Category: Collaborative Age value production system

How Memes are Selfish

Since the inception of the concept by Richard Dawkins in 1976, memes behaviors have been considered analog to genes in their way of reproducing and evolving. This Gapingvoid post ‘the mean meme‘ reminds us that when one wants to design memes that spread, those need to have certain characteristics. And that memes are selfish: they can spread whether they are useful or harmful.

According to Wikipedia a meme is “an idea, behavior, or style that spreads by means of imitation from person to person within a culture and often carries symbolic meaning representing a particular phenomenon or theme.”

The Gapingvoid post reminds us that “Memes, like genes, are designed to be spread. Which means they must take on characteristics most likely to ensure spreading. There is art and science to how this is done.”

Luckily the art of creating a meme is not yet infallible although many people work daily on this (advertisement agencies or book writers, for example). There is a lot of psychology involved.

Memes are necessarily tainted by culture and education, and they also may need to evolve with our knowledge and understanding of the world.

The post also reminds us that “memes, like genes, are selfish. They don’t care about us.” Bad memes can also spread if they have the right characteristics, and it is up to us to be alert to keep them under control. And there are definitely also some specialists in creating harmful memes around.

We should probably try to be better at recognizing memes and their origin, and also better analyzing if they are useful or harmful. In any case this concept leads to some fruitful consideration of what our culture is made of.

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How the Debate is Open About the Nature and Future of Cryptocurrency

In this interesting post ‘‘Black Swan’ author Nassim Taleb says bitcoin is an open Ponzi scheme and a failed currency‘, an interesting question is expressed about the true nature of cryptocurrencies and their future.

Cryptocurrency are highly volatile, which is an issue as to their actual usage: “you don’t replace the currency with something that’s so volatile that you can’t really commit to a transaction in it.” There is no doubt either that there is currently a lot of speculation on those cryptocurrencies, and as it becomes an increasingly public speculation with many people of all ways of life attracted to the scheme, it is certainly much overpriced and there will be a lot of disappointments in the near future.

The decisive aspect however I believe is the fact that cryptocurrencies are intrinsically difficult to control by law-enforcement and hence widely used by organized crime. This seems to be changing, and recent recovery of bounties paid in bitcoins after some hacking events, as well as increasingly stringent tax authority control, shows that it becomes much less safe as a way to hold money. However, such cryptocurrencies are not acceptable by governments in the long run because they are potentially economically destabilizing, therefore I don’t believe this will be sustainable particularly if independent cryptocurrencies volumes increase. In addition the ecological impact of cryptocurrency mining has become evident, as its impact on the semi-conductor market: cryptocurrencies don’t scale beyond a certain size without difficulties.

All in all, while government-backed electronic currencies will certainly emerge in the future, I am much less optimistic about the scalability and acceptability of really independent cryptocurrencies, and I believe that the current fashion may not last long. We’ll see what the future holds!

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How Copyright Trolls Now Spread to Modern Creative Common Licenses

This excellent article ‘Beware the Copyleft Trolls‘ explains how certain organisations are now suing systematically material used under modern Creative Common licenses.

Creative Commons licenses are a new approach to copyrights that provide lighter protection and usage rights. They have developed with the development of collaborative approaches on the internet, where images, sounds and other resources are shared widely. They are not free-for-all licenses, however they do allow a lot of non-commercial usage of material.

Still, some organisations seem to sue abusively users of material under those licenses, as soon as some conditions are not strictly followed such as attribution etc.

“Verch’s scam is a profitable one. He posts stock photography he savvily generates to meet market demand, such as images of “face coverings, test tubes and people wearing masks” that he put on his website at the start of the COVID-19 outbreak in 2020. Then, he waits for someone to slip up on the CC-BY-2.0 attribution. And he pounces.”

This is the behavior of trolls (other exist in the field of patent law – see for example our older post ‘Patent trolls and the end of conventional intellectual property‘ ) and judges seem to be reluctant to follow suit, however this creates a lot of disturbances.

