Last week Australian energy company AGL withdrew its A$3 billion takeover offer for Vocus. This came only two weeks after Swedish private equity firm EQT halted its $3.3 billion transaction.
Bill goes on to reflect that as currently structured, Australia’s broadband market may not enable companies to make a reasonable profit:
All of which says bad things about the state of retail telecommunications. The private equity investors have looked and seen there is no quick path to profit.
More patient, longer-term investors like AGL, who have access to the magic formula of adding power sales to a broadband subscription don’t think it looks viable either.
The Australian telecommunications industry reminds me of how our aviation industry was in the 1980s and 1990s. Carriers would arrive, make losses, destroy shareholder value, and disappear. Now, instead of aeroplanes, it’s communication networks.
Same as it ever was.
I’m experiencing the existential crisis that is all too familiar to many a blogger… what goes on this blog of mine and what goes on the other blog of mine? 🤔
Atlassian is an interesting company that possibly doesn’t get the kudos it might deserve. As an Australian, I have admiration for seeing one of ours hit it big internationally. Atlassian and Canva are probably the only two Australian companies that immediately spring to mind as having won big in the international IT space.
I’m impressed that Atlassian continue to walk the walk in regard to their world-view and values. This is evident in their now public approach to mergers and acquisitions. They are trying to reduce the angst and power imbalance and increase the fairness and focus on outcomes.
From their blog post announcing the release of a new public term sheet to support merger and acquisition deals:
one thing has become very clear to us about the M&A process – it’s outdated, inefficient, and unnecessarily combative, with too much time and energy spent negotiating deal terms and not enough on what matters most: building great products together and delivering more customer value.
There is plenty of ego in the IT world. The ‘bro’ culture permeates, and it promotes ego and ‘winning’, rather than value creation and shared successes.
In an effort to reduce this unnecessary friction and increase trust, we’re doing something that, to our knowledge, no company has done before: we’ve crafted a new M&A term sheet and we’re making it public.
So much time is wasted through replicated effort. The software world is built on the reuse of frameworks. Not having to re-invent the wheel each time a new project begins is how great advancements are realised. What Atlassian are doing here is providing a fundamental public framework for mergers and acquisitions. Spend less time, money and effort doing things that have been done before and instead focus on getting the deal done and realising the value that prompted the M&A in the first place.
The reality is that because of the leverage that many buyers exert over sellers, certain “market” terms have evolved to buyers’ advantage, even though, based on the data, it’s simply not necessary.
Another example where pure laissez-faire markets are wonderful in theory and damaging in reality. Market power is a thing that is readily exerted. This creates a culture of ‘winners’ and ‘losers’ where the real focus should be on having the reason for coming together create a win for all. This doesn’t need to be a zero-sum game.
I hope this new approach to M&As catches on, and less money is spent on wasteful lawyer fees and negotiation and everybody can end up with a better outcome at the end of the process. The market will be better off, customers will benefit, and the stakeholders to the deal will both be better off with less of the angst, stress and ill-feeling that can arise at the end of a protracted M&A process.
Thanks for your kind words, micro.bloggers. On a day when our dear pet left us, it’s nice to have positive responses. So different - and so much better - than the snark I might expect on other networks. I love this place.
Today we said goodbye to our gorgeous Airedale Terrier, Indi. Loyal friend for 14 years. She will be missed.
I’ve decided that I’m not going to renew my Lightroom subscription when it comes due. I’ve just gone through and brought all the photos that were on the Adobe Cloud back to my local NAS. I just don’t do enough photography anymore to justify the expense.
I have changed my DNS provider to OpenDNS. I have been using CloudFlare DNS and have nothing but praise for its speed and stability. However, with kids in the house, I need the additional network filtering and site-blocking that OpenDNS can deliver.
For OpenDNS to work it needs to be kept abreast of my home’s IP address. My ISP doesn’t provide1 a static IP. While my dynamic IP doesn’t change often, any change that does occur prevents the OpenDNS filtering from working. What’s more, it’s a non-visible problem. There are no error messages that pop up alerting of a problem. The filtering just stops working.
OpenDNS know this. They offer an app that runs in the background to monitor and update the OpenDNS service with the current dynamic IP address. However, that app isn’t nice. What’s more, I don’t like the idea of the network filtering being dependent on a laptop device that might not always be available on the network to perform the update.
Enter Raspberry Pi
I have a Raspberry Pi that provides ad-blocking throughout my home network with the brilliant Pi-Hole. Given it’s already important role in my network configuration, I decided the Pi should also be responsible for monitoring any changes to my dynamic IP address.
A bit of research led me to discover that ddclient was the tool for the job. It’s not installed by default on the Pi, but can be installed through the GUI package manager or on the terminal with:
The end result is that I now have ddclient running as a daemon process on the Raspberry Pi. It launches upon reboot and checks my IP address every 1 hour.
The best part is that I don’t have to run the very ordinary OpenDNS Updater app on my Mac.
Well, this is a good reason to completely leave Google. It’s not sending me 2FA codes to my devices, and my attempt at recovery failed. So, I guess no more access to my Google account?
