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My Keynote Yesterday
I gave a keynote at the Information Industry Summit yesterday and tried to be provocative. The title of my talk was "Does Information Want To Be Free" and the presentation is available on the Union Square Ventures weblog.
UPDATE: Thanks to Scribe Media, there is also now the video of my keynote up on the Union Square Ventures weblog. Same link.
Comments (12) | Posted January 30, 2007 in Venture Capital and Technology
Comments
Fred: really nice, succinct preso. Maybe you should pop it into SlideShare to make it easier to consume on the site?
Posted by: Brian Oberkirch | Jan 30, 2007 9:36:51 AM
Looks like you've just ripped off what Umair Haque has been saying at Bubblegeneration for a while now and repackaged it in simpler terms. Wasn't he the one that turned you on to the Herbert Simon quote anyway?
Posted by: Anonymous | Jan 30, 2007 10:56:40 AM
ripped off is kind of harsh.
of course Umair was the source of the Herbert Simon quote and i think most regular readers know what a fan i am of Umair's
fred
Posted by: fred | Jan 30, 2007 11:46:07 AM
Reality is ripping off Umair Haque
I would say Fred was just microchunking and syndicating content. It's the future of information man!
Posted by: Ethan Bauley | Jan 30, 2007 1:36:38 PM
everyone 'rips-off' everyone nowadays, especially those of us who inhabit the web on a professional basis. however, inspiration and the subsequent reflection/distribution of knowledge is not the same as plagarism.
when was the last time any of us had an entirely original significant idea/thought? anyone that claims so is either hubristic or ignorant. some will be entitled to such a claim, but very few, now. most ideas are tangential to something we have absorbed - as was the source (most likely) of whatever it was that inspired the original provider of the data/knowledge/commentary, etc.
up until a few years ago there was a paucity of relevant useful and inspirational data/information/opinions/knowledge on the web - now there is an ever-acccelerating-and-growing excess of it.
it's how you collect, correlate, filter, analyse and distribute it that matters.
Posted by: carl rahn griffith | Jan 30, 2007 9:01:23 PM
In the hierarchy of internet denizens, Anon posters are only one step above myspace lurkers posing as sub-teens and one step below email spammers.
If your going to accuse someone of plagiarism at least have the stones to say who you are.
Posted by: Jamie | Jan 30, 2007 9:10:09 PM
http://www.nowpublic.com/don_t_be_a_dude_yamaha_a_gripping_story_of_life_and_death_in_silicon_valley
Posted by: guy.kawasaki | Jan 30, 2007 10:57:23 PM
Great presentation. A couple of things that don't ring true for me:
* advertising being the way to monetize information. Most people would like to skip advertising. I am guessing you and most of your readers skip TV advertising with a Tivo (or Tivo like system). I know I do. Advertising stands in the way of the information/content I want to spend my attention on.
* I think your "syndicate it" makes the right point. However, RSS is simply tactics. RSS is today's lingua franca but it may be replaced (or not) in the future. Anyway, it obscures the overall syndication point.
Posted by: Mats | Jan 31, 2007 11:45:02 AM
Mats,
Someone else brought up your point about "skipping advertising" in the Q&A section. I am right with Fred's response, which is that, basically, you're presuming this advertising is irrelevant to you.
If all this information gets organized and disseminated the right way, "advertising" is going to be shorthand for "shit you really need based on what you're reading/doing."
Think in terms of Google...
Say I want to buy 3 chainsaws, for my juggling routine. I Google "Chainsaws"...what is the first hit? Chainsaw Records. But, there's a bunch of ads for discounts on John Deere chainsaws.
Viola, the advertising was more useful than the search itself.
This is the opposite of advertising standing in the way of information.
Posted by: Ethan Bauley | Jan 31, 2007 2:31:52 PM
Yep, targeted advertising is way more powerful and perhaps more interesting. I am still not convinced though. The google metaphor is also not quite apt when applied to audio & video. When I search in google I am actively looking for something and if the ads point me in a relevant direction, then this is good and well-aligned with my focus at that point. However, when I am listening to music and or watching TV/video, I am not in search "mode". I want to watch/listen at that point to the content I am interested in. It is a different modality and the ads are way more intrusive than text based ads on a web page.
Posted by: Mats | Jan 31, 2007 2:38:29 PM
I still don't think that ads necessarily have to be intrusive for audio or video:
- The net exploded music search. People's grazing habits are generating a lot of information that is untapped and could result in targeting for non-intrusive ads [they could be text...you still have to look at a player, or web page, or something when you're interacting with your music]. Adidas ads for people listening to Run-D.M.C., etc.
- Also, the kind of music you like says a great deal about your identity; I'm sitting here looking at Fred's Last.fm widget and I can tell without knowing him that we would get along great personally purely based on his "All Time Artists." My dad has been basing all his personal relationships on musical taste for 30 years and he's got great friends!
- Mike over at Techdirt has been beating the "advertising is content" drum for like 5 years now. Video ads can be more about companies sponsoring great entertainment and branding it than buying ad time on attention-generating content.
Posted by: Ethan Bauley | Jan 31, 2007 5:15:29 PM
Fred, great stuff. Added a bit to your keynote over at my blog and references a few of your notes:
http://www.darrenherman.com/2007/02/01/information-in-the-digital-age/
Posted by: Darren Herman | Feb 1, 2007 9:57:41 PM
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