Tag: people (Page 4 of 12)

Capitalism, I protest thee

November 9, 2009 / elias

I’m well schooled in the world of business, both from an undergraduate and postgraduate point of view. I’m no professor, but I’m a thinker. And having worked for some of the biggest companies in the world whilst at PwC, I’ve developed an insight into how the world works. And to put it bluntly, I think capitalism sucks. The problem though, is that I can’t think of a better system to replace it, so as I grapple to understand how we can improve it, I’m forced to participate in this game that I think is not having society achieve its optimum.

However, every now and then, I come across interesting books, articles, and have discussions that make me go “yes!”. Most recently this happened the other day, when I read insight by someone I least expected to, on a thing I’ve been thinking for years and am glad its been articulated so succinctly.

Jack Dorsey, the programmer who created Twitter – a business criticised for its lack of a revenue model but which is also disrupting the world of communications – was recently quizzed on stage, having to say words in free-association relating to a concept.

To quote the Wall Street Journal:

What about monetization? He laughed, then said, “I think of our users”, clearly avoiding more obvious Twitter territory. “I think of how people are using it, and how, based on that usage, we can build something that will sustain the company.”

Mr. Dorsey kept free-associating. “How does the network itself generate value? And what can you put on top of that to extend the network and make it an even better network”, he added. “monetization to me is just a way to sustain, and that’s the first thing I think of.”

Money, you see is just a way to sustain something. It shouldn’t be the end-goal of business, and it’s that point that fundamentally irritates me about capitalism. That being the whole focus on it being about returns on capital – not returns on humanity.

Twitter’s other co-founder and the current CEO clearly drinks the same water. As Evan Williams said several months ago:

The entire premise of economics is to study how peoples needs and wants can be catered for, in the context of scarcity in resources. The implication of this, is that by satisfying our wants and needs, we are happy and by happy we have better living standards. Economics is meant to be about increasing our living standards. Yet we are so caught up on the measures that simplify our world as “earn more money, spend more, get rich and therefore you get happier”. We’ve let the economists bastardise our world in order to make their paper models work. And it’s created a consumerist society where value is placed on material goods, which may boost GDP but not necessarily happiness.

My friend and former colleague Charlie Perry, a Chartered Accountant and philosophy major at university, thinks the same thing. He recently proposed abandoning profit as a measure going forward and wrote a manifesto that had me say “yes!”. I introduced him to a book that after years of thinking about these issues, was finally articulated in a brilliant book by Clive Hamilton called “Growth Fetish“. And he now blogs regularly, with his evolving thoughts. As he says in his new about page (version 2):

I’m interested in mutualism. I think it’s the fabled third way.

In September 2009 I thought I’d invented mutualism and wrote down all my thoughts here.

Subsequently I’ve found that there is a long history of thinking around mutualism.

I think the time’s come to champion this economic theory as an alternative to the pointless to-and-fro of left-right politics. It’s time to end the sham of the liberal capitalist democracy. There’s a better way, a happier way.

We don’t need to capitalise or socialise; we need to mutualise. Let’s work together.

Don’t get me wrong – winning at the game of capitalism is awesome – making money out of air is great for the minority that have done it. But it’s an uneven distribution of the world’s wealth and it distorts the operation of our society. The Global Financial Crisis just proved this system is a joke, though I don’t think anyone has the answers. But I’m not giving up on this – I want more “yes!” moments to the point where we can evolve our society to its potential. What I do know is that it’s a mistake to make it the main way to measure our society.

I’m not advocating we abolish capitalism: far from it actually. It has some very useful concepts that can be incorporated into a new model. But just like trade unionism, too much can be a bad thing for a society (as can too little as well). While I still have issue with the way companies measure progress, I think that’s a harder problem to fix. But where we can start, is by getting our governments to change the way they view society. Wealth is currently defined by the amount people spend every year. We’ve used that for a few centuries now, and although it was a good attempt, it’s not right. There is more to wealth than proving we have capacity to acquired goods and services. And in this 21st century, things have changed too much to frame the world in a lens that was created hundreds of years ago.

So if that’s not the right answer, what is? Well let’s work backwards and think deeper about this. Let’s start with the assumption that we want everyone to be happy within themselves, not rich in material goods where we assume that is what generates happiness. If we do that, then we will have made one giant leap forward.

