Collaborative Age | The Fourth Revolution Blog

How Artificial Intelligence is Already Influencing Our Genes

Artificial Intelligence is already reorganizing humans. The statement developed in this post ‘AI will reorganize the human population‘ by Silver Keskküla struck me. But “it is actually difficult to argue. Surely there are thousands of kids born to couples that found each other on internet dating sites and since often the matching algorithms on those sites are based on machine learning and artificial intelligence, then we effectively have AI involved in the matter of whose DNA gets mixed.”

And this is even when speaking only of “Weak AI” (“computational agents that exhibit problem solving abilities in restricted domains that we typically assume require intelligence“), not even of higher levels of artificial intelligence that we fear might maybe sometime try to overcome humankind.

Thinking about it, since our emotions are increasingly influenced by social networks, which are increasingly monitored and facilitated by Artifical Intelligence, AI does indeed progressively enter our lives, and even our intimate lives.

The rest of the post is a bit of an advert for the author’s new startup, but his idea to influence human migration by proposing easier comparison of different cities globally depending on one’s project is quite amazing.

In any case, let’s realize that AI is already influencing our lives probably more than we currently imagine, on a day-to-day basis.

Why Ever More Large Companies Will Collapse Suddenly

In the next years and decades we will witness more frequent events of collapse of organizations and companies which we thought were almost like institutions in the economic landscape.

Bank-Run — A bank run, the typical extreme event where a quasi-institution falls

That’s at least the view of Jeremy Rifkin in his interesting book ‘The Zero Marginal Cost Society‘. He quotes an economist of the XXth century, Oskar Lange, to have said: “The stability of the capitalist system is shaken by the alternation of attempts to stop economic progress in order to protect old investments and tremendous collapses when those attempts fail“. It was true in all times. Today more and more industries struggle to defend their position and their investments as the Fourth Revolution spreads. The more they are in oligopolistic or monopolistic situation, the longer they will resist – and the harder the fall will be. The larger and global they are, the more widespread the consequences will be.

As we move into the Collaborative Age in the next few years and decades we can expect some dramatic collapses to happen as many dominating organizations will resist until the end while their economic model will crumble.

Why We Need to Restore Productivity Through Collaboration

Productivity is the basis of wealth. Yet after decades of sustained growth in the Industrial Age, its growth has been progressively slowing down since the 1970s, and is almost plateauing today. This causes economic stagnation.

In a very interesting TED talk, Yves Morieux explains how this crisis is due to a change in the concept of efficiency – because value has shifted, due to the Fourth Revolution.

Yves Morieux explains that the traditional tenets of the corporation (clarity, measurement, accountability) are obsolete and have to be replaced by collaboration. “To cooperate is not a super effort, it is how you allocate your effort. It is to take a risk, because you sacrifice the ultimate protection granted by objectively measurable individual performance. It is to make a super difference in the performance of others, with whom we are compared”.

“Clarity, accountability, measurement were OK when the world was simpler. But business has become much more complex”. And thus the processes and effort around clarity, measurement and accountability and the innumerable processes around these issues have become a liability instead of an advantage.

Collaboration is the key to effectiveness in a complex world. Remove the rules around individual measurement and focus on getting the maximum out of collaboration!

Why We Should be Learners Rather Than Experts

“In times of change, the Learners will inherit the world while the Knowers will remain well-prepared for a world that no longer exists.” writes Eric Hoffer. Just right – and as we are now constantly in a time of change, this should apply universally.

‘Experts’ or ‘Knowers’ derive their views from an analysis of the past. Furthermore, in instances where the past is complex such as in history or economics, they add a layer of rationalization on these observations (such as correlations or implied causations).

The thing is, the future is not going to be a repeat of the past. And even more as time tends to accelerate. Even if is useful to study history to grab how random events create huge consequences, it can be disastrous to use this knowledge in the field of forecasting.

The observers, the ‘learners’, are those that will keep an open mind to new developments and will more quickly adapt. Be a Learner. Don’t seek to be a Knower.

How Sensor Devices Add Another Dimension to the Personal Data Sharing Conundrum

Since the start of the Collaborative Age most of us have been giving out personal data in exchange for free services (like Gmail or Facebook where it serves to generate “targeted” advertisement). It’s already a lot of personal data, but it might become much more soon: we are increasingly wearing personal sensors that generate a lot more intimate data (location, movement, biological data etc.) and the Internet of Things will generate still more data about our personal environment. Should we continue to share it in exchange for more and more (annoying) targeted advertisement with the risk to really see our intimacy compromised or should we put a stop to this trend? Or are we happy to continue to fund free services with our personal data?

