There are always those articles that you read and continue thinking about for some time.  They may be big stories or just small human interest pieces but for whatever reason they capture your interest.  These are a few that I collected from this weeks browsing.

While Japan’s economy is now experiencing reasonable 2% growth, there is a generation of Japanese that are referred to as the “lost” or “suffering” generation. This group is made up of some 3.3 million Japanese aged 25 to 34 who mainly work as temps or contract employees. For these Japanese all is not well in Japan and may never be. For me this is interesting since I worked for a Japanese company the last 17+ years.  I understand how this must be terribly hard for that generation.

Perhaps doing away with the enclosure method and using a direct case bonding method will provide the means for thinner, lighter, stronger and more aesthetically pleasing laptops from Apple then we have ever seen.  Hummm….I also read this as a laptop that cannot be modified or upgraded in any way without special tools and processes.

Anybody else amazed at what Microsoft paid for the ad company aQuantive.  I know Microsoft’s pockets run deep but $6 billion is still a hugh price for a company who’s net income in 2006 was about $54 million.  After hurting from loosing the DoubleClick buyout to Google they must of decided that they were going to get aQuantive at any cost.  Maybe it was a smart preemptive move?  It sure makes DoubleClick look like a bargain for Google now.

Any company that will drop $6 billion dollars to become competitive in ad marketing is someone to respect if not fear.  Especially if your main revenue stream is ad marketing. So is Google afraid of Microsoft?  Some interesting insight of the Microsoft vs. Google vs. Microsoft “wars” in this article by Donna Bogatin at ZDNet.  Kent Newsome has an interesting look at Googles ability to continue to play the underdog…even when they’re not.

Technorati Tags: apple, business, google, link, microsoft