Aussie startup Stalqer helps you find your friends when about

October 28, 2009 / elias

Over the last few weeks I’ve been alpha testing an innovative new iPhone app by an Aussie team led by Mick Johnson, innovating in an exciting space. Leena Rao at TechCrunch has written a brilliant post about the product, with another high quality article on CNET by Rafe Needleman. Both those posts cover more than enough so I won’t rehash, but I will share an interesting concept this product has that’s got me thinking about.

Stalqer has an unique viral dynamic at play. Your friends are on a map, and the technology behind it automatically tracks their whereabouts. The cool thing though, is that the technology can be overcome – for example, if I see one of my friends in a location that I know they aren’t, I can physically drag them to where I think they should be (like where I am now at a bar, as they are sitting next to me). This means that even if you shut off Stalqer, you are forced to have to deal with it if you care about your privacy.

This may sound evil, but it’s all relatively safe and you can control which friends see you. However, the fact other people can determine your location, forces you to interact with the app and at least be active with it.

All too common with web and phone applications, people sign up to them and then move on – often forgetting they had signed up in the first place. But Stalqer’s innovation is that it focuses on something people (claim) matters to them – their privacy – and requires them to stay at least alert of what’s happening if they care to protect it in any way.

It’s a simple concept, but it’s also sheer brilliance in my eyes. Admittedly, I haven’t been too phased by this feature and I still think it needs more work for it to truly be viral (like incorporating game mechanics to give people an incentive to move their friends frequently). But it certainly gives an interesting perspective and highlights a smart approach in creating engagement in this saturated market. That being, aligning peoples incentives to participate even when they get bored of it.

Vote for my SXSW presentation!

August 24, 2009 / elias

I’ve submitted to do a presentation at SXSW, which is the Internet and technology industry’s biggest conference. I attended my first SXSW this year and was blown away by the people, the passion and the ideas. However something that bugged me, was that a lot of people submitted panels with agendas: they either snuck buzzwords into their panel description, to be thinly veiled attempt in getting an audience for themselves (despite no substance in the content). More common were panels that were based around something with a clear motivation to promote their company or business. It was tiring and I know a lot of people were annoyed by that.

Only about 300 people will get accepted for SXSW 2010, with a large part of the decision being decided by people voting on 2200 submissions. I hope I get to do my presentation, because I want to propose a new economic model that will help people understand opportunities for businesses in the Information economy. (It will also be the first public attempt to really explain data portability business models.) I’m also going to synthesise 50 years of technology development, and explain where things are evolving.

My goal is not to self-promote any agenda of mine, but quite simply, to get people excited about the future as much as I am. Because after all, it takes driven passionate people to build new businesses and to create growth is this troubled economy.

So click here, login and vote for me. I *promise* I’ll make it awesome.

How to create engaging presentations

July 22, 2009 / elias

Last Tuesday, I spoke at Bootup Camp, an initiative run by my good friends Bart Jellema and Kim Chen at Tjoos. Four teams worked for 14 days from 9am to 9pm to conceive, build and launch a business. Speakers came in every day to give advice, and I give my insights into communications, human nature and generating an emotional connection with an audience.

I’m cringing, but people that didn’t attend did ask me to share the videos when I got word. So here it is – enjoy!

Rethinking copyright and its scope creep

July 8, 2009 / elias

Modern copyright has been influenced by an array of older legal rights that have been recognised throughout history, whose legacy development may be harming our future. It traditionally protected the moral rights of the author who created a work, the economic rights of a benefactor who paid to have a copy made, the property rights of the individual owner of a copy, and a sovereign’s right to censor and to regulate the printing industry. I’m not going to say copyright is dead, but perhaps now irrelevant, given the evolution of media. As I’ve argued before, access to information is more valuable than ownership and modern copyright law doesn’t recognise this fully.

Rethinking media
Media, content, and other related words essentially are words that reflect human expression. When you read a book or a newspaper article, it’s another human being expressing something to you. That expression in turn, generates an experience for you – such as (but not limited to) interpretation, entertainment and reflection. You can’t “capture” media and lock it in a jar – you can only remember it. No one can own the individual words in a body of text because no one owns a language. But that power of provoking emotions in other people is powerful and outright scary if you truly realise the power.

