<nettime> Michael Malone : Regulating Destruction

["Patrice Riemens" <patrice@xs4all.nl>]

You know something is badly amiss with 'the economy as we know it' when
the Wall Street Journal welcomes and publishes deep critique of certain of
its none so trivial mechanisms.

On December 21st, Michael S. Malone, a columnist for ABCNews, wondered
aloud why IPOs were conspicuously absent from the new dotcom boom
reverberating across the US fromout Silicon Valley. Instead it's a case of
'Google Will Eat 'm All' (so much for eating itself ;-) The fault he
thinks is a Kaliyuga-like (he doesn't use that concept though, not being
Indian) result of over-regulation benefiting the big players at the
expense of potential new, small entrants (aren't we very surprised?).

End of the article quote:

" The result was Sarbanes-Oxley, Regulation FD ('Fair Disclosure', aka
'Fear and Doubt' - PR), and stock option valuation (by the IRS -PR)- three
great lessons in the law of unintended consequences. Let's do our own
accounting: Thanks to this troika, fewer companies are going public;
economic power is being concentrated in the hands of fewer companies;
competition is reduced; new wealth is less widely distributed; the rich
are getting richer; fewer talented people want to join entrepreneurial
ventures; and corporate boards are getting stupider and more paranoid (- a
reference to the recent HP bandobust -PR). And, please note, one of the
crucial triggers for economic booms - a burts of young tech companiy IPOs
- has now largely evaporated.

Just curious, but is this really what federal regulators, Congress and
shareholder rights activists had in mind? "


If someone could put the whole article on line, it's interesting. I
couldn't google it back, and Dow Jones has a reputation for 'robust
defense of our intellectual property' ...

Happy End and New Beginning to All!
patrizio and Diiiinooos!


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