Convergence

The verb “converge” means to come together as if to meet or join.[i] The adjective “convergent” means having the tendency to become similar while adapting to the same environment.   The noun “convergence” is defined in Wikipedia as “ the act of moving toward union or uniformity;  a meeting place; the intersection of three electron beams for red, green and blue onto a single pixel in a CRT (cathode ray tube); (Mathematics): the process of approaching some limiting value; (Physiology): the coordination focusing of the eyes, especially at short range;  (Biology):  the evolution of similar structures or traits in unrelated species in similar environments; convergent evolution; and the merging of distinct technologies, industries, or devices into a unified field.

Clearly there is not one monolithic type of convergence.  And convergence can apply to anything from spiritual to harmonic; political gatherings to festivals, music to literature, social sciences, computing and technology, natural sciences and under mathematics:- properties, theorems, notions, generalizations, applications and modes – yes, it is all there.

However the notion of convergence in business and in business profit models or business patterns is gathering popularity.   Convergence in business causes “Frontiers (to) fall. The rules of competition change.”  (Profit Patterns)[ii] They go on to say “competitive boundaries are evaporating. Previously solid competitive walls are disintegrating in industries as varied as materials, financial services, life sciences and retail.  In the convergence pattern, competitors from previously distinct industries start competing for each other’s customers.”[iii]

Patterns exist everywhere, but they are not always exact replicas of themselves.  Patterns are used in learning and in language.  Patterns are certainly not new.  Indeed we learn from experience by learning from patterns – what follows next? – Until we automatically know what follows…  “Chess is a game of patterns; patterns about how the game has unfolded, about where the game stands at the moment, and, most importantly, about where the game is heading.  In chess, the player with the best skill at pattern recognition has a critical advantage.”[iv] Our knowledge, our logic, our problem solving abilities and even our instincts, our survival are based on patterns and pattern recognition.

Patterns can be exact replicas (a carbon copy) and they can be similar, they can be fractional copies, they can be siblings and similar relate or be related to each other or they can be lovers in a relationship.  Synonyms for pattern includes original, prototype, archetype, model, outline, stencil, tessellation, category, blueprint, mould, guide, cycle, example, precedent and similarity. Patterns shift and move around, they are neither always constant nor orderly, nor are they easy to read.  Patterns can be obscured, hidden or simply difficult to spot.  Hence it is the detail and the  nuance of patterns that determine its value.  It is the fine-tuning of the reading that adds expertise and that adds value.  Just as the fortune-teller or tarot-ready is able to assess your life patterns, your cycle, your blueprint of what you have learnt and how your respond to the stimuli of your life, so can other pattern readers assess the pattern.  And answer the ‘what’ questions – what is future, what is wrong with me and what is the weather going to do?

“Patterns open our eyes, our thinking.  They give us clues.  They tell us what signals to look for?”[v]

(Also posted on Media Studies by Marian Pike)

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[i] The Concise Oxford Dictionary, 1991, 8 edn, Oxford University Press.

[ii] Slywotzky, AJ, Morrison, DJ, Moser, T, Mundt, KA, Quella, JA 1999, Profit Patterns: 30 ways to anticipate and profit from strategic forces reshaping your business.  Wiley.  Sussex, England.

[iii] Ibid p67

[iv] Ibid p 3

[v] Ibid p48

Living online

About five years ago I googled myself and there was not a single return.  I was completely unknown in cyberspace.  I was relieved that I had not done anything to generate publicity or media attention.  I was below the radar and in terms of my parent’s life and etiquette this was indeed a good thing.  My reputation was intact, my good name preserved.  I did another search last week and the result was very different.  There were 3’190 returns,  (and the discovery that there was more than one of me around the world, alive and dead) substantive evidence that I am there, living in the public space, along with every other generation net.  In fact, everyone on the web is living in the public space; my life is out there.  I could be a celebrity, except for the fact that nobody is watching, listening or noticing.  Everyone is more focused on doing their own thing on their blog/s, their social network, Facebook, Twitter, Fickr, YouTube and a host of other applications.  But absolutely anybody could find me and find out all about me because I am living in a public space.  (There goes my right to privacy.)

Despite this public space being overpopulated, third in size to China and India, it is incredibly easy to find me.  Easier in fact on line that off line.  There are roughly 940-million social network users worldwide.  These are people and companies who have chosen to have a presence on the web, to use it for all things, personal or impersonal or a combination thereof.  It might be worth remembering that 2002 was the year the first blogger (Heather Armstrong aka Dooce) was sacked for her online comments.  There are now over 200,000,000 blogs, and 50% post daily or twice daily.  Today the second largest search engine is YouTube, an online video service, which continues to be the playground of the young with 57% (20-35 year olds) and 20% teens which means music, bands and entertainment.

