The New Normal

I was going to link but oddly the Dallas paper cannot find its own article under the search for 

Home Funerals, but of course can display ads for patio furniture, oh well, 

Families are now using simply constructed wooden caskets at low cost to bury their relatives. 

Seems the $6,000 funeral is coming under serious scrutiny. 

My Dad has the opinion that all caskets should be rented. Once everyone leaves the cemetery, the body drops into the grave and the casket goes back to the funeral home to be rented again, looks like Dad was ahead of his time. My wife reports reading of caskets made of banana leaves, the idea being that we recycle everything. 

Meanwhile SW Airline stock is in the doldrums, no wonder. An article relates that Cisco

is embracing its own video conferencing systems. I posted an article some months back that

Alexander Grant was using video conferencing, to the delight of its employees. Now the gosh awful trip to the airport can be avoided. Capitalism is amazing, what hath the shoe bomber wrought?  I did not like going to the airport before the shoe bomber, I certainly do not like it now. 

Has anyone used Skype?  wow, use the web cam on your lap top to go there, much better. I will be investigating gotomeeting.com for our school.

bottom line, expect a decrease in travel as video conferencing becomes the literal extension of

reach out and touch someone. 

Comments

[LeAnna M Nesbitt]

The new normal regarding funeral expense does seem to be a trend because of the economic conditions. People are looking at cost to bury their family members. Wooden caskets were normally used in the past and then caskets are at almost out of control cost in the present. A 360 cycle has developed which we are ending up in the 1900 procedures again.

While the airline industry was experiencing crude oil hitting record high and gasoline was retail price of $4.00 a gallon everyone was thinking mass transportation was going to be the escape mechanism. The airlines experienced a short bubble of increase percent until prices of crude oil and gasoline crashed during the past 6 months. Meanwhile as if the conversion back to individual automobile methods seems like the airports and airlines are making a bad case even worse by causing fustration at the check in counters with security and now operate during the economic adversity..

[Dennis Elam]

With video conferencing there is no waiting line and one is not wanded or shoeless.

[Rob Earle]

In regards to the outrageous costs of funerals, I feel that it was simply a matter of time before people began to find alternatives. While I do believe that the economy may have expedited the process, eventually people were going to wise up. Personally, I hate the idea of making my family buy an expensive box they’re going to turn around and burry six feet in the ground. Regardless of the amount of money I make, practicality would still reign over this decision. Why don’t they spend the money on a vacation to scatter my ashes? On that note, most cremations still require the family of the deceased to purchase a coffin. Wow… I hope that I’m buried face down in a class topped coffin so the funeral industry can kiss it.

____________________________________________________________________

Video conferencing tools such as Skype and Cisco are extremely useful tools in the modern business environment, but being the social person I am, I often need to speak to people in person to truly convey a message. While tools such as these may significantly reduce the amount of travel, it can in no way eliminate it completely. Additionally, in many cultures, a face-to-face physical presence is needed to gain trust, express competence, and conduct business in general. I wonder how (and how long) it will take providers to overcome these barriers, as well as how much profit these providers will make when it happens.

[Dennis Elam]

Cisco used the last season of 24 to demonstrate some of their products, the conversation that powers booth as president ad with a president of an african country was most impressive, the large as life screen made each seem as though they were in the room
I will be going to chicago in Sept, and yes I want the face to face, after that, hello Cisco...

[Tammy Salinas]

Call me old fashioned but I prefer the face-to-face interaction over video or plain telephone conference. Body language can not be seen with telephone conferences unless there is video. And what if there is a malfunction with the video feed? Then What? WHO knows the way technology is moving, maybe we will one day get to the Star Wars movie, of having a replica illusion be in front of your eyes...yikes.