Skip to content
By using Twitter’s services you agree to our Cookies Use. We and our partners operate globally and use cookies, including for analytics, personalisation, and ads.

This is the legacy version of twitter.com. We will be shutting it down on June 1, 2020. Please switch to a supported browser, or disable the extension which masks your browser. You can see a list of supported browsers in our Help Center.

  • Home Home Home, current page.
  • About

Saved searches

  • Remove
  • In this conversation
    Verified accountProtected Tweets @
Suggested users
  • Verified accountProtected Tweets @
  • Verified accountProtected Tweets @
  • Language: English
    • Bahasa Indonesia
    • Bahasa Melayu
    • Català
    • Čeština
    • Dansk
    • Deutsch
    • English UK
    • Español
    • Filipino
    • Français
    • Hrvatski
    • Italiano
    • Magyar
    • Nederlands
    • Norsk
    • Polski
    • Português
    • Română
    • Slovenčina
    • Suomi
    • Svenska
    • Tiếng Việt
    • Türkçe
    • Ελληνικά
    • Български език
    • Русский
    • Српски
    • Українська мова
    • עִבְרִית
    • العربية
    • فارسی
    • मराठी
    • हिन्दी
    • বাংলা
    • ગુજરાતી
    • தமிழ்
    • ಕನ್ನಡ
    • ภาษาไทย
    • 한국어
    • 日本語
    • 简体中文
    • 繁體中文
  • Have an account? Log in
    Have an account?
    · Forgot password?

    New to Twitter?
    Sign up
vgr's profile
Venkatesh Rao
Venkatesh Rao
Venkatesh Rao
@vgr

Tweets

Venkatesh Rao

@vgr

This is my conversational account. For my work follow @ribbonfarm, @breaking_smart, @artofgig. Tweets are 90% vacuous views, apathetically held. Mediocritopian.

Los Angeles, CA
venkateshrao.com
Joined August 2007

Tweets

  • © 2020 Twitter
  • About
  • Help Center
  • Terms
  • Privacy policy
  • Imprint
  • Cookies
  • Ads info
Dismiss
Previous
Next

Go to a person's profile

Saved searches

  • Remove
  • In this conversation
    Verified accountProtected Tweets @
Suggested users
  • Verified accountProtected Tweets @
  • Verified accountProtected Tweets @

Promote this Tweet

Block

  • Tweet with a location

    You can add location information to your Tweets, such as your city or precise location, from the web and via third-party applications. You always have the option to delete your Tweet location history. Learn more

    Your lists

    Create a new list


    Under 100 characters, optional

    Privacy

    Copy link to Tweet

    Embed this Tweet

    Embed this Video

    Add this Tweet to your website by copying the code below. Learn more

    Add this video to your website by copying the code below. Learn more

    Hmm, there was a problem reaching the server.

    By embedding Twitter content in your website or app, you are agreeing to the Twitter Developer Agreement and Developer Policy.

    Preview

    Why you're seeing this ad

    Log in to Twitter

    · Forgot password?
    Don't have an account? Sign up »

    Sign up for Twitter

    Not on Twitter? Sign up, tune into the things you care about, and get updates as they happen.

    Sign up
    Have an account? Log in »

    Two-way (sending and receiving) short codes:

    Country Code For customers of
    United States 40404 (any)
    Canada 21212 (any)
    United Kingdom 86444 Vodafone, Orange, 3, O2
    Brazil 40404 Nextel, TIM
    Haiti 40404 Digicel, Voila
    Ireland 51210 Vodafone, O2
    India 53000 Bharti Airtel, Videocon, Reliance
    Indonesia 89887 AXIS, 3, Telkomsel, Indosat, XL Axiata
    Italy 4880804 Wind
    3424486444 Vodafone
    » See SMS short codes for other countries

    Confirmation

     

    Welcome home!

    This timeline is where you’ll spend most of your time, getting instant updates about what matters to you.

    Tweets not working for you?

    Hover over the profile pic and click the Following button to unfollow any account.

    Say a lot with a little

    When you see a Tweet you love, tap the heart — it lets the person who wrote it know you shared the love.

    Spread the word

    The fastest way to share someone else’s Tweet with your followers is with a Retweet. Tap the icon to send it instantly.

    Join the conversation

    Add your thoughts about any Tweet with a Reply. Find a topic you’re passionate about, and jump right in.

    Learn the latest

    Get instant insight into what people are talking about now.

    Get more of what you love

    Follow more accounts to get instant updates about topics you care about.

