Cornwall in March

Cornwall, the county in the West. A holiday destination for millions, drawn along the A39 by the promise of sun, sand, surf and sea-themed adventures. In the summer Cornwall is a riot of life and activity. The beaches, roads, pubs and hotels are thronged with happy visitors, all looking for a little light entertainment, outdoor exercise and stress-free downtime.

But what if you travel out of season? What if, in order to take advantage of your remaining holiday allowance and some cheap deals on cottage rental, you visit out of season, in March, for example? What, in this summer holiday specialist, do you find to do in winter?

Firstly, it's safe to say that Cornwall in March isn't as lively as Cornwall in, say, late May. In fact, you would have to work hard to find a holiday hotspot that was quieter than Cornwall at this time of year and that is the first good thing about visiting the county in March; no queues, no traffic jams, no waiting. Of course, it also means fewer shops, no beach activities and quiet, laid back atmosphere; whether or not this suits you depends almost entirely on how much shopping you want to do.

There are a few things you might consider doing:

• Cream Tea - Cornish scones with jam and clotted cream and served with a good pot of team are one of life's little luxuries. Whether you have scone-jam-cream or scone-cream-jam matters little (although one is obviously incorrect) as long as you get a good one; our favourite is place for cream teas is The Dwelling House in Fowey. Fresh (still warm) fruit and plain scones, great jam and large quantities of clotted cream, all backed up by a good selection of teas.
• Quiet Time - head for the Bedruthan Hotel and Spa for a £30 lunch and spa access deal. You'll find good food, friendly staff and a spa with views across the bay to the sea.
• Padstow - head to Padstow for art galleries and good food (much of it from the restaurants and cafes of Rick Stein). You can walk the beach if the weather holds or shop for paintings, sculptures and other holiday mementos if it doesn't.
• Penzance and St Austell - some towns are best saved for the summer when they are busy and the sun is shining. Avoid in winter.
• Eden Project - probably the easiest, if most expensive, way to see plants while avoiding the sleet. Definitely worth a visit if you like looking at trees in a hot, sticky environment.
• Walks - if you are lucky and the weather treats you to a day of dry sunshine, head for the cliffs or moors for a walk around Cornwall's rugged landscape. Fowey to Polkerris to Gribbin Head to Fowey is a decent walk, especially if you grab a cream tea at the end.

Overall, Cornwall in March can be great if you dodge the weather (or dress for Arctic conditions). Same again next year?

Religious Business

Religion is, in many respects, the ultimate example of capitalist business. By stripping back the business of religion and comparing its products and methods with other modern companies we can learn much of how churches and their related industries have survived, and flourished, for so long.

The long-term survival of new companies is not guaranteed and most fail within a few years. Even one-time market leaders like Nokia, Marconi or Rover can be rapidly reduced or destroyed by new market entrants, changes in the law or emerging technology. The churches, and in this case I am thinking of the Catholic Church and the Church of England, are amongst the oldest continuously operating institutions in the world; how have they done it?

The key to their long-term success is their product, which remains desirable even as customers become more enlightened. With a finite lifespan humans are naturally drawn to products that offer to extend their experience time and so the Church's core product, ever-lasting life in paradise, has a strong appeal and is readily peddled by any salesman prepared to make unsubstantiated promises to his customers.

Not only is the product highly desirable it has essentially zero marginal production costs since it is a service delivered exclusively post-mortem and sold through a highly-scalable and long-established network of local and regional facilities. The cost of sales and customer acquisition are reasonably high - churches must be built and maintained, political support must be obtained and retained and considerable effort must be made to avoid legislation covering workplace equality and related issues - but at core the product is basically free to produce and the Church's longevity means that it has accumulated vast assets with which it can weather even the most dreadful disasters.

The fact that the major product is delivered only after death also means that post-sales service and customer returns are both minimised. Every customer can be assumed to be happy and if they aren't there's nothing that can be done anyway.

Apart from the physical infrastructure, the only other major cost for the Church is the hiring of new salesmen and managers, who undergo long period of product training before starting work. This training is primarily to familiarise new employees with the huge volume of (sometimes contradictory and impenetrable) sales literature produced by the Church over the centuries. Mastery of this literature can take years but fully trained employees often stay with the firm until retirement and can generate revenue and attract new customers for decades; some former employees remain useful for marketing purposes for millennia.

Given all this, why do religious organisations have charitable status? They compete for customers and resources (personnel, property etc.) with other entertainment and lifestyle management businesses but enjoy an unfair tax advantage whilst discriminating on the grounds of gender and sexual orientation.

The answer is simple; disestablish the Church of England and end privileges for religious organisations, putting them on the same basis as all other companies.

Apple and Old Technology

Apple's current line of mobile devices, iPhone, iPad and iPod, are sleek, modern and exceptionally well-made. They are assembled with cutting edge techniques, pushing the boundaries of what is possible in the machining and assembly of aluminium and glass. They feature modern processors designed to maximise performance while minimising battery drain and heat generation. They have a sophisticated proprietary connector, Lightning, that is small, neat, solid and reversible. The "innovate and iterate" strategy has given Apple a range of market-leading products that generate huge profits and whatever you think about them there is no denying that they are enormously successful.

Amongst all this fantastic 21st century technology there is one element that stands out as old, preserved beyond it's years and ripe for replacement. It's so common, so familiar and so well-established within its niche that you've probably never noticed its age or heritage or questioned why it hasn't previously been replaced. In fact, when I suggest that it is inevitably something that Apple will ditch you're likely to protest and you may even rant about standards, arrogance and how it simply isn't possible to displace such an entrenched system. I disagree; it is both necessary and desirable to retire old technology so that new and better solutions can take their place.

And the item of which I speak, the humble 3.5mm headphone socket, is well past its prime, having been designed for use with transistor radios in the middle of the 20th century. Surprised?

Apple have a history of retiring systems when better (faster, cheaper, easier) alternatives become available and they have often surprised observers by dumping "vital" features while the rest of the industry carries on unchanged. Why would they want to do away with the 3.5mm headphone socket? There are two good reasons, from Apple's perspective:

• Size - have a look at the photos of the bottom of the iPhone 5 on Apple's website; the 3.5mm socket is huge in comparison with the overall depth of the phone. Apple may not be able to slim the iPhone, or the iPad, further if they stick with the 3.5mm socket.
• Manufacturing simplicity - removing the 3.5mm socket saves machine time (one less hole in the case), reduces component count, lowers assembly costs and frees up internal volume for alternative uses.

If there were no obvious alternatives then even Apple might balk at such a large change but there are at least two; 1) Bluetooth connection, or 2) the Lightning connector (which provides a standard USB audio output) with appropriate adapters or headsets.

The 3.5mm headphone socket is used on all Apple's major products so a change wouldn't be simple. If Lightning can be pressed into service (and I suspect it includes USB audio for precisely this reason) then it makes sense to refresh all the mobile products, including laptops, in one go. It might never happen but I think the 3.5mm headphone socket will be replaced by Lightning on all Apple's products at the 2014 Autumn product refresh.