How the FDA Really Evaluates Drugs

I just realized something about how the FDA evaluates drugs.

Essentially, they look at two numbers.

A. How many people had their symptoms reduced with this drug?
B. And, how many people died or got sick/worse on this drug.


If A is a bigger number than B, they say it's a good drug. I oversimplify, of course, but that's about it.

In the case of Vioxx, there were over 55,000 deaths, right? But if there were at least 60,000 people who had relief from arthritic pain, the FDA thinks "Oh, that's okay then."

I realize that the numbers probably need to be a lot wider a margin than that for the FDA to okay a drug, but it's the underlying logic that I question.

Why do drugs need to kill people at all? If a drug kills even a few of its recipients, shouldn't we throw it out and try again?

But the FDA can't use this line of thinking, because that would throw out almost every drug in existence. They all kill people, to varying degrees. Even Tylenol and aspirin.

But then we'd all have to "make do" with herbs, vitamins and lifestyle changes. Too bad, huh?

Or, we could all just skip the whole "drugs killing people" part and move right on to the herbs, vitamins and lifestyle changes to stay healthy and to recover from illness.

Just a thought.

If You Love to Write...Or Hate to Write - Read This!

By now you know that I love to write. Lots of people do, that's why there are so many blogs.

Do you love to write? I've met a good number of holistic practitioners who love to write, they talk of writing a book someday.

Often they do not know that their writing skill could be a perfect marketing tool if they used it in the right way.

Article writing is an incredible marketing tool. Writing a bunch of articles and then posting them everywhere on the Internet can lead an enormous amount of traffic back to your Website. (Hint: If you don't have a Website for your holistic practice, it's time to get one.)

Okay, so you can write a bunch of articles, but how do you do the second part? How do you get them spread all over the Internet?

Let EzineArticles.com do that for you. For free.

This amazing free service allows you to post articles on their Website, and then people from all over the Web use your articles as content for their Websites, e-mail newsletters, e-zines, etc.

They must attribute those articles back to you, which means they'll be including a link back to your holistic Website.

Imagine the traffic! There are several tricks to doing this properly:

1. Always include a URL to your holistic Website in the author box at the end of the article.
2. Write well. EzineArticles.com will not accept articles with poor English.
3. Write lots of small articles. EzineArticles.com suggests that you try to write at least 20 articles, but that you shoot for 200 if you can possibly create that many. Each article can be as short as 300-500 words.
   

EzineArticles.com is a free service to writers and to publishers. So, if you HATE TO WRITE, this is also the service for you. Just include other people's articles and wrap them up in an e-zine that you send to your customers through e-mail. Voila! You have a great newsletter and you didn't have to write anything!

Remember the three keys to a good holistic marketing strategy:

A. Speaking
B. Publishing
C. Networking


See you next time!

There's Sugar in Everything

My mom recently commented how hard it is to find any type of food that doesn't have sugar in it. Most packaged meals have a big dose of the white poison, and of course any kind of dessert or snack is out of the question.

This morning, I linked the sugar omnipresence to that "sugar feeling" in other things.

My wife was watching "True Lies" on satellite TV, starring Arnold Schwarzenegger and Jamie Lee Curtis. I was trying to do some work, but I found my eyes drifting back to the TV screen again and again.

It felt like sugar! I'm trying to cut my own intake of sugar as much as possible, and I know what it feels like to NEED SUGAR. It's overwhelming. But once you stay away from it for a few weeks, it isn't so bad. I no longer need to pull over in a mad rush on State Street to get a chocolate chip-wich or milkshake. I don't eat cookies for the hell of it.

But this TV thing was a unique experience. I kept making excuses to come back to the room where the TV was on to see the show. (BTW, I've seen this damn movie probably 3 times already. Why??)

When a marketer finds a "sugar" in his product, something that people can't stay away from, they start to use it as often as possible. Sweet tastes, saltiness, exploding bombs in movies, sex scenes - these are all types of sugar. I know that sugar is bad for me, but is the rest of this stuff bad for me too? In a way, it is because it takes me away from whatever I was trying to accomplish. But I wonder what other health effects it has.

For now, I'll keep on rationing sugar and not worry about the TV type of sugar. But I really need to think about this.

Two Economies

I've been thinking recently how the Open Source Movement in software will affect the rest of the economy.

It has certainly made a huge difference within software. Linux open source Web servers outnumber Windows servers perhaps 10-t0-1. Almost all hosting companies offer Web hosting services on Linux boxes exclusively, or as an option.

The Firefox browser has been downloaded tens-of-millions of times, and it is gaining market share against Microsoft's Internet Explorer. On my Websites, I see Firefox at around 8-9% of all hits. This is up from 4-5% only six months ago.

But will the "open source phenomenon" carry over into road construction, haircuts, training, manufacturing and publishing?

I don't really think so. I think what will happen is that we'll essentially have a hybrid economy. We'll have the capitalist economy that has worked so well for so many years, and we'll have a second economy that is modeled after a socialist utopian economy, the Open Source Movement.

Please understand, I'm not using the words "socialist utopian" as denigrating to open source. I am a huge advocate of open source and I mean only that open source embodies what was always the good part of socialism. I would never expect a socialist or communist government to work in any country for any length of time. The only thing that has helped China progress in the past ten years has been their dramatic lurch towards capitalism and away from communism. "Communism in name only," as my Chinese friend says.

I think open source methods of doing things other than software will start springing up, but I don't think they will displace the existing capitalist supply chains. There will be a place for both. I believe that software, music and publishing will be most affected. Any industry where duplication can be digitized, and therefore one million copies of an item will cost no more than one copy.