We are now seeing a dramatic evolution in the media landscape. The disruptive influence, of what was called “user generated content” yesterday and now called “social media”, is making us rethink the media in our world. The thing is, it’s the same thing as any media – it’s human beings expressing themselves. The only difference now, is that the means of that expression has changed – less so technologically and more so the actual process – to one that is many-to-many.

Rethinking value
Social media is about discussions rather than broadcasts. It’s about the producer and consumer of the information interacting. Everyone has an opportunity to respond to my blog post here, and sometimes I respond. Other times I don’t, but that doesn’t matter because it still impacts me and future readers of my blog post with an alternative perspective.

What we are seeing now is a move way from the mass production of media, and a growth in the mass socialisation of media. It’s not about how many people you can push your content to, but how engaging your content can be. The economic models supporting content are still evolving, but it’s engagement that pays the bills. An engaged reader will be more receptive to advertising (which is increasingly important as advertising performance is now more accountable) and for the subscription model of content, engagement is what retains a customer. To retain a readership, you need compelling content.

However this old media adage about compelling content is changing. The socialisation of content isn’t just about pushing content, as insomuch discussing it. It’s about building a community of people that are passionate and interested: an expertise network where value comes from being in the same place as others that are like-minded. An example of this can be see with Read Write Web, who have created an exclusive community manager community. GigaOM, another innovator in the media space, has done the same thing for premium content that runs in parallel with its popular (free) blogs. Compelling content is now about building compelling communities. Copyright works well for static objects – but not so much for people interacting freely.

Rethinking copyright
This is a complex subject and I by no means am being definitive here. But I simply want to raise a question of what really is the value of copyright? If content is an expression that generates an experience in a human, then specific types of expression need specific treatment. And if compelling communities are now a new form of engaging with content, requiring a lock down on the content produced may actually hurt value. As another form of content, news has value in its immediacy and is useless a day later as the news is constantly evolving. There’s no value of copyright there as ‘time’ is where news derives its value from – not long-term protection.

Should copyright be dead? No, that’s not what I am arguing – rather, it needs a rethink of what exactly it’s protecting, with its scope reduced. Like a parent protecting a child, if you protect them too much, they might never actually experience life, be happy and potentially ignorant to future dangers – which is what a parent is ultimately responsible for. The aggressive remarks of newspaper executives I’ve heard in the last month about being more aggressive in their copyright may not be the right solution. Protection of assets is valuable only when it enhances future value.

Let’s be careful we not lose sight of what we are protecting and why.

Can the newspaper industry please stop their damn whining

June 26, 2009 / elias

Google is not a blood sucking vampire. In fact, the newspaper industry is a spoilt little brat.

Search engines such as Google and aggregators (like the constantly criticised techmeme) provide a huge amount of economic value for the newspaper industry. They enable discovery by people that are not regular subscribers to their content. They provide traffic, which drive up the page views, that enable them to sell inflated prices for perceived access to an audience.

Newspapers put their content on the web for free by their own choice. They have plenty of ways of excluding their content from being freely accessible, either through a paid wall or technology conventions like the robots.txt…But they don’t want to completely do that, because they lose the traffic.

Subscription models will be the future revenue model for content. One where people will pay for constant access to a particular information provider (as fresh access – not static objects – is where the real value comes from in information and especially in news). Of course, this means people with established brands can only do this as people will not pay unless they know what to expect. However despite their current lead in this game due to their century-old mastheads, the newspaper industry is refusing to solely go down this route. And the reason for this, is because they still rely on advertising for the majority of their revenue mix – and advertising is driven by traffic.

Newspaper executives want the economic value provided by search engines and aggregators in discovery and traffic – but they whine consistently because these innovative new businesses in the information age have found a way to monetise this function in the value chain.

The solution is simple: cut public access, and put all content behind a paid wall. And only participate in exclusive aggregators. The search engines and free aggregators no longer have your content to add to their mix – and yes, you Mr newspaper executive no longer get as much traffic. But that’s what you get for being a whining little kid.

I am sick and tired of hearing industrial age executives refuse to compromise with information age business models.

Interview with an Iranian about the elections

June 25, 2009 / elias

Below is a podcast I recorded two days ago on Tuesday 23 June 2009 around 1200 UTC. For your benefit, I’ve attempted to transcribe the conversation as best as possible.

