Paul Kedrosky has lots of comments on the Google-YouTube deal, most notably the realization that Google is no longer a tech company, but a media company. With that, competition over online content distribution will intensify and we'll probably see more consolidation down the road. Given my background in finance, I am always intrigued by the numbers, which are compelling:

But only one venture capital firm — Sequoia Capital — got in on what has turned out to be one of the hottest Internet deals since Google went public in 2004.

Sequoia, which is among the most successful venture firms in Silicon Valley, invested a total of $11.5 million in YouTube from November 2005 to April 2006. It may be walking away with more than 43 times that amount. Its stake in YouTube has been estimated at roughly 30 percent, which would give it a value of $495 million.

Such multiples are rare and are unlikely to be replicated for a similar deal soon. However any company or individual that can figure out how to amass and sustain large online audiences while leveraging them competitively will do very well.

UPDATE: Read Jeff Jarvis' take too. Excerpt:

"In the explosion of the new television, what we need now is not more content or distribution — we have plenty of both on YouTube alone. What we need is a way to find the good stuff, the the stuff we want to watch"

While many were cheering its rocky start and predicting its early demise, few were willing to acknowledge its potential and eventual success. Since I know a thing or two about early stage ventures I was confident that persistence and trial-and-error would at some point yield results for Pajamas Media. That is also Michael Malone's take at ABC News Silicon Insider:

That's why, longtime readers of this column will remember, I cheered the arrival of Pajamas Media, the first real aggregator of the blogosphere.

Pajamas got off to a shaky start — stumbling just enough to satisfy those who had predicted it to fail but eventually finding its legs.

Now that the mainstream media have moved on to other stories, Pajamas is pulling in hundreds of thousands of readers each day, all drawn to its attractive mix of stories, viewpoints and, increasingly, videos.

Right now, especially on the big international stories, nobody covers events from more perspectives and with greater nuance than Pajamas Media.

More endorsements to come, no doubt.

There was a time when I got e-mails suggesting that European governments should pay all Muslim immigrants an amount of money sufficient enough to get them to move back to their country of origin. A buy-out literally, but one that is not only impossible to implement and somewhat morally abject, one that is also economically dangerous. The Dutch economy for instance would grind to a halt if some 7% of the population: (a) wrecked the national budget by cashing in on these 'go home bonuses' and (b) all decided to go leave instantly.

Yet, there are some that actually go voluntarily and maybe they are discovering ways to bring the benefits and opportunities of free trading democracies to stagnant Arab economies. Consider this:

Mimoun a young Moroccan entrepreneur from The Netherlands wants to start a cookies factory back in Morocco. By emigrating to Morocco he plans to start a new life.

[ ... ]

Many well-educated and well-integrated, second generation Moroccans like Mimoun leave The Netherlands. They don’t see many economic opportunities and feel unwelcome in The Netherlands. In Morocco they seek to start a new life.

These well-integrated second-generation immigrants are probably the one group that Europe does not want to lose as they can be instrumental in helping the rest of their ethnic and religious group make that important transition. Still, if they are able create economic opportunity in countries like Morocco, they may prove themselves to be as valuable there as they could have been back in their adopted home country.

NOTE: I translated ‘stroopwafels’ as ‘cookies’ but those of you familiar with this Dutch delicacy will know that is not correct. There is no English word for it, 'syrup waffles' is probably the best one, but think of it as two thinly baked pieces of dough which are glued together by a thin layer of molasses or syrup. I used to buy them at Amsterdam's Schiphol Airport on my way back to London and Hong Kong and they were an instant hit with foreign colleagues who thought it was a unique delicacy. Well, it is up to Mimoun to prove that he can unleash the same excitement in Morocco and turn it into a profitable venture.

Here is an excellent example of social engineering that through its arbitrary and mandatory nature will no doubt have a detrimental effect on companies' and shareholders’ ability to effectively manage their affairs:

Within the next year, the 510 Norwegian companies listed on the Oslo Stock Exchange must have 40% of their respective board seats occupied by women. Any company failing to comply will be booted off the OSE. For now, the law passed in 2002 only applies to publicly traded companies. But the government is considering extending the law’s reach to cover family-owned companies as well.

While I do understand the background to that European penchant to get women to work, it is hard to see how such an objective can be achieved by such drastically enforced legislation. The only way to encourage more female representation on boards is to let the market do its work and build boards based on merit and achievement. Women have advanced rapidly in terms of career development and achievement over the past few decades, so I don’t see why this process needs to be artificially accelerated by some overzealous nordic legislators.

