Standards for expertise have been severely reduced and the Internet, with its most recent child, Social Networks, have done wonders to spread knowledge and popularize the conceptual understanding of several industries that rely heavily in this medium. Furthermore the sheer act of “massification” has distributed information previously digested and processed by more trained experts in relatively new fields which has everyone else thinking that that simplified analysis of how systems work is functionally operational and true .

What’s worse in fact is that this lack of general vision or pragmatic honesty did not only not lead to experts but people who think they are.

Poor performers tend to grossly overestimate their knowledge and performance and even further research has proven that after little to no training (which results in no proved improvement) the same people will even more vehemently defend an outstanding illusion of performance.

It’s a shame that this “digital age” has expanded this concept to an annoying extreme and that so few make an effort when assessing and following some “social media virtuosos”.

If you’d like to buy and read the full research click here.

With 600 million Facebook users, 6 billion people in the world and around 200 that will read this post do you know how to interpret what that actually means?

Have you ever seen 1 million little tiny human beings together?

Of course not.

So today I wonder, what is it, that these microconnections (macro actually), momentary lapses of socialization or interaction really become when you don’t have a real grasp of your reach and the potential audience out there? Light years where put in place to explain, in simpler terms, distances absolutely incomprehensible to men.

What’s 40 million miles or 400 million miles?
It’s fucking far away.

Does arguing that 10 million is greater 600 million makes a difference when trying to understand?
Hell no.

Mistakes made, mistakes won

Unlike most businesses the digital renaissance after the first bubble burst made it very clear that profit for profit’s sake was not the ideal market model for a system as distributed and open as the internet was thought to be (is thought to be). Human beings, being the extremes animal we are, decided to go the exact opposite way and generate businesses that foster communities in value not only with users but with other developers who add and change platforms and systems for better by direct third party affection. But as with any corporate cycle companies who are born out of inherent good, whether it is a soft drink or a micro-blogging service, the idea is to fix something that’s broken, tap a new market or advance technology that will make users be healthier.

An incredibly complex system is put in motion once the idea becomes a profit driven business. Once the idea needs to necessarily engage in monetization all the core values that had driven development usually take heed as the whole point of the company is to make enough money to keep the dream machine running. We work, we build, we expect to make enough out of our users/consumers to get better, grow and sell more. It’s not an evil circle but a rather virtuous and collaborative effort to make the bits and pieces connect to create something. At the core of any business remains the first engaged motion that drove an idea into gestation and execution of a product or service, after that it’s an organism which can be directed but depends solely on third parties to exist. I guess you could equate this process to the actual birth of a human being if you so wanted.

The Dream

Going back to our issue, APIs are part of the intrinsic development of web based applications and other that require a cross referenced data set in order to properly function and deliver. APIs are the expression of that notion that collaboration needs to exist in order to guarantee survival and growth. A third party observer would argue that they are symbiotic relationships, very much like Twitter with developers everywhere that user their platform to build on. Both companies grow, everyone’s happy.

The only issue behind collaboration is the same basic logical defeat that releases most communist hardliners from any reason, individuals/companies are eager to own more, to grow more, be better and efficient. Nobody enjoys living by an imposed set of rules, much less if it’s your back yard and you are the one that actually built the house. Setting rules in your own house is simple because the general notion of structure is pretty straightforward, this is my property, these are my things.With my remote I change the channel so that I can see whatever I want to see. This also brings with it rules of acceptable social behavior, such as respect and value for your guest.

There’s a reason why you let your guest in.

The House Within the Dream

The Internet does not carry the same set of rules and it is widely regarded as a more despotic kingdom than the offline world. Physical rules apply to the offline world where you can react in a number of ways to a certain omission of previously agreed on rules. Twitter, as many a houses online, does not understand or sees itself as a house. It stands today as the gatekeeper to those who wish to enter their realm as guests, because that is what we are. Platforms are “free”, and “free” comes with its own set of rules, Facebook and Twitter make a habit of making this clear with changes that meet resistance whether in design, application or terms. This puts us at fault and should force us to take a deep hard look into the mirror and ask: Have we reached the lowest point, the lowest of lows, where the rules imposed blur into our own?

Quite possibly the complete disregard for an ecosystem will have some backlash, alas it will not be significant in any way. There are literally thousands of developers ready to help social media beasts make more money and willing to take their share of the profits even if they are low.

Waking up

Companies are (usually) born good, they become evil when they realize profits is what they need to get that idea to more people only to understand that any successful business needs a balance. It takes time, after experiencing witnessing the bubble from the outside looking in, being inside the bubble and attempting to poke it I can honestly say…VCs, angel investors, seed investors and users are tired of the next big thing. There will be no next Twitter, or Facebook killer. Developers are tired of fighting money.