    Find what's happening

    See the latest conversations about any topic instantly.

    Never miss a Moment

    Catch up instantly on the best stories happening as they unfold.

    1. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Apr 5
      • Report Tweet
      • Report NetzDG Violation

      1940: Roosevelt asks for 700 million in army appropriations, up from... 24 million. This, coming just 7 years after dumping the gold standard must have been a huge shock. How much is that in 2020 dollars?

      1 reply 1 retweet 9 likes
      Show this thread
    2. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Apr 5
      • Report Tweet
      • Report NetzDG Violation

      About 15.6B inflation adjusted. Drop in bucket compared to CARES act. But then, shit was low-tech and cheap in absolute terms then.

      1 reply 0 retweets 7 likes
      Show this thread
    3. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Apr 5
      • Report Tweet
      • Report NetzDG Violation

      “...on policy matters FDR was a procrastinator. He preferred to put off decisions — or at least to keep news about them from going public.” Hmm. The anti-Trump, who declares mission accomplished before it starts.

      1 reply 0 retweets 9 likes
      Show this thread
    4. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Apr 5
      • Report Tweet
      • Report NetzDG Violation

      Bernard Baruch, organizer of WW1 War Industries Board (and target of Nye committee) declines to do an encore for WW2. Don’t blame him.

      1 reply 0 retweets 6 likes
      Show this thread
    5. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Apr 5
      • Report Tweet
      • Report NetzDG Violation

      Apparently WIB didn’t manage to pull its act together in time for WW1 despite (because?) of strong economy. Baruch nominates Knudsen, who enters stage left.

      1 reply 0 retweets 4 likes
      Show this thread
    6. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Apr 5
      • Report Tweet
      • Report NetzDG Violation

      Hitlers response to FDR plan of 50k planes/year: “What is America but beauty queens, millionaires, stupid records, and Hollywood” Oh shit Hitler had 2016-America viewing palantir

      1 reply 2 retweets 27 likes
      Show this thread
    7. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Apr 6
      • Report Tweet
      • Report NetzDG Violation

      Knudsen starts off as an immigrant doing riveting work on the tough New York waterfronts and learning boxing. This is already cartoon grade. Marlon Brando plus Rocky.

      1 reply 0 retweets 8 likes
      Show this thread
    8. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Apr 6
      • Report Tweet
      • Report NetzDG Violation

      Montage of early industry career and now Knudsen is systematizing Ford’s assembly lines by 1916. The real Taylorism is Knudsenism it seems.

      2 replies 0 retweets 6 likes
      Show this thread
    9. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Apr 6
      • Report Tweet
      • Report NetzDG Violation

      Knudsen leaving Ford after high-level head-butting with Henry Ford, and going to Sloan at GM reads a bit like Wolverine leaving Magneto for Prof. X.

      1 reply 0 retweets 11 likes
      Show this thread
    10. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Apr 6
      • Report Tweet
      • Report NetzDG Violation

      GM is more interesting as an early business case study than Ford, even though Ford steals the technology honors. The invention of the federated conglomerate was a bigger deal than the assembly line.

      1 reply 1 retweet 15 likes
      Show this thread
      Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Apr 6
      • Report Tweet
      • Report NetzDG Violation

      “Speed produces nothing in manufacturing,” Knudsen likes to say — which was one reason he eschewed the complicated time-and-motion studies of production gurus like William Taylor. “Accuracy is the only straight line to great production.” I LIKE THIS GUY

      5:17 PM - 6 Apr 2020
      • 3 Retweets
      • 50 Likes
      • mental blanking interval Nikete Zed Burnett Nathan Sorenson Alec Resnick ContrarianPragmatist It Arises N.S. 🧪 stupid twitt account
      1 reply 3 retweets 50 likes
        1. New conversation
        2. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Apr 6
          • Report Tweet
          • Report NetzDG Violation

          He’s basically discovered “slow is smooth, smooth is fast” thinking in 1922. True flow thinking including lean vs fat tradeoff. Unlike charlatan F. W. Taylor. There’s an element of Elon Musk first principles thinking to Knudsenism.

          2 replies 2 retweets 29 likes
          Show this thread
        3. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Apr 6
          • Report Tweet
          • Report NetzDG Violation

          Knudsen set a “one to one” goal of matching Model T sales and got from 18:1 to 2:1 in a few years. He also invented model year system of annual updates. Damn.