America will be a country with two economies. Perhaps they will be tracked and measured separately, and certain people will be involved in only one, only the other or both.

For myself, I enjoy being involved in both.

Billy Tauzin - Poster Child for Political Corruption?

It looks like I'm way behind on the Billy Tauzin story.

Here's an interesting take on it.

Here is the data on pharma lobbying efforts.

And a copy of a New York Times article on corruption in the pharma industry, highlighting Tauzin.

Yeah, I'm really trailing on this story. But it's never too late to jump on the bandwagon, huh??

WorstPills.org

Public Citizen has published a Website and a book called "Worst Pills." They expose the pharmaceutical drugs that are most dangerous and list them for all to see.

I strongly urge any holistic practitioner to subscribe to their Website ($15/year) or buy the book. Don't buy the book at Amazon.com, the book being sold there is outdated. Buy it instead from their Website here.

Thanks, Public Citizen, for doing what our media is not able to do for us.

The Legend of Billy Tauzin

Somehow, I missed the story last December of Bill Tauzin.

This guy was a cantankerous Republican congressman from Louisiana who headed the House Commerce Committee until he stepped down last year.

This Committee oversaw the pharmaceutical industry as well as other industries. In fact, the pharmaceutical industry gave over $200,000 to Tauzin's campaign.

So what does a congressman do once he's retired? What could he do for employment?

No problem for Tauzin. He is now CEO of the pharmaceutical lobbying group Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA). This is the largest lobby group for big pharma.

I certainly didn't hear much about this last December, but it's only through my own ignorance. The press did report it, although not enthusiastically. There must have been a shark attack or sex scandal that was more pressing at the time.

The reason I found out about it today was that Tauzin was quoted in an article in Newsweek magazine on the problems with pharmaceutical drugs like Vioxx, Celebrex, etc. The quote came but the magazine only stated that Tauzin was with the lobby group, no mention of his former position in Congress. I thought I had heard that name before, so I looked it up, and WHAM-O, there he was - former Representative Tauzin.

Tauzin said upon taking the job that his first priority was to "restore credibility to the pharmaceutical industry." Huh? You're going to do that by taking a job with their lobbying group immediately after stepping down from the committee that oversaw them??

I must say that Tauzin had a good excuse for why he joined big PhRMA. He said that he had a battle with intestinal cancer himself and that it was pharmaceutical drugs that gave him his life back. Okay, I can understand that.

But I really remember Tauzin as a staunch defender of big PhRMA while he was Chairman of the Committee. And now he's on the payroll officially?

What kind of person would feel good about that? What kind of news media would not be pouncing all over a story like that, questioning his every move and asking why he would want to destroy his own credibility like that?

That is our news media, fellow Americans. That is why blogging has become so popular and so important. Because the news media like Newsweek magazine cannot report on the industries that they are part of. The magazine issued that I mentioned, except for the single story on Vioxx, was a tribute, a beautiful salute to the drug industry. Packed with ads from drug companies, and favorable stories, it was 90% favorable and only 10% questioning.

They simply can't do the job. They are now in that position and they can't get out. So we bloggers need to help. The point is not to blame Newsweek. They're stuck.

The reporters are not happy about this, I'm sure. They have to write this crap, they don't like it. They know they're destroying their own credibility. They hate that.

The magazines have got to keep the ad revenue moving, or they'll die. And you can't publish stories about your advertisers. And big Pharma is the biggest advertiser. Hell, for every full page ad a pharma company pays for, they have to pay for 2 more pages just to write all the fine print about the drug! Do you know how much it costs to run a full page ad (much less 3!) in Newsweek? Probably about $100,000 for one issue.

So, let's get blogging. If you don't blog yet, please start. We need to hear your take on things. We need you as a "citizen journalist." We need you putting the pieces together that Newsweek is not allowed to do.

Blogging is free. This service that I use, Blogger.com, is run by Google and there is no charge. It's a great service. Hell, you might even make a little money by running Google's AdSense ads on your blog. If you don't like writing or typing, start a Podcast instead. There are lots of good Podcast hosting companies like this one.

The only thing I'm asking you to donate is your time.

Please add your voice to the blogosphere.

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Talks about Thimerosal on Comedy Central

Robert F. Kennedy was the guest on Jon Stewart's Daily Show last night. What a show! Kennedy, who is usually focused on environmental issues, talked the entire time about how thimerosal is solidly linked to a dramatic rise in autism in kids. He said that most vaccines don't use it anymore, which I was not aware of. I thought it was still everywhere. He said that the flu vaccines still have it.

They also chatted about a missed opportunity on ABC. Kennedy was supposed to appear on a news show there, but the "higher ups" pulled the show at the last minute. Then they got deluged with e-mail from mother's with autistic kids, so they ran a "cut-up version" of the show, which Kennedy said was basically a long ad for the drug companies. He said there were even ads from drug companies right before and after the show.

What a joke. Anyway, we can look to Comedy Central and Jon Stewart (love that guy) to bring out the actual truth that the networks are too afraid to air. Thanks, Jon. And thank you, Rolling Stone magazine, for publishing the original article by Kennedy that started all this. I had forgotten that magazine even existed until news of this article surfaced recently.

Fear is the Sin

I had been thinking for a long time that there is only one true sin, and that is the failure to life up to your own potential. I saw the major reasons that this happened as laziness and fear.

