My Take

Tech for the Under-served Masses

The vast majority of people on the planet don't have the wherewithal to get a PC. Does this mean that there's no market? Well, consider this article in the New York Times, describing an effort by Raj Reddy, a prof at Carnegie Mellon and his new PCtvt project.

The PCtvt is a wirelessly networked PC that doubles as a TV and DVD player for $250. Efforts like these have been started before but it seems this one may actually go somewhere - MS is on board, TriGem (from Korea), and researchers from IIT are on it as well.

It'll be very interesting to see how this proceeds... No doubt there will be snags and issues along the way but there's also tremendous potential for innovations that to this day have not been broached due to perceived economic barriers...

Education & Economy, Correlation & Causation - NOT!

Interesting article that I haven't fully digested yet basically puncturing a big hole through the argument that better educated societies lead to better economies.

It's a worthwhile read simply as a primer that correlation DOES NOT EQUAL causation. Just because there's a correlation between 2 variables (for example, Hot Dogs consumed per capita and GDP), that doesn't mean that 1 causes the other (i.e. Hot Dogs consumed per capita does NOT drive GDP). This is something that we need to be reminded of daily - we're way too quick to jump to conclusions just because of "perceived" correlations. Here's a fascinating article about the NBA and the lack of shooting that gets to the same issue - the perception that shooting is down (effect) because NBA players can't shoot (cause) anymore.

A couple of personal thoughts about the correlation between education and the economy. My guess is that there's a "tipping-point" factor somewhere that is required for education to make a difference in the economy - would be very interesting to look into this... Secondly, the degree of emphasis on defining one's social stature on the RELATIVE position of an individual to others in the society is probably over-looked - this is something that I'll have to flesh out as well...

Technology in Context

Great articles about Genevieve Bell's research for Intel on the use of technology in other cultures - specifically, Ms. Bell researched the use of technology in 7 different countries in Asia. Results? Here's a brief blurb that I think sums it up:

"Technology, per se, is uninteresting... Technology in context is interesting."

Here are some other interesting quotes:

"One of the things that I found interesting, and in many ways most provocative, when you start thinking about the digital home, is that most people's homes in Asia are much smaller than the average footprint in the U.S."

"In the West, one of the critical metaphors we use to divide up our time and our space is the idea of the negotiation between work and leisure. Those are the two categories into which most of our activities fall, and when you think about the kind of models people assume for technology use, it's one of those two things. But what if there's a third set of activities that are really important? What if there are things around play, or religion or health and wellness that don't neatly fit into the work or leisure category?

One of the things that became clear in Asia, and is becoming true in the West, but we're not really good at seeing it, is that people are using these technologies for those third activities. In Asia, it's visible in the way people use mobile devices to support religious activities. The nicest example is people using their mobile phones to find Mecca. LGE, a Korean handset company, has produced a Mecca-finding handset with GPS technology in it. So it's a tool of religious devotion. They anticipated selling 300 million units in the first couple years."

I think work like this is going to be increasingly important, particularly for U.S.-based companies because we've been the most egregious in assuming that the world revolves around us.

The interesting thing is figuring out how to incorporate more of this kind of thinking into organizational behavior.

Furthermore, I would even go so far as to re-phrase Ms. Bell's quote above, "Technology per se is uninteresting... Technology in context is interesting" to:

"Technology per se has no value... Technology in context creates value."

Asia and the U.S. - Ongoing...

This is yet another sign that the U.S. economy will exhibit less and less of an influence on Asian economies. Granted, this is 1 country in Asia for the time being going against a single monetary direction of the U.S. Stay tuned as the decoupling of major Asian economies from the U.S. will continue to accelerate.

The real irony in all this is that the manufacturing competency, which is now squarely in Asia guarantees that the Asian economies will continue to reap disproportionate benefits from a strong U.S. economy while also reaping disproportionate benefits from a weak U.S. economy because people can't live on information alone - we require material goods and products in order to live day to day.

EA & Item Trading

Very interesting discussion of a corporate guy (from EA) basically not getting the significance of virtual item trading to the online gaming industry.

Here's a comment from the discussion thread that I want to highlight:

"It's not a question of whether this is a waste of time or not, but realizing the economic implications of virtual item trading. This "niche market" already acounts for millions of dollars of revenue and some people actually make a living of it."

I really think that this part of the online gaming experience is being massively overlooked. For example, there are sites like GOM that enables virtual item trading. Check out this little experiment mentioned in the thread that gives you an inkling that there's some monetary potential in virtual item trading.

Based on my experiences in Asia, there's no question that virtual item trading is a fairly large biz - all of my friends into MMORPGs in Asia have "bought" or "sold" a virtual item at some point in their gaming. In fact, I kno a guy that basically makes a living doing.

It may be tough to understand but a big reason that this is the case in Asia is the "clanning" / social aspect of MMORPGs, where you play the game with a number of different people. People want to keep-up with their "clanmates" and are willing to pay for it. There's also a competitive aspect to it - why spend 5 hours to do something when you can buy it for $20? Basically, MMORPGs allow for patterns of behavior that are eerily similar to society - game theory in action as well.

