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Nodes in the Network
network-vs-node----sxsw-2010_1 Sorry - that IS what you are. I have had this lurking in my mind for a long time now.
This ?
‘This’ is the idea that the points in life, the data, the people, the stuff, the things, are actually all irrelevant. It is the connectedness.
In fact - as long as I have been in business I keep hearing (and repeating) the phrase - how do you ‘monetize the network’ ?
And remember that old line from Stanford University Network (sic) - ‘The Network is the Computer.’ ? How about “.. it’s not what you know - it’s who you know”. Let’s not forget that the second oldest profession in the world is ‘The Middleman’ - who live and die (see Layer Cake) by their connections.
In other words, the world’s ‘corpus of knowledge’ has known about networks for sometime - but only recently has it started to come together in a clear way. Until now - it has been all about the stuff - not the connections between the stuff. But now, as the drivers of Social Media take hold, the giant is waking up - and we discover it IS the network.
Even this new fangled concept ‘Big Data’ keeps us firmly in the mindset of managing ‘stuff’. But I think it is wrongly named. The hidden power of Big Data and The Social Graph is that we are beginning to understand the relationships, the connectedness. the dependencies BETWEEN things. And from that will cascade a revolution. You think it is hard to keep up now …. hang on to your hat.
What is also interesting is that just this past week I have met with TWO stealth companies betting their future on understanding relationships between things - not of things - which if they get it right will be turning two industries upside down.
And it would seem I am not alone in the thinking. Click through to read what Brian Solis has to say.