Replicants, Ballots, and Widgets

Random clippings from the Web

Companies usually develop leaders who replicate rather than innovate."
--Jeffrey Cohn et al., in the Harvard Business Review (found here)

Run-up in ballot challenges clouds Coleman-Franken recount - With 3,000-plus votes disputed, it's hard to know who is really gaining.

Found here

Twitter coolness, Geezer biz lameness or Social Media Abuse? Twitter and Pizza Widgets as discussed in Fast Company:

On the plus side, Twitter doesn't cost these facile marketers anything.
Widgets -- you know, the kind of applications good for cluttering up a Facebook
page -- can get expensive. The six most-dreaded words in corporate America in
2008 have been "After we release our Facebook app... ." Yes, once these
beautiful butterflies are released into the world, pots of gold and unicorns for
all! Building a widget can cost a company between a few thousand dollars (for
something simple like a countdown clock) to $100,000 or more (for, say, an
elaborate game).

For that kind of investment, the apps should both reinforce a company's
brand and ideally convert usage into sales. Hard to get a return on investment,
though, with 34 active users. That's how many Facebookers have added Papa John's
Order Online Widget. The widget lets customers "place their order up to 21 days
in advance of their preferred delivery or pickup date and time." Remember that
time you got a pizza craving for two weeks from next Tuesday at 7 p.m. and
couldn't act on it?