[display_podcast]

[Time=00:00] Hi my name is Elias Bizannes and I have done a podcast with an Iranian, who has grown up and still lives in Iran, as a way of trying to create some clarity into the situation that we’re seeing currently in Iran. A bit of background ‚Äì in 2005 I went traveling around the world, and one of the countries I visited was Iran. I spent about ten days in this beautiful country – exploring it ‚Äì and I really got a unique insight into the place. Since I heard about the issues hearing about the issues in Iran, I reached out to some friends of mine, worried that they might have been hurt themselves. And I finally got a response ‚Äì and as I was hearing about the things that are happening, I thought it might be interesting to share that information to the rest of the world ‚Äì because there is a lot of speculation and I think people are misunderstanding a lot of the events that are happening. So hopefully this will give you a bit of insight. If you have any other questions,¬† or if you would like me to get some further clarity, feel free to contact me. You can visit my personal website eliasbizannes.com

[1:08] So let‚Äôs now tune into my friend, who‚Äôs identity can‚Äôt be revealed, sitting in Iran right now.

[1:17] Are there protests happening outside of Tehran? Is there widespread discontent with the population?
I‚Äôm not living in Tehran, I‚Äôm living in a centred city of Iran ‚ÄúKashan‚Äù. There are not big rallies here, and the protests here are not widespread. Y‚Äôknow people here are much rural people and living in villages. And y‚Äôknow¬† – people that are a low level of thinking, there not so much student, not so much talented and open-minded people here. Y‚Äôknow, they’re public people in here.¬† But inside of the university of Kashan – there are so – much rallies and protests against the government. And the first day after the election results, the boys and girls in here staged rallies and they canceled the exams ‚Äì even the exams that they are holding. And they took the papers from the students, and they canceled the whole exam. And it had a very tough reaction from the security of the university ‚Äì and I heard there were some security forces outside the university and they were determined to use tough action against the students if they stepped out of the university. And there were some protest continuing at the university for three days. People were wearing black clothes, in mourning of those youths killed in Tehran and Esfahan. And they find some candles‚Ä¶

[3:35] Are people being killed in Esfahan as well? Because what we are hearing¬†in the West, is that all the protests are happening in Tehran. Has there been a lot of‚Ä¶
Yeah yeah. I hear from a friend of mine in Esfahan that there were some rallies¬†at Esfahan university and there were some bombings in there. And they ‚Äì students I don‚Äôt know if students or some people else ‚Äì they fired the amphitheatre of Esfahan university of technology. There were broken windows and this situation there was so much much worse than here.¬† And the university of Esfahan is completely off these days. But, in my university, the exams are holding, but in the University of Tehran and the University of Esfahan, the exams are completely off.

[4:40] Yeah right. The situation is that everyone thinks the election was rigged. What makes people think it is. Has there been evidence or people just think it? Why do people think it has been rigged?
Well, y’know the majority of people that I confirmed, they don‚Äôt actually think that actually Mr Mousavihas actually won the election. They think that Mr Ahmadinejad has won, but not with the huge margin that they say. Y‚Äôknow, they want to rig the election because Mr Khatami won 21 million votes and they wanted to break his record by Mr Hashemi. They wanted to show people that Mr Ahmadinejad is more popular than him.¬† Y‚Äôknow, students and people ‚Äì they were saying that the people around them ‚Äì they were not seeing the villages ‚Äì y‚Äôknow inside the cities. They were thinking it was just themselves that were voting.¬† I think that Mr Ahmadinejad has won, but not with this huge margin. Maybe the election might be, is going to be next level, and Mr Ahmadinejad I don‚Äôt think he won the 50% plus one votes. Alright?

[6:24] Yeah ok. So from what I understand also is that people don‚Äôt want to completely overthrow the government and have another revolution.¬† They just want a better government.¬† Is that true?
Yeah ‚Äì yeah, not concurring that this situation is 1979. The notion that the people don‚Äôt want a huge change in the system. The majority of people they do believe in the mullahcracy in Iran and the governing mullahs, they do believe in them and they do believe in the Ayatollah and¬†they do believe in the in the fundamentals of the Islamic Republic, which are the government of the clergy men ‚Äì Islamic clergymen. They just want their votes back, and they expected Mr Mousavi to change the situation Mr Ahmadinejad made in foreign affairs and in internal affairs they feel a huge mess, and I can see so much disappointment in the face of the people here because of this situation Mr Ahmadinejad has made. And they just wanted a change in the situation, changing the way in treating the world and the way in treating the people inside the country. They were tired of not being honest, tired of the legitimacy of the government, and they were tired of a government which is not straight forward to people and lying to people.¬† So I think people want big change – alright‚Ä¶

