Apple brand overtakes Google; rumble injures several at Beijing store
Two news stories and a blog post I’ve read this morning strike me as connectible, so here goes:
First comes news that Apple has overtaken Google as the world’s most valuable brand, according to advertising research firm Millward Brown.
Then we have reports about a fight at a Beijing Apple store that left several people injured after employees attempted to forcibly remove scalpers who kept cutting into line.
And, finally, we have a blog post from security expert Bruce Scneier that previews a book he is writing, tentatively titled: “The Dishonest Minority: Security and its Role in Modern Society.” Here’s a excerpt from the book’s thesis statement:
All complex systems contain parasites. In any system of cooperative behavior, an uncooperative strategy will be effective — and the system will tolerate the uncooperatives — as long as they’re not too numerous or too effective. Thus, as a species evolves cooperative behavior, it also evolves a dishonest minority that takes advantage of the honest majority. If individuals within a species have the ability to switch strategies, the dishonest minority will never be reduced to zero. As a result, the species simultaneously evolves two things: 1) security systems to protect itself from this dishonest minority, and 2) deception systems to successfully be parasitic.
Humans evolved along this path. The basic mechanism can be modeled simply. It is in our collective group interest for everyone to cooperate. It is in any given individual’s short-term self interest not to cooperate: to defect, in game theory terms. But if everyone defects, society falls apart. To ensure widespread cooperation and minimal defection, we collectively implement a variety of societal security systems.
So it looks as though Apple needs to work on its in-store security systems because the phenomenal success of its brand has attracted too many parasites.
Welcome regulars and passersby. Here are a few more recent Buzzblog items. And, if you’d like to receive Buzzblog via e-mail newsletter, here’s where to sign up. Follow me on Twitter here.
- Brookstone needs to accept that Mom is a tough sell.
- Programmer unknowingly live blogs raid that killed Bin Laden.
- Captain Midnight: ‘No regrets’ about jamming HBO back in ’86
- Wozniak questions long-accepted date of “Day One” at Apple.
- IRS e-file system turns 25 … and tops 70% participation rate
- 35 years of ‘Apple’ Fools Day fun
- Groupon vs. the price of gasoline.
- On the company dime: Rogue game server admins tell all
- World of Warcraft player offers $1,000 bribe.
- Tech ‘firsts’ that made a President’s day.
- If you had bought 100 shares of Microsoft 25 years ago …
- No e-wallet can replace a John Wayne.