The age of profitability where those who survive are those who have learned how to make money with what little they have is here. The conditions are set, the systems are in place for distributed funding and “monetization” is what will carry you to the tech afterlife.

Hey, by the way, how did South by Southwest go this year?

The dream is dead. It’s time to wake up and smell the markets.

He who said this when.

The word culture has a Latin root which puts it alongside “cultus” that means “to cultivate”.

To aggregate, add, change and subtract for that is the basis and genesis of cultural divergence. Let’s do more of this, less of that.

Enough has been said about how these structures need to engage in a transverse conversion of their current disposition, meaning that all areas of any given company need to start interfacing in a way in which synergy is no longer an objective but an actual fact of daily life. This extends to most aspects of corporate life, particularly that which involved communication with the outside world and even the flow of internal information. Long gone are the days where people found out about CSO outreach programs or volunteering opportunities through banners posted around any given office. All hail the power of email which very few read and most discard.

Basically, communication has come to having the specific purpose of engaging to promote understanding. Someone who doesn’t read or acknowledge will not be able to even give themselves a chance to understand or be informed about whatever is going on around him. The basic principle of “if I don’t see it it doesn’t exist” applies to all. This is to me the most interesting aspect of fostering a distributed corporate voice where you stop thinking about a spokesperson that is functional to the company as a whole but actually tapping employees that look for opportunities in their own fields in which they are, in all honestly, usually more experienced than most communications experts.

This distributed approach, often referred to as Social Business, does not only affect the sheer reach of any given message but also ensures they go out properly in the hands of people who will do their utmost to get it out there, to get people to interact, understand and act upon said message. Engaging for engagement’s sake usually turns out very poorly as the flow of information is tampered with and usually responds to the interest of external groups that may not reflect the ones of the people crafting and curating the massive feeds. Death by information is real and having gatekeepers that control the flow, because that’s the need (or so most companies think so), creates a bottleneck that is very hard/expensive to put up with.

That’s modern social media strategy for you: “set up a limited amount of outlets to control the flow of information, respond to feedback, report on results.” Rinse and repeat.

But social media experts are still being slapped in the face with major crisis every single day that jeopardize every single one of these outlets on an individual basis but do VERY LITTLE to actually gauge the information that surrounds any organization. A distributed approach like the ones offered by horizontal organizations (I’m not talking about not having bosses or people answer to you, don’t get your panties in a twist) in which all and every employee is in charge, alas of a small part, of what the company displays, hides or wishes to promote thoroughly helps create a gigantic catch all rule and crowdsource their own work and daily life. Putting this to practice is tough, it requires a mindset battle of epic proportions as we fight with paradigms that have existed since the beginning of organized labor and fostered in part by the industrial revolution and specialization.

We’re a one trick pony, who can talk and walk at the same time. How about that?

Good friend, boss and generally awesome guy Michael Brito just finished writing a book that deals with real world examples of this and other aspects of re-organization of any business that is inclined to change for the better and put the work back into the company. Examples of how to actually enforce models in social organizations are rare and usually deal with an intense amount of theoretical analysis and speculation as results are usually…yet to be proven. “Smart Business, Social Business“ is a social business book built upon the work of Michael’s experience and will be out soon but you can sign up to win a free copy which by all means is a good idea. Free book? Great Subject? Sign me up!

Laura

Did you know that, as a direct result of governmental lobbying by companies like Disney, the length of copyright terms in the US has been extended more than most other countries – to over 70 years after the copyright owner’s death? It’s going to be a lot harder to innovate or build on derivative works if the public domain runs dry.

(Editors Note: Laura is referring to the US Copyright Act of 1976 and its subsequent Copyright Term Extension Act of 1998)

Santiago

The single most interest fact about copyright (to me obviously) is that it no longer exists as we understand it and we’re not even responsible for its death. Copyright law was instituted as a way of promoting innovation through the re-purposing of information not as a blockade for its use.

Years and greed have translated into a sort of roadblock for knowledge and transfer which would be broken on occasion by the written word and spoken transmissions (when private, like if I chose to sang a song) – not because it was legal, but because there was no way of enforcing it.

The 20th century converged into a wonderfully paradoxical environment where laws tightened their grip, special interest groups worked out necessary filters and caveats while the general public re-purposed an otherwise educational tool for mischief. Thus the Internet was born, the same microorganism evolved by sheer human ingenuity and need.

Record labels and movie studios, publishers and lawyers collaborated only against themselves to create a more sophisticated virtually unstoppable system by their own word! They cannot enforce copyright where they have no claims, like…outside the US. How can you stop movies from being downloaded if they refuse to release it in some markets?

