More Job Cuts Coming for Kodak?
“Kodachrome. They give us those nice bright colors. They give us the greens of summers. Makes you think all the world’s a sunny day.”
Well everyone has known for years that the move from film photography to digital photography would not be good for Kodak. But after cutting about half their work force in the past four years it looks like still more job cuts may be in the cards for Kodak in the near future. From Bloomberg:
“To see any sort of meaningful turnaround, they have to get costs way more in line with their peers,” Standard & Poor’s equity analyst Erik Kolb said in an interview. “That means cutting jobs, cutting anything wherever they can.”
Kodak sliced its projected 2008 operating profit in half in October and withdrew the forecast altogether in December. The moves have caused some investors and analysts to doubt the success of Chief Executive Officer Antonio Perez’s overhaul that eliminated 28,000 jobs by the time it ended in 2007. “
Since Eastman Kodak’s (ticker EK) high of a little over $90 per share over a decade ago, the stock now is down about 92% to $7.17 per share. The once great company that once was a part of the 30 stocks that make up the Dow Jones Industrial Average was removed from that Index in 2004. Despite a significant initiative to move from a film business to a digital business made by the company over the past few years, the question that still lingers is can the company survive even the next few years ahead.
Especially given a bad economy right now, things will be even more difficult for the company which was already facing considerable challenges. Quite a different world than when George Eastman first invented roll film back in 1885.
On a related note, from the NY Times: “Polaroid Fans Try Making New Film for Old Cameras.”
Update: It looks like Kodak is in fact going to be laying off another 4,500 workers, per reports out today.
Why Isn’t Carol Bartz, Yahoo’s New CEO, on Flickr?
I just got done listening to Yahoo’s quarterly analyst conference call. Carol Bartz, Yahoo’s new CEO, gave a rundown on what we should expect in the quarter ahead and took her first round of questions from Wall Street analysts. There will of course be plenty of financial analysis on the web about both their quarterly performance and her first analyst call as CEO, so I’m not going to get into much of that here except to say that I did think it was interesting that she mentioned “micro blogging” at one point in the call and that makes me wonder if Yahoo might be interested in buying Twitter or FriendFeed.
One of the things that I was struck by on today’s call though is that my favorite Yahoo property Flickr was not mentioned a single time, not once, nada, nilch, it’s like they didn’t even exist. Many of Yahoo’s other properties were mentioned of course, Yahoo News, Yahoo Finance, etc. — she even mentioned Buzz. But the word Flickr was not uttered a single time on the entire call.
Analysts asked questions about Facebook and myspace and Bartz even mentioned at one point that one of her daughters wasn’t as interested in posting pictures to Facebook any more as she was now more interested in reading Yahoo Finance etc. Posting photos on Facebook? Why not Flickr? There were many points in the call that it would have been appropriate for Bartz to mention Flickr, but she didn’t. Which to me was a bit disappointing. Especially given that Alexa rates Flickr as the 23rd most visited English internet site in the world. Certainly well ahead of almost every other property that Yahoo owns.
But then I got to thinking more. Maybe Bartz just doesn’t know about Flickr. Maybe she’s just not familiar with it. So I did a search for her on Flickr to see if I could find an account for her to add her as a friend, maybe she just needs me as her friend on Flickr. The closest thing I could come up with on Flickr for Bartz was this account. Unfortunately, if this account (screenshot above) is actually Carol’s account, well, then it’s no wonder she’s not familiar with Flickr, she doesn’t seem to use the account at all. The account has no avatar, is sharing no public photos, has no testimonials, has no contacts — heck, the account isn’t even a paid Pro account.
Now there is a chance of course that this account is not Carol’s. That it belongs to some other Carol Bartz and that she has some other sort of handle on flickr like hotmama28787, but then again maybe not.
Now I’m not suggesting that every CEO needs to “dogfood” their own company products. But as one of the most trafficked and highest profile Yahoo property, I certainly think it makes some amount of sense for her to use Flickr, or at least to have a halfway presentable account on the site. Everybody has photos right? Even if she didn’t want to share photos of her kids or her dog or things like that, she could at least share a few photos that she’s snapped of flowers or sunsets, no?