I finally watched the 1991 movie with Albert Brooks called "Defending Your Life" last weekend. It is great! In the afterlife, the movie shows how fear is the one really bad sin that will kick you back down to Earth again to learn through another lifetime. You keep getting smarter, using more of your brain, until you aren't paralyzed with fear anymore.

I see that Amazon.com has it available as a DVD. I'm thinking of buying it.

The Holistic Educator

There is a big difference between being a Western medical doctor and being a holistic practitioner.

The doctor says "I'll do that for you. Take this pill."

The holistic practitioner says "You can heal yourself safely and effectively. Let me show you how."

This means that the holistic practitioner is not just in the "medical business" but also in the "education business." The nature of holistic health means that you, as a practitioner, need to understand and excel at both.

Education means just what you think it means. It means talking with your clients in the office, explaining how they can change their lifestyle choices day-to-day. It means encouraging them and coaching them. It also means writing articles, even books. And it means speaking in front of groups.

As it happens, these are incredibly good ways to do marketing too. Speaking and publishing are the top two ways to get trusted by potential clients enough so that they may visit your practice.

As a practitioner, you need to have a constant schedule of speaking and writing, speaking and writing.

Trouble is, many practitioners aren't too crazy about speaking. Or writing. Or both.

Speaking in front of groups is an anxiety-causing activity for many people.

Writing any length of articles (forget books!) is a huge challenge for many others.

What to do?

For speaking, there is one cure. Practice, practice, practice. Practice in non-threatening environments.

My suggestion for speaker-phobics? No matter where you live in the world, there is undoubtedly a Toastmasters chapter near you. Toastmasters is an incredibly wonderful organization that allows you to get practice speaking in front of small groups. It is a great confidence builder. Your self-esteem will rise with your speaking ability. The fees are something less than $50 U.S. per year, very affordable.

For writers? Well, I'd like to practice your own ability to write. But if that is not a possibility, if your heart just isn't in it, I urge you to use other people's material. No, this isn't stealing. Using the Internet, you have access to a wide range of articles on holistic health.

You can't use any articles without getting permission from the author. But there is one exception.

Article marketing Websites publish high-quality articles on many topics. The articles are "there for the taking."

That means you can copy them from the Website and use them in your own publications, e-mails, paper copies in your office --- whatever. You must keep the attribution to the original author, but you can use the article.

This is a reasonable substitute for people who cannot make the effort to write themselves.

The best article marketing Website is EzineArticles.com.

You can see my articles on the EzineArticles.com Website here.

A Message of Holism From...Who Was That Guy??

Here's a message of "holism" from an unlikely source: the Chairman of GE Health.

http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB112112057892482677,00.html (requires subscription)

In this article, Sir William Castell says our progress of scientific medicine in the past one hundred years has been successful, even stunning in some cases.

But now it's time to do more, and this will mean we have to shake the paradigm of our current medical systems.

Our current model is to allow "ourselves, through lifestyle, environment, and latent genetic predisposition or simple ignorance, to develop serious disease. The more sophisticated the economy, the more you have access to costly resources to optimize your late-stage treatment, when options are narrower and success less likely. We need to challenge whether this narrow focus on "Late Disease" is the best way to help people preserve their greatest asset, their own health."

He goes on to say that we need to focus on "Early Health" rather than "Late Disease." He sees this as a tremendous business opportunity for those who jump on it. If you are a holistic practitioner, or someone who uses holistic services, you've already jumped! Congratulations!

If not, now is the time to switch. When the Chairman of GE Health is making statements like this in the Wall Street Journal, "alternative medicine" ain't alternative no more...

A Health Machine

Let's say that Janice had created a machine that kept a person healthy and was able to bring a person back to health when they got sick. It took Janice 30 years to develop this machine and get it perfectly right, but now it works great.

Then let's say Marvin came along and said "Oh, fine, that health machine works for you and your patients, Janice, but I can't figure out how your machine works. So I'm going to build my own machine based on 'true science.'"

Then Marvin goes on to develop a machine that works not nearly as well, kills many of his patients (but helps some) and costs a lot more to operate. However, it does match his scientific calculations perfectly.

Now let's unmask the players. Janice is China, and Janice's machine is Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM). Marvin is the U.S., and his machine is Western medicine.

Western medicine kills over 100,000 people every year in the U.S. It is based on scientific principles, yes, but it has developed only over the last 100 years or less.

Chinese medicine has been improved over the past 3,000 years, and it works for billions of people. Why did we have to re-invent the wheel? Why do we continue to re-invent medicine? The Chinese and Indians (and Native Americans) had systems that worked well and that they continue to use.

Is it just the romantic notion that knowing the science behind a solution can solve all our health problems?

For me, I'm going to put my health into the hands of a practitioner with 3,000 years of experience behind him, rather than the newest, latest Vioxx to hit the shelfs.

Great Health Site

I found an excellent health articles Website called NewsTarget.com. I has an astonishing number of articles about holistic healthcare, many of them written by the so-called Health Ranger, Mike Adams. I don't agree with everything said here, but I feel most of the information is sound.

What Did Our Founders Feel?

I'm reading a book by Gore Vidal called "Burr." It's the life of Aaron Burr, vice-president of the United States and well-known as the person who killed Alexander Hamilton in a duel.

The book is utterly excellent. The rich details of the American founders' characters and habits is a delight to read.

As I read what they went through in those years, I actually felt some kinship. Of course, the types of things I'm "founding" are infinitely less in magnitude, but still I feel many of the same feelings that Vidal attributes to them in those early years of America.

