“As Gutenberg’s press spread through Europe, the Bible was translated into local languages, enabling direct encounters with the text; this was accompanied by a flood of contemporary literature, most of it mediocre. Vulgar versions of the Bible and distracting secular writings fueled religious unrest and civic confusion, leading to claims that the printing press, if not controlled, would lead to chaos and the dismemberment of European intellectual life.”
Venture capitalist John Doerr, who is arguably the most successful venture capitalist of all time, told me this during our briefing call for Disrupt:
Zynga is the fastest growing business Kleiner Perkins has ever invested in.
That was said by a man who’s firm has invested in Google. And Amazon. And AOL, Compaq, Electronic Arts, Flextronics, Genentech, Intuit, Lotus Development, LSI Logic, Macromedia, Netscape, Quantum, Segway, Sun Microsystems, and Tandem, among many, many others.
[…]
First thing tomorrow John Doerr is going to outline why he thinks that is happening. He’ll talk about the Third Wave.
The First Wave was personal computers and the wave of disruption that caused. The second wave was the Internet, ditto. We are now, says Doerr, in the Third Wave.
What exactly is the Third Wave? It’s the tectonic shifts we’re seeing in mobile platforms (read his post here about the iPad), the social graph (particularly Facebook), and online commerce. All of these things are related and being accelerated by each other (Facebook is the largest mobile application, Zynga leverages Facebook and also stokes Facebook growth, Groupon is social/flash commerce, etc.).
Ok, thanks for the micro-view Michael gave. Here is the micro-macro-view and punchline.
Government and businesses have built a very efficient and effective infrastructure, both in macro terms (routers, throughput, capacity, $-backing) but micro too (interoperability, standards, “open”, learned lessons, 75% of exploration done, growth potential in niche and broad spectrum). Every term mentioned and left out is prone to grow.
Welcome to take a drive on the paved road. Decide what you drive and the driving style.
PS: I have yet to watch most (95%) of TCDisrupt. BTW why is techcrunch.tv not working? Get only usr:pwd request.
Make sure you dispose of anything baring flesh on your mobile phones and laptop drives before heading to Australia.
[…]
“It’s hard to fathom what the pressing concern could be that requires Australia to quiz every entrant to the country on their pornography habits, as if visitors would be aware of the nuances of the Australian classification scheme,” said Colin Jacobs, chairman of the Electronic Frontiers Australia lobby group. “If this results in Customs trawling through more private information on laptops searching for contraband, I would say the solution is way worse than the problem.”
So what exactly is the problem? Certain forms of pornography are banned from crossing the Australian border, however various groups believe that the question found on the Incoming Passenger Cards is too broad, and should ask more specifics such as “are you carrying child porn” or “are you carrying animal sex porn.” Of course, that would be a waste of time—not many people will be comfortable admitting to legalized porn let alone more offensive material.
They might ban flat-chested-women-porn, but they are not taking my porn away from me. Never. NEVER! (via)
The car you drive on the autobahn does leave a (carbon) footprint too. People see what car you drive, with or without seatbelt, how fast, …
I see the Network == Roads. Internet and Web is just the term media and pundits to describe it.
Governments build roads, railways, harbours, airport terminals because they saw it as necessity for (and to accelerate) economic growth (industrial revolution was reliant on transportation).
Internet (ARPANET, Advanced Research Projects Agency Network) was a Government/Military funded project done by Universities. The Military saw benefits in instant communication of its computer assisted defence systems on the East- and West-Coast (Hawaii) and across the Atlantic (Norway). One has to remember that this was the time of the Cold War and the threat of nuclear war.
So, while various transportation networks were build, improved, extended during the Industrial Revolution to facilitate trade and economic well-being and efficiencies (urban travel - the NYC Metro), the Internet has the background of the Cold War and urge to protect this economic well-being.
And it took again Government (1991), representing public and economic interest, to build a platform where commercialisation can prosper.
The United States would benefit significantly from the creation of a national research network (NRN). […]
An NRN would create a computer network infrastructure to provide much-needed support to the scientific research community. Data obtained by the committee regarding current and anticipated research activities demonstrate that an NRN could dramatically improve the productivity and quality of output of the U.S. research community. Through these direct .benefits, plus commercial spinoffs from associated computer and network research, an NRN could greatly promote U.S. competitiveness in a multiplicity of disciplines.