Another proof that even when one tries to develop a benevolent and collaborative approach, some trolls do try to take advantage of the situation. Therefore one should be careful however I am certain society and law will act to make sure this remains marginal and the general intent of collaboration remains.

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How Long Lasting Internet Memory Can Be

In this Wired article ‘I Called Off My Wedding. The Internet Will Never Forget‘ we get reminded how internet can maintain memories of past events (even if they did not really happen at the end). And how this will impact the choices provided today by internet services.

“Of the thousands of memories I have stored on my devices—and in the cloud now—most are cloudless reminders of happier times. But some are painful, and when algorithms surface these images, my sense of time and place becomes warped. It’s been especially pronounced this year, for obvious and overlapping reasons. In order to move forward in a pandemic, most of us were supposed to go almost nowhere. Time became shapeless. And that turned us into sitting ducks for technology.”

Facebook memories, or advertisements for stuff we consumed years ago (I still see on my screens adverts for camper vans in New Zealand where we vacationed years ago…) are reminders that internet does not forget anything. And through AI those memories may emerge in the weirdest ways.

On the opposite, curiously, everything which happened before the advent of social networks (2005-2010 approximatively) does not exist in Internet memory, which creates a substantial gap.

The only exit from this situation is to delete it all, but that may not even be possible. We have to live knowing that the internet has in memory everything we posted and wrote all those years – and that some may come back to haunt us one day.

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How to Deal with the Challenge of Regulating GAFA Algorithm Updates

Valeria Maltoni in her post ‘Social Media Bubbles‘ reminds us that “Social media algorithms determine what you see when you search and scroll the platforms. Not your friends.” Therefore, we at the mercy of an algorithm update. Hence the idea by some governments to regulate those updates.

We all know that Google or Facebook algorithm updates create substantial disruptions in the way search results or screen results are displayed, creating considerable dismay to all those that depend on this natural or paid advertising for their enterprise. It also funds a coterie of search gurus and naturally increases GAFA revenues as people finally end up paying to get better visibility.

The Australian government has been particularly at the forefront of trying to regulate the GAFA. “If the bill passes in one form or another, which seems likely, the digital platforms will have to give the media 14 days’ notice of deliberate algorithm changes that significantly affect their businesses. Even that, some critics argue, is not enough for Big Tech.”

It is interesting to recognize that this shows that GAFA are increasingly seen as a sort of public service with real-life implications on the life of people and companies. Of course this is a bit contradictory with the commercial nature of those companies.

This tension between public service and the nature of the GAFA as commercial enterprises will only increase in the coming years as we become increasingly dependent on their services.

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How We Get Closer to Having a Second Virtual World

In this post ‘Epic Games Raised $1 Billion to Fund Its Vision for Building the Metaverse’ I discovered that some companies are actively moving into creating that virtual second world of Ready Player One fame. Epic Games is one of the largest companies in the field of video games.

“In the context of Epic Games’ announcement, the metaverse will be not just a virtual world, but the virtual world—a digitized version of life where anyone can exist as an avatar or digital human and interact with others. It will be active even when people aren’t logged into it, and would link all previously-existing virtual worlds, like an internet for virtual reality.”

“The technology needed to build the metaverse is already available.” And many companies are heavily investing in virtual reality.

The article comes with a world of caution: like in the book and movie, we may be tempted to escape the real world into the Metaverse, and there will definitely be a challenge to find the right balance between virtual and real life.

Anyway, high quality virtual worlds are coming faster than we realize, and this will be a substantial disruption in our daily life.

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How The Origin of Wealth Has Changed in the Last Decades

In this interesting post ‘How People Get Rich Now‘ by Paul Graham, he makes the point that the origin of the fortune of the richest people has changed dramatically since the 1980s. Heirs and oil fortunes have been significantly displaced by entrepreneurs and financiers. I believe it is due to the shift to a new Age, the Collaborative Age.