On the analyst call she talked a bit about how Yahoo’s traffic had spiked during the inauguration. What a great opportunity for her to have plugged Flickr and mention that some of the best photos of the entire event came from Flickr, Yahoo’s users. Instead she didn’t, and I think that’s too bad.
By the way, one thing that Bartz did say over and over again on today’s earnings call was that she hoped to make Yahoo successful by having a “maniacal focus on our users and their experience.” She used the words maniacal many times and it seemed to be a focus of hers. In the spirit of this maniacal focus on my own experience, I’d like to offer my own comment as a very heavy user of one of Yahoo’s top properties, Flickr (which I hope she and her daughters join and are active on the future).
Carol, if you want to focus on *my* user experience on Flickr, the best thing that you could do is to have Flickr stop censoring my images. Oh, and it would be nice if Yahoo would agree to notify users if their photos on Flickr are censored in the future. That’s all for now. Carry on with the new job as CEO and dropkicking friggin’ ass.
The Light That Never Goes Out
I took the shot above at Oakland’s Mountain View Cemetery. I love cemeteries and spend lots of time exploring them. They are like parks to me. Mountain View Cemetery is within walking distance from my house and is one of the places that I shoot most regularly. I love wandering around the cemetery there with my kids, watching them play, wondering about the people who lived the lives buried there. A single one line entry on a tombstone seems so little to give someone for an entire life of living — and even then only the simplest of phrases “Thomas Hill, California Artist.” Turns out there’s a lot more to Thomas Hill than just that. He was making amazing paintings of Yosemite before Ansel Adams was ever even born.
I wonder about the other people buried in Mountain View and other cemeteries. We have no Pharaohs anymore, no King Tuts. It seems like even the grandest of figures in life oftentimes are ignored in death. Recently I visited William Randolph Hearsts grave at Cypress Lawn in Colma. It took me a long time to find it. The tomb is large as far as tombs go and impressive, but nowhere near something that you’d think about for the man who built Hearst’s castle.
When I was down in Los Angeles I went by one “Henry Charles Bukowski Jr.’s” grave at Green Hills Memorial Park in Rancho Palos Verdes. Bukowski got more than just a single line on his tombstone. Along with his nickname “Hank” he’s got an etching of a fighter, with the words “Don’t Try.” Somehow in his case that almost seemed appropriate.
When I visited New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina, I visited Lafayette Cemetery up in the tone Garden District of the City. My friend Anthony told me that the cemetery used to be full of great statuary but that thieves had stolen most of the great pieces there a few years back. After we visited the cemetery we walked around the Garden District. Anthony showed me Nick Cage’s house there. On his front lawn was one of the most beautiful sculptures I’d ever seen. I thought to myself that it probably came from a cemetery just like Lafayette cemetery, and thought about the irony of the rich having their graves robbed so that their statuary could adorn the lawns of movie stars.
If you like exploring cemeteries like I do, you might like this site “Find a Grave.”
My collection of cemetery images is one of my works in progress. I plan to visit as many cemeteries as I can and shoot them before I die. You can see my cemetery collection, “The World Belongs to the Living,” here.
U.S. Rep Pete King Wants Your Cell Phone Camera to Go “Beep”
U.S. New York Representative Pete King (Republican, Long Island) introduced a new bill in Congress this month H.R.414: “To require mobile phones containing digital cameras to make a sound when a photograph is taken. ” The short title of the bill is simply, “Camera Phone Predator Alert Act.”
From the bill:
” (a) Requirement- Beginning 1 year after the date of enactment of this Act, any mobile phone containing a digital camera that is manufactured for sale in the United States shall sound a tone or other sound audible within a reasonable radius of the phone whenever a photograph is taken with the camera in such phone. A mobile phone manufactured after such date shall not be equipped with a means of disabling or silencing such tone or sound.
(b) Enforcement by Consumer Product Safety Commission- The requirement in subsection (a) shall be treated as a consumer product safety standard promulgated by the Consumer Product Safety Commission under section 7 of the Consumer Product Safety Act (15 U.S.C. 2056). A violation of subsection (a) shall be enforced by the Commission under section 19 of such Act (15 U.S.C. 2068).”
Now I’m a father of four young children, and nobody wants to protect their children from predators more than I do, but this is just plain stupid.