[8:22]‚Ä¶And what do people think of Musavi and his backer Rafsanjani.¬† What are the perceptions of the public to those people?
Mr Mousavi is not a hero.¬† Of course, then he was not a hero, but now he‚Äôs a hero.¬† No ‚Äì he is a person which was so popular to Mr Khomeini and he was so close to him and one of the people who had a very huge role in the victory of the Islamic Republic. He‚Äôs someone inside the system, and he‚Äôs not come outside of the system to change it ‚Äì he‚Äôs one of them. Actually, before these protests people said he was one of them ‚Äì but when he showed so much courage and so much bravery in behaving and consulting in these situations in Tehran ‚Äì he didn‚Äôt push back and he didn‚Äôt take down the protesters ‚Äì and encouraged them to more and more protest.¬† They now think he is a very brave man; he‚Äôs not one of them ‚Äì he‚Äôs come to change the situation.
About Mr Rafsanjani ‚Äì I know, the people were not backing Mr Rafsanjani in his presidential period, which was for eight years.¬† And people hated him – and in the previous election, they think that anyone but Mr Rafsanjani¬†that was competing against Mr Ahmadinejad, he would have won the election. But because of Rafsanjani, Mr Ahmadinejad won, and whomever was in front of Ahmadinejad¬†was losing ‚Äì er, was winning the election but Mr Rafsanjani. But after that, people saw lots and lots of criticism from Mr Rafsanjani of Mr Ahmadinejad, they think he changed his behaviour, and when he supported Mr Mousavi ‚Äì I‚Äôm not saying¬†that people are now a fan or supporter of Mr Rafsanjani ‚Äì but people think that he‚Äôs changed. But, they hate him anyway right now, but not as much as before. His family ‚Äì people believe, there‚Äôs so much evidence about his families financial corruption in the country ‚Äì people are always talking about his daughter, his boys – and their corruption.

[12:10] So, what‚Äôs happening right now? What are you seeing around you? Are there people all over the streets, police that are restricting movements? Have they cut down the Internet? What are you seeing right now?
Around me, which are students of the university,¬† I can see so much disappointment in their faces about their future. Lots of my friends and lots of students here are determined to learn English, and send applications to foreign universities overseas, and apply to different universities to get out of this country. They say they cannot endure this situation anymore. Me neither can endure this situation here, and I am determined to leave this country. And some people that are stuck to the system, they remain here ‚Äì people that are not satisfied with the situation will leave the country. The intellectual people are among those who are not satisfied with the situation, and if these people leave the country, there will not be any more intellectual engineers, there are not more talented people in here, and I think it‚Äôs going to be a huge mess.

[13:55] What would people want to see though, to prevent this sort of drain of people leaving the country. What is it that people want to see to fix up Iran?
Well first of all, they want their votes back. They do believe that the election was rigged. And they do want Mr Mousavi to take back their lives, their votes‚Ä¶first of all, they don‚Äôt want Mr Ahmadinejad anymore. As you can see in Facebook and other Internet communities that there are some causes,¬† people are saying that he should go – just go ‚Äì it is not important who should be our president, but it should not be him, should not be him‚Ä¶

[15:03] So if Ahmadinejad is taken out of government, would people be a lot happier?
You mean to crackdown this government?

Yeah ‚Äì do they just want different people elected? Is that the only change they want?
Um ‚Äì I think the majority of people want Mr Mousavi to become president. They do hope for a bright future and for positive changes in the country with Mr Mousavi ‚Äì I think they just want Mr Ahmadinejad to resign and to be taken out of Iran politics.

[16:06] Something I want to get clarified and that would be interesting¬† – things like Facebook, Twitter and all that ‚Äì have they been blocked by the government?
Yeah yeah, these whole websites are filtered. We can‚Äôt Facebook ‚Äì YouTube ‚Äì even I cannot access my Yahoo Messenger and mailbox Yahoo.com ‚Äì and the situation is very tough. Even some websites inside the country which had permission from the Islamic Republic like cloob.com which is a website inside the country ‚Äì they just don‚Äôt want the information to spread around the world. And with the pictures, they don‚Äôt want the world to see the violence. And some extremist websites and TV like we the voice of America, which are so extremist about pulling down this government.¬†They are scared of truth! What the BBC says, y‚Äôknow the BBC with no personal focus, just saying the truth ‚Äì they re sending so much noises on satellite. Given the BBC has gone down, its broadcast on Hotbird start broadcasting on Telstar and Eutelsat?