News ticker Twitter has 75-million user accounts, not all are active with 73% with less than 10 tweets.  Only 15-million users keep up with Twitter, with almost 80% on mobile, which makes it instant and powerful.   Any bad experience can be shared right now.   Twitter reported 50-million tweets per day (Feb 2010).  In 2007, the figure was 5,000 per day.  Top of the Twitter rankings is Ashton Kutcher (@aplusk) with 4,694,900 followers.  In April 2009, Kutcher challenged CNN to a popularity contest stating, “I found it astonishing that one person can actually have as big of a voice online as what an entire media company can on Twitter.”  Today CNN is 11^th with 2,978,759.  Twitter is a baby compared to the Facebook  (400-million active users) community. Facebook’s stats are easy to find and kept up to date.  These stats state 50% of their users log on in any given day, 35-million update status daily, 60-million status updates daily, and 5-billion pieces of content shared weekly.  Interestingly Facebook, which allows most people to have a huge number of friends, has not made friendships meaningless.  Despite accessibility, it would appear that the Dunbar number (top number of stable social relationships one person can handle is 150) still holds true.  The average Facebooker has 130 friends and tends to interact with only five or six on a regular basis.  (A little like the T-shirt pile in the cupboard, we only wear five or six on a regular basis.)

One of the original social networks Friendster (2001) with 55 million registered users and 33 million unique visitors per month, remains popular in Asia.  Alongside Friendster (which inspired it) MySpace with its 8-million bands and pop culture demographic had, in 2007, 185-million users and 39 – 45-million page views per month.  Another popular group is LinkedIn, a professional social networking site, has more than 60-million users (Feb, 2010) across the world and just introduced a faceted search to make it easier for their members to find the people they need to find.   (And now having spent some time cobbling together these stats I find someone else has created a similar list has done a better job, such is the way of the WWW world.)

One of the biggest changes to the social media scene is the radical increase in mobile access (91% mobile vs. 76% desktop users).   According to http://socialmediaatwork.com mobile access to Facebook increased by 112% in the last year to March 2010 (65-million users via Mobile) and to Twitter by 347%.   Approximately 31% of the 57-million people with web enabled phones in the USA use the device to connect to the web.  Facebook’s mobile browser audience overtook MySpace in February 2009.  In South Africa we have reached the 10% (5-million) of population access mark for Internet penetration, (15% growth in 2009) while mobile access is approximately 34-million with over 50-million connections.  This is not news to anyone that mobile access is the way of the future – it is easy, instant and convenient – but might be bad news to companies.

Companies are experimenting with, not using social media, to connect, nor to manage their reputation so they are a little behind in terms of hearing what is being said about them.

On a lighter note, here are some stats that you won’t find online yet. There is only 15 seconds of fame online, so don’t expect to hog the limelight.  There is a lot of competition so just forget the 15 minutes unless you are SuBo(Susan Boyle) or Dancing Matt.  Also 99% of what you want to know is on line.  There is sadly almost 0% chance of being original; the competition is about 100,000,000% bigger than ever.  Finally, everything you need to know, someone will tell you, but I don’t know much about Buzz yet!  (First published on Memeburn.com,  Now on Media Studies by Marian Pike)

Why social media makes sense

“It is a documented fact, for example, that human consciousness influences quantum energy – the stuff everything is made of – under certain conditions.” so says Gregg Braden in the introduction of his new book.[i] He quotes “ Princeton University physicist John Wheeler[ii], “ We had this old idea, that there was a universe out there, and here is man the observer, safely protected from the universe by a six-inch slab of plate glass.[iii] And adds “Now we learn from the quantum world that even to observe so minuscule an object as an electron we have to shatter that plate glass; we have to reach in there.  . . .  So the old word observer simply has to be crossed off the books, and we must put in the new word participator.”[iv]

“A new civilization is emerging in our lives, and blind men everywhere are trying to suppress it.  This new civilisation brings with it new family styles, changed ways of working, loving and living; a new economy; new political conflicts; and beyond all this an altered conciousness as well.”  so says social critic and futurist, Alvin Toffler.[v] “Humanity faces a quantum leap forward. . . .  Third Wave civilization begins to heal the historic breach between producer and consumer, giving rise to ‘prosumer’ economics of tomorrow.”  He explains that the Second Wave split moved the world from being agricultural to industrial.  It successful split production and consumption and created an exchange platform, the market.  This was accompanied with principles of standardization, interdependency, gender and skill differentiation (or specialization), synchronisation of humans to machines (time management), concentration (space), maximisation (growth, bigness) and centralization.  The Second Wave was division, compartmentalization and the splintering of things into components, smaller, manageable or rather, controllable things.   The Wave broke with earth, people and systems stumbling under the pressure – it was unsustainable – to roll on towards the shore.

Toffler observes, “Throughout the Second Wave era the mass media grew more and more powerful.  . . .  As the Third Wave thunders in, the mass media, far from expanding their influence, are suddenly being forced to share it.   . . . The oldest of the Second Wave mass media, newspapers are losing their readers.  By 1973 US newspapers had reached a combined aggregate circulation of 63-million copies daily.  Since 1973, however, instead of addition circulation they have began to lose it.  . . .  Nor were such losses due to the rie of television.”[vi] Toffler goes on to make numerous predictions of the future, many of which are suprisingly accurate.  (But you will have to read the book to find out more).