“In 1982, 84% of the richest 100 people got rich by inheritance, extracting natural resources, or doing real estate deals.” “In 1982 the most common source of wealth was inheritance. Of the 100 richest people, 60 inherited from an ancestor. There were 10 du Pont heirs alone.” Today, “Roughly 3/4 [got rich] by starting companies and 1/4 by investing“. This makes a huge difference.

Looking at it with an even wider historical perspective one “1892 looks even more like today. Hugh Rockoff found that “many of the richest … gained their initial edge from the new technology of mass production.” That was a time of intense entrepreneurship with the Industrial Revolution, when railroads and factories were built generating huge changes.

It is where I beg to differ from Paul Graham interpretation about the future. It seems to me that the situation in the 1980s was due to a mature Industrial Age, driven by large corporations that exerted scale effects on mature technologies of the Industrial Age. With the technological revolution, we enter a new Age, the Collaborative Age, and like in the 1880s many new companies are blossoming up and new wealth is created accordingly. But in a few decades we may be in another mature Collaborative Age and maybe the richest people will remain the heirs to the Apple, Amazon and Facebook founders.

Nevertheless the statistics shared by Paul Graham show that we are in a period of Opportunity where value is created from new technology, upending the more traditional wealth ranking.

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How a New Economic Paradigm Emerges in the USA

The first days of the Biden presidency has raised a few eyebrows with some sweeping changes in the economic field. In this interesting article ‘Bidenomics, explained‘ an analysis is proposed around “creating a two-track economy – a dynamic, internationally competitive innovation sector, and a domestically focused engine of mass employment and distributed prosperity“.

In any case, all commentators agree that the Biden economic approach is singularly different from the liberal and deregulating approach applied since Reagan. A number of measures include funding family and child care, minimum wage substantial increase, and building and upgrading national infrastructure. This leads to supporting and developing a very national, non exportable economy, generating high level of employment while at the same time supporting a smaller export-orientated economy based on technology and knowledge.

The point being that “this [high technology] sector will generate a lot of productivity and a lot of export revenue, it is not going to employ most Americans. Instead, most Americans will work in less competitive, domestically focused sectors — selling houses to each other, pulling each other’s wisdom teeth, preparing each other’s food, bagging each other’s groceries, taking care of each other in their old age. That vast domestic sector will distribute the income generated by the highly competitive knowledge sectors“

It will be quite interesting to watch how this approach unfolds and whether a new equilibrium can be reached in terms of economic redistribution. In any case it is quite a logical approach to try to address major current issues in terms of globalization impact and increase of inequality.

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How to Overcome the Fear of Publishing

Leo Babauta in his post ‘The Fear of Putting Our Work Out There‘ expands on the fear of publishing which seems to concern most of us, and how to overcome it.

I must say first that this concerns only publishing things like art of a written text – anything which is an emotional investment – because it seems we don’t have much fear publishing (sometimes stupid) pictures ourselves on social networks, maybe because we believe that they will only be available to connections.

Anyway it is true that fear is present when we push publish to the world and I still vividly remember the first time I published a post back in October 2010!

“What’s so scary? […] They might judge us, dismiss it as having no value, think we’re stupid. We’ll feel embarrassed or rejected. This uncertainty is too much to bear for many people.” We need to face our fear, and the avoidance of this possibility that is prompted by our reasonable mind. However this clearly leads to procrastination. This also means you can’t develop your ability to improve over time the quality of your interaction with the world.

Let’s face it: not many people are going to read what you wrote, or look at what you produced. At least at the start it is probably going to be family and friends so don’t worry too much about it.

There will be negative feedback, jealousy and all sorts of negative crap. Don’t let it discourage you – the more you get, the more you are on the right way and you are touching a hot button. And you’ll also get those great encouragements and some day, someone will tell you that you changed their life.

Overcoming that fear of putting your art out in the world is if course a practice. I don’t think about it too much nowadays – I don’t really care, in fact, what people may think. The first time is the hardest time. Practice makes us better, and let’s not get deterred from publishing and getting feedback.

