
The New New Economy: More Startups, Fewer Giants, Infinite Opportunity - peter123
http://www.wired.com/culture/culturereviews/magazine/17-06/nep_essay
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mbrubeck
Ironic headline, given that Wired was the major cheerleader of the last "New
Economy" during the 1990s dotcom bubble. They trumpeted technologies like
hydrogen power as the Next Big Thing in their original New Economy articles.
(Predictions are hard, especially about the future.)

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joecode
_As venture capitalist Paul Graham put it, "It turns out the rule 'large and
disciplined organizations win' needs to have a qualification appended: 'at
games that change slowly.' No one knew till change reached a sufficient
speed._

An interesting article, and no doubt a prediction that many of us in the
startup world would like to see come true, but the above quote was one of the
few pieces of actual support for its thesis. And it seems like most of the
economy does _not_ change quickly, and so for the most part, the claims appear
baseless.

Side musing: I wonder how Paul feels being referred to as a "venture
capitalist".

~~~
pchristensen
It took me a triple-take to tell they were talking about pg. The "venture
capitalist" tag obscured the name completely.

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jamesk2
It does not matter if you're huge or tiny. The ability to quickly anticipate
and react to unstoppable change is the key to success.

Microsoft is a giant but when threatened by tiny Netscape they moved mountains
to get their internet tech out there.

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aurora72
Great, but this time the states are getting bigger, aren't they? And also, we
see the news of "vertical integration" in the IT business, e.g. Oracle buying
Sun. What does the author have to say about them?

~~~
enki
a counterexample doesn't mean there's no trend.

it's a prediction, so i doubt he'll have hard data to back it up, but i think
the argument is pretty compelling: if transaction costs hinder smaller
companies in competing, but on the upside they have a competitive edge in
being able to adapt faster, then lower transaction costs will increase the
number of viable small companies, and decrease the relative viability of big
companies.

how far this trend will go is hard to say. what advantages of being big are
really sustainable?

~~~
aurora72
Oh no, I didn't mean to object the author's point of view, on the contrary I
agree. Thanks to the current technological level, it's definitely much easier
and less risky than ever for small companies to undertake businesses which
normally bigger companies are supposed to take. TV Broadcasting is an
immediate example here.

What I wanted to point was that there's a real and enormous effort by the
governments to keep those "big companies" going no matter how much it costs.
Apparently those big, unproductive and unsuccessful companies are being
rewarded.

I just wish the author had a thing or two to say about this irritating fact as
it concerns thousands of billions of dollars being spent to help those biggies
stay big a little more.

~~~
Kadin
Steady, predictable employment is the opiate of the masses in a way that
religion will never be. That's why there's so much political will to keep
those big companies going: they keep, or kept, a lot of people steadily
employed, and those employees vote.

I think it's entirely possible that an economy consisting of fewer giants and
more startups would have less overall unemployment and produce more real
wealth, but it would also require workers to give up any remaining idea of
lifetime employment and instead embrace careers as people in the IT field are
frequently used to them: a string of engagements with different companies,
hopefully helping you to develop personally and professionally.

It's not necessarily an easy sell; to a lot of people, it looks a lot more
risky and less certain than the jobs their fathers had at the steel mill or
the auto plant. To the extent that such jobs exist anymore, there's going to
be a lot of political pressure to keep them around at any cost.

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ahoyhere
Giant empires are great!

Oops, it rotted from within. Small countries are great!

Giant empires are great!

Oops, it tore itself apart by war. Small countries are great!

Giant empires are great!

Oops, we decided it was too much work and gave the other countries back. Small
countries are agile!

Ad nauseum...