What is more interesting is the emergence of the Cluetrain Manifesto (1999), almost 19 years later.  A website which became a book, a book which became the basis of a new way of living, doing business and communicating with each other.   No matter what social media, new media lecturer, consultant, guru, or evangelist you listen too, sooner or later they will refer to the Cluetrain Manifesto.

Why?  The Cluetrain Manifesto proposes that companies move outside their six-inch plate glass bubbles and engage with their customers.  That instead of viewing the customer as being on the outside, the consumer who is separated from the means of production, the enemy who needs to be overcome, manipulated and seduced to buy, the them, but nevertheless the source of income – the market.

Ironically those inside the bubble, the organisation, do not appear to consider that they too live outside many more bubbles than they inhabit.  It is the typical pedestrian/motorist duality.  When you are a pedestrian you are conscious that the motorist has more ‘hurting power’ but do whatever you can to wrong foot him.  And it is the same when you are the motorist.

Perhaps this can be better explained with a sports club analogy.  You join a sports club mainly because you are interested in that particular sport, particularly to participate in the sport with like-minded people. But then you get elected to the committee, which manages the club.  Suddenly, you feel special, exempt from the rules of the club.  You feel that you can impose all sorts of rules and regulations, fee increases, punishments etc without considering how you, a member of the club, would feel if you are ONLY a member.   This sense of being divorced from the members, this autocratic behaviour, this dominance through ‘power’, this elitism, is the very thing that the Cluetrain Manifesto protests, and Toffler highlights as a major pressure which lead to the breaking of the Second Wave.

Last century, the Cluetrain Manifesto called desperately for a conversation not a monologue, for inclusion, not exclusion, for respect, not manipulation.  In the second decade of this century, Leroy Stick (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/leroy-stick/why-i-co-opted-bps-twitte_b_599283.html) called desperately for a conversation when he launched the BPGlobalPR twitter page, following what is possibly the biggest and worst oil disaster ever.  Off the southwest coast of America, the Deepwater Horizon explosion in the Gulf of Mexico is releasing gallons, no one really know how many gallons, of oil into the ocean daily, nor how many have already escaped, some 50-odd days later.  BP tells us they are dealing with it, but they are not giving us enough information for us to believe them even if we want to.  Nor, when they are obviously stuck, are they asking for new ideas or suggestions.

Sticks’ complete dissatisfaction, 30 years after the publishing of The Third Way and a similar number since the comments by physicist John Wheeler, shows that although much of big business is still behind the six inch plate glass, the people on the outside have the tools to protest, and protest loudly.  On the outside we have the tools to reach in and if you want to stop us, talk to us, because no matter how big you are, how much money you have, there are more of us.  Individually we are insignificant together we are and can change the world.

The Third Wave means that we can reclaim our earth, our time, our lives, our space and most importantly our independence, originality and creativity.  We are not working stiffs, nor are we just a marketplace.  The Cluetrain Manifesto means we want to be part of our world, equal, intelligent and should you ask, we will help you.  You are not alone, we are all in this world together.

This is why social media makes sense.  You are not alone.  Neither are we.  You, with we (your them), could be us.

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[i] Braden, G 2008, The spontaneous healing of belief: shattering the paradigm of false limits.  Hay House, Inc. pviii.

[ii] John Archibald Wheeler (July 9, 1911 – April 13, 2008) was an eminent American theoretical physcist and one of the later collaborators of Albert Einstein.  Wikipaedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Archibald_Wheeler accessed 13/06/2010.

[iii] Braden, G 2008, The spontaneous healing of belief: shattering th paradigm of false limits.  Hay House, Inc. p37-38 from John Wheeler as quoted by Peat, FD 1987, Synchroncity: The bridge between matter and mind, Bantam Books, NY, p4.

[iv] Ibid

[v] Toffler, A 1980, The Third Wave, Wiliam Collins Sons & Co. Ltd, London, p23.

[vi] Toffler, A 1980, The Third Wave, Wiliam Collins Sons & Co. Ltd, London, p169.

I have a voice

I have a voice on a global platform.  That very fact should make me special, but today it doesn’t.  Having a voice on global platform is no longer something special.  This opportunity is available to every one.  It is not enough to have a voice.  It is not enough to have a global platform for that voice.  This opportunity is available to everyone.  So what would make having a voice special.

Just because the platform has changed, just because the opportunity is there for everyone, having a voice is only special if you have ears listening to that voice, in just the same way that ‘readership’ determines the power of traditional media.  So ‘readership’ determines the power of your voice.  This is actually a fortunate factor.  It means that we are all able to blab on about stuff until we work out what we want to say without worrying if what we have to say is worth saying.   There are a lot of voices out there building confidence, working out what is worth saying and what is not; and more importantly where they, like I, want to lend the energy of their voice.