Starting my own company, founding a holistic practitioners' networking group, and a lobbying group all give me those feelings. Most of the time, I'm wondering if we're doing the right thing. I think of us as a rag-tag group of nobodies trying to pretend we're important. That's how the founders often felt too!

Vidal's chapter on the inauguration of Thomas Jefferson was illustrative. Nobody knew how to get started. Jefferson told Burr "You go first," and Burr said "I think you should start." (Ha! We've had meetings like that!) Finally, Jefferson made his speech, but no one could hear him. Jefferson hated speaking in front of crowds, so he just mumbled his way through. Only two people (Burr and the judge) heard Jefferson's eloquent inauguration speech, because they sat right beside him. Later, Jefferson flipped his speech notes all over the floor and nervously tried to gather them up again.

It's always the same when people are trying to start something new. You don't know what you're doing, and you feel stupid because you think you should know. But you don't. So you do it anyway.

The China Price

Apparently there is one phrase that is more frightening to Wal-Mart's suppliers than any other. It's called "The China Price." This means that Wal-Mart is comparing prices between the product you sell and what they can get from China. China can produce finished, sellable products for an unbelievably cheap price to American retailers. And Wal-Mart has taken advantage of this. I've heard estimates that 80% of the durable goods in a Wal-Mart store are from China.

I witnessed this firsthand recently. The floor lamp here in my office became a strobe light last week because of an electrical short in the base. It was about twenty years old so I decided to replace it.

I visited several stores to compare styles and prices. Several stores featured a particular lamp that was quite stylish and bright. But I could not believe the price.

This was a six-foot tall floor lamp with six bulbs (not included). It looked excellent. The price? $19.99. I had expected to pay perhaps as much as $100 for a lamp like this. But twenty bucks?

Needless to say, I snapped it up. It was easy to put together, and the quality is top-notch. (So much for assuming lower quality from Chinese products.)

I'm sitting here wondering, "How could they even ship this thing from China for $20?" It's pretty heavy, since the base is weighted to keep it from falling over. I guess I have a lot to learn about the economies of scale in manufacturing and distribution. How much could a factory worker in China be paid to assemble a product like this? The materials must have cost at least $5. That leaves $15 for the worker, factory costs, shipping and the retailer.

This just doesn't add up in my head.

Anyway, China can produce these durable goods in tremendous quantities at good quality at excellent prices. That is an established fact.

Re-orienting to the Customer

Which of these scenarios would you prefer as a customer?

Scenario A
You go to a holistic health practitioner, let's say a nutritionist, from whom you seek help for a skin condition. She tells you to eat lots of this and stop eating that. It doesn't really work, so you decide to visit a chiropractor. He tells you its all due to a kink in your neck and once he fixes that (after a mere seven visits) you won't have the skin problem. It doesn't help. So then you seek an herbalist, who says take this herb and rub this salve on your arms. This works!

Scenario B
You look for someone who can help you with your skin problem. You see an ad in the new age journal that says "Holistic remedies for skin problems - call 999-999-9999."

You call and make an appointment. You find out that this person has trained as a nutritionist, bodyworker, herbalist and yoga teacher. She has found out the best ways to holistically treat skin problems. She sees people with skin problems all day long, and she has a passion for solving skin problems, since she once had a disfiguring skin problem that she healed herself with holistic means. She is able to help you with a set of nine visits.

So?
So, which one would you prefer? Although it is the same number of visits and probably the same cost for both scenarios, the second one is preferable because you have someone who really understands your problem.

The feeling I sometimes get with holistic practitioners who are not customer-oriented (like Scenario B) is that they are always guessing. "I'm going to guess that my bodywork/energy/nutrition/exercise is going to help your condition x." That does not strike confidence in me.

Holistic health practitioners, listen up! Re-orient your practice towards a specific health issue that you can solve for your clients. We'll appreciate it very much!

Distributed Energy Production

I think something that a lot of people don't realize is that as we move toward solar, wind, geothermal, biodiesel and other "green fuels" we are doing a lot more than just saving the environment and reducing our dependence on foreign oil.

As if that wasn't enough!!!!

Don't get me wrong, if that was all we accomplished, it would be plenty for me. But I think there's more to the package.

We are creating a distributed energy economy. By that, I mean that many of these energy-producing devices will be installed on people's homes and business offices, not in a central location. That means that me, sitting here in my home town, will have my own power and can do with it as I please. Just by virtue of installing the solar panels, or the wind turbine, I've made an initial investment, and now I'm "off the power grid." Or, more likely, I'm still connected to the grid as a backup, but when I produce more power than I can use and store, I pump that additional power back into the grid and the power company pays me for that. Basically, my meter begins to run backwards.

So, by distributing this energy production, we have the following benefits:

1. No big power lines to devalue house prices and ugly-up the neighborhood.
2. No massive power outages, or outages local to one house or office building.
   
3. Power coming from multiple sources (solar and wind and geothermal, etc.), making it difficult for "solar barons" and "wind barons" to arise and create monopolies, because as soon as they raise prices on their energy or devices, the other sources become cheaper by comparison and take over.
4. Much more difficult for terrorists to disrupt our power supplies.
5. An additional way to add value to a residential house sale. "This house has solar panels, so you won't have to pay electric bills the whole time you're here."
6. No fluctuation of energy prices to deal with. Energy production becomes just another function of your house, like insulation, storage, etc.

Maybe this will also lead us towards the community government idea of my previous post. If communities are more involved in producing their own energy, rather than buying it from large companies or government-owned utilities, they might be more likely to desire more autonomy.

