On business dealings and moral principles...

It's not too often to see corporates to stand up (or show some backbone) when it comes to business (ie. money/market). So it comes as pleasant surprises to see more than one such incidences in the span of a month.

Such was the spat between Conan O'Brien and Jay Leno for the NBC's "The Tonight Show" and the time slots that they're in.

Such was also the cyber-attack on Google users (human rights activists, journalists, etc) in China, allegedly by the Chinese government, with Google threatening to stop filtering its search results, and even pulling out of the China market altogether.

Not that I have much care about Conan O'Brien or Jay Leno. Afterall, I don't watch TV, and I don't find O'Brien that funny anyways, judging from the various clips of his shows on YouTube. But his refusal to stand down from the NBC management in elbowing him off of the promised time slot, thereby giving it back to Jay Leno, is indeed admirable. That's probably the main reason why most people stand behind O'Brien in this episode. To say the least, the low ratings from O'Brien's and Leno's new shows show them both to be failures in their new time slots. It goes to show, too, that NBC management is tactless and clueless. Have them even done market research to see how audience might perceive O'Brien and Leno might do in the new slots? We were never told (which probably means there wasn't any done). No matter, it now all boils down to how O'Brien is treated, and badly indeed.

The same is true with Google. Afterall, Google hasn't gained much traction in the Chinese market, and its miniscule impact on the bottomline after years of attempts reinforces it to be a failure, given the all-almighty Google. No matter, it now boils down to the fact that it's standing up against the even bigger threat of a communist Chinese government, and suddenly it's standing by its "Do No Evil" motto. Where was this motto when Google decided to enter the China market, and filtered search results to please the government, we were not told. Google suddenly became victorious as the "small guy" against the Chinese government, much like O'Brien against NBC (and Leno).

Sure, all these gave them (Google and O'Brien) a more than graceful exit from some disastrous foray. Afterall, O'Brien is going to get $40 million to kiss NBC goodbye - not bad for kicking and screaming when you're kicked off of the stage, metaphorically.

Still, it requires certain backbone on the part of Google and O'Brien to throw those spats publicly. Afterall, nobody thinks it's a good idea for Google to exit such an important market of China with growth far exceeding US and the western countries. It's certainly not a good long-term strategy. If they brown-nose long enough, maybe the communist government might even fall on its knee like USSR did.