The Periscope Post

Bloomberg

Is social media losing its lure … and return on investment?
That social media – Twitter, Facebook, FourSquare and their ilk – are an indelible part of the American social fabric is widely accepted. But the thing is, says Laura Vanderkam, Bloomberg opinion-writer and member of USA Today’s board of contributors, Americans don’t actually spend all that much time on social media. “Which is good because the reason many people have embraced social media (which would be marketing) is turning out to have a lousy return on investment, if you consider the opportunity cost of time,” Vanderkam opined. One of the major offshoots of social media is the “free advertising” aspect, the promise of being able to connect to users and potential customers in new ways. “But if by ‘connecting’ you mean eventually getting them to buy something from you, I’m not buying that.” Messages get buried and, Vanderkam noted, “[W]hat business owners often miss in all this is that time has an opportunity cost. Time you or your employees spend on social media is time not spent, say, calling potential clients, or trying to turn the ones you have into bigger spenders.”

Financial Times

BP spill report shares the blame
BP’s internal investigation into the circumstances around the explosion on the Deepwater Horizon offshore oil rig and the subsequent oil leak in the Gulf of Mexico “shares the blame in a way that is bound to capture the attention of the companies involved and the lawyers on all sides in the litigation frenzy already under way”. But of “wider importance” in this 193-page report are the report’s recommendations to reduce the likelihood of another such accident the FT claimed. Said the paper, “[T]he proposed changes would require oil groups to keep far closer watch on what is being done in their name or on their behalf. BP is right to accept them: the rest of the sector should study them too.”

The Wall Street Journal

Caricature in Cleveland
President Barack Obama is “having a hard time keeping his economy story straight”, The Journal claimed: On the one hand, he claims to support business and entrepreneurship, but on the other, he keeps banging on about “greedy business”. In a speech delivered in Cleveland yesterday, Obama complained about the “very specific governing philosophy” that ruled America prior to this Administration: “The idea was that if we had blind faith in the market; if we let corporations play by their own rules; if we left everyone else to fend for themselves, America would grow and prosper.” The Journal guffawed: “The caricature is so over-the-top that it’s hard to imagine anyone writing it without laughing… More important for Mr. Obama’s own hopes for the economy, how does he think entrepreneurs and CEOs react to this sort of broadside? Does he believe it makes them more likely to invest, take more risks or hire new workers? Will they assume Washington will now be less destructive?”

Reuters

China `Sweet Spot’ Is Returning for Investors
“To understand what is going on with China’s economy, just look at wheel loaders,” declared Stephen Green, columnist for Reuters. Wheel-loaders are big, shovel-fronted tractors used to build roads and railways; companies only buy them if they’re planning on using them in the next 24 months. And right now, China, an investment-heavy economy, is practically buying out the store: In July, 15,823 new loaders rolled out of the showrooms, a 50 percent increase in seasonally adjusted sales compared with a year earlier. Said Green, “This is hardly the kind of number that one would expect from an economy on the verge of collapse. Instead it is just one of many signs that Chinese gross domestic product is steadily expanding while inflationary pressures have moderated. In short, figures for August may well be what we have all been waiting for: a China sweet spot.”