Once again, Time Magazine picks the peak If Time Magazine features something on its front cover, you know that "something" has jumped the shark. I'll never forget the breathless article about the new generation of internet entrepreneurs - the cover featured a guy whose genius idea was an online dating concierge service for nerds, and had attracted huge amounts of venture capital. That was back in 2000 (I think) and looking at that cover I knew instinctively that the internet bubble was close to collapsing - too much money being thrown at bad ideas, and the clueless editors of Time Magazine had fallen for it.

So earlier this year, on the cover of Time Magazine, they featured the headline "NYLONKONG: A Tale of Three Cities". See what they did there? New York, London, Hong Kong. The article goes on to describe the three cities as:

Yet these are places that know how to meet a challenge. They've done it before. From being dismissed as long past their prime a quarter of a century ago, New York, London and Hong Kong have gone on to extraordinary heights. Tying themselves together, they have also knitted the world into a seamless fabric, financing and transporting the container vessels and the streams of data that have made today's global economy a phenomenon that has increased the life chances of countless millions. Welcome to Nylonkong, and the world it made.

Contrast and compare with this quote from today's Wall Street Journal:

The financial crisis is hitting many drivers of London's growth as a global financial capital in recent years. London's economy appears to be changing in fundamental ways, and, with it, the psyche of the City.

And in The Standard

Thousands of workers gathered outside a shuttered toy maker in Dongguan, southern China, demanding unpaid wages as factories in the region, hit by falling demand and now the global crisis, struggle to survive. Manufacturers in the once-booming Guangdong province have suffered over the past year and a half from tight curbs on loans, rising labor costs and China's stronger currency, which makes their products more expensive.

And of course New York is the home of Wall Street, where all this mess started anyway.

So the lesson is this - if you, or your industry, or your country, or your culture, are featured on the cover of Time Magazine, your time is over.  ¶ 10:21 AM