Type A versus Type B Personalities

I read an article recently that stated that the evolution of open source computer programming was providing a way for Type B personalities to find creative outlets for their favorite type of work style - collaboration.

Type A personalities are competition-oriented, dog-eat-dog, etc.

Type B personalities are collaboration-oriented, and prefer to duck below the radar when Type A's are fighting it out.

It is very interesting to me that in the cyber-world of today, Type B's are collaborating to produce open source software, some of the finest, best quality software available, while the Type A's of the cyber-world can be found in a very different place - virus-writing. Hackers and crackers are prototypical Type A's, competing with each other to create the "best" virus, etc.

Isn't it interesting to see that the corporate ladder-climber has evolved into a common criminal, while the underachieving Type B thrives in a non-structured, non-corporate future?

Community Government

Everytime I fill out my taxes, I'm reminded how many levels of government we have, and what they want from me, as well as what I want from them.

It's a power struggle between city governments, state, county, federal, etc. They all feel that they have the right to collect the majority of the taxes and then redistribute it to the other levels of government.

Right now, the majority of my tax dollars go to the federal government. Then they redistribute it to the states, and the states give money to counties, cities, etc.

I think this is backwards. I think the major force of government should be at the community level. In a small town, it should be the town council. In a big city, it should be the neighborhood. Maximum of 1,000 people, let's say. The community government should collect all the taxes and then redistribute to the cities, counties, states and federal.

Here's why. Corruption in government always occurs, no matter what level. One look at the Bush administration and you can easily see this. However, it's easier to do corrupt things with people's money if you never have to see them face-to-face. Much, much more difficult.

In order to have a government where the citizens can easily see their government officials face-to-face, we need government at the level of 1,000 to 1 or less.

I also feel this helps with complexity problems. When problems are too big, one person cannot comprehend them in his or her brain. And it doesn't take much for a problem to be "too big to completely comprehend." All environmental problems, poverty, racism - these problems seem to be too complex for us to solve at our current level of thinking.

The Internet could serve as a useful tool to connect these many communities and share information.

Am I saying that we should disband the federal government in favor of community governments? No, I am not. But I think those lower levels should be the tax collectors and that the states and federal governments should be recipients of tax money from the communities, not vice-versa.

Backyard Manufacturing

An emerging technology called "3d fax" caught my eye a few years ago and I haven't been able to stop thinking about it.

A 3d fax machine would allow you to put an item into a box in Santa Fe and then be able to replicate that item into a different box here in Columbus, Ohio, using a normal fax line between the two boxes.

The idea is that you can scan the item from multiple perspectives in the first box, and then transmit those specifications as data to the Columbus fax machine, which casts the item out of plastic resin.

It's a pretty simple idea, as long as you keep the item to one physical piece and do not require assembly.

But soon enough, that will be possible too. Think how automated car assembly plants are getting. What's the next inevitable step there? Miniature the car plant down to something that can fit on a desk, of course. Now you've got a 3d fax machine that can build almost anything (as long as it's plastic).

My projection on top of this is that you could obvious take that datastream of specifications from anywhere, not just another 3d fax machine in Santa Fe. It could come from a computer program instead. So you could design something on your PC and then build it right there, more like a 3d printer.

If this became possible, I think there would be a new type of industry popping up which I'll call "backyard manufacturing." You could buy one of these boxes (different sizes depending on how big the stuff is you want to build) and then begin building whatever you want using computer models.

Think of the creativity that could be unleashed! And it would be cheap too!

Let's start with toys. Obviously, most toys are made entirely of plastic, so you could begin creating a whole range of toys yourself, using your own designs or designs you purchased from other people. I imagine that there will be a set of "open source toy designs" that people create as computer data, and then release to the world for free.

Then, I imagine that new companies would pop up who certify certain toy designs as being safe or unsafe for children.

If all this happened, all the toys that are being made in China today could be made in America again using the backyard manufacturing process. The all-plastic items would be the first to move "on-shore" and then maybe wooden, metal items later on.

Would China be in trouble? Probably not, they could do their own backyard manufacturing, but this inefficient process of sending specifications offshore to be manufacturered and then sending them back here again would slow down.

Something as complex as an internal combustion engine would be the last thing to be created with backyard manufacturing, but then I think about the new types of engines coming down the pike, like hydrogen and solar. These have far fewer moving parts and would be much easier (relatively!) than the ICE to create with manufacturing-in-a-box.

I think it's quite likely that Apollo Alliance will be successful in convincing American politicians to create a new Apollo project that provides us with energy independence from the Middle East. When this happens, we'll get cleaner, simpler engines and cars that are more compatible with backyard manufacturing. Not to mention the other new technologies, like brake-by-wire and steer-by-wire, featured prominently in General Motor's Autonomy concept car. Again, the trend is toward simpler designs, fewer moving parts, more electronics.

Currently, big companies have the advantage over smaller companies because of three things: manufacturing economies of scale, exising distribution networks and marketing.

The backyard manufacturing idea gives small companies a leg up on manufacturing. Distribution becomes a non-issue once you can distribute information-only and do the manufacturing locally. And the Internet obviously helps small company marketing look like big company marketing.

Unsolicited Health Advice

Have you ever complained to someone about a health condition that you wish would go away, only to receive an avalanche of health advice from them? How did you feel about that?

Some holistic practitioners seem to feel that they should go through life giving their free advice to people who haven't asked for it. I don't agree. I think it's annoying to the other person, and it makes your advice seem like it's worth what you're charging - nothing.