[18:05] How are people organizing the protests? Is it through SMS and telephone calls then, if all these important websites are blocked, to organise?
The SMS was also cut down for about a week and a half. The mobile phones are ok, but not in Tehran. In Tehran, the whole telecommunications system was cut down and people were just using card phones, home phones ‚Äì and they were spreading the news just on the internet via Yahoo messenger, especially some blogs ‚Äì and people are using anti-censors and proxies to access the website and get the information about the place and the dates of the protests‚Ä¶but the SMS service was not on for a week and a half.

[19:26] What‚Äôs going to happen now?¬† What‚Äôs going to happen in the next few weeks? Do you think it‚Äôs going to be predictable, or do you think everything is unpredictable at the moment?
I think the protests have calmed down, and its not going to happen anything. And the tyranny of of Ayatollah Khamenei and Mr Ahmadinejad, is growing up more and more ‚Äì and nothing is going to happen. But I think in the next few years, there is going to be more and more protests. And this government and this system, has not firm fundamentals and firm foundation anymore. People do not believe in the Ayatollah anymore‚Ä¶
(phonecall dropped out exactly at this point and podcast discussion ended)
(music)

The Internet, Iran, and Ubiquity

June 15, 2009 / elias

What’s happening right now in Iran is absolutely remarkable. It validates the remarkable impact ubiquitous computing and ubiquitous connectivity to the Internet has and its potential to disrupt even the most tightly controlled police state in the world.

The rejection of the election by the public is creating public chaos, finally giving the people a reason to revolt against a regime they’ve detested for decades now. This situation has the potential to escalate to bigger things – or it likely will settle down – but regardless, it gives us a real insight into the future. That is, how these new technologies are transforming everything, and disgracing the mass media in the process.

What I saw in Iran
This blog of mine actually started as a travel blog, and one of the countries I wrote about was Iran. In my analysis of that beautiful country, I hypothesised a revolution was brewing based on societal discontent. What prevented this revolution from ever occurring, was a legitimate trigger – one that wasn’t shut down by the Islamic propaganda.

A interesting thing I noted was that the official messaging of the country was anti-American and very over the top – no surprises there. But when you talked to people on a one-on-one level, you realised the Iranian’s actually respect the American’s – and it was the establishment they detested. It seemed the regime had a tight grip on society, using Islam as a way of controlling them in much the same way the Bush Administration use patriotism and the War on Terror, to do what it wanted and silence criticism. But by controlling the media (amongst other things), it essentially helped control society from revolting.

How ubiquity has changed that
In my previously linked article, I talk about the rising trend of a ubiquitous world – one where connectivity, computing, and data was omnipresent in our world. Separately, we are seeing a rising trend toward a “network” operating model for internet businesses, as demonstrated with Facebook’s CEO recently saying how he imagines Facebook’s future to not be a destination site.

The implication is that people are now connected , can share information and communicate without restraint, but better yet, do so in a decentralised manner. The use of Twitter to share information to the world, isn’t reliant on visiting Twitter.com – it’s simply a text message away. It’s hard to censor something that’s not centralised. And it’s even harder to control and influence a population, where they no longer need the mass media for information, but can communicate directly with each other on a mass scale.

Take note
Social media is having a remarkable impact. Not only are we getting better quality reporting of events (with the mass media entirely failing us), but it’s enabling mass collaboration on a grand scale. One where even a government has the risk of being toppled. I’m still waiting to here from my Iranian friends to get their insight into the situation, but if it’s one lesson we should take note of, is that the Internet is transforming the world. Industries are not only being impacted, but society in the broadest sense. If a few picture-capable phones, a short-messaging communication service, and some patchy wireless Internet can rattle the most authoritarian state in the world, then all I can say is I’m gobsmacked at what else is on the horizon.

Google Wave’s dirty little secret

May 29, 2009 / elias

Google has announced a new technology that is arguably the boldest invention and most innovative idea to come out in recent years for the Internet (full announcement here).

It has the potential to replace email, instant messenging, and create a new technical category for collaboration and interactivity in the broadest sense. However hidden in the details, is a dirty little secret about the practicality of this project.

