CSotD: Virtual Reality Check
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Bob Englehart with a take on the Chinese corporate espionage case that stands out not only because he makes a good point but because he fails to make a bad one.
The Prime Directive here being that we praise the good stuff rather than ripping on the not-so-good, I had despaired of saying anything about the indictments of Chinese hackers-in-high-places for theft of corporate information. There have been a lot of cartoons on the topic, but they've nearly all been in the "well, since NSA monitors the Internet, we can't criticize this."
Which certainly raises once again the difference between collecting data and reading individual emails and listening in on cell phone conversations. I'm about ready to give up on that one, because the comics pages would implode if we suddenly removed all the cartoons in which NSA figures remind someone to pick up milk on his way home like his wife asked him to.
But the "we do it too" approach also shows a really startling lack of understanding of the interplay of commerce and government in the two nations. For all the unreconstructed Cold War Warriors out there peddling their visions of Mao and Stalin, there seem to be an equally large cadre of wide-eyed types who think that putting a McDonalds in Beijing makes China a free-market capitalist nation.
Similarly, the role of lobbyists and corporate campaign contributors here is not only a disgrace but perhaps our most serious governmental problem. But it has f-all to do with corporate espionage.
Which, by the way, would be a rich vein of comic humor if people knew how it worked.
Malls have been touchy about cameras for years, because they don't want rivals taking pictures that would let them calculate who their tenants are and how much square footage they rent.
When I was a business reporter, the local mall wanted me to check in at their office before doing any stories with tenants, and to let them know what I might be planning to photograph.
The joke is, who needed to sneak photos of store fronts to get that?
Aside from my ability to read upside down and their tendency to leave papers on their desk while we chatted, someone, for instance, once slipped me a complete multi-page, full-sized set of blueprints for a proposed strip mall they were building on adjoining property, complete with the tenants of the anchor stores penciled in.
When the mall manager gave me a "no comment" on the story, they fired him for even saying that much. Way to lock the barn door, guys.
And then there was the time when one of the big "membership" chains — BJ's or Costco, I forget which — was planning to come into the market. The chain's Vice-President In Charge Of Signing Things got off the plane and was met by the corporate leasing agent for the mall and said, "Hey, is it true that there's a Sam's Club being built?"
Told that was the case, he literally turned around and got back on the plane and flew away.
Retail is a touchy sector, but they all are, and, when you get beyond street-level stuff like that, the stakes get even higher and the game gets even dirtier.
Mike Smith takes a kind of Luddite view of things: It's beyond absurd to think a company could actually do business without going on line and exposing itself to some extent.
Nor are hard copies of data all that secure either.
But he's got a point that dovetails with Englehart's, in that, if it's on line, it's not secure. Period. Exclamation point if needed.
I caught the tail end of a discussion of this on NPR the other day in which the person was (accurately) pointing out that it's not all about the secret technical specs for the next magical gizmo and can be as mundane as plans and projections and strategies.
This is the kind of casual back-and-forth that we see happening around board room tables in the movies but that, in the real world, happens online because there aren't enough people in one place to gather around an actual table.
In the brief commentary on his blog, Englehart notes the inevitability of corporate espionage, and quotes a Wall Street Journal source who said “There are only two kinds of companies in the U. S. today; those who’ve been hacked, and those who don’t know they’ve been hacked.”
And he's right that on-line security is going to be a hot career field, and soon. Yesterday would be even better.
Two observations:
1. What made the Whitewater faux-scandal work was that most people don't know how business works.
Residential real estate is legally regulated to protect the home buyer, because it's assumed you may only buy three or four houses in a lifetime, so your transaction with a Realtor is fundamentally unbalanced. Corporate real estate, by very great contrast, is a full-contact, no-rules, protect-yourself-at-all-times sport played among pros.
The Scaife-financed vast rightwing conspiracy teased the Whitewater deal into what sounded absolutely filthy and corrupt, but when someone finally revealed what had actually happened, reporters on the business side said, "Wait … where's the scandalous part? This is how it works. Always."
2. That's why letting women into country clubs is crucial to their effectiveness in the board room.
What happens on the eighth tee stays on the eighth tee. And if you're not there, or you're only there as a "guest," the fact that you are sitting around that boardroom table, real or virtual, is simply a tokenistic gesture to placate the yokels.
Including the yokels in the newsroom, because Whitewater wasn't being covered by the business writers.
And neither is the Chinese spying thingie.
And on the topic of the Prime Directive
The first of the new Mark Trail daily storylines not only features much stronger artwork but a coherent outdoorsy plot. If the new crew can keep this up, they may erase the absurdity gap between the wonderful, nature-themed Sundays and the heretofore ridiculous dailies.
However, I will predict with complete confidence that the Merchants of Snark will continue to dump on the strip with glee, because, once you are targeted for bullying by the Cool Kids, it really doesn't matter what you do.
Case in point: Judge Parker has always been the strongest of the surviving continuity strips, but it became a snark target and so remains one.
Meanwhile, my only criticism of the current storyline is that the Judge and his wife are portrayed as a little less savvy than seems likely, but, after all, it's the younger cast members who now carry the burden of the strip, and I'm actively waiting each day for the next installment, as this thing plays out.
And if that strip is forever branded as uncool by the self-appointed arbiters of hip, the greatly improved Rex Morgan hasn't got a chance.
I've often cited the hipster snark sites as my motivation for starting CSotD four years ago, but I'm not sure how much I've conveyed my contempt for the Cool Kids who, if they really were all that clever and discerning, wouldn't all flock around the same designated targets.
Mike Peterson has posted his "Comic Strip of the Day" column every day since 2010. His opinions are his own, but we welcome comments either agreeing or in opposition.
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