World of Ends

Doc Searls and David Weinberger have just published World of Ends. To quote Doc: “ _The idea is to help save dumb companies (and whole industries) from wasting their money and our time by failing to grok what the Net is fundamentally about._. And from the article: _We can end the tragedy of Repetitive Mistake Syndrome in our lifetimes — and save a few trillion dollars’ worth of dumb decisions — if we can just remember one simple fact: the Net is a world of ends. You’re at one end, and everybody and everything else are at the other ends._ Lots of people will argue that this is overly simplistic and hence, cannot be proved to be wrong. Sometimes it boils down to simple things though.

Some comments follow.

Ok, I will try to give some feedback here. The discussion might be interesting and it’s likely very important for wireless.

First of all, a lot of people might mistake this Internet for the WWW. This is not what this article is about. Still, I think, due to the way it is branded in the media, we might make that mistake, so let’s rule that out from the start.

Point 1 and 2, I am in full agreement. Then it starts to get a little scetchy. The internet is not stupid for one (point 3). It might be stupider than other things, but we know where packets are coming from. The telephone network doesn’t know either that I am Oliver, it’s just that the other end of the line might know that my number is Oliver. Same for the internet. If I had a fixed IP address, everybody could know that I am Oliver. The other side of the arguement might go that this is something that is added on top of the internet, so ok, might have to give in to that.

Point 4 is something I don’t really agree to. VoIP is a good idea, but these packets are more important due to their nature. If we agreed to the above statement, that things like Caller ID are something that it added on top of the network, then this too, is added on top. The value is only lowered if something else really will have a lower value. In case we use the current bandwidth, and suddenly say that 90% of it will be VoIP, then the rest will slow down and it will have lower value. But it’s added services that have lower value there, the system of sending packets arround is still the same. If we create additional bandwidth, the equation is different. It’s a system about 1+1=2 or 1+1 = 1 and “the Internet” doesn’t stick at 1. It’s growing. One might say that by now the Internet is a number of 13673903398. As long as we do not add value on top of routing packets arround, we have no value. Routing packets arround is an enabler for value.

The internet is no free market for innovation. Emm… no, in general it is, provided we thing bandwidth is free, but it isn’t. The internet is something new, hence a new field for new innovation.

I like the idea of point 6, and it’s essentially a good way to go.

The other points are good and I like point 10. What if I could put all my MP3s online and have you buy them from me, getting 10% of the revenue?