Google Wave is transformative, but it also is a technical challenge. If adopted, it will entrench cloud computing and ultimately Google’s fate as the most dominant company in the world.

The challenge in its development
For the last two years, the Google Sydney office has been working on a “secret project”. It got to the stage where the office – which runs the Google Maps product (another Sydney invention) – was competing for resources and had half the office dedicated to developing it. So secret was the project, that only the highest level of Google’s management team in Mountain View knew about it. Googler’s in other parts of the world either didn’t know about it, or people like me in the local tech scene, knew it was something big but didn’t know what exactly.

However although I didn’t know what exactly it was, I was aware of the challenge. And basically, it boils down to this: it’s a difficult engineering feat to pull off. The real time collaboration, which is at the core of what this technology provides, requires computationally a huge amount of resources for it to work.

It needs everyone to use it
Although we are all digging into the details, one thing I know for a fact, is that Google wants to make this as open as possible. It wants competitors like Microsoft, Yahoo and the entire development community to not just use it – but be a big driver in its adoption. For collaboration to work, you need people – and it makes little sense to restrict it to only a segment of the Internet population (much the same like email). Google’s openness isn’t being driven out of charity, but pure economic sense: it needs broad-based market adoption for this to work.

Only few can do it
However, with lots of people using it comes another fact: only those with massive cloud computing capabilities will be able to do this. Google practically invented and popularised the most important trend in computing right now. A trend where the industrial age’s economies of scale has come to play – reminding us that there are aspects of the Information Economy that are not entirely different from the past. What Google’s Wave technology does, is give a practical application that relies on cloud computing for its execution. And if the Wave protocol becomes as ubiquitous as email and Instant Messaging – and goes further to become core to global communications – then we will see the final innings to who now runs this world.

Wave is an amazing technology, and I am excited to see it evolve. But mark my words: this open technology requires a very expensive setup behind the scenes. And those that will meet this setup, will be our masters of tomorrow. Google has come to own us due to its innovation in information management – now watch Act II as it does the same for communications.

Why we should support movie piracy

May 24, 2009 / elias

Across the entire developed world, you will see piracy warnings from the entertainment industry. They usually make some emotive video about piracy costing jobs (because of six billion dollars in lost revenue) and that you as a consumer should join the fight. But is this really the case? I think laziness is what is costing jobs. Executives are clinging onto an old way of doing things in a new world, and instead of exploring alternative mechanisms, they fight for the past. I think if the industry lets go a bit, they might actually improve the status quo.

Let’s have a look at the movie industry and see the difference.

Currently
Hollywood studio invests in the production of “The man with a Blog”. They have an all star cast, filled with James Bond action scenes and circus freaks.

Movie theatres around the world premier the movie, after months of publicity. Box office sales smash the predictions in that weekend – millions of dollars are spent by people buying movie tickets. Several months later, a DVD version is distributed, giving a second hit at having consumers spend their cash on experiencing this masterpiece. Television networks several years after that will license the movie and play it on TV.

Money continues to stream in – it’s a model that’s worked for decades.

Pause: two important things to note
Unlike reading a blog, for example – where your attention can wander and not be fully engaged – a movie has the full engagement of the consumer. They’re absorbing every sound and image being presented to them. So engaged are the consumers that people will rewind the movie to rehear a line they missed. They will pause the movie if they need to go to the bathroom, for fear of missing out on a scene.

Another thing to note is that the consumer is having an experience. Even if they “own” a copy of the movie, all they are truly buying is a license to replay the movie in the convenience of their homes. When a consumer buys tickets or a DVD to a movie, what they are really buying is access to an experience that can provoke them intellectually and stimulate them emotionally. Beyond stimulating an individual, it also serves as a cultural tool in our society, allowing people to have shared experiences that can then allow them to relate to each other – like how two strangers laughing over a movie will create a bond.

Replay
So why can’t movies be free? And if they were, who are they hurting? Let’s now replay the blockbuster described above and see the difference.

Hollywood studio invests in the production of “The man with a Blog”. They have an all star cast, filled with James Bond action scenes and circus freaks.