I read this because it seems one of those books that should be read before one dies. So it goes. The worldview (universe view?) of the Tralfamadorian’s resonated with the reading I have done recently on stoicism. Perhaps that was always as it was meant to be?
I am glad to have read this book. but will have to contemplate more on what it means for me, who is currently living in an existence in a different era.
The search for the right Mac Markdown editor is like a quest for the Holy Grail. There are many options, but finding the ideal fit is a challenge.
It got to the point where I had to do an audit of the options that exist on my computer, and consider which one might be best for my needs.
The list I came up with is, in potential order of preference:
MultiMarkdown Composer (currently free version)
This offers live preview with synchronised scrolling, works with the file system directly and is designed specifically for Markdown writing. The downside is the editing environment just feels slightly ‘off’. I do like the keyboard commands and the way it pastes in links.
Solid as a rock text editor. I’m not a programmer, so many of the features are lost on me. With the Keyboard Maestro additions it can deal with Markdown formatting with keyboard shortcuts elegantly.
No typewriter mode.
Doesn’t carry forward markdown lists, as I’m finding writing this post.
Has built-in git support.
$75.14
The Archive
A fork of nvAlt, this is an app I use for my zettelkasten notes, and other bits and pieces. The markdown editing is okay, but it doesn’t play well with links on the clipboard.
Drafts
Where text starts.
Also where text stays in a database which is not great for easy git management.
DEVONthink
The new version 3 has much better Markdown support, but it’s still rudimentary when it comes to editing. Limited keyboard support makes this better for looking at Markdown than writing in it.
I’m going to buy the new version anyway.
NotePlan
I’m using this for my daily notes.
While it has a section for generic notes, I’m not going to incorporate this into a wider writing workflow.
Byword
It’s really old, and while it still works, it’s starting to show its age.
I don’t like the way I need to switch views to preview the markdown.
Ulysses
Uses a custom variant of Markdown (Markdown XL) by default.
Keeps everything in it’s own library so not great for git management.
Every time I try to use this app for general Markdown editing I end up getting frustrated.
Curio Good for project-based Markdown notes, but not good for file-based writing and editing.
Notebooks (requires Dropbox)
The Notebooks editor is quite nice. Unfortunately, I’m in the process of ditching Dropbox, and it uses Dropbox as its fundamental sync engine, so it’s a non-starter.
A special mention:
iA Writer
I don’t have iA Writer on my Mac, but I do have it on iOS where it frustrates me by not having TextExpander integration.
Micro.blog feedback indicates that it is great on the Mac, though, so let’s add this as a strong contender.
$50.00
Picking a Winner
I thought I would end up choosing BBEdit. That’s why I typed this post in the app. But in usage, I think the winner might be MultiMarkdown Composer.
Hey micro.blog friends, you’re a coercive bunch! I think I’m going to have to run with iA Writer! Is there a way to get x-callback URLs to render as tapable links though?
I’m getting the hang of using git from the terminal now.
I’m really in the mood for shaking up my apps. Now I’m looking at Mailmate for email. It’s an app I’ve known about for years, but now I’m genuinely interested.
“The answer to the ultimate question of life, the universe and everything is 42.”
– Douglas Adams
In that case, I’m looking forward to true enlightenment because today is my 42nd birthday.
I was fortunate to be born in Australia. We didn’t have much growing up. Raised by a mother whose husband returned to the USA without his wife and four children, we benefited from the generosity of the country’s social safety net to keep our heads just above water.
Life went on, I enjoyed my education and saw it as a pathway to something bigger. The nation helped me once again with its low-cost loan system to support students in the costs of attending university. Without the ability to defer these subsidised university fees until I was employed, I would not have gained a Bachelor’s degree in Economics and Law.
At 22 I met my wife, Hannah, through a random chance encounter during a night out. We hit it off and things grew from there. As it turned out, my wife is the daughter of the man who at the time was Leader of the Federal Opposition party, and who had served with distinction as a Minister in the famous Hawke government.
The fact that I, a boy who grew up with not much, should be thrust into this very different world, is a measure of the egalitarian potential of our nation. It has led to a whole range of circumstances that seem unimaginable from my perspective of a boy from a low-income family.
In 2005 we married. Since then we have owned and operated a small business and had two wonderful children. Over the years we have had had medical emergencies and fun and sadness. We exist most happily when we have a project to focus upon.
I played basketball until I was 40, at which point my knees and hips said, “enough”, and I was forced to give up my favourite sport.
I’ve always been interested in computing and technology. This interest persists even as I’m no longer the young whipper-snapper.
My hair is greying, my wrinkles are deepening, my belly is expanding. I am a family man who values his wife and children over and above his job, a career, or professional reputation.
I see the potential in Hannah to participate in the body politic of our nation. The country that held me close, lifted me up, and gave me the chance to build resilience in my youth and explore my potential in adulthood.
So here I sit in the foyer of middle age, full of interest for the future.
Vocus’ share performance over 3 years
