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IP: LAST COLUMN! NYT Digital Commerce: Is That All There Is?
From: David Farber <farber () cis upenn edu>
Date: Fri, 31 Mar 2000 09:16:17 -0500
X-Sender: caruso13 () mail earthlink net Date: Fri, 31 Mar 2000 06:02:51 -0800 To: farber () dsl cis upenn edu From: Denise Caruso <denise () caruso com> Subject: LAST COLUMN! NYT Digital Commerce: Is That All There Is? good morning! this is my last 'digital commerce' column for nyt. i've started a nonprofit foundation in support of the research community called 'the hybrid vigor institute," and i'll be devoting most of my time to it. i'll still be writing for the times -- most frequently for saturday's fantastic 'arts & ideas' section -- but for the moment, at least, i am turning my daily focus away from the internet economy. this is something of an auspicious moment for me, after all these years writing about the inner workings of the technology industry. for the past few months, as i've been contemplating these changes, i've been thinking about how i wanted to mark the event and give something back to the community. so i decided to archive 17-plus years of writing and speechifying and put it on the web, which i did with the help of a couple of great web designers in san francisco (nathan shedroff and mark meadows). et voila: http://www.caruso.com i hope it will be a useful resource, especially for people who may not be aware that some of the big issues -- both technological and social -- have been thought about and discussed for a long time. we got the site up and running in less than a week, basically. so i hope it doesn't break and if it does, 'pardon our dust,' as they say in the construction biz. the beta 'hybrid vigor' website is linked to caruso.com as well -- it's still on a staging server, so don't bookmark the url. but DO send me email and tell me what you think -- and tell me you want to get involved, or know someone who's perfect, etc. thank you for your support of my work; i hope you'll stick around for the next installment. leaving the column was an incredibly difficult decision, but i think the timing is right. best, denise March 27, 2000 DIGITAL COMMERCE Technology Has Made Some People Money, but Is That All There Is? By DENISE CARUSO I once heard the technology pundit and historian Paul Saffo say, "Never mistake a clear view for a short distance" -- a witty caveat that surely must be the understatement of the digital age. It was a truth that struck close to the bone while I was preparing to write this, my last Digital Commerce column. (I'm starting a nonprofit research venture.) While browsing through my archives, more than 15 years' worth of articles and speeches and commentary for various publications and venues, I recalled the days when telling people that you wrote about technology was like dropping a stink bomb at a political rally. You could clear the place in 10 seconds flat. Then I came across the first piece I wrote that detailed the enormous challenge facing copyright law as digital media gained commercial ascendancy. The year was 1990. But only now is the battle fully engaged between copyright holders and citizens who demand their legal right to copy. The pieces I wrote describing the challenges of online privacy and censorship were even longer ago, in 1988. Never mistake a clear view for a short distance, indeed. Yet for all of technology's new exposure and celebrity, many executives and other industry experts are increasingly and deeply troubled by the turn the Internet industry, in particular, has taken. Technology and business strategists like John Doerr, the venture capitalist, who by this point has nearly the name-brand recognition of Coke, once saw in digital technology -- and particularly the Internet -- a universe of bankable ideas. It was a fertile breeding ground that could both change the world and make a ton of money. The result, as we have heard Doerr say so many times the last five years, has been the greatest legal creation of wealth in history. But in the past, investors knew that a company's successful public stock offering only signaled a promising start, not the final bell. A company that lasted was the real proof of their vision. Today, the only vision required to make zillions of dollars in the Internet economy is nearsightedness. The stock market remains so irrationally exuberant that almost every me-too dot-com company can pick up $10 million or so in venture funding and make a bundle either on a quick initial public offering or acquisition, with nary a glance toward long-term viability -- or long-term investors, for that matter. Nevertheless, the focus on money, money, money that we encounter daily in the Internet economy is almost impossible to discuss rationally in most quarters. Try telling someone hit by the money truck (or waiting to be) that the making of millions overnight does not justify the present means -- like poor business practices, rejection of even sensible government oversight and early profit-taking -- that leaves the dregs of