First off there are many times that you don’t want your camera to make audible noises. Let’s say your shooting your own kid in the school play. Having a bunch of disruptive beeps going off every time someone takes a photo is annoying. There are many times when you want to shoot something being less disruptive not being more disruptive. There are certainly plenty of times and places where it is perfectly appropriate to try and be as quiet as you can while shooting.
Secondly, this bill only applies to cell phones. So if some predator wants to try to sneak photos of kids in the locker room all they would have to do is use a regular old point and shoot camera which this bill doesn’t apply to. In fact, spy type cameras have been around for years and if someone really wants to try to take stealthy photos, they certainly can without the need to use their cell phone camera. The law also does nothing to address video.
Then of course there is the part of the bill that this would only apply to new phones. So let’s see, a predator then could, theoretically, still use any old cell phone that they want to take silent phones while millions of law abiding users have to put up with noisy beeps going off whenever they shoot.
I have no idea what the cost of implementing this technology would be, but I’m sure AT&T would figure out some way to make the “enhancement” a reoccurable fee every month on your cell phone bill.
It seems to me like this bill is yet another example of really bad ideas coming from government. It would seem that this is not the first boneheaded idea that Rep. King has come up with by the way. Another of his winner ideas was responsible for funneling $3 million in taxpayer money to a campaign donor for custom manhole covers that Con Ed said could be dangerous in — order to fight those pesky terrorists. At least that’s the way the Daily News reported it. I thought Republicans were supposed to be for less government not for more.
Los Angeles’ Museum of Neon Art
Museum of Neon Art (MONA)
136 W. 4th Street
Los Angeles, CA
213-489-9918
Last month while I was down in Los Angeles I had an opportunity to stop by the Museum of Neon Art, or the MONA as those familiar with the museum call it. Those of you who follow my photography know that my Neon Days and Neon Nights set is one of my most worked on collection of images. I’ve got almost 2,000 photographs of neon in my collection so far and so I was very excited to be able to visit this interesting museum devoted to neon signs in Los Angeles.
The MONA is easy to miss. It’s on 4th Street in Downtown L.A in a fairly nondescript space with three big letters in it’s storefront window, A-R-T. But if like me you admire neon, you will definitely want to stop by and check it out.
The museum was founded in 1991 and the space it’s in now is its temporary space from what I understand. I don’t think that a permanent space has been identified for the museum but I think that they are working on finding one. The current space that houses the MONA is a little on the small side for a museum, but they make up for their smaller size by having some of the most amazing vintage neon signs I’ve ever seen. Included in their collection are a giant Jantzen neon diver, a great vintage Pep Boys sign, a Van de Kamp’s bakery sign, a Fun Land side with moving neon, and lots of other great vintage signs.
In addition to the museum’s vintage neon signs, most of which were restored and in perfect working order, there were a number of other interesting group exhibits by contemporary artists focusing on neon. In the lobby of the museum they also had several fantastic neon photographs by photographer Rob Carter. They also had some great historical neon photographs, including a photograph of the first neon sign in the United States, a Packard sign that people used to drive from miles around to come see and visit.
I spent a half an hour or so talking to the guy who was working the door at the museum and he gave me a lot of great background on the museum. Apparently, in addition to the museum itself they also have a giant warehouse with even more signs downtown somewhere that is not open to the public. Apparently the warehouse doesn’t have electricity so you have to visit it with flashlights. Hopefully someday I’ll be able to check out that place as well.
My favorite thing about the museum? It was such a relaxing place to take photographs of their signs. It’s refreshing to me that the museum is so open with it’s photo policy and had no problem with me spending a few hours shooting their collection. I pretty much had the entire place to myself and had all the room I needed to work and photograph the amazing collection. I was able to get down on the floor to shoot and really had the run of the place. My only warning from the guy working there was to watch out for the suitcase that moves around on the floor, it’s an exhibit and sometimes people forget that it’s there.
In addition to the neon museum itself, the MONA also runs a number of different double decker bus neon tours. I didn’t get a chance to go on any of those but I’ve heard from other people who have that they are great.
It seems like every other day another neon sign is coming down. I worry that, especially with the bad economy, more and more places are going to go out of business and that we are likely to lose more and more historic signs going forward. Having a museum devoted to salvaging these signs and restoring them is a great thing. Hats off to the people behind this museum for doing the important work that they do.