Movie theatres around the world premier the movie, after months of publicity. Box office sales smash the predictions in that weekend – millions of dollars are spent by people buying movie tickets who are paying for the experience of being in a room of people laughing with premium surround sound, a premium screen, and an excuse to snuggle up with their first date. Several months later, a DVD version is distributed, giving a second hit at having consumers spend their cash on experiencing this masterpiece – consumers will pay for the DVD because they like to store their movies on a shelf for reuse. Downloading the movie over the computer eats their bandwidth and storage space, and while some will do it, the value proposition of a physical storage item still exists. Because although they can download a medium-quality movie over their connection – they might want to one night experience a high quality version on their big plasma TV. So they will willingly pay for that DVD, which in bandwidth terms, is a hell of a lot cheaper.

Television networks several years after that will license the movie and play it on TV. Because at the end of the day, if other people are going to generate revenue on your assets, they should continue to seek licenses to do so. Sharing a movie to other consumers should not be a crime, but showing it to mass audiences where you take the full sales, is.

Money continues to stream in – it’s a tweaked model that honestly don’t affect the world that much. Or jobs in the industry, other than the lawyers.

Fast forward
The movie industry is under-exploiting two essential characteristics I mentioned above: the undivided attention of the consumer and the fact they generate an experience for consumers. In the old world, that’s what advertising agencies were paid for to achieve!

I’ve previously argued that online advertising is a bubble economy, but that’s not to say advertising is dead. If fact, brand advertising is something I expect to thrive, and something like a movie is the best opportunity to take advantage of it.

Movies are replaying our lives, in a real or fantasy way. They are a replication of life, with consumer products filling the screen just like they do in our lives. When I watch my favourite actor talking in a scene, I am taking in the visual experience – and allowing product exposure to my attention. If I see a funky piece of furniture in that room, I should be able to interact with that – like clicking on it for more information and perhaps even create a direct order to buy. Television networks have spent decades monetising movies by showing advertisements in between regularly scheduled breaks (which disrupt the experience). Why not make advertising an embedded experience during the movie? It’s non intrusive and it’s relevant – a much better way of doing it.

Every time someone clicks on a table in a movie, the movie studio gets a cut out of the sale. Indeed, the supply of the table in the movie could also come as a form of premium sponsorship, as the studio is promising the supplier guaranteed exposure to an audience. The exact reason why people advertise: exposure to an audience.

Taking it a step further, we haven’t even got to explaining brand advertising opportunities. Imagine if your favourite actor is wearing a new style of jeans – isn’t that going to influence your thinking? Even if we consciously don’t think much of the jeans, the experience of being in a happy state watching our favourite actor, generates an emotional bond with that consumer product. It’s doing what advertisers have spent decades trying to master: building an emotional connection and a need with a new product.

The scenes that have been cut out
What I’ve just done here, is made you realise that movies can still be sold despite being free – but people will happily pay for it as they are really buying a unique experience. The actual movie itself should be free for consumers and there is untapped opportunity to innovate in this sphere.

There is an Israeli startup that allows you to embed advertising in a movie. What’s the big deal about that? Well every time someone downloads the movie, they will get an updated ad. So the original publisher can actually control the content for an entire lifetime: once an ad has been inserted, it can simply be replaced with the newest advertiser to sign up.

Imagine if movie studios distributed free versions of their movies, with commercial breaks like TV – and an option to pay to remove those ads for those willing to do so. And imagine, if with a bit more research, technology could be evolved so that scenes within a movie showcasing consumer products, could be updated with a new product. The painting on a wall can now be replaced with another painting. It’s already being done for computer games – why not movies, that themselves now rely on computer generated graphics?

When thinking of the opportunity in that way, restricting access to that movie is no longer in the studio’s incentive. With an audience, you monetise more by having a bigger audience. And so making something free, actually could make more money because demand will not be affected by price elasticity.

La Fine
Once you think about things in this light, you realise the enormous opportunity available. And hopefully, you too also realise that what’s holding us back from this innovative, less-obtrusive, higher-value-generating future – is outdated thinking. Because as long as we cling onto the past, we are preventing bold strides into new models that potentially will make more money, if done right.

It’s a bold statement to say that you should support movie piracy, but it’s actually forcing the industry to adapt to this new world. Piracy has made us reevaluate the value of movies when the distribution line can no longer be fully controlled, and continuing to do it forces our legislators to reconsider public policy on intellectual property that was made for another age.

Using pirated material isn’t costing jobs in the entertainment industry – it’s doing something much better. It’s getting some media company executives in trouble, as they haven’t got the guts to innovate.