A couple of posts on technology innovation here and here. From the second:

With the 3G iPhone, Apple not only outdid Nokia and RIMM, they outdid their future selves. They created the acme, the Nazz of the smartphone, and some sort of new undiscovered technological innovation is needed to proceed to the next level. Meantime, we will see next week that most everyone has caught up. There’s a word for what happens next: commoditisation. When no substantive competitive advantage exists, prices contract, margins tank, customers get to boss you around, and no-one is nice to you any more.

Does the Onion have the answer? (probably NSFW).

Gillian Tett:

The Lehman collapse has sown a sense of terror about creditors losing money on any bank bonds they hold. The only way truly to remove that terror would be for the government to persuade investors that banks are so healthy they cannot collapse – or promise to protect creditors if they do.

I would humbly suggest another option, namely that the banks should actually be so healthy they cannot collapse. International Monetary Exchanges are certainly not the solution, they will just create an even bigger mess next time.

Sippican Cottage talking about his father (via TimW). My condolences.