» The Guys invented Freemium (although not coined it).
To encourage the development and use of a widely accessible network service, the committee suggests that the NRN might provide (1) a universal basic service at some low to moderate speed for electronic mail at a low cost to users and (2) higher levels of service with an appropriate charging structure. A low charge for basic service would lessen the initial resistance that might otherwise be felt by first-time users and yet discourage the overloading that occurs with free networks.
» Why Academics, IBM, AT&T, Bell and others went to Congress?
This committee believes that unless a stable source of funding is provided, the NRN will never achieve the impact of which it is capable.
Looking forward to Google I/O event and announcements of partnerships. Android was a little earthquake (iPhone caused techtonic shift).
TV partnerships could be a technonic shift as it still is that there are distinct difference between watching on Laptop/PC/tablet and watching on TV(/cable/sattelite/DVD/Blueray/TiVo/Netflix).
Google and technology partners (Samsung/Intel) could deliver and package technology, software and infrastructure to merge both experiences in your @home and possibly wherever you are.
Deliver a vice versa experience. Get your YouTube and Internet experience on TV, and get your TV experience on the PC/Laptop.
And again, Google will be the backbone of smart targeted advertising. Knowing who I am, what cookies I have on my PC, on what ads I clicked, and what 30 second ads I didn’t switch channels, and what I watch (I am interested in).
I have seen pretty much everything on the web […]. Nothing surprises me.
These days, on both sides of the Atlantic, the travails of the print media hardly raise an eyebrow. But for me, at least, last week’s announcement by the Washington Post Company that it was putting Newsweek on the block still came as a sad shock.
It shouldn’t have been. America’s once mighty trinity of weekly news magazines have fallen upon dismal times. US News & World Report, the smallest of the three, has all but vanished into cyberspace, its main claim to fame its annual ranking of America’s best hospitals and universities. Newsweek itself has been losing money hand over fist for several years. Time insists it is still profitable, but gone is the imperious self-confidence of yesteryear. Like the traditional evening news shows on TV, the news magazines have long since ceased to rule. But somehow, the “for sale” notice pinned on Newsweek marked the end of an era.
In a pre-cable-TV, pre-internet era, and before USA Today became America’s first genuinely national newspaper in 1982, the current affairs weeklies were the print-news glue that held a vast country together. Each had a different flavour. Time exuded Wasp-ish Republicanism, while Newsweek was its more liberal counterpart – cheekier and less pretentious, always trying to catch Time in circulation but never quite succeeding. US News was the most conservative of the three, whose typical subscriber used to be described as a retired military officer living in Arizona.
Time and Newsweek would appear on Monday, to synthesise and explain the events of the previous seven days. At the White House, their correspondents received special briefings. The people and the issues that went on their covers became national talking points. In short, they mattered, even to me at a time when I had never set foot in the US.
During the Watergate crisis, I was working for the Financial Times in Paris. These days, you’d follow developments on the internet, or through the blow-by-blow coverage on cable TV. But in the early ’70s there was none of that. Each Tuesday, I’d rush to the drug store on the Champs Elysées to buy the latest Time or Newsweek – sometimes both – to get my Watergate fix.
[…]
For the Post company, headed by Don Graham, the decision to sell must have been especially painful. It was Don’s father, Phil Graham, who bought Newsweek back in 1961, at the urging of a Newsweek staffer named Ben Bradlee, who would earn newspaper immortality as The Washington Post’s editor during Watergate. “The best telephone call I ever made,” Bradlee said later of his initial approach to Phil Graham.
What happens now is anyone’s guess. Post executives say there’s no deadline for a sale. Various media companies have been mentioned, but no public suitor has yet emerged. “I’ll just have to start calling my billionaire friends,” one Newsweek writer remarked last week – though in fact Jon Meecham, the magazine’s editor, is already on the case, saying he received messages from “two billionaires” within hours of the sale announcement.
Newsweek has a talented staff and a valuable brand-name. But in any re-incarnation it will surely be very different. It would be “hopelessly Pollyanna-ish” to believe that “fundamental shifts” could be avoided, Meacham admitted to the New York Times. At the very least, the magazine’s future, like that of US News, will be primarily online. In other words, no need to rush to the drug store on the Champs Elysées. It’s sad.
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My 2cent
Traditions are a romance of the past. Welcome to the Now. The New New.
