The Answer to our Robot Quiz

PLUS a new phrase I am proposing to quickly become an overused cliche. And I want it to!

EXTRA HELPINGS: Another BIG investment possibility

I’m pleased to report that the Substack servers didn’t crash with the rush to guess the mystery robot’s identify and name. One solitary person took an incorrect shot. Their selected answer made too much rational and practical sense.

No, this small flexible robot - invented in China who now are the clear leader in technological innovation - is designed to shoot gum directly into mouths. It is triggered by simply opening your trap which is immediately filled for your chewing pleasure.

Gummy is getting absolute raves from all over, but particularly from Reddit users. Not yet available for sale, many users are queuing to acquire this product. It will soon be an essential household robot. An inauspicious start for the “do everything around the house” Rosie.

Yes, really. Raves!

Another mystery was also solved for me. I never really understood the attraction and community of Reddit despite trying it on several occasions. This inexplicable love for a gum shooting robot seals the deal. I’ll never look at Reddit again.

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WORD SALAD - Supply chain

I don’t want a resurrection of this phrase. Instead I am proposing a new one that is much more apt for our present times.

Supply chain is fine in certain, rather narrow circumstances having to do with procurement and acquisition of materials in a business setting. During the pandemic when we experienced supply shortages, suddenly everyone was dropping “supply chain“ like they had decades of experience in major automative procurement or materiel planning departments. Lifelong stay at home grandmas were trying to explain trucking problems in Long Beach, California. Fortunately its common usage dropped away after a couple of years.

Let’s face it though these mental models of supply chain were pretty simplistic - like diagram below - nice and easy to look at, as if for 4th grade children. (Don’t studies show that is the level most adults operate at?)

So why am I bringing it up again. I believe with the tariff carny game stateside (for my American readers that is the USA) supply chain is about to be resurrected quickly as a common cliche. Let me talk you out of this and instead give you a much more apt phrase for these ferris wheel times.

Trump must have been one of these glib supply chain cliche-ists in 2021. Here is one of yesterday’s simpletonisms: “Jobs and factories will come roaring back into our country, and you see it happening already,”. His speech would have been improved if I had lent him my diagram, animated with new little factories popping up all over.

Let me return to the automotive industry which should be a simple topic given the tens of millions of pandemic supply chain experts. Each assembled car has tens of thousands of parts; many of these parts are also complex in nature being an assembly of even smaller parts. Each one of these tens of thousands of parts have very exact specifications and tolerances which often require highly specialized equipment and skills to manufacture. Vendors of each of these parts tend to be few and far between. Getting qualified takes years. They are also located all of the globe. Changing this in an instant - or even in 4 years - is a fool’s dream.

On a recent flight I sat next to a guy from a small, highly specialized machine shop in the Okanagan area of Canada. Their core business was making particularly important parts for the SpaceX rockets. It had taken 10 years and a huge investment in customized equipment, along with 2 to 3 years of advanced training for 30 ticketed machinists in order to make these critical, there-can-be-no-mistakes-in-specification rocket parts. Even the trucking from BC to Florida used highly specialized vehicles.

Trumpian view of rockets

Now presumably the Right Honourable Mr Musk is totally on board with the Trump tariffs - which will be likely also be placed on these special rocket parts from Canada - and he is going to follow orders to re-resource parts in the USA. I have a sudden interest in placing bets on Polymarket¹ on how many delayed, aborted or disastrous Space-X launches there will be in 2025.

Oops, I forgot. Emperor Elon has a tight buddy relationship with a President. I’m sure SpaceX special tariff exemptions will be quickly processed, well before his departure at the end of May

So I’m proposing that phrase to become ubiquitous instantly: Special Tariff Exemption.

Please just start dropping it into all everyday conversations as it will soon become real in an American political world where everything is for sale.

So we are back for Costa Rica visiting my son and his wife in Maryland, about 35 minutes south of the White House. Our being near Washington DC in NO way affected this week’s Word Salad. Thanks to all my readers and new subscribers. Likes, comments, messages and restacks are all gratefully received. See you on Monday. Have a happy weekend

1. a Prediction Market that takes bets on any real world events