Gene Morphis ' View

I received a letter from Portfolio magazine, announcing that they were ceasing publication. I'm only mildly surprised and mildly disappointed. Surprised only because it joins a list of magazines that I had paid subscriptions to, which folded, or turned into ezines. Red Herring was a favorite of mine, but it disappeared years ago. I became a convert to Business 2.0 . It didn't really get my attention at first, but over time I began to look forward to it. It closed a couple of years ago; I still don't think Time Warner gave it a fair chance. More recently, PC Magazine converted to a net-only product. In all three cases, it was obvious that advertising was down as once-fat magazines full of ads became as thin as a supermodel, but not as rich. I occasionally go to PC Mag online, but for me it just isn't the same. And I'm only mildly disappointed in that I had paid for issues I'll never receive. I'd already decided not to renew my subscription. In an at...

I attended a conference at Pebble Beach this week. Being a total business junkie, I always ask everyone how business is. At the tony Pebble Beach Resort, it turns out business isn't very good. The staff generally tried to put a good spin on it; blame the general economy. But after a bit they would open up a little about the criticism companies have undergone from Congress and the press about meetings at resorts. My feelings about this certainly haven't changed, some middle manager banker busts his ass all year trying to close a couple of loans while working with clients in trouble trying to collect something without knocking them into bankruptcy and losing all the bank's money, and that guy has a contest that if he makes his numbers he wins a trip and the next thing he knows; trip canceled. The staff at Pebble were courteous, friendly, helpful and went out of their way to thank us for the business. But I learned that as soon as our conference was over, there weren't...

Yesterday, I took United Airlines from San Francisco to Philadelphia. The plane was at the gate before the scheduled departure time. But, it was raining and the pilots for our flight were stuck in Reno. Those things happen; I brought more than enough to read for just such a situation. After about a two hour delay, the pilots made it in and we boarded. Since the flight was only about two-thirds full, there was adequate overhead bin space and we were able to board quite quickly. But, once boarded and seated, we waited. Waited for the luggage to be loaded. How does that happen? How does a plane sit at the gate for over two hours and the ground crew not put the luggage on the plane, so that when everything else is ready so is the plane???? If you fly often at all, you see just exactly how the airlines manage to rack up the losses and have to take a periodic pilgramage to the cleansing water of a bankruptcy court...