-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 Tim wrote:
This is "the reputation of a reputation."
As soon as people tumble to the fact that "Tom Clancy" has sold his nym/reputation to some hack writer, that is, let them put his name on their words, then the reputation of "Tom Clancy" falls.
Nothing new here. "Fisher" was a respected (high reputation) name in stereo equipment. (I don't like the term "reputation," due to issues I've discussed here, but I'm using it in the commonly understood sense.)
The name Fisher was bought by a Taiwan maker of equipment, and one can now see "Fisher" on boxes at Costco and Best Buy.
Draw your own conclusions. My own sense is that no one is fooled: those young enough not to know what "Fisher" once was don't care. Those old enough to know aren't fooled. I expect the brand name Fisher sold for very little money, reflecting all of these issues.
Great points, but consider the example "Harvard University." People are willing to pay a premium to be associated with it regardless of the academic worth of the individual programs in the eyes of specialists. A lot of students are after the cachet and couldn't care less about the curriculum. But then, I'm sure it's a mistake to assume education for it's own sake has the slightest thing to do with why the majority of people bother going to college at all. Ridiculous how so many employers put such stock in a word on a piece of paper too--pure credentialism. How ironic when you contrast that with the fact that the great Herman Kahn didn't have a PhD. I wonder where he'd end up today. Someone once remarked that the most unimaginitive, laziest Harvard graduate students at the bottom of their class tend to end up at the IMF and UN. Sort of sinkholes of mediocrity. Oh well! ~Faustine. *** The right to be let alone is indeed the beginning of all freedoms. - --William O. Douglas, Associate Justice, US Supreme Court -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: PGPsdk version 1.7.1 (C) 1997-1999 Network Associates, Inc. and its affiliated companies. (Diffie-Helman/DSS-only version) iQA/AwUBPAvjEfg5Tuca7bfvEQLJAwCeLOsOt6pEuBELu+p8zN7boPrf9z4AoJeA BVIpjCrxsgAZdMQ9ujYld9NL =1lef -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----