Pokemon, Microsoft and the Economics of Greed Greed Economics: The uplifting or debilitating effect of the excessive desire of gain on the production, consumption and distribution of goods and services. Solid proof that greed economics lives and breathes was recently found in Newsweks Novmber 8th issue in an article entitled Puffys Crowded Orbit. Sean (Puffy) Combs is founder and CEO of the extremely profitable Bad Boy entertainment. In the billion dollar a year rap music industry, he is the cognac in a world of beer. In 1997, his first album, (carried by the hit Missing You), sold an extraordinary 6 million copies! But Combs who is known as much for his business savvy as for his musical talent, ignored the rules of greed management and recklessy expanded into publications, clothing lines and restaurants. The sale of his recent album Forever, despite a red-hot reputation and a 32-city promotional tour, was weaker than weak. Newsweek reports that in the first week of November the album was No.27 on the charts. The same article places his last years earnings at $53 million; well off his tyical $100 million-a-year earnings of the mid 1990s. Sorry Puff the law is real. Greed affects quality.Inner-city America finds it of some interest that this law does not favor the rich, the politically plugged in, or the white of this world. America richest man, Bill Gates received a stunning setback earlier this month when Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson ruled against the $500 billion software company Microsoft, declaring that it violated antitrust law and was in fact a monopoly. In a Newsweek article dated November 15th rntitled Bill Takes it on the Chin, Judge Jackson stated: Microsoft has demonstrated that it will use its prodigious market power and immense profits to harm any firm that insists on pursuing initiates that could intensify competion. Why couldnt Billy be satisfied with say a $100 billion company? The penalty for ignoring the law of ree...