          1 reply 0 retweets 9 likes
          Show this thread
        4. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Apr 11
          • Report Tweet
          • Report NetzDG Violation

          Aside: this was clearly the OG example of the Mac vs PC pattern. Dunno why I didn’t see it before. Probably because this is the first time I’ve read about the Chevrolet story.

          1 reply 0 retweets 10 likes
          Show this thread
        5. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Apr 11
          • Report Tweet
          • Report NetzDG Violation

          Kaiser was a dropout hustler who led with sales looks like. Makes his start in photography in upstate NY, then heads west to grow a hardware business, then lands in highway construction. So a hacker-hustler pair saved the US in WW2.

          1 reply 0 retweets 7 likes
          Show this thread
        6. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Apr 11
          • Report Tweet
          • Report NetzDG Violation

          Kaiser builds thriving road construction business in BC but WW1 makes the name Kaiser acliability do he he adds back to US and grows big there.

          2 replies 0 retweets 6 likes
          Show this thread
        7. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Apr 11
          • Report Tweet
          • Report NetzDG Violation

          Kaiser building thousands of miles of roads in the west. Early adopter of innovations. Steve Ballmer type seems like. Hard driving and hard working but subtler than Ballmer... not a bull type. Seems like he elevated roadwork from mostly manual labor to mostly machine.

          1 reply 0 retweets 4 likes
          Show this thread
        8. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Apr 12
          • Report Tweet
          • Report NetzDG Violation

          Now we have Kaiser orchestrating the Six Companies to build Hoover Dam. He spent most of the time in DC managing the political bosses.

          1 reply 0 retweets 8 likes
          Show this thread
        9. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Apr 12
          • Report Tweet
          • Report NetzDG Violation

          Huh, Kaiser apparently pioneered the internal competition model with Grand Coulee dam, which he later used in WW2 work. I guess that’s where the X/Y flyoff model originated perhaps?

          1 reply 0 retweets 6 likes
          Show this thread
        10. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Apr 18
          • Report Tweet
          • Report NetzDG Violation

          Okay. Chapter on 1939-40 world fairs as transition, and we’re finally into WW2. Knudsen meets FDR.

          1 reply 0 retweets 3 likes
          Show this thread
        11. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Apr 18
          • Report Tweet
          • Report NetzDG Violation

          Interior secretary Harold Ickes skeptical of Knudsen; “I have heard that Knudsen even makes his own notes in handwriting” (presumably as opposed to a secretary transcribing shorthand into typewritten notes) Moron. If you aren’t taking your own notes you’re not thinking.

          1 reply 0 retweets 12 likes
          Show this thread
        12. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Apr 18
          • Report Tweet
          • Report NetzDG Violation

          Knudsen pulls together a sort of fellowship of the ring from across industry. They have to figure out what the military needs and tell them, because the military if 1940 doesn’t know.

          1 reply 0 retweets 6 likes
          Show this thread
        13. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Apr 24
          • Report Tweet
          • Report NetzDG Violation

          Finally into the war production story proper. We’re talking tanks, airplanes, engines. Building for US, British, and French needs all at once, 1939-41. Just a vast amount of action getting underway.

          1 reply 0 retweets 5 likes
          Show this thread
        14. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Apr 24
          • Report Tweet
          • Report NetzDG Violation

          Lessons and anecdotes at every level from rivets vs welding through contract laws to amortization regulations, to foreign policy. “Reality has a surprising amount of detail” is a good side read here. This is that times a million. http://johnsalvatier.org/blog/2017/reality-has-a-surprising-amount-of-detail …

          2 replies 1 retweet 10 likes
          Show this thread
        15. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Apr 24
          • Report Tweet
          • Report NetzDG Violation

          Nice anecdote: a banker who has to transfer top secret Merlin engine plans meets the battleship bringing them from the UK with an empty suitcase. The captain laughs: the plans occupy a whole railroad-car sized crate of paper (would be a container today... or a largish USB stick)

          4 replies 1 retweet 11 likes
          Show this thread
        16. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Apr 24
          • Report Tweet
          • Report NetzDG Violation

          I’m honestly kinda excited for the post-covid rebuilding.

          1 reply 0 retweets 13 likes
          Show this thread
        17. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr May 3
          • Report Tweet
          • Report NetzDG Violation

          Spark plug and steering gear auto subsidiary companies commandeered into making machine guns. We’re still on Knudsen. Kaiser is trying to get in on the action but Knudsen doesn’t trust him. Yet.

