yevgeny Chichvarkin. Today’s Russia rewards the man who operates from the shadows, the grey apparatchik, the master of the politique de couloir – the man like Putin. 

3. Propusti u "vanzemaljci napadaju" filmovima, počev od toga da uglavnom napadaju goli, preko toga da uvek prvo napadnu Ameriku, pa do najzanimljivijeg - zašto, kog đavola, napadaju Zemlju zbog resursa, kad mogu iste te resurse da nađu na nenaseljenim planetama? Dobro, u nekim filmovima jedu ljudske mozgove, tu priča ima smisla.

Zašto prosečna plata raste?

Čitam sutrašnji Ekonomist, pa u rubrici "Reč po reč" vidim izjavu premijera:

Prosečna plata nam uopšte ne pada uprkos tome što se priča. Ona čak realno raste.

Tačno, ali iz razloga koji su, blago rečeno, veoma loši - prosečna plata raste pretežno zato što su oni sa niskim platama ostali bez posla.


Otkud to znam? Pa, ne znam baš pouzdano, ali pogledajte tabelu, pa zaključite sami (podaci RZS). Pre nego što pogledate tabelu, jedna napomena - statistika plata u Srbiji je veoma, veoma loša. Obuhvat malih privatnih firmi je posebno loš, naročito obuhvat preduzetnika i zaposlenih kod njih. Ovi podaci koje dajem čak i ne uzimaju u obzir te zaposlene. Dakle, ovo svakako nije dokaz, ali je vrlo indikativno.

Tabela: Broj zaposlenih po rasponu plate


Septembar 2008
Septembar 2010
Razlika
Nisu primili zaradu
74561
51811
-22750
Manje od 15000
39712
23660
-16052
15001-20000
71435
35562
-35873
20001-25000
112698
88927
-23771
25001-35000
191611
163969
-27642
35001-45000
183056
165534
-17522
45001-65000
256029
252248
-3781
65001-85000
89631
122733
33102
85001 I vise
82142
124205
42063


Dakle, vidi se da onih sa nižim platama ima manje, a da ovih sa višim platama ima više. Ja tvrdim da je to zato što su neki sa nižim primanjima "ušli" u kategoriju sa višim primanjima, a da su neki izgubili posao. Alternativna tvrdnja, da su svi sa nižim primanjima prešli u više kategorije, pa da su ovi sa najvišim primanjima izgubili posao je naravno moguća, ali veoma, veoma malo verovatna.

Za one kojima matematika nije jača strana - kada iz populacije izbaciš one sa najnižim platama, prosečna plata raste, čak i ako nikome pojedinačno plata nije porasla.

Par komentara na događaje na Bliskom Istoku

Prvo, pročitajte odličan tekst Džordža Fridmana na Stratforovom sajtu u kojem se, pored svega što se dešava,  bavi i prethodnim globalnim revolucijama  - 1848, 1968, 1989. Poenta teksta:


U međuvremenu, dok gledate šta se dešava u regionu, zapamtite da ne obraćate pažnju na demonstrante. Posmatrajte ljude sa oružjem. Ako oni ostanu da brane državu, demonstracije su propale. Ako neki pređu na stranu demonstranata, postoji šansa za pobedu. A ako dođe do pobede, i uspostavi se demokratija, nemojte odmah da pretpostavite da će ono što sledi da bude dobro za Zapad - demokratija i prozapadna politička kultura nisu ista stvar.

Drugo, pročitajte vrlo zanimljiv post Waltera Russela Meada o modernoj istoriji Egipta. Ima dosta stvari koje nisam znao. Recimo, evo šta je Ismail paša rekao 1879. godine:

Moja zemlja više nije u Africi, mi smo sada deo Evrope. Zato je za nas prirodno da odbacimo stare običaje i uspostavimo novi sistem prilagođen našim društvenim uslovima.

 Treće,  Čarls Kroford je imao nekoliko odličnih postova u poslednje vreme, od kojih je možda najzanimljiviji ovaj, o konceptu Muddle Through Somehow (što bi mi možda preveli kao "Nekako će se sve srediti samo od sebe"), a u kontekstu demonstracija/revolucija na Bliskom Istoku.


Probably best to do nothing for now. Waiting and seeing looks inglorious, but being glorious and wrond does no help much in these circumstances.
In the meantime, my heart leaps at the thought of all those 2010 FCO risk-management matrices and target-setting roadmaps being revealed as so much drivel.
All that laborious, meaningless work - trashed! By reality!
The whole 'risk-management' bureaucracy as developed by Whitehall is phoney. Why? Because it basically assumes variations on Muddle Through Somehow. It allows no serious role for non-MTS events.
And as we are now seeing, non-MTS events are the ones which really matter.