This a quite interesting speech of Harold Print, who received the Nobel Price in Literature this year.

Harold Printers Nobel Lecture

This is my current CV.
For further Question do not hesistate to contact me.

CV of Andreas Franz

Introduction

Today I read the transcript of Steve Jobs’ Commencement Speech at Stanford University which he held on June 12, 2005. I found this speech both amazing and inspirational as it highlights and underscores the major factors behind the successes and failures of the Chief Executive Officer of Apple and Pixar encountered in his life so far.

The Speech and his Life

Steve Jobs split his speech in three basic stories dealing with the ups and downs during his personal and professional life. The interesting thing is that he, as most of us, had a lot of hurdles to master in life. However, he continued to learn from each and every hurdle as he progressed from student life to the entrepreneurial period.

connecting the dots

So his downs in live basically started from birth on, he has been adopted, because his biological mother wanted him to go to college. The pair that adopted him eventually sent him to college. Unfortunately, he dropped out of it after six months, as this enabled him to participate in the courses that really interested him such as calligraphy. At the age of 20, he co-founded Apple Computer with Steve Wozniak in his parents’ garage and within ten years the company has grown into a USD 2 billion company with more than 4000 employees.

about love and loss

Just around that time, when Apple had released their first Macintosh computer has experienced the worst thing an entrepreneur can encounter: he was fired from his very own company. Jobs was convinced that giving up was not an option for him. So he founded a technology company called NeXT and bought a controlling stake in Pixar, the computer division of Lucasfilm.

Pixar created the first computer animated feature film, Toy Story, which was a major technological milestone in filmmaking and practically created a new genre out of the blue: the computer animated movie.

NeXT was bought by Apple and the technology developed at NeXT, according to Jobs, is at the heart of Apples current renaissance. So Jobs had returned to Apple and anything seemed to turn out well in the end.

about death

About a year ago, Jobs was diagnosed with cancer, a tumor on his pancreas. The doctors told him, that his type of cancer was incurable and his life expectancy is somewhere in between three and six months. Jobs, in other words, was told to say good bye to his loved ones. On the same day he had a biopsy and it turned out that he had a very rare form of cancer which is curable by a surgery. Jobs is of the opinion that death is one of the best movitational forces. According to the principle ” If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you’ll most certainly be right. ” , he developed his own philosophy of implementing the ‘eternal force of death’ into his daily life. Instead of focusing on the negative aspects of death, he utilizes the positive aspects…

Personal Opinion

When a friend of me notified me about the speech I firmly believed that yet another boring talk was about to follow. However, I was pleasantly surprised to encounter a man talking not only about his personal success story but as well mentioning the unplesant factors that shaped his life. I would even go as far as to proclaim this speech to be the most inspirational story I have ever listened to. The motivational aspect of sentences such as “You got to find what you love” or “Stay hungry. Stay foolish” is already very high. But given that this talk was held in front hundreds of Stanford University graduates the words of Steve Jobs could possibly motivate the next generation of technology-loving entrepreneurs to create something unique and valuable to mankind.

Sources

Stanford News
audio file of the speech

Introduction

Of course I did know who Bob Dylan is for a long time. But last summer it was the first time I did listen to a Dylan song actively. We were sitting at friends house, and he suddenly started rummaging around in his collection of Vinyl records and picked out Boy Dylan’s “Blonde on Blonde” LP, which is believed to be the first double album in the rock and roll genre. So we did listen to that original mono pressing and I have to admit that I was really amazed by Dylan’s music, which I considered to be pretty old fashioned and antiquated. I was very delighted to hear that Martin Scorsese is doing a documentary about Bob Dylan, and did watch this documentary yesterday .

The Documentary

The film is called “No Direction Home: Bob Dylan”, is 225min long and split in two parts which aired on PBS.
The movie shows some uncovering interviews recently made with Bob Dylan. It basically covers the years between 1960, when Dylan appeared in the public, and 1966 when he did not tour for about eight years after having a motorcycle accident.

It also has a wealth of interview with people who knew him at that time, like, for istance, Baez, Pete Seeger, Mike Seeger or Liam Clancy, but also a lot of live footage is provided including the famous “Judas shout“at his “Royal Albert Hall” concert in 1966, when a folk fan shouted “Judas” and Dylan answered “I don’t believe you! You’re a liar!“ and motivated the band to „Play it fucking loud“. This leads to another important point in Dylan’s career which is covered by the documentary.

Dylan, which became famous by writing folk songs and playing these traditionally on an acoustic guitar started to become more and more “rock and roll” and moved on to the electric guitar, which many of his die-hard folk fans could not forgive him. But this is what distinguishes Dylan from other musicians. He just does not care what the people think about his music, he just want to make his music and, at that time, his protest songs. This is shown very clear in some quite funny and amusing footage, which shows Dylan in press conferences giving some stupid answers to journalist who, from his point of view, ask stupid questions.

Personal Opinion

I want to strongly advise everyone who is into music and likes to know more about the person Bob Dylan and also the time which is covered by the documentary to buy the DVD. Scorsese created an excellent and interesting portrait of Bob Dylan mixed with fascinating footage.
And even if you just want to see Dylan at work I can recommend you the DVD. Starting from his part in opening for Martin Luther King’s “I Have a Dream” speech at the March on Washington, to his “ Royal Albert Hall” performance of “Like a Rolling Stone” you can find lots of appearances.

Sources

Bob Dylan on Wikipedia
Official Dylan Website

Introduction

The Article „A temporary truce on textiles“appeared on the Economist website on September 7th 2005. We discussed this article in one of our economics lessons and I found it quite interesting, so I decided to put it in my portfolio.

Article

The article is about the so called “Bra Wars” and its solution which has been found lately. The “Bra Wars” is the conflict between the European Union (EU) and China concerning textile imports from the Chinese industry. The quotas which are given to Chinese textile imports have been exhausted since June, so any types of clothes from sweaters over trousers to even bras began pilling up in warehouses around Europe. Also the retailers began to get excited because they are in need of the ordered clothes.

In order to settle the differences between the EU and China the EU government had to walk on a narrow path. On the one side there are nations with big textile industries like, for instance, France and Italy, on the other side there are nations, which want to support their retailers with cheap Chinese imports. So the EU government had to find a solution to satisfy all parties and of course also the Chinese.
Finally after long negotiations the EU and China found a preliminary solution, at least. The stocked goods are allowed into Europe, but half of them are counted as part of other quotas. Especially as part of the next years quotas.

Personal Opinion

The solution may be a fine preliminary solution but in my option it just gives some delay to the European textile industry. According to the article the quotas have to be lifted in 2008 because of the World Trade Organization rules. So in 2008 the European textile industry will have to face to problem again, but hopefully it has adapted by then. For me the question is how a whole industry can adapt to the danger of low-cost competitors. In my option most of the European textile companies will start building factories in China or other low-cost countries like Bangladesh or Morocco. So the EU will somehow not be able to maintain its textile sector.

Sources

Economist Website