Archive for August, 2009
MGX Copy
I wanted to take some time and talk about the competitive advantages and vision that we have for MGX Copy.
MGX Copy is an internet based printing, disc duplicating, fulfillment and corporate services company. I know that’s a mouthful, but in essence what it means is that we serve corporate clients through printing business cards, brochures, flyers, booklets, newsletters, duplicating dvds and cds, as well as packaging and shipping products for them.
I’m very bullish on our company’s long term prospects-I’ve always enjoyed taking a traditional industry and applying new technology and new methods of execution to improve on its productivity and efficiency.
What’s particularly encouraging is the emerging technology that is available for us to use and implement. For example, traditional printers have had to deal with long and expensive setup times, resulting in slow turnarounds and higher prices. Here at MGX, we are currently building systems that will nearly fully automate the production process. It would be unwise for me to get into specifics, but the production workflow will allow a customer to price, pay, transfer files, and order their job completely without our intervention. Afterwards, the files would become automatically converted and transferred to the point where our operators simply need to push 1 button before the production begins. This type of full automation dramatically speeds up production, reduces errors, and perhaps most importantly, heavily cuts down on costs by eliminating a huge portion of operator input.
Long story short-I’m excited to see how far we can take this technology. By reducing our costs and speeding up our workflow, we can expand ourselves to handle more clients and more effectively compete online, where pricing is paramount.
If I had to choose 3 phrases to describe MGX Copy, I would go with technology driven, customer oriented, and aggressive. You can decide what aggressive means 
Hello and Welcome.
Posted by Lawrence in Miscellaneous on August 17, 2009
Hi, I’m Lawrence and welcome to Think MGX! Thanks for taking the time to check out the site.
With any luck, I will be posting updates on my companies, MGX Copy and Keep the Kiss, as well as providing updates on the new businesses that are in the works, such as Project Armonica. I will also be using Think MGX as a place to post my thoughts on economics and finance, as well as my thoughts on economics and finance. In addition, from time to time I will include some papers/publications that I am currently working on.
Thanks!
How The Internet Works
Posted by Lawrence in Publications on August 17, 2009
In 1996, the theoretical physicist Per Bak published a book titled “How Nature Works: The Science of Self-Organized Criticality,”. That title was the inspiration for a paper that Caitlin Keane and I authored together regarding power law distributions and their prevalence among internet based entities.
Essentially, this paper argues that power law distributions occur when interconnectivity becomes more and more present. The internet is perhaps the epitome of interconnectivity, and we explore and survey how blogs, search engines, social networking sites, news sites, etc exhibit power law distributions. Enjoy.
In the long run, we are all dead.
Last October 2008, I had written this post as we were about to descend into the midst of the “Great Recession”. As nearly a year has past, my predictions have been fairly accurate, and I’ve also attached some links from articles to add extend some legitimacy to my proposals and arguments.
The possibility of the FDIC going bankrupt is documented here: http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=washingtonstory&sid=alsJZqIFuN3k
The “closed door negotiations and strong-arming that I suspected is documented here: http://www.marketwatch.com/story/as-paulson-testifies-democrats-focus-on-lewis
My original post follows as below:
I think it is high time that Generation Y reassess their view on America’s place in the modern and world economy.
Let’s set something straight. I was born in 1987, but the first president that I can recall, was named Clinton. Growing up, I think it is fair to say, that we were presented with a very rosy, fairytale view of the world. The United States was far superior militarily, economically, and in the sense of prestige. Perhaps we were young and naive, but it almost seemed as if we couldn’t be touched.
Fast forward to our current situation in society. We are currently dragged down in a war that apparently we shouldn’t have been in, an economic situation and stock market that resembles the newest coaster at Six Flags, and as far as I am concerned, whoever coined “freedom fries” should be removed from the gene pool.
Let’s talk the bank failures. Does everyone know why we’re in this position, what just happened, and what’s coming up?
Anyways, here’s something we need to seriously consider. 11 federally insured banks have failed this year. As for the deposits, supposedly, the omnipotent FDIC will cover any deposits that we have in the bank, at least up to $100,000. The truth is, does the FDIC even have the money? Not a chance in hell. At least not until the government pumps more money into the FDIC, of which we taxpayers will need to foot the bill.
Let’s think about this for a second. When IndyMac failed, it cost the FDIC roughly 7-8 billion dollars. Well, just last week, we had “failures” of Washington Mutual and Wachovia. Wamu has a market capitaliztion of over 300 billion dollars. Obviously not all of this money is in the form of deposits, CDs, or other FDIC insured funds, and the closest estimates I have heard is that if Wamu were to be bailed out by the FDIC, it would cost the FDIC 48 billion dollars.
Guess what, the FDIC only has 45 billion dollars on tap.
See the problem here? Know what’s even scarier. I hear that Wachovia is a bigger bank than Washington Mutual.
Is it just me, or is it coincidence that Merill Lynch was acquired by Bank of America, Wachovia was acquired by Citibank, and Washington Mutual was acquired by JP Morgan all with a little “encouragement” by the government?
Ladies and gentlemen, think about all of this. What does the government do when it lacks the funds necessary to let a bank completely fail, so that it would be on the hook for the FDIC insurance policy payout? It should not be an impossibility that Capitol Hill and Wall Street are meeting for tea, and the politicians are “forcing/begging/encouraging” JP Morgan to buy out Washington Mutual, otherwise the FDIC would go bankrupt.
The mega corporations are bailing out the mega corporations, because the FDIC(government) can’t do it right now. Did anyone ever mention that, more than ever, corporations are running more of the world?