To all holistic practitioners - wait until you're asked for help before you offer it. This is the courteous, professional, profitable way to approach healthcare advice.

---END OF RANT---

Marketing Quintiles

I'm just reading another book called The Next Economy by Elliott Ettenberg. I've been borrowing so many crappy marketing books from the library lately that I had almost given up.

Then this gem of a book shows up.

Ettenberg asks us to break up our existing customer list into quintiles (20% sections) based on how much they buy from us and how often. Then we look at the top three quintiles and focus all our marketing on them.

We actually ignore quintiles Q4 and Q5 because they cost us more money than they pay.

This may sound callous, or like we're wanting to ignore poor people. But there is no correlation between quintiles for a certain business and level of income or net worth of the customer.

I can see this in my own life. I am a regular customer at the Firestone car maintenance place here in my hometown. They have had my business for probably ten years. We do regular oil changes and then whenever they find some other problem, we ask them to fix that too. They never add on unnecessary stuff and they always let us look at the old parts to see what the problem was.

So, I am probably in their Q1. They should treat me like a king. (They do treat me pretty good, but not different from other people.)

I am also a regular shopper at Giant Eagle grocery store. They have my business every week. So I am their Q1 shopper.

Then, when I look at car dealers, I have no affinity. I am a terrible customer. First, I shop around for the cheapest deal. Second, I hardly ever buy new cars, I wait until they totally break down. My Monte Carlo is over 10 years old and running great. My Dodge Dakota is seven years old and also running fine.

I must be a Q5 customer for the car dealers where I've bought cars. They should be ignoring me or even discouraging me.

Same for clothes shopping. Meijers, Wal-Mart, who cares? Whatever's cheapest. Q5.

So, every one of us is simultaneously a Q1 and Q5 customer somewhere. There is no inherent prejudice against the poor with this model. And it allows the businessperson to focus their efforts on their best customers. You've already heard me talk about Attracting Perfect Customers (best, most holistic marketing book ever) on my previous blog, this is the same concept except extended to be a bit more scientific.

Limits to the American Economy

You may have heard me say this before, but I'll say it again.

I firmly believe that the West has certain things right and the East has others right.

By the West, I mean America, Canada, Europe, etc. By the East, I mean China, Japan, India, the Asian tigers.

I think the West got it right many years ago with two things: capitalism and democracy. These two in combination have proven to be excellent growth catalysts and have truly made for a great, lasting economy.

I think the East got it right thousands of years ago with two different things: religion and healthcare. Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) and Indian ayurveda are vastly superior systems of medicine than what we have in the West. Yes, we can put a person back together quickly after they've been in an accident. But we seem totally clueless when it comes to cancer, diabetes, all the chronic diseases and even more clueless when it comes to prevention. The only thing saving us is a general switch by Americans to the healthcare systems of the East.

I also feel that Asian religions seem more sensible than Western religions. Catholicism, Protestantism require a high degree of "suspension of disbelief" and have such an emphasis on "selling" the religion to other people, making conversions, etc. It is like religion combined with sales. It seems weird to me. I know a lot of you will disagree, but this is my way of thinking.

Having said all that, I found it very interesting to read about a comment made by Paul Volcker, former chairman of the Federal Reserve, who said that our habit of making public policy based on the short-term needs of special interest groups has created a "looming celing on our standard of living."

Are we giving up this incredible gift we have with capitalism? True capitalism is not fostered by large corporations trying to create mini-monopolies for themselves by jiggering the laws. But, unfortunately, that is what is happening, and, in fact, it is only encouraged by the Bush administration, who are brazenly making these concessions to industry without even trying to hide it. Past administrations were no less guilty of this, but they seemed to at least be a little embarrassed about it, whereas our current administration seems to feed on it.

I hope this trend reverses. I think that perhaps as the power of small business grows and the power of the large businesses weakens, we may see the trend changing. I've often thought there should be a "Small Business Party" that represents the interests of small businesses. Small businesses needs of the government are usually the opposite of what large businesses ask for. Large business wants their mini-monopolies. Small businesses want a level playing field.

But as large businesses drain away their workforce and small businesses continually scoop up those people, the influence of the large businesses will also drain away in their ability to shape policy.

What will that be like? I think we only need to wait 5-10 years to find out.

Making the Nail Pay Again and Again

My last post was about the book "Millionaire Mind." I'd like to write another post on a different idea in that book.

The author, Thomas Stanley, was getting a good-natured ribbing from a friend who built houses for a living. The friend, DD, said "I feel sorry for you. I get to work out here in the sunshine, pounding in nails, and you have to sit behind a desk, writing your books."

They got a good laugh from this, then Dr. Stanley replied. He said that every nail that DD pounded in was a form of work-for-payment. DD was paid for every nail he pounded in.

Dr. Stanley was also paid, but he was basically paid by the word. Every word he wrote was his form of work-for-payment.

The big difference was, DD was paid for each nail ONCE.

Dr. Stanley got payments for each word thousands of times, maybe even millions of times (depending on how many books sold, which in his case, was millions).

Get paid by the nail once? Or get paid by the word thousands of times per every word you write?

Would it make sense for every business person to be thinking this way? What am I building in this business, and how many times does it pay back? Once? Or ten? Or thousands?

I hadn't thought of it this way before. I've written several books, but now I think I'm going to put more effort into my future book writing efforts, as well as software that I can resell, Web services, etc. Anything that is build once, sell many.