Secondly, while measures like this will throw a bit of a challenge in front of large publicly traded companies; they will make life for medium and small sized businesses all that much harder. I have been closely involved in building boards for a number of early stage technology forms and if they had to comply with what is now on the table in Norway, their difficult first years would have been even harder.

Finally, I could make a lame joke about Patricia Dunn, but I won’t.

Steve Maich in Macleans thinks that western companies are "selling their souls" by doing business with repressive regimes. Or even doing business in countries with repressive regmines.

Leave aside the anthropomorphism of declaring that legal entities have souls to sell, what perplexes me is this demand that the companies with which we do business be more ethical, more moral than our elected representatives. Maich points out that several companies are being asked to testify of a US congressional subcommitte, but that "it's not clear how far Western lawmakers are willing to go to defend human rights in the world's hottest new market".

The answer is, of course, not very far at all, especially when Western diplomats are bending over backwards to avoid offending the same regimes.

I'm not going to defend any behaviour. It seems clear that the actions of Western companies in China in particular vary from mostly harmless to actively participating in repressive activities.

What interests me is the devolution of responsibility. The new thesis is that business is responsible for social change.

If businessmen were to show as much courage in the face of Communist leaders as they do in the boardroom, China would be a far more liberated place than it is today. "Business people are supposed to be able to do this kind of thing, they should be natural at it," Kamm says. "You should be able to sell the guy on something he may not want to hear initially. That's what salesmanship is!" But after more than a decade of cajoling and lobbying high-profile CEOs, Kamm has yet to convince a single one to make the promotion of human rights part of their strategy in China.

Maich goes on to give a few more examples of where business leaders have affected social change. All true, and heartwarming. But now it's not enough when the occasional courageous CEO puts human rights above profit. Now we expect them to be the agents of change.

Instead of relying on our elected governments to push for human rights awareness, we give them a free pass. Paul Martin for example could meet with Chinese government officials and only bring up human rights issues 'in passing', but we expect more from our business leaders dammit.

It's a crazy world we live in, where we expect our federal government to abdicate their diplomatic responsibilities to private enterprise, but won't let the similar private companies (for example) deliver health care.

A Jesuit order in Guelph Ontario is continuing their fight against Walmart, although they've now upped the ante. The new argument is that the existence of a Walmart will violate their charter rights. (Home Depot, Staples and Canadian Tire stores are already nearby, not to mention the Curling Club.)

The order makes the astonishing comparison between not wanting (another) big box store on their doorstep and the expulsion of the Israelites from Egypt.

But there is also a deeper social incompatibility, which can only be appreciated by stepping into the realm of mystical spirituality and religious symbolism. An enduring aspect of the Judeo-Christian tradition is an invitation to leave behind the concerns of this world in order to experience the Divine in solitude, in the depth of our being. The Israelites were driven out of Egypt and were spiritually transformed wandering in desert solitude for 40 years. Jesus went into the desert for 40 days of mystical experience, and often retreated to a quiet place in nature to pray. Early Christian mystics are called the Desert Fathers because they stepped away from urban life to find God in remote solitude. And ever since, men and women have left the preoccupations of normal life to contemplate the Divine in monasteries and retreat houses located in peaceful, bucolic settings. Another tradition associates “high places” as the typical location where humans report encountering God. Moses met Yahweh on Mount Sinai. Judaism built its temple, where God resided in the Holy of Holies, on the Temple Mount. Jesus was transfigured on Mount Tabor. Mount Athos is the pre-eminent monastic cluster for Orthodox Christians, as is Monte Cassino for Roman Catholics. Thus, it is not by accident that the Jesuits located the Church of our Lady and the Jesuit Centre on “high places.”

So basically, Home Depot didn't violate the inherent spirituality of the 600 acres owned by the order, but Walmart will? I know the deep hatred of Walmart in many people is in itself a religion, but this is going a bit far.

We've been a little obsessed with the election here at Peaktalk, (okay, I have). So here's something completely different. An idea I genuinely hope can work: CarHarbour.

Right now it's just vapour-ware. But the idea is so simple. Identify an unused parking space (like your driveway) to a central server, and let people pay for it with their cell phones. (Description from TechCrunch.)

I can already spot some issues (payment enforcing, time limits etc.), but the implementation seems straightforward. Considering the interesting things people can do with the Google Maps API, I can easily envision a web-enabled cell phone where you can check for available spaces based on your location. And there wouldn't be any issue while it was still getting going. Even while inventory is low, if checking for available spaces is quick and easy, there's no downside.

File under 'Damn, why didn't I think of that?'