Keywords

I just changed the slogan that I have in the title of this blog since its creation in 2008. Now, instead there is a list of keywords identifying me as a person. This reflects the fact the this blog is more of a diary than a blog in the sense that I write down my thoughts, often quite incoherently, mostly for my own sake and to remember them.

That said, if you read anything here that you want to comment on, please do so. I would love to read it. I might even link to this blog from my LinkedIn page at some point. But I am not quite there yet I think.

On the comparison of automakers to phonemakers

I just read an article where Tesla is compared to Apple. The analogy is interesting and has some merits. But I think they are taking it way too far. The auto market will not go the same way as the phone market did.

There are several reasons for that, but the main one is that when phones turned into smartphones they stopped being phones. The term smartphone is actually completwly missleading. It should rather be denoted nanoportable computer or something. And by that, a completely new set of functuons became available.

But this will not happend to cars. They will still be cars. Just that they will drive by them selves. The nanoportable computer we have will be the devices that will occupy the time we used to spend on driving. Not something new in the cars.

There are also a bunch of other reasons that the analogy is limping. The safety and security requirement on cars can not be compared to those on phones. Also the price tag is completely different. And the life span. Also the complexity of a car can not be compared to a nanoportable computer. Those are actually quite simple devices relying totally on Moores law. However that is not the case of cars. They are just so much more mechanical. And therefor complex.

Hence, in conclusion, Tesla is not the next Apple in the sense that they will obtain a 50% market share. But that belief is what makes their stock completely over valued.

As an interesting side note, Apple is big now, but it was bigger some time ago, and it will continue to decline. The idea with proprietary solutions that are not shared has proven a bad one over and over again (beta max, mini disc, ...) Thus, Apple will continue to decline and Android will continue to dominate. Price allays beats performance. And shared competition always beats proprietary in the long run.

Marx analysis is will be even more important in the future

I just saw a video on YouTube about the future of automation. I agree with most of what is said there. However, what is not discussed is how to deal with it. The political implications of the development.

The difference between those who own means of production and those who do not will grow further. This is a key point in Marx analysis of the interplay on the capitalist market.  Of course, his solution was not very successful, and hence, we are in a desperate need to investigate how to deal with the situation.

I would like to propose some embryos to solving the situation. It is obvious that we will need to abandon the idea of continues growth. This is not a sustainable scenario. At least not in the setting it plays out now.

Another thing that perhaps could be used and put into the analysis is irrational players. Game theory is the basic framework in which economics is done. It that is all well and good. however, the central assumption of rational players is not true. Thus, that should be replaced by irrational players. One such scheme would be to let the players also act randomly to some degree. That could be used to model irrational players. There will be many questions that needs to be answered about irrational players and game optimum with irrational players. E.g. prior distributions of random moves.

Angående de nysläppta frekvenserna i 700 mhz-bandet

Nu har regeringen beslutat att TV får flytta på sig till förmån för mobilt bredband i 700 MHz-bandet. Det är nog bra. Men nu gäller det att PTS inte gör bort sig som tidigare och ger bort detta bandet utan att säkerställa att det faktiskt används som det är tänkt - att ge bra täckning på landsbygden. Det duger alltså inte att detta säljs till någon operatör som väljer att bara lägga till stödet i sina befintliga basstationer och där med öka kapaciteten där man tjänar mest pengar, dvs. i tätbebyggelse.

Nu gäller det att frekvensägandet ska komma med tydliga och sanktionerbara krav på 100% täckning i hela landet. Det måste alltså finns med klausuler i avtalet om frekvenserna där PTS kan ålägga operatörerna kraftiga viten om inte kravet på 100% täckning uppfylls. Beloppen bör överstiga kostnaden för total utbyggnad. Det kommer vara enda sättet att garantera att full utbyggnad.