1.30.2009
2009: A Great Time for Tech Innovation
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For a moment, let's take a detour from the theoretical and the cognitively focused and also away from the political realm and the continual hand-wringing over the Economy.
Let's look at some basic technology changes that have been a decade in coming, but are finally here.
What I'm referring to first of all, is the final collapse of the price barrier in mobile computing, with laptops and other highly portable computing devices reaching price points between $180 and $300.
This means that full-productive work capability has been completely untethered from the office setting and can go anywhere, with more power and utility than the typical smartphone.
It's a new time of excitement in hardware, with capable linux-installed computers available to the mass market for the first time.
This change was foreshadowed by all the talk of 'smart devices' and the network computer or NC, the slimmed-down device, over ten years ago. But now, the size differential is substantial, and WiFi has become ubiquitous, which it certainly was not in 1999 or 2000.
What's Coming?
Nothing less than a work revolution. People are going to realize that all of the consumer and business changes from the Internet's first decade-plus were a warm-up to what's ahead.
In this economy, one must be cognizant of the strategm of the false retreat.
An ancient battlefield tactic, one combatant makes a public display of the fact that they are withdrawing the field of battle, hoping to draw their numerous competitors in headlong flight to the exits with them. Suddenly, the fleeing horde wheels around and unleashes a deadly flight of arrows, the famed Parthian shot, skewering their incautious foe, who is then routed in a charge across the flanks. This tactic was used successfully by the Parthians to obliterate the legions of Crassus during the roman republic, later by the Huns, the Hsiung-nu on the borders of China, the Mongols, and possibly even by venture capitalists in Silicon Valley.
Who knows? It's conceivable that social hubs could one day supplement or even replace government. That's a revolutionary thought. But consider this: the growth of social networks such as myspace and facebook - going from scratch to more than 100 million users in each case in just a few years is totally unprecedented from the perspective of human socio-political organization. The founding fathers would have started one if they could code, but alas, they couldn't. America and Australia, two start-up countries populated initially by losers and castoffs, - were the two fastest growing de novo countries, e.g., from scratch due to immigration.
It took the U.S. over 100 years to achieve a population of 100 million. Myspace and facebook achieved this number 33X-35X faster.
Also, imagine the potential efficiencies for government right-sizing. Today's government has enormously inflated bureaucracy at every level - Federal, state, county, and city - the structure of which originated before telephone and telegraph service was available and didn't change with this invention.
Even more mind-blowing is the fact that early America had MUCH SLOWER communications than the post system of the Roman Empire 1800 years earlier.
Since then, the U.S. absorbed radical telecom and Internet innovations, witnessed the ascent and decline of the railroads; changing business markedly - all except for the case of government, which simply grows unabated.
Some of the blubber needs to be flenced off. Social networks with their large memberships could become an efficient revenue management system. Rather than going to IRS.gov to print out hundreds of specialized forms and/or the library to pick up instruction booklets, you could simply wait to be "poked" by Uncle Sam on April 14th, prompting one to transfer funds.
Let's look at some basic technology changes that have been a decade in coming, but are finally here.
What I'm referring to first of all, is the final collapse of the price barrier in mobile computing, with laptops and other highly portable computing devices reaching price points between $180 and $300.
This means that full-productive work capability has been completely untethered from the office setting and can go anywhere, with more power and utility than the typical smartphone.
It's a new time of excitement in hardware, with capable linux-installed computers available to the mass market for the first time.
This change was foreshadowed by all the talk of 'smart devices' and the network computer or NC, the slimmed-down device, over ten years ago. But now, the size differential is substantial, and WiFi has become ubiquitous, which it certainly was not in 1999 or 2000.
What's Coming?
Nothing less than a work revolution. People are going to realize that all of the consumer and business changes from the Internet's first decade-plus were a warm-up to what's ahead.
In this economy, one must be cognizant of the strategm of the false retreat.
An ancient battlefield tactic, one combatant makes a public display of the fact that they are withdrawing the field of battle, hoping to draw their numerous competitors in headlong flight to the exits with them. Suddenly, the fleeing horde wheels around and unleashes a deadly flight of arrows, the famed Parthian shot, skewering their incautious foe, who is then routed in a charge across the flanks. This tactic was used successfully by the Parthians to obliterate the legions of Crassus during the roman republic, later by the Huns, the Hsiung-nu on the borders of China, the Mongols, and possibly even by venture capitalists in Silicon Valley.
Who knows? It's conceivable that social hubs could one day supplement or even replace government. That's a revolutionary thought. But consider this: the growth of social networks such as myspace and facebook - going from scratch to more than 100 million users in each case in just a few years is totally unprecedented from the perspective of human socio-political organization. The founding fathers would have started one if they could code, but alas, they couldn't. America and Australia, two start-up countries populated initially by losers and castoffs, - were the two fastest growing de novo countries, e.g., from scratch due to immigration.
It took the U.S. over 100 years to achieve a population of 100 million. Myspace and facebook achieved this number 33X-35X faster.
Also, imagine the potential efficiencies for government right-sizing. Today's government has enormously inflated bureaucracy at every level - Federal, state, county, and city - the structure of which originated before telephone and telegraph service was available and didn't change with this invention.
Even more mind-blowing is the fact that early America had MUCH SLOWER communications than the post system of the Roman Empire 1800 years earlier.
Since then, the U.S. absorbed radical telecom and Internet innovations, witnessed the ascent and decline of the railroads; changing business markedly - all except for the case of government, which simply grows unabated.
Some of the blubber needs to be flenced off. Social networks with their large memberships could become an efficient revenue management system. Rather than going to IRS.gov to print out hundreds of specialized forms and/or the library to pick up instruction booklets, you could simply wait to be "poked" by Uncle Sam on April 14th, prompting one to transfer funds.
Labels: crassus, facebook, flenced, gov, mongols, myspace, NC, wifi
