Forget traffic cops! The traffic situation in Caracas, Venezuela is so bad that the mayor called in the heavy guns: traffic mimes.
You read that right:
A sort of silent shame has cropped up in South American cities, as officials plead with both drivers and pedestrians to obey traffic laws by using the antics of hired mimes.
And why not? Nearly everyone looks at a mime, especially when dressed in a brightly colored getup while eagerly making fun of people on the side of a busy street. The latest effort has about 120 mimes on the downtown streets of Venezuela's capital, Caracas, making a (silent) scene any time a driver or pedestrian disobeys a traffic rule.
Link (Photo: Ariana Cubillos)
Comments (5)
The betamax died out in the mid 80's do to the same reasons MiniDisc, and 7" audio disks died. Sony kept the tech proprietary. The tapes, discs, whatever material had to be bought along with the machines, from Sony ALONE. At Sony's prices. Which are, even today, still at the top of the bar for consumer electronics. The VHS was licensed freely and had very strong competition driving down costs on both the machines and consumables along with raising competition for features on the machines. But Sony tech stagnated and did not continue to keep up with feature upgrades since they were not making the sales.
This simply a case of keeping too tight a hold and not having a strong enough brand to carry the price tag. Apple runs this risk as well. And, as competition increases giving other devices and OSes equal footing, Apple continues to loose market share. JUST LIKE Sony. It's simply a case of market econ.