Initial Price versus Lifecycle Cost

I've been reading the book "The Millionaire Mind" by Thomas Stanley in the past few weeks. I enjoyed his first book "The Millionaire Next Door" so much I thought I'd see what he's up to now.

The premise of both books is incredibly simple. A professor studies millionaires to find out how they handle money and how they live their lives. Then he compiles that information and writes a book about it.

The results are surprising, especially to the "typical American." What's the typical American dream? New mansion, sports cars, motorbikes, fancy clothes. That's how you know you've made it in America, right??

Wrong, says Stanley. Dead wrong. The millionaires in America are not the people you think they are. The people with the flashy clothes and fancy cars are probably not millionaires. Statistically, it is very unlikely that they are millionaires. Instead, they are people living beyond their means. They are doctors, lawyers, real estate investors who are "income statement affluent" but they don't have any net worth, because they're out buying stupid stuff like clothes and cars.

Of course, we always like to read books that affirm our own ideas, and I'm no exception. I've always thought the way to get rich was to economize and to save like crazy. My wife is the same way.

But there was a concept in the new book "Millionaire Mind" that hit me like a brick to the forehead.

He compared two ways of thinking. Non-millionaires, he says, think of saving money in terms of "initial cost." This means they try to find the product that costs the least.

Millionaires think in terms "lifecycle cost." This is a bit different. He compares how people buy shoes. Buy the cheapest pair of shoes that fit, or buy a pair of shoes that will last a long time.

He even says that most millionaires (including himself!) buy dress shoes and then have them resoled once or twice in the lifetime of the shoe, rather than immediately buying a new pair.

Just a simple shift in the way people buy things like this would cancel out so much debt in our society. It would be great.

Everything I read (or listen to in the audiobooks) in Thomas Stanley's books reminds me of the radio show that has fast become a favorite of mine. The show is called "The Dave Ramsey Show" and it is on a variety of radio stations around the country. This guy sounds like a Rush Limbaugh type of character, but he stays out of politics (mostly) and focuses on helping his callers get out of debt. He gives rock solid advice to every single caller. Some of these people are hurting bad. He helps every single one of them, with compassion and excellent words of wisdom.

Check his Website to see if the show is on in your area. If not, you can actually download a Podcast of his show (the first hour each day, not all 3 hours) for no charge, again from the Website.

If we can get more of this great information out to all Americans we can put this country on the right track again financially. Dave Ramsey is doing his part. Thomas Stanley is doing his part. Pass it on!

I Hate the Phone

My wife and I agree. We both hate using the phone.

Cell phone. Landline. Conference call. It doesn't matter. We both just dread using it.

I don't really know why. We have the latest technology in speaker phones and ear-pieces to make things comfortable.

Maybe it's the thought of interrupting someone else's day. Maybe it's having to leave a message and then wait around until the person calls back.

Whatever it is, it must be bad.

The Internet is a great way to avoid using the phone, for your customers who hate using a phone. They can go to your Website and reserve an appointment, make a change to their profile, update information, or whatever.

I'm just about to use Holiday Inn's Website to book a hotel room. Boy, that used to be a pain. Now, I just click a few buttons, enter my Priority Club number, make sure I have enough points to cover the stay, and DONE!

I hate the phone. I love the Internet. Some of your customers are probably like me.

A Little Good News - Global Wage Gap Narrows

It's time to dig up a little good news in the global war against poverty. We're winning.

Sociologist Glenn Firebaugh of Pennsylvania State University and author of The New Geography of Global Income Inequality (Harvard University Press, 2003) states that incomes of individuals in countries such as China, Taiwan, Thailand, Singapore, Hong Kong and other Asian nations are rising more rapidly than incomes in the West.

"On average, incomes worldwide are increasing at a little less than 2% per year, but China's is increasing at about 6%."

This means that the trend of the "rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer" has begun to reverse. The Futurist magazine article that I read did not emphasis the reason, but it seems obvious that global trade is the major factor here.

Outsourcing and global partnerships are making an incredibly positive impact that international aid could never accomplish.

The individuals in the poor nations are saying to us "Do not give us your aid, just trade with us." Now we are and everyone is reaping the benefits.

A stronger China means a stronger world. A stronger Poland means a stronger world. A stronger East means a stronger West.

The key to globalization is to acknowledge it, accept it and embrace it.

Still left out of the benefits of globalization? Sub-Saharan Africa, unfortunately. But I definitely have strong faith that the world will soon understand how to include these strong nations under the umbrella of increased wealth, productivity and peace.

Jobs in the Holistic Future

The job opportunities of the holistic future are many. Here are a few that I consider to be likely:

• Naturopaths - the level of demand for these people today is unbelievable, and it will just increase. We need a person who is highly trained, but not like an MD, who can give us our initial checkups and help us with everyday problems without a high cost for an appointment. Most likely, these practitioners will operate completely outside the health insurance structure.
  
• Nurse-Practitioners - another first line of defense practitioner who we see before the doctor, similar to a naturopath except a nurse-practitioner may be more acceptable to people who are stuck with a Western medical thought pattern, if naturopaths are too large a shift for those patients.
• Midwives - this is a burgeoning profession today, and it's illegal in most states! Imagine what will happen when expectant mothers have a real choice between a sterile, dangerous hospital environment and a home birth with experienced midwives.
  
