In the last few days a Tumblr called simply Sad Guys On Trading Floors has had yet another jolt in internet popularity. This snarky view of those connected to the stock market is pervasive throughout the American citizenry. Their lack of sympathy of course is not unearned. This week the dollar took a hit by being downgraded from a triple A economy (AAA) to an AA+ economy by the firm Standard’s & Poor. Interestingly this same firm once gave AAA ratings to banks and toxic assets that caused our first crash back in 2008. Now as they have denigrated the dollar they have once again launched a sell off on the stock market sure to hit middle America and the middle class at large hard.

It would seem there is a few things the markets could(but most likely will not) do to save face and maybe save some people a lot of hardship. For one thing they could hold on to stocks rather than making moves on short term fears. The only way for the economy to begin to grow and for business development to flourish again is for money to still be circulating throughout it. With the government officially on cut-back mode that leaves the private sector and Wall Street to bravely take on investing in America once again. Of course I won’t hold my breath.

Business development requires smart internet moves and yet these days there is an increase in social networking tools making an effort to undermine the work of people making empty marketing based content on social networking sites. A great example is Klout. The folks at Klout are trying to measure individual’s merits within and out side of their own social network. The site takes it’s measurements not by sheer quantity of followers but by those followers engagement with content in “likes,” retweets, and active commentary.

This does not mean your business is out of the social networking game it simply means that you have to up the ante and offer your customers content that sparks their collective interest. Links to deals are great but how can you make offering something into a conversation? Answer that question and you will be cracking the code for better brighter business news in the future.

Business blogs are buzzing about Apple’s expected launch of a music streaming service. But the big news is that the iCloud will hold all of the data you need. Web hosting, photo galleries, and data syncing are some of the benefits, and Apple has suggested that for those who switch to Lion, their most up-to-date software, the service will be free. The lack of price point and a low cost for Lion (Snow Leopard was only $29 upon its debut in 2009) may be just the thing for people to make the transition in droves.

Does it beat a new iPhone? Mmmm. Rumors are that when the new iPhone appears, likely in September, it probably won’t be much different from the 4. Sans SIM-card and an 8 megapixel camera will be the major upgrades. Lighter and thinner, likely too. So yes, the iCloud points to a new direction of cloud based computing. And that’s a lot more useful than a few extra pixels on my phone camera.

So I’ll hold off on Pandora, at least until Monday. After all, Apple does have the rights to the Beatles.

President Obama will address the nation tonight regarding American intervention in the Middle East.  Republicans have been quick to paint him as a ditherer, but Obama’s pretext is that it is better to mitigate the “reflexive suspicion” of America as world police, than to soil our hands with another Arab war. David Cameron and Nicholas Sarkozy issued a join statement urging Gadhafi loyalists to side with NATO. The protection of civilians has been the main reason for the West to join in the wartime proceedings. But the real issues are just beginning.

Libya is a relatively unimportant country in terms of global power. Egypt, Iran and Syria are perhaps the three most important. The developments in Libya matter insofar as how they affect the momentum of the uprisings. How developments in the Big Three turn out could determine the fate of the 21st century.

Nations that follow President Obama’s call for reform will likely fare better than those who don’t. Jordan’s King recently issued a decree allowing street protests, and fired his prime minister. Iran, one of the more stable of the nations, has appropriated these revolutions as counterparts to its own 1979 revolt. Oil helps countries like Saudi Arabia to boost GDP, and placate their citizens. Yet internet political parties continue to brew.

Much of the Arab League is still waiting to see what happens with Egypt. Egypt’s military coalition doesn’t have much to do besides trying to get things back to the way they were.  In the meanwhile powerful business men aren’t sure where to place their monies. The rest of the region hopes that a democratic balm can be applied to return economic peace to business. But right now, it’s too soon to tell.

The implications for business are multifarious. The notion that anyone could design whatever they need has led some to speculate about a reversal of the effects of industrialization and business to business design, which according to a Marxian teleology (progression of capitalism into socialism), isn’t so far off. Empowering the individual to create and design whatever he needs, just as he wants it cuts out the middleman, and means less money spent.