dot-com reality for the public to deal with. Say that out loud and you, too, can live the experience of clearing a room in 10 seconds flat. But even to my somewhat jaundiced eye, it appears that something is shifting. Venture investors, the rocket fuel of the Internet economy, have started to question the path that so many Internet companies have taken -- despite the tremendous profit they make from the present state of affairs. In fact, at a recent conference, Doerr apologized to the assembled crowd for his "legal creation of wealth" remark, saying that he never expected everyone to focus on the money, to the exclusion of creating substantial businesses. He credits some of his new perspective to a book he has been brandishing in public the last couple of months. "The Monk and the Riddle: The Education of a Silicon Valley Entrepreneur" (Harvard Business School Press, 2000) was written by Randy Komisar, a longtime player in Silicon Valley. Komisar, in fact, has seen the game from nearly every angle -- lawyer, co-founder of the Claris Corp., chief executive of LucasArts Entertainment and Crystal Dynamics -- and has been increasingly dismayed by the focus on the getting of money at any personal cost. His book is a "stop the madness" cry from someone who has not only seen how the sausage is made, but has stuffed a few casings himself. "We're moving toward the toxic extreme of capitalism," Komisar said in an interview last week. Capitalism works better than any other market structure that has been devised, he added, because it harnesses man's "absolute base instincts -- greed and aggression." But a focus on money, to the exclusion of substance and human relationships, he said, will ultimately fail, perhaps spectacularly. Indeed, it is becoming increasingly apparent that the "digital divide," which lately has been given a lot of lip service but not much else, does not involve only the issue of which people have computers and which people do not. It also has to do with the attitude of those who hit the jackpot in our new casino economy and who are completely comfortable with pressing their advantage -- behaving with staggering hubris because they believe that merely having money entitles them to do so. "In the 60s it was all about 'wait until the revolution comes,'" Komisar said. "Well, guess what? If you take your billions and flaunt them in front of people who don't have enough to eat, ultimately you will get your revolution. You can't keep that toxic edge. It's not sustainable." Others are also planting flags for common sense and ethics. Another book, "The Cluetrain Manifesto," (Perseus Books, 2000) makes the case, as does Komisar's work, that Internet companies that ignore the people behind the computers are going to fail. The manifesto, which states unequivocally that the Internet changes the way people interact with businesses, profoundly and forever, has become a best seller. Doc Searls, a longtime marketing executive who is one of the manifesto's four authors, sees such a positive response as a source of hope. The change, he says, is in the balance of power -- from supply to demand, from the institution to the consumer -- and some investors are now starting to get the message. "The people in the crumbling ivory towers of old Fort Business are missing the fact that the real action in the marketplace consists of conversations that people are interested in," Searls says. Ultimately, companies will be successful to the degree that they open up to their customers and unsuccessful to the degree that they close down. "You either contribute or you don't," he adds. "That's how conversations work." For the last couple of months, Doerr, the venture capitalist, has been redefining success from an even broader perspective. In public forums, he has been encouraging a shift in focus from "mercenary" to "missionary," asking executives to think about starting companies and building products that they believe will change the world, rather than merely amassing wealth. This is not much of a choice: zealotry rarely serves anyone besides the zealots. But if the metaphor jump-starts people into thinking about their actions and motivations, the overstatement may be worth it. "I am seeing the first signs of consciousness," Komisar said. "People are engaging in the discussion" about learning to be human in the context of what they do for a living. "There's a bit more introspection, at least from a significant group of people who have already made it. They have gone through the process and found themselves wanting." Few have yet gone so far as to reorder their priorities, he said. "I'm not expecting a radical change in my lifetime, but we have to back off from the brink." - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 'By whom?' Dorothy Parker, when told she was outspoken Denise Caruso 415.695.0508 vox/fax http://www.caruso.com - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
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- IP: LAST COLUMN! NYT Digital Commerce: Is That All There Is? David Farber (Mar 31)