The question to end all questions, to bring a halt to all discussion regarding ownership then translates into: is ownership transferal something real or made so real, very much like time, by people itself?

Can I be trusted to hold on to this idea, this written word, if it is the hand that feeds me, on behalf of someone else? Am I allowed to profit? For how long?
But most importantly…why?

Laura

You framed it quite well – “ownership” is a construct – and the transferal of ownership respects business ideals over societal. I think the issue of trust and profit will always vary circumstantially, but to answer why we have this desire to ‘own’ …. I mean, it’s gotta be instinctual. Ownership gives the owner a sense of approval and ‘success’ – the contribution they have given society has thusly ‘given’ meaning to themselves.

Santiago

Is property ownership/intellectual copyright a personal matter? The way I understand it, most of the things that happen around us are sub-products of third party perceptions. Ownership is definitively one of those things, we own because others recognize our right and property in a way which will allow us to retain control and command over a certain piece of information/land/song or whatever we’re trying to enforce.

Laura

I think property ownership/intellectual copyright is only a personal matter when you’re not legally bound or obligated to a corporation or institution.  part of your alignment with a corporation or institution means that what you create under their ‘supervision’ is legally their domain. But this gets into intellectual property rights – which in and of itself is a whole other beast. (for the record – i think the idea that a company owns what i create for them sucks. But i also believe that a completely de-copyrighted system doesn’t make a whole lot of sense either. People like Larry Lessig are really trying to champion this though- did you ever read Free Culture?)

Yes, I understand your contention – what happens when your ownership isn’t acknowledged, or it’s even outright ignored? The short answer – not much. You can *maybe* go to court if you can make a case, which in most cases probably isn’t worth anyone’s time or money.

If you’re thinking a bit more existentially here, and are referring to “third parties” in less of a institutional way – and instead pragmatic – I don’t think we own because we seek outward personal acknowledgment. I think that’s a by-product – the by-product that’s perpetuated by the years of greed you mentioned in your previous note.

Enforcing ownership rights on a society that fundamentally couldn’t care less? It’s always going to be a losing battle. Because the system is fundamentally not fair to “people”? Because we live in a disposable world? not sure… what do you think?

Santiago

Well who defines the system then? It is my very basic understanding of institutions that are defined by the people that construct them into culture. We accept chairs are chairs because we do. But what was the wheel before someone discovered the shape could be useful? Copyright law and the principle of ownership exist because we’re hell bent in upholding ridiculous statutes that argue that what’s mine is mine and what’s yours is yours simply because we have that need for control. In any other way boundaries would be shaded to a darker shade of grey which could put homeless people sleeping in your bed. Copyright law is a mere reflection of ownership as a principle, the earned is mine not yours. I wrote this therefore I am entitled to profit from it.

Lessig, a lawyer and has a general belief that everything should be shared – “care for some of my apple Mr. Lessig?” – and he promotes the Utopian openness which could never be achieved because we, human beings are greedy motherfuckers. That’s why socialism collapsed, people want more TVs earned from their hard labor, not share 4 TVs but this is a larger conversation about socio-economic theory and history, not the point.

Back to the convo.
I think society is inclined to go for the lesser financial strain. They care about copyright law as long as it doesn’t mess with their wallets, see: artists, writers, musicians and actors who sue BitTorrent users. Quality may suffer in a more open society but I don’t see why the two models can’t co-exist, the freedom to pay whatever the hell you want is still freedom right?

People should patron the arts, software developers and movie studios if the material is worth it. Yes, A LOT of people won’t. But does that offset costs? Reasonably? Probably so.
Thoughts?

Laura

Can ownership and financial gain ever be mutually exclusive?

Santiago

No. Good talk.

Tom Osenton author of “The Death of Demand” explains it best:

Every successful innovation enjoys two major trends during its life: a period of ever-increasing rate of growth followed by a period of ever-decreasing rate of growth. The point at which an uptrend turns into a downtrend  is known as innovation saturation. Inventive marketing initiatives and non-organic growth strategies, such as acquisitions or retail expansion, can temporarily slow the declining rate of growth. However, over the long term, once the downtrend starts, it cannot be reversed.

Incredibly so, innovation saturation is currently being introduced now faster than ever. Markets get populated and overcrowded extremely fast due to the outstanding propagation of information, both in speed and sheer size which is to say the least, overwhelming. The so called “tablet wars” are the perfect example, Apple introduces innovation, competitors struggle to follow and suddenly the market is overcrowded by speculators. Modern economy is filled with pre-orders and post-payments, the truth behind it is that new and more evolved markets are born, boom and fail in extremely short periods of time, because the first two stages are driven by information now, not by purchase or even intent of.