It is a real debate that is unfolding under our eyes at the moment. Cory Doctorow who is clearly on the side of the defense of personal data, proposes in a recent column ‘What If People Were Sensors, Not Things to be Sensed?‘ to change the logic: let the world produce offers and let us choose and filter without giving out our data. Large internet conglomerates on the other hand, defend their interest to have our data (while pledging for confidentiality and anonymity). And when Microsoft when installing Windows 10 asks a lot of questions of what we accept about data sharing, it seems scary but well, at least they are asking for authorization… while others don’t!

It is a narrow edge that the internet giants are treading at the moment. Their business model is at stake. Give the consumer the impression that they know too much about their intimacy and they risk a backslash; allow too strict personal data laws to pass and their revenues will disappear. And at the end of this conundrum, the choice is ours, as it will shape the Collaborative Age to come.

Why are we working the more the higher in the organization? The work-time paradox

Today, the higher people are in organizations, and the higher paid they are, the more they are expected to work. That is very much the opposite of the situation one century ago: it was rather the lower classes that had to work long hours to gain a meager living while the upper classes took advantage of a life of leisure. And in the meantime, productivity gains should have rather diminished the average work time, while automation should have reduced human effort.

overworked — Overworked in the bureaucracy?

Why this paradox? Is it representative of a societal shift? Where will it stop (when one hears for example about young interns in banks dying from overwork !?)?

The New-Yorker published an interesting column on this topic ‘You Really Don’t Need To Work So Much‘ following some recent controversies about work conditions in Collaborative Age companies such as Amazon.

The column I find does not give convincing explanations of the paradox. Some arguments are probably valid (such as ‘If you’re busy you seem important’ and the fact that the modern large organization does create a lot of occupation that diminishes dramatically the efficiency, not to mention the effectiveness). One can think also about the fact that the current organizational structures are not designed to tackle the increasing complexity of the world, and this creates huge work to try to catch up the increasing gap. And yes, it is probably possible to be as effective and putting less hours at work, removing some bureaucracy.

It seems to me that the fact that the higher one is in an organization, the more he/she has to work is a remnant of the pyramidal organization of the industrial age. This should disappear progressively with the Collaborative Age. However the increase of inequality counteracts this movement as many people have to work more to earn what they expect. And freelance people end up working more than employees in general, because they also need to do marketing and administration tasks they can’t easily delegate.

Please comment if you have a good explanation for this paradox and your views on its evolution!

How to Benefit of Reality Distortion Fields While Avoiding Total Disconnect

Reality Distortion Fields are essential for visionary leaders like Steve Jobs, but they can also be dangerous if too strong – reality often catches up rather quickly when ignored for too long. This is in particular the case for distortions of time (the most common maybe).

There is thus a fine balance to be maintained so as to allow visionary jump forward while at the same time, retaining sufficient connection with reality.

It is very possible to keep a moderate reality distortion field, which most people do even if unaware, and sufficient realism too. The issue is when the distortion strength becomes significant.

It is then easier to have this balance maintained by a team rather by a single individual. The visionary leader with his distorted vision of reality must then be paired with a down-to-earth realistic counterpart, and sufficient trust must exist between those individuals, which must rely on mutual respect. Sometimes leaders themselves must try to maintain this balance, but this often leads to unease and sometimes to accidents.

Strong reality distortion fields are essential for creativity and for leaps forward. They need to be managed and counterbalanced for a healthy progression.

When Will We Have Health Warnings on Social Networks?

Social networks create significant disruption in our lives. Some people get addicted and they indirectly generate accidents when people can’t help looking at their friend’s latest posts while driving or walking…

So, when will we have health warnings on social networks like on cigarettes?

Joke apart, this may happen sooner than you think!

How Creators and Artists still Thrive in the Collaborative Age

With the Fourth Revolution came the collapse of creative industries such as the music industry, the publishing industry etc. It is relevant to ask what became of the artists and creators. Were they also destroyed by the tsunami? In an excellent piece ‘The Creative Apocalypse That Wasn’t‘, the New York Times Magazine gives a clear answer: no, actually the artists are rather thriving. It is the industry around them that crumbled.

Focus the value on the artist, not the industry around him

The entire business model of creativity has been put on its head. The collapse was incredible: “The global music industry peaked just before Napster’s debut, during the heyday of CD sales, when it reaped what would amount today to almost $60 billion in revenue. Now the industry worldwide reports roughly $15 billion in revenue from recorded music, a financial Armageddon even if you consider that CDs are much more expensive to produce and distribute than digital tracks.”