Just imagine a future Manhattan composed entirely of skyscrapers and apartments, where people can get whatever they need within a three block radius. Sounds pretty green to me.

The best part about this new technology is that it isn’t fifty years away. Right now, a 3D printer costs less than one of the original ones did in 1985. It looks like this century may be about deindustrialization.

The periodical offers a web narrator to walk the reader through articles, a constantly rotating carousel of articles and images, and an audio version of many articles. Mr. Murdoch appeared with Apple executive Eddy Cue to say that last year, this year and maybe next year belong to Apple. That’s why so far The Daily will only appear on the iPad. More tablets will have it eventually.

It’s interesting that The Daily decided to partner with Apple. You can download the first copy of it for free by visiting the iTunes link on their site. On one hand, it’s a good move – Apple is very powerful, and they consistently offer the best electronics. On the other, it seems like it’s limiting its market business share, or at least attempting to provide an elitist newspaper that you can only access on your $500 appliance. That may not be a bad thing.

The benefits of the continent accepting the Euro have been great: about 10 to 15% GDP greater trade growth than it would have been otherwise. But the cons – namely, economic inflexibility – have been also.

Wage cuts have been met with protests, but because Portugal and Spain are tied to the Euro, they can’t devalue their currency – it’s standard is immovable unless the other nations agree. This would make it much easier to recover from huge debt, because it aligns prices and wages and makes wage cuts much more manageable.

Part of the problem with the Euro is fiscal integration – British taxpayers don’t pay for Spanish Medicare. And while Europeans can travel easily throughout the Euro zone, language provides a barrier in many cases.

Now because of the real estate bubble’s bursting as well as unchecked borrowing by the peripheral European countries, deflation is imminent. The issue is that with wages falling, debt isn’t. So with smaller incomes, less money has to be spent, which further depresses the economy. Greece and Ireland were helped last year by the stronger countries (Germany), but the results probably won’t do much more to ease debt.

What will happen? Paul Krugman outlines four different plots, but it doesn’t look good in any way for business to business workings in Greece, Ireland, Portugal or Spain.

Looking for a competitive MBA program? Here is the Economist’s global top 10 and their North American top 10.

Meanwhile Facebook joined forces with Goldman Sachs’ business, which invested half a billion dollars into the social media company this week. They also have a plan to sap $1.5 billion from investors to inject into Facebook. In case Facebook ever offers an IPO, Goldman will be right there waiting to benefit. With all that added funding, Facebook can grow unrivalled and undisclosed. In the meanwhile, they will profit greatly from Goldman’s investing so hugely.

Now Facebook is worth more than Time Warner, News Corporation and Yahoo. Is it overvalued at $50 billion? Probably.

Once a company has 500 or more investors, the SEC mandates that quarterly accounts and audited financial statements be published. Thus, the fact that Goldman uses their investors monies to fuel Facebook, although they still only count as one investor, may raise eyebrows at the SEC and force it go public, much as Google did in 2004. While the law makes it clear that Goldman is one investor, it also seems that Goldman and Facebook are doing everything they can to circumvent regulation.

Watch out – if the value of Facebook doesn’t drop at all, the result will likely involve legal intervention.

Jobless claims fell to their lowest rate in two years, evidencing further optimism for the new year. John Silvia, chief economist at Wells Fargo, expect about 160,000 jobs to be added monthly in 2011 as compared to 90,000 monthly in 2010. Even so, it will take years to recover the 8.4 million jobs lost in the Great Recession. For many of the long-term unemployed, poverty is the new norm. And the real estate market, still plagued by foreclosures, is beginning to pick up after months of decline due to the expiration of April’s tax credit for home buyers.

Europe continues to ready for another disaster as her small countries, a-eireland-choo, excuse me,  continue to battle with sovereign debt. Fiscal integration is a likely move. The New York Times also predicts that the European Central Bank will begin to buy up all the government bonds it can and that it’s likely a country (Greece, maybe Portugal, too) will be swept out of the Euro Zone proper as a result of default, but will still retain the Euro as currency, much like Montenegro.

Generally, however, business managers are optimistic. Consumer confidence is up! Along with durable goods orders and personal income! So people are feeling better about having suffered for so long. That means you can expect more business to business works. In any event, the worst is over.