Admission to the MONA is $7. There is metered street parking, but bring lots of coins because the parking meters downtown are pretty expensive (fortunately I found a broken meter when I visited). The museum is open Thursday-Saturday noon-7PM; Sunday noon-5PM.
I put together a set of about 15 images from the museum that you can view here. I’ve got lots more images of the museum that I still need to upload that I’ll be adding in the days ahead.
Update: Interestingly enough there is an article today over at the Environmental Capital blog at the Wall Street Journal that talks about the recent decision by ConnocoPhillips to try and save some of the Union 76 service station balls that have been coming down. It looks like the MONA has in fact recieved on of these iconic balls from ConnocoPhillips. Thanks, Russell!
Valentine’s Day is Over
Adobe Releases Lightroom 2.3 and Camera Raw 5.3 Release Candidates
Yesterday Adobe released the latest version of Lightroom, Lightroom 2.3, as well as Camera Raw 5.3.
From Adobe:
“The ‘release candidate’ label indicates that this update is well tested but would benefit from additional community testing before it is distributed automatically to all customers. The Lightroom and Camera Raw teams would like the community to help verify the quality of this update through normal usage as this will ensure that the application is tested on a wide variety of hardware and software configurations not available internally at Adobe.
Both release candidates provide additional raw file support for the Nikon D3X and Olympus E-30 cameras. In addition, the Lightroom 2.3 Release Candidate provides a solution to a memory leak that affected some customers of the Lightroom 2.2 release.
Adobe is also pleased to announce the availability of Lightroom in eight new languages, including Dutch, Italian, Portuguese, Spanish, Swedish, Korean, Chinese (simplified) and Chinese (traditional). The Lightroom 2.3 Release Candidate available on Adobe Labs includes these additional languages, and Adobe greatly appreciates any feedback the community can provide the Lightroom team.”
You can download both Lightroom 2.3 and Camera Raw 5.3 from Adobe Labs here.
You can submit feedback on the new version of Lightroom here.
Catalyst, Plate 4
Aaron Brazell on How Thomas Hawk’s Digital Connection Was Moved to WordPress
Aaron Brazell is the WordPress king as far as I’m concerned.
After three years of thinking about moving from the Blogger Platform to WordPress I finally took the plunge last week. I’d always wanted to make the switch but it just seemed too technically difficult for me to do myself. I’d heard about a bug that wouldn’t allow blogs with lots of comments (I had over 20,000) to transfer all of the comments over from Blogger to WordPress.
It turns out that there was in fact a 5,000 comment limit, but a huge thanks to Rick Klau, the Blogger Product Manager, who worked with us to change that (not just for me, but for everyone going forward) so that I could move my blog over to WordPress. Usually helping a customer move to a competitor is not high on anyone’s development list, but I’m really pleased that Blogger helped us with this and I think it goes a long way to show a very positive front from Google with regards to data portability.
What I will say is that I was *tremendously* pleased with the job that Aaron did in the migration of my blog. He is an amazing professional and made the entire transfer seamless and easy for me. And I’d really encourage anyone who is thinking about doing any work with the WordPress platform to consider hiring him to do the work for you. In hindsight, moving the blog over is something that I never could have done on my own. I would have spent many hours on the project and been extremely frustrated. If you are on another blogging platform and are thinking of making a change or need any sort of WordPress work done, Aaron is definitely the guy to do it.
Since I transferred my blog to WordPress last week it has lit a fire under me with a greater desire than ever to blog. I think I’ve blogged more posts in the past week than any week since I’ve been blogging. I can’t say enough good things about the WordPress platform. I love the way my new layout looks and feels and I feel like I have so much better control over my blog now and so many great tools from the WordPress Community to use. I only wish that I’d moved my blog over years ago instead of waiting as long as I did.
Aaron has a consulting page up on his own site here. He actually really needs consulting work right now and things are getting sort of dire for him in this bad economy. If you or your company are considering any WordPress work it would be fantastic if you could take a look at his services. Consider this a ringing endorsement from a very satisfied customer. 🙂 Oh, how did I find Aaron by the way? On FriendFeed, where else 🙂 He’s on FriendFeed here.