Where is everyone going on holiday this summer?
Hey Comrade,
What’s your favourite park in London? (Apologies if you’ve never been to London.)
Mine is St James’. I used to stand on The Blue Bridge as a young cheesemonger returning from my round to Paxton & Whitfield on Jermyn Street. If you look one way you can see Whitehall, the heart of government and the other way is Buckingham Palace, the home of the monarchy. And there I was in the middle, a vision of commerce, holding both aloft with my trade in dairy goods.
Henry VIII bought the area from Eton College in 1532 to be yet another deer park. James I went sideways and filled it up with crocs, camels, some birds and even an elephant or two. It’s still home to pelicans and civil servants having muttered conversations but apart from that it is just a really nice place.
Have a delightful day,
Hugo
Keeper of Stuff
The Business of Stuff
The Stuff
Amazon Connect and My Time to Fly 🎷 - connect is contact centre technology used by thousands of call centres (handling over ten million calls a day) and they have just one song licensed for when you’re put on hold, ‘My Time to Fly’ by Harriet Goldberg. She started composing songs in her late 40s and self-recorded her first album in 2001. She didn’t realise that the company who bought her album had licenced her music to Amazon until she was on hold with a bank and thought “Blimey this is good mellow, slightly generic jazz.”
The Philippines do loads of Business Process Outsourcing 🤙 - whilst we’re on the topic of call centres, did you know that 7.5% of the economy in the Philippines is running business operations for global companies? There is inevitably a lot of concern about AI automating jobs, with lots of people pushing for the government to support adoption to get ahead of the game.
South Korea is exporting loads of eco-friendly cars 🚗 - they made early bets on the need for greener cars and for the first half of this year exports were nearly 50% higher YoY. Whilst the US is pumping out electric vehicles like it's nobody's business, the lack of infrastructure at the moment may mean people are looking for a hybrid as a compromise.
Meetings scheduled between 4-6pm are down 7% YoY 🖥️ - as opposed to grinding it out until 5-6 then calling it a day, lots of people are now either picking up children, hitting the gym or beating traffic before logging back on in the evening. Great for flexibility but a bit of a nightmare for meeting scheduling seems to be the general consensus.
Companies looking to slim down as debt bites 🥕 - Disney and The Hut Group are two of several conglomerates looking to re-focus after years of acquisitions. Disney is looking to sell its TV assets as it struggles to return to profitability. Buying stuff with debt is great when interest rates are low and the good times are rolling but things have got a bit trickier as of late.
Albania is the destination of choice this summer 🇦🇱 - the Balkan country has flown under the radar for many years but its coastal riviera is luring tourists from across Europe and the US. Of course, now this has been published in The Stuff, I’ve completely ruined the secret, sorry guys!
Center Parcs has got a hefty price tag 🌲 - the private equity owners are looking to sell it for £4bn but the current economic climate is making it a questionable deal. The company is struggling to find a new site which makes growth a concern as most people who go have been before.
The Netflix password crackdown has worked 📽️ - the strategy to stop people using their ex’s housemate’s uncle’s account has proved effective as they’ve added 5.9 million subscribers since March. Still a bit of a tricky year for the streamer, what with all the writer walkouts in Hollywood.
Microsoft announces Copilot pricing and Aptos becomes default font 💳 - the big tech company is charging a hefty $30 per month for its new AI toolset. Unsurprising given the amount they’ve invested and the majority of companies that use O365 instead of G-Suite, so they decided better just to lock people in now while they’re scared of being left behind. Aptos, also known as Grotesque, is replacing Calibri as the default font. You can read a great piece about fonts here.
Some celebrities don’t mind AI deep fakes 🪞 - whilst much of Hollywood is kicking off about the use of AI, some celebs like Jamie Yeo are licensing their likeness to sell content. Even she acknowledges it is literally an episode of Black Mirror, but you know, hats off for rolling with the times.
Have a good week!
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Other Stuff
Something to watch
Ramit Sethi on DOAC
Something to listen to
How an 18th Century Sailing Battleship Works
Quote of the week
“Can't resist Haribos" - Stuart Broad