Post-Capitalism. What’s next?

It’s a Sunday morning and I’m relaxing after a tough week at work.  Youtube news sources are busy showing and discussing the “Occupy Wall Street” movement.  (you won’t se this on mainstream news, it’s censored, try RT News).  This got me to thinking…

It’s pretty obvious there is a current world-wide economic crisis at hand.  It’s also predicted the next emerging economic superpower will be China.

If all of these protests have an impact on society, and things change drastically, will we replace Capitalism in the coming years?

This got me to work on trying to find factual evidence…

Here’s a sample of things I tried.

The NGram viewer shown below is definitely a historical tool because it pulls data from books that are already published.

For more current data, it’s possible to utilize Google trends, which are based on search.  I added a graph below to show (bottom) that Socialism and Capitalism are pretty widely searched, however, Google doesn’t have much penetration into China.  What is interesting, however, is the Chinese language data shows higher searches for Capitalism.  Does this mean the global economic structure will be a hybrid of Socialism and Capitalism, perhaps State Capitalism?

I’d love to hear your views on this.

Google N Grams for Economic Systems

Google Trends for Socialism and Capitalism

The ongoing saga of iPhone – reader wars

Isn’t it really interesting to see all of these book companies scrambling to find ways to avoid giving up revenue?  For instance, Kindle has begun work on an HTML5 web application so they can still get in the face (and the pockets) of iPhone users without giving Apple a slice of their pie.  It’s hard to blame them I suppose, when Apple charges such a high premium to vendors.

I read today that Apple revenues will surpass HP’s in the next 12 months.  With all of the hype around the iPhone 5 coming this September, and the expected sales figures, perhaps those execs at Kindle should just be happy to ride the Apple delivery train.  The ticket price might be high, but it’ll get you to many places.  I suspect the real loser will be consumers, who shell out (in small amounts) to both.  Chris Anderson or “Wired Magazine” has a great perspective on this stuff. Something about “bytes want to be free”.  I won’t hold my breath on that one, although the Torrent sites were hopping recently with a bunch of JSTOR content that found it’s way to “freedom” with help from Greg Maxwell.  Although the cost and value were probably balanced at zero on those 18 thousand (or so), scientific papers.

Khan Academy iPad app closer

I recently came across some early beta screen shots of the Khan Academy iPad application. They will be releasing version one in the near future, followed by versions for non-Apple tablets. Revolutionary or disruptive? I’d love to have your comments.

India to surpass China with smartphone subscriptions

http://www.penn-olson.com/2011/07/11/india-mobile-china-subscribers/

Okay, so by mid-2012, there will be 1 billion phones in China and another 1 billion in India. With North-American numbers approaching 500 million, wouldn’t the best possible market for educational content be finding ways to deliver it to this technology? Just sayin.

ISTE Conference laden with iPads

Christopher Dawson of ZDNet fame has made some interesting observations about the interest of iPads at the recent ISTE conference in Philladelphia.  For those who aren’t familiar with the acronym “ISTE”, it’s the International Society for Technology in Education. While Apple’s iPad is not the only game in town, it’s fast becoming the eponym.  My guess is that it will do just that, mostly because it’s just the delivery mechanism for software, information and services.  Who want’s to talk about the technology itself other than geeks anyway?

Location based marketing widget

A Singapore-based start-up named “Chalkboard” has partnered with HTC Malaysia to incorporate a location-based widget into Android smartphones. This will enable vendors to publish specials and sales marketing directly into phones of consumers who are in or near their businesses. Imagine knowing the soup of the day before you get to your table. Marvelous!