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How I Develop as Businessman

The trigger for this post is actually that I updated my LinkedIn profile with the names of the startups I have invested in as business angel, along with the 2 I am part of the strategic council (along with the 3 private companies I am active in with significant shares). Hence I felt the need for a follow-up and update from my 2015 post ‘How I Became a Businessman‘.

Since 2015 I have invested in quite a few new companies, some of them where I am busy, some where I am only an investor. I have also developed a business angel activity with more than a dozen investments. I realize how much I am continuing to develop as a businessman along this journey, and how this changes my perspective on things.

My latest post ‘How Being an Angel Investor Requires Developing Some Personal Rules‘ is part of this reflection on my evolution. I realize, as I have witnessed and lived through some tough difficulties in some companies, and sometimes utter failures, come across crisis like the Covid crisis, how my responses to those events have become more adapted and reflective. I also realize that I think more in terms of value created in the mid and lon-term than in terms of immediate income. And I start thinking about creating synergies about companies and how projects can be developed combining expertise and dynamics.

The perspective on the world offered by the viewpoint of the businessman-investor is quite different from the traditional employee perspective. It gives me hope though as we see a generation of entrepreneurs emerging that attempt projects.

Still my conclusion is that the priority is still the people and that nothing beats relevant teams being put together to support projects. And that this is what needs to be protected and enhanced, in particular when times get tough.

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How Being an Angel Investor Requires Developing Some Personal Rules

I am a modest angel investor, still with more than a dozen investments in the past 5 years, and also an active member of a business angel association. Therefore I am always keen to read about the practice and possible alternative paths. In this excellent post ‘A Weird and Wacky Approach To Angel Investing‘, Darmesh Shah reveals an interesting approach with some useful learning points.

Of course Dharmesh Shah is a very rich entrepreneur and therefore Angel Investor, (and write checks much bigger than the ones I can afford), still I find that his approach has got nice points to it. Basically he seeks to minimize time spent, and therefore:

  • He performs absolutely no due diligence but relies on a judgment on the team
  • He does not negotiate deal terms or gets involved in negotiations
  • He does not invest in later rounds as a matter of principle
  • He always sides on the side of the founders
  • He keeps his investments separate from his main company and role

And this seems to have worked for him in his specific conditions, including in terms of returns on investment.

On some aspects I believe he is quite right – there is no way you can do due diligence on an early stage startup apart from judging the team, and it is always better to stick to the side of the founders and the general objectives of the company. However I tend to personally get more involved in a handful of investments, out of interest or friendship, and I do sometimes participate to bridge rounds (however, never to later rounds as the interest as a business angel then gets quite diluted in terms of possible returns).

In general, I observe that becoming a more frequent business angel one has to develop some rules to minimise time spent and I am currently in this process too.

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How Some Companies Now Declare the Conventional Work Week Dead

This article ‘Salesforce declares the 9-to-5 workday dead, will let some employees work remotely from now on‘ sets the scene for some transformation of the work environment in the wake of the Covid crisis (this was as a reaction to a Salesforce post itself ‘Creating a Best Workplace from Anywhere, for Everyone‘).

The idea is that while most employees will still be encouraged to drop by the office 1 to 3 days per week, they will be given far more flexibility in their work hours and conditions than previously. Some will even be allowed to work fully remotely. “An immersive workspace is no longer limited to a desk in our Towers; the 9-to-5 workday is dead; and the employee experience is about more than ping-pong tables and snacks“

Fully office-based employees are now expected to be only a very small percentage of the workforce and even for them, more flexible workhours may well be the norm.

As I have often said in this blog, crisis do accelerate changes and this is definitely one that is due to happen, in particular as we work increasingly globally through videoconference and across time-zones.

The way we relate to our work, how much time it takes in our day, where and when we work, is due a complete overhaul. The 9 to 5 arrangement of the Industrial Age is now obsolete.

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