Advertising, media and PR have short circuited the market’s natural evolutionary process and we’re stuck with half a wheel that no matter how hard won’t move forward forcing us to jump into new markets.

It lies within their strategy to ensure the survival of the previous methods and thus retain employment that we never fully understand the importance, or lack thereof of the current system. Individual thought is deprived of the collective hive mind and is usually not ready to accept that one may overcome the other while absolutely destroying the notion that this interconnection is not the answer, neither the solution, to their lack of creative drive.

Here I reached my first standstill, influence as perceived is very shallow and if I was to understand and properly write about how it affects the whole of society, or its individuals, I would have to dig a little deeper. The massive impulses we receive from media from which we derive our very understanding of influence is very narrow as it is only understood with a specific purpose, driving intent of purchase. Securing said purchase and actually measure it effectively are another discussion. As applied this type of influence, consumer driven is what is regularly and widely regarded as the more general sense of influence.

If you were to go out on Twitter, say something and someone would reflect that statement with a different or expected action it would constitute this type of influence.

We have a very narrow understanding of what influences us yet we think we understand and control what ultimately does.

Oddly enough it is within these boundaries that we can escalate levels of influence, as if this purchase, change of heart or new and skewed vision of a particular subject has a more profound effect in the person we are and what we do. Every single action in human interaction is consequential as it is cutting down a tree or demolishing a building. Noticing that change might take from a nanosecond to forever. That is the basis of what we perceive as influence, we don’t and thus it affects and controls us.

The sudden rush of digital media, not social because all media is social at some degree, which allowed for shared and collaborative feedback and opinion sparked a new and strange networked connection. We’re no longer in control of the source of affection as often as we’d like. The internet is basically a gigantic street sign were we read aimlessly while actually looking for a specific tidbit of information. It is mostly distracting and renders our capability obsolete, that is why Clay Shirky’s theory of Cognitive Surplus is null and void.

We’re not here to be productive yet we require some degree of consciousness to function. Information and its influence provide us with specific guidance.

We perceive when someone says: “Pick up that up” yet we fail to assign a significant degree of analysis to the statement. This is how little we care about what’s being force fed and we’re force feeding the world around us. Massive amounts of information are toxic as long as we don’t generate proper immune systems for them and turn the newly found time to be productive.

Going back to the first standstill then, we have such a narrow and annoying yet so self-important view of the subject as if nothing ever will happen to us but everyone else is subdued that we fail to see. We’re not only exactly the same but the more we think about it the less we know and can measure thus understand.

My second full stop struck me at the other end of influence, the emitter.

A few premises will help understand this analysis:

1. Emitters function as receivers of external influence as well.
2. They are subject to information overload at the same degree.
3. They are the object of an ostensive definition (the object will remain there regardless of the onlooker)

As the three premises state, influence cannot be exerted without receiving it too, thus suffering cognitive excess while being permanent regardless of the execution. Having said that it is time we acknowledge we are all on both sides of this quarrel, by merely existing we influence and are influenced.

We’re distracted long enough during the process of input/output of information that we do not execute consciously, it is what we do, no questions asked.

I would like to leave you with two underlying ideas.

Feedback media, social media, new media or whatever you would name it as long as you realize its true value has become a tremendous liability. We are seeking to understand a human exertion in which we participate heavily and actively. This is not an equation that social media will remove us from, but completely the opposite. It has dragged us dead in the middle of it and we’re only able to see what is presented bluntly to us in it.

Influence is beyond isolated individuals and the medium if these individuals become the medium.

Finally, and in the interest of exploring future opportunities I leave you with a quote taken from “Reassembling the social: An introduction to the Actor-Network-Theory” by Bruno Latour:

Macro no longer describes a wider or a larger site in which the micro would be embedded like some Russian Matryoshka doll, but another equally local, equally micro place, which is connected to many others through some medium transporting specific types of traces.

Influence has always been hand to hand, human to human combat, it has always been this way, it’s only more visible now.

They will never be apart, of travel far, thus they will never miss. They will live alongside their family and form their own hoping to make it as alike as their own. Truth be told I envy the lack of drive and inspiration, which is what usually keeps me up at night. It is that whimsical chemical thunderstorm in your brain that tells you that you’re missing a great deal, that it is not yet the time to sleep. And even though I’ve grown tired and weary of years of losing sleep I stumble through every single night.

I truly believe we are participated by absolute chance into this world and not playing an active role is neglecting everything including ourselves.

I only wish I had more time to sleep and stay awake than a single lifetime.