Obviously, recordings don’t sell so well any more and their value has decreased. To compensate, live shows are an increasing part of the value creation, and their price has increased tremendously (“In 1999, when Britney Spears ruled the airwaves, the music business took in around $10 billion in live-music revenue internationally; in 2014, live music generated almost $30 billion in revenue“). And, in general, there are more professional musicians now than before, which shows that one way or the other, they get a share of the remaining value.

I definitely concur with the conclusion of the article: “I suspect the profound change lies at the boundaries of professionalism. It has never been easier to start making money from creative work, for your passion to undertake that critical leap from pure hobby to part-time income source. […] From the consumer’s perspective, blurring the boundaries has an obvious benefit: It widens the pool of potential talent. But it also has an important social merit. Widening the pool means that more people are earning income by doing what they love.”

Overall the Collaborative Age encourages expression and creates value and income for creators. The border between full-time and part-time professional is just blurring like in many other occupations.

How Social Ratings Determine Our Choices

In a well-known but scary experiment on the music market, Duncan Watts and a team of Princeton researchers showed in 2006 that the popularity of songs was only very partially related to their appeal and quality – most of it is influenced by our peers’ rating.

In this experiment, people were either able to see or not the ratings from others. This created very significant differences in behavior. When rating was present, there was a big “luck premium”: whoever had some good ratings first would emerge as the uncontested winner at the end.

Hence, funny articles such as ‘Is Justin Timberlake a Product of Cumulative Advantage?‘. As mentioned in this paper, “The reason is that when people tend to like what other people like, differences in popularity are subject to what is called “cumulative advantage,” or the “rich get richer” effect. This means that if one object happens to be slightly more popular than another at just the right point, it will tend to become more popular still. As a result, even tiny, random fluctuations can blow up, generating potentially enormous long-run differences among even indistinguishable competitors — a phenomenon that is similar in some ways to the famous “butterfly effect” from chaos theory.” We come back to one of the main characteristics of the Collaborative Age.

There is no way to predict the popularity of your creation. But early support and excellent ratings from your tribe might be a good place to start!

Why Creating a Startup is About Building a Different Future

“Positively defined, a startup is the largest group of people you can convince of a plan to build a different future” writes Peter Thiel in ‘Zero to One: Notes on Start Ups, or How to Build the Future‘.

early-google-employees — Early Google Employees

This vision of a different future may be more or less ambitious, and intend to touch more or less people in the world. It might be within a small specialized niche or intend to take the world by storm. However, any real startup will be built on the premise of bringing a change to the world.

Actually this criterion might be an excellent differentiator between real startups and new companies that only intend to milk a situation.

Peter Thiel continues along the same trend of thought: “A new company’s most important strength is new thinking: even more important than nimbleness, small size affords space to think”

In my experience, the quick iterations around product, marketing, and business model do mobilize a significant dose of mental power and unending discussions. And indeed, the need to create value in a commercial startup (get revenue before funding is exhausted) is a great incentive to create something that will change the world somehow.

If you want to build a different future in a context where you’ll really mobilize your thinking, creating a startup is the way to go.

How the Rise of Ad-Blocking Software Questions Internet’s Business Model

Most of large internet companies are funded by advertising, such as Google and Facebook. In exchange for the provision of some free services (of high value to us, but highly scalable), they use the data collected to target advertisement, with the expectation to increase the advertisement click-through rate hence their revenues.

Adblock software is a response to this, as it blocks ads from showing up on pages. It definitely improves performance. The most successful of these software originated in Germany, which has a fierce data protection approach shaped by a reaction to the years of internal state-spying in East Germany.

While these software remained marginal they were a limited threat. But it tends to grow exponentially, reaching 40% of the users in Germany! (see ‘Ad Blocks’ Doomsday Scenarios‘ by Frederic Filloux) Now it appears that Apple has included one of such software natively in their latest browser (see ‘What the Adblocker debate reveals‘) and that might change significantly the industry. Of course it is a nice strategic coup from Apple to weaken Google, as Apple does not depend on advertisement as a primary source of income. But it nevertheless poses a great threat to much of the internet industry, as the advertising community does not seem to have done anything against it yet.

The balance between intimacy, the usefulness of targeted ads and the economy of internet is still not settled. The next few months will be quite interesting to monitor as it might be that a few cards will get redistributed in the industry!

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