Anyway, this is a very interesting dynamic that I think could be fertile grounds for innovation by someone - above and beyond just brokering virtual item trading...

Ubiquitous Computing?

Download project_roar.ppt

Interesting take on ubiquitous computing... Makes you think of it in a slightly different way. The part that I think is most interesting is the following:

"I think this is why people in ubicomp are suprised that phones are winning out as the dominant computing platform. Because people want devices that do survival and entertainment-related tasks well, not a general purpose computer (like a PC or laptop) that can play me a videogame, render 3D, or simulate protein folding."

I have been saying for a long time now that it's the mobile phone that will ultimately win-out in the mobile computing game. I've mentioned it here and here.

The PPT above was put together sometime late last year to try and convince an Asian tech company to really start driving this concept home - guess who? It's a bit sanitized but basically all there... Basically, my thot was and is that the mobile phone's killer app is digital music.

eBay Investment in Craigslist

News today about eBay taking 25% of Craigslist. The beat goes on... I really like this move. The common theme between eBay and Craigslist is community.

Craigslist will provide a not-so-indirect forum for eBayers to establish online communities that aren't necessarily centered around e-commerce and products. This is an extremely interesting move and one worth watching - eBay's building a very strong online community "network" that actually has been and will be highly monetizeable.

It would be interesting for eBay (or other content guys) to look at players in Korea like NHN, Daum, and Nate to get some potential brainstorms on ways to monetize communities.

Everyone's been talking about Google vs. Microsoft - I'd keep my eyes on eBay vs. Google as well...

VC Organizational Design

Interesting write-up of organizational design in the VC industry. To summarize, the reason for the success of VCs are as follows:

1. "The Science of Maybe" which basically translates into trying a number of different experiments, failing early, and learning from your failures.

2. Making staged investments and avoiding the "all-or-nothing" syndrome.

3. Peer-based structure of VC firms that encourages learning and sharing of learnings, even if most of the learnings are due to failures.

4. Lack of day-to-day intervention by LPs while being rewarded / punished on the ultimate outcomes of the investments.

The argument here is that VCs succeed to a large degree because of the design of the organization, NOT necessarily due to the specific individuals involved.

My thought is that there is a lot of truth to this, although this implies that the $ you have to make money is large enough so that you can afford to participate in a sufficient number of experiments and learn from them to get the returns.

I would really be interested in figuring out how to get this type of a model implemented into the corporate world - my current guess is that the key is making sure that there's an allocation / budget / reserve for "experimentation" and tie that back to the "carrot-and-stick" structure for organizations.

Any thoughts on this?

Japan, China, Football / Soccer, and Asia Relations

Read an intriguing article about the soccer / football match between Japan and China. Japan won 3 to 1, but the angle that gets me piqued relates to Japan - China relations.

My 2 cents here - Korea is in great position to be prominent in China due to the historical record between China and Japan. It's no secret that there's a LOT of resentment towards Japan by most of Asia for what's happened in the past. My opinion is that it shouldn't matter. BUT it does. AND it will.

AND it'll force Japan, Inc. to be 2nd in China to Korea for the foreseeable future (India will also play a significant role). This means that if you want to make a China tech play now but also don't want to dive-in YET, I'd be looking seriously at Korean tech plays into China - i.e. Samsung, LG, SK Telecom, etc.

Athens, HDTV, and the Asian Consumer

Wanted to highlight this article not necessarily for the HDTV piece of it but more to give a taste of technology consumers in Asia:

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"'I am seriously thinking of buying an HDTV,' Lee said. 'If the quality is everything it promises to be, I will be able to watch the games and feel like I am actually at the stadiums.' Lee is one of many South Koreans who are seeking to buy digital TVs ahead of the Athens Olympic Games, which will be broadcast through HD programming for the first time in South Korea this year."
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Granted this article is about Korea, BUT I believe the salient point here is that there is a real DESIRE to consume the latest technologies at a pace that makes the U.S. crawl in comparison (the Olympics is just a rationalization, if you ask me). Of course, there are a number of reasons for this - government leadership, conglomerate structures, greenfield-type buildouts, advanced infrastructures, etc.

An often overlooked aspect is the very real need by individuals to feel like "they're not left behind." There is an over-riding psychology in most Asian socieities that enforce a deep-seated (yet, polite) "competitiveness" among individuals for things such as education, new technologies, new trends, etc.

In Western society, most of the emphasis in deterimining fulfillment is centered around the self - i.e. I am fulfilled if I am / can be comfortable with myself, etc.

It's extremely complicated in Asian societies, however. In principle, there is also an emphasis on fulfillment being defined in terms of self - in Buddhism for example. However, what I've noticed is that as a group or an aggregate, being comfortable with one-self is defined by society by what you can show you've accomplished. And accomplishments are often defined by: education, job, and stuff like gadgets, etc.

I kno this also exists individually in the U.S. and the Western world. I just don't think that it exists at the aggregate or society level that it does in Asia. Anyway, it would be interesting to get feedback from everyone about this...