          1 reply 0 retweets 3 likes
          Show this thread
        18. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr May 3
          • Report Tweet
          • Report NetzDG Violation

          The auto industry had 1050 factories and $3B in facilities and largest pool of engineering talent. Like Silicon Valley today. Except luckily SV capability is a better match for Covid response.

          1 reply 0 retweets 4 likes
          Show this thread
        19. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr May 3
          • Report Tweet
          • Report NetzDG Violation

          “It was also an industry of associations” 850 companies, 1/20 of workforce,... saw this while at grad school at UM. Auto industry is ridiculously full of industry orgs associations densely knitting it together. SV is much looser.

          1 reply 0 retweets 2 likes
          Show this thread
        20. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr May 3
          • Report Tweet
          • Report NetzDG Violation

          “What Knudsen saw in the defense buildup was more than just rearmament... he saw a way to revitalize American business and industry”

          1 reply 0 retweets 5 likes
          Show this thread
        21. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr May 3
          • Report Tweet
          • Report NetzDG Violation

          “The arsenal of democracy” has a nice ring to it. Need something similar to capture strengths for pandemic. China may have started it and democracies may have suffered way more casualties but I suspect long term liberal democracies will win the war against covid better.

          1 reply 0 retweets 7 likes
          Show this thread
        22. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr May 3
          • Report Tweet
          • Report NetzDG Violation

          Vignette about unions opposing Knudsen and proposing alt Reuther plan by UAW chief Walter Reuther. Book is clearly anti-union but Reuther’s plan does look like stupid wrong-problem (fighters overran bombers) vaporware objectively speaking, from engineering and other lenses.

          1 reply 0 retweets 2 likes
          Show this thread
        23. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr May 3
          • Report Tweet
          • Report NetzDG Violation

          Why FDR resisted urge to appoint war czar and take over all econon: “A victory small enough to be organized is too small to be decisive” — Eliot Janeway (who? an economist who influenced FDR it seems) https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eliot_Janeway …

          1 reply 3 retweets 12 likes
          Show this thread
        24. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr May 3
          • Report Tweet
          • Report NetzDG Violation

          Alright Kaiser back in the story to build merchant freighters for British because America’s biggest shipyards were at capacity for navy orders.

          1 reply 0 retweets 5 likes
          Show this thread
        25. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr May 10
          • Report Tweet
          • Report NetzDG Violation

          Knudsen gets full authoritah over Office of Production Management (OPM) but FDR sez he has to share authoritah with a labor leader. Guy named Hillman.

          1 reply 0 retweets 3 likes
          Show this thread
        26. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr May 10
          • Report Tweet
          • Report NetzDG Violation

          Now we have Kaiser going brrr. Gets shipyard location swamp drained in 3 weeks instead of 6 months that people expect. Richmond shipyards. So that’s the story behind that huh. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richmond_Shipyards …

          1 reply 0 retweets 7 likes
          Show this thread
        27. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr May 10
          • Report Tweet
          • Report NetzDG Violation

          Apparently Kaiser revolutionized shipbuilding by treating it like a construction industry rather than a steel industry.

          1 reply 0 retweets 10 likes
          Show this thread
        28. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr May 11
          • Report Tweet
          • Report NetzDG Violation

          Ship building go brr. Knudsens people are now making a huge Soviet style central production planning and demand forecasting ledger.

          1 reply 0 retweets 3 likes
          Show this thread
        29. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr May 11
          • Report Tweet
          • Report NetzDG Violation

          Guy named Stacy May did a massive project to compile the ledger but is now forgotten. Not even a Wikipedia page smh

          1 reply 0 retweets 3 likes
          Show this thread
        30. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr May 11
          • Report Tweet
          • Report NetzDG Violation

          The production priority lists of “strategic”, “critical” and “essential” had to be repeatedly redone to balance regular and military economy needs.

          1 reply 0 retweets 3 likes
          Show this thread
        31. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr May 16
          • Report Tweet
          • Report NetzDG Violation

          Everybody cool in 1940s USA had quoted nicknames. “Babe” Meigs, “Powder” Johnson. Still at 34% on this book. Slow going since I’m dividing limited reading time between 2 books rn,

          1 reply 1 retweet 5 likes
          Show this thread
        32. 15 more replies

      Loading seems to be taking a while.

      Twitter may be over capacity or experiencing a momentary hiccup. Try again or visit Twitter Status for more information.

        Promoted Tweet

        false

        • © 2020 Twitter
        • About
        • Help Center
        • Terms
        • Privacy policy
        • Imprint
        • Cookies
        • Ads info