• Holistic Center Managers - this is a really difficult job and is seldom done well today. Someone with incredible management skills who is a fairly hands-off manager when it comes to the medical skills but a great coach, motivator, organizer and teacher of business skills for the holistic practitioners.
• Holistic Lawyer - the evolution from Western medicine to holistic health will be fraught with lawsuits. Western medicine ain't going down without a fight, and that fight cannot be made on the merits of drugs and surgery, so it will instead be pushed into the courtrooms. Lawyer who understand the urgency of this change and who are passionate about helping it happen will be needed everywhere, as Western medical hospitals, doctors and pharmaceutical companies sue everybody in sight.
• Holistic Lobbyists - the holistic economy will need to make changes to the Western medically-focused laws on the books in most states. Lobbyists who can help build grassroots movements to change these antiquated laws will be in high demand.
• Holistic Center Franchise Builders - holistic health centers are almost completely "one off" businesses today. But there is an evolution toward a franchise model, as evidenced by the Massage Envy businesses springing up in the U.S. This will continue, and the businesspeople who are able to create franchises from their own successful clinics will profit handsomely.

I'd also like to highlight the ecologically-oriented industries that are growing rapidly today, and will accelerate in the coming years. I take these from Lester Brown's excellent book "Eco-Economy."

• fish farming
• bicycle manufacturing (mostly overseas)
• wind farm construction
• wind turbine manufacturing
• hydrogen generation
• fuel cell manufacturing
• solar cell manufacturing
• light rail construction
• tree planting
• wind meteorologists
• family planning midwives
• foresters
• hydrologists (scientists who can find sources of water)
• recycling engineers
• aquacultural veterinarians (restoring health for fish in fish farms)
• ecological economists
• geothermal geologists (scientists who can determine sources of geothermal energy)
• environmental architects
• bicycle mechanics
• wind turbine engineers

I think it's exciting just to start thinking about these possibilities, ecologically and holistically.

Don't you?

Here's a Business Opportunity - It's All Yours

I just thought of this business opportunity, and I'm giving it to you, my loyal blog reader, because there isn't a damn thing I can do about it.

The holistic retirement center.

Imagine a retirement facility that specializes in having all types of holistic treatments available to their stay-in clients.

Reflexology.
Massage.
Reiki.
Nutritionist.
Personal trainer.
Psychotherapists.
Guided imagery.

Essentially, every client has the ability to call on any therapist as much as they want. (Maybe some limits.) The idea is that you are in this retirement home, but you just keep getting healthier and healthier, even though you're getting older.

This idea came to me when one of my clients e-mailed me to say she worked part-time in a retirement home, and got a lot of joy doing it, but usually did it for free because the retirement home was too cheap to pay for the sessions and the families of the eldery clients didn't want to pay because they thought the retirement home should pay.

Obviously, this has to be figured in to the price, but I think people would pay extra. What an incredible value-added service!

This business idea is all yours. Run with it. Let me know how it works out.

Burgeoning Self-Employment

Self-employment really seems to be climbing. I mean, I know that small businesses are taking over the economy, but I also think that self-employment is a huge part of that.

The hard and fast statistics are that small businesses (fewer than 50 employees) generate 2 out of 3 new jobs every year. This has been the case for the last five years.

That means that small business are growing, in terms of employment, TWICE AS FAST as big companies every year. Do the math and you realize that it won't take but a few more years of this before the big companies (50+ employees) will just be empty shells with advertising, brands, and marketing but nothing inside.

Neat, huh? Think of that type of economy. No big companies to speak of. Just all us self-employed geeks and geekettes churning the economy.

Business book authors have been calling this a million different names. The networked economy. The next economy. Small is better.

Look at the drudgery of big company life these days. Layoffs imminent. Job security out the window. Even companies that have promised pensions to their employees are renegging on that promise. No big company has the resources to supply pension funds and, even worse, health insurance, to their retirees.

So why join a big company again? Job security? Nope. Career advancement? Nope. Might as well start a new company when you graduate from college, eh?

I just did a series of talks at a local elementary school for their "career day." At the beginning of each talk, I went through the audience and asked each kid what type of business they would like to start. Most of them responded with something.

A car repair shop.
A beauty salon.
A law firm.

I loved it. I've promised myself to never again ask a kid what type of "job" they want when they grow up. Now I only ask "what type of business do you think you'll start?" I love the creativity that comes out when I ask that question.

What is a Holistic Economy?

I feel that the economies of North America are undergoing a major shift, due to the influence of the Internet, open source software, 3-d faxing, the upsurge in small business startups and holistic health practices.

I am seeing it everywhere around me. In my wife's family, there are four siblings, all married. Four men, two of us are in-laws.

Six years ago, every one of the four men was pulling in a paycheck. Today, only one still has "a job." My brother-in-law in Cleveland was laid off 3 years ago and hasn't found a job yet. My brother-in-law in New York was laid off last week. And I decided to start my own business in 2000 and have never wanted to go back to cubicle life since, despite a failed startup in 2002.

Baby boomers are getting laid off. And when they do, they see it as a perfect opportunity to change their life. My New York brother-in-law is probably going to start a business. I'm sure he will. The Cleveland guy decided to stay at home and be a Mr. Mom, and I think he really loves it. Videotaping all the kids' soccer games, playing chauffeur, all that stuff.

The small business revolution (or should I call it the self-employed revolution?) is taking over.

Where is the job security of the "big company job?" United Airlines just defaulted on their pensions. Will this be the last time a big corporation defaults? No way. This is a precedent and every other big organization (including IBM, where my New York brother-in-law used to work) is going to be jumping on that in a millisecond.

So what the hell is job security? I'll tell you what. It's relying on your own skills to do sales and marketing and delivery, and building something up for yourself. Using your own value system, your own blood, sweat and tears. And lovin' every minute of it.