Photo credit: Laurie Jackson “Capture This Photography.”

It’s been a long hot summer, and isn’t it just so right that it’s cooling off before it’s time? In fact, it’s almost downright cold for this time of year. Summer’s last blast is turning out to be one huge dampening effect on our expectations, like a chill wind settling on the bones.

So what we don’t need are some (more) misguided good intentions. We all know where that road leads to….besides to trillions of dollars of debt for what appears to be no return.

I hear, and I’ve been fairly upfront and personal with the situation myself, funding for new ventures is still very hard to come by, regardless of what the SBA is saying they are willing to do (now you know, sort of, what my summer has been like). The banks are getting richer….having been bailed out by the taxpayer, but that doesn’t seem to have inspired any redemption on their part. No, no…instead they are just hanging onto their dollars even harder and finding new ways to bite the hands that feed them.

VC’s continue to look for the next holy grail of technology to save them. Another Google? Oh, that would be Bing. Just what we needed….another search engine (as the above image indicates, we all think bing just searches Google and comes back to us with their results; whatev). Why not another Iphone then? Oh, got it, a few of them, like we needed that. Technology, that saviour of the empire, causes me more indigestion than a Southwestern burrito from Taco Bell. You still need customer service to manage all of this redikulous technology, and that my friends, got laid off en masse this summer. In fact, I think that guy to the right of the Bing Google image is what is left of customer service.

And I would expect angel investors see more return on an investment coming to them through the recently but recovering crashed stock market….and I would expect, yep, they’re probably right, at least immediately. I’m not sure if it will assuage their conscience any though; just, well, they may suffer less indigestion eating that burrito than I do, for the moment anyway.

My advice? Well, you can take it for what it’s worth (and that would be free) but I’d say we need to start investing in manufacturing again in this country….and coming up with ways to make that more efficient and earth friendly. Seems like a golden opportunity to me. Investing in the country’s future and the future of the planet…both at the same time…that’s a novel thought! Wish I’d thought of it. Oh wait! I have.

If being Green is the new black, then why are we all still so yellow?

(on a side note, that Laurie Jackson, top photo, is one heck of a photographer)

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image New York Magazine

Like Lt. Colonel Custer fatally leading his army of men in the Battle of Little Bighorn, Fashion is battling it out to the end in an attempt to save the day (in fashion speak that means maintaining its current heirarchy of power players, including luxury retailers and their executives: see documentary The September Issue, and all about Fashion’s Night Out on September 10th, 2009 during Fashion Week in New York).

Who is Fashion’s Custer?

Looks like Anna Wintour (above image right sitting next to tennis great, Roger Federer), American Vogue’s Editor and highly esteemed fashion power player: mmmm, but that’s so yesterday. We all know we are in an age of ice melt.

PSA for Fashions Night Out.

History has it that Custer’s assumptions re his charge onto the battlefield were based on inaccurate information from the field (see Wikipedia). Wowser, you think?.

So, who might tomorrow’s leader of the fashion industry be….dare I say it…..could it be???

Yes, that gorgeous creature, Heidi Klum. Supermodel, TV producer and star of emmy nominated “Project Runway,” Heidi knows her fashion. But it’s not just that, she’s loved by all and represents a new generation as well as a new method of fashion speak. She’s married to the one and only “Seal” and she’s a mother of five.

Who in the fashion world would not want to know how Heidi Klum would steer the next generation’s fashion ship? With Tim Gunn as her wingman, or in keeping with the ship’s metaphor, the ships mate, the voyage would no doubt be interesting.

Am I wrong or what?

The biggest issue with print media is that it doesn’t know how to align itself with new media and still be what it is, whatever that is. In this case it’s fashion. And the fashion industry is struggling to keep itself relevant with it’s consumer. For decades, Anna Wintour has led that march by managing the shark infested waters of the industry as being an all powerful editor in chief of American Vogue. And she’s been incredibly good at it.

But as we know, all the kings horses and all the kings men couldn’t put humpty back together again. With the industry’s numbers, especially at the higher end, being as dismal as they are and have been, and confusion, to say the least, reigning, especially on Seventh Avenue….like “Oh, where did the fashion industry go?…” (China, anyone?)

To think they may fix it with a global Fashion Night Out and a documentary about the Devil Wears Prada American Vogue editor Anna Wintour …I don’t think so. That’s just akin to sticking one’s finger in the dike–am I the only one that sees that? The deal with Project Runway is that it’s already included us, for several year’s now…so for the fashion elite to all of a sudden declare themselves at one with their market is, shall we say, a little after the fact?

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