Cards on the table

Pinned to a corkboard in our editorial office is a press release, which was transmitted by a successor of the machine originally invented by Alexander Bain in the 1840s. It is there to remind us of how things used to be, when we had no internet – and there were only a few very basic websites around anyway. This is what things were like when I was starting my adventure with journalism. The editorial office of one journal employed interns to regularly cover the new online businesses. As time went by I noticed they were being treated more and more seriously, and the one column per issue changed into a whole page – and that eventually even turned into a few pages. It was all going so well until, well, it... died. 2001 turned out to be the end of this odyssey, as the dot.com bubble burst. Someone recently told me that City of London investors are happy about the Brexit because the UK real estate bubble was getting too big anyway. The first few consequences of it, in the form of significant stock exchange shocks, are already behind us. What next? We can only wait a few days, weeks and months... time will tell, as it always does. Coming back to the aftermath of the internet frenzy – not only did it rise like a phoenix, but it is now going from strength to strength. More traditional companies that base their businesses around the ‘actual reality’ are now in a full-on war with their virtual rivals. The eventual outcome could turn out badly for shopping centre developers; but as long as they also build offices, they can actually benefit from the situation because, after all, every thriving business – even if it operates online – needs a physical office. Another change that has taken place in these dynamic times is that there is a new person at the helm of Echo Investment. After the company changed hands it was time for a new captain, who we interviewed about Echo’s future in the article entitled ‘Echo from the top’. It will be interesting to see if the wide-ranging changes that have been announced are as profound as they have been made out to be – and who will be asking first (Echo’s shareholders, business partners or other investors): Well, gentlemen, the cards are on the table. Let’s see what you have.