Is Capital Business’ Evolutionary Equivalent To Intelligence?

21. February 2012 · Write a comment · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: , , ,

Another post on technological innovation and evolution.

In the real world our intelligence allows us to occupy niches without waiting to evolve to fit it naturally – too cold, build a fire; too hot, set up air conditioning; vicious current occupiers of niche, shoot/trap/relocate/co-op them, etc

In the same way, capital allows businesses to move into new niches uncovered by technological innovation before that niche can support a profitable business (alternatively, capital is the equivalent of a fridge/freezer!?). If the niche proves to be profitable it will be more difficult for other businesses to move in later because it is already occupied. As mentioned in block 1 part 1 it took Amazon nearly ten years to become profitable.

One difference perhaps is the degree to which our intelligence seems to cut us off from evolution. If you’re living in a cosy centrally heated house, there is little selection pressure to evolve to adapt to a cold outdoors. A business moves into an emerging niche though in the expectation the the environment will change so that it can make a profit. There are of course two routes open in the event that a niche is a failure – a capitalised business may be able to withdraw to an existing or new niche, a startup can go bust!

Does Technological Co-construction Require Business?

09. February 2012 · Write a comment · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: , ,

As far as I can see there are four main groupings that can be involved in the co-construction of technology – academia, business, government, and the public[1].

There would appear to be no theoretical reason why a technology could not achieve widespread presence without any one of these groups, including business. Particularly if that technology was software based prior to the widespread adoption of 3D printing) but I am struggling to think of an example.

Is there any particular technology that has taken off without business adoption and/or participation? Note that many open source projects have a large degree of business sanctioned developer hours, and many larger personal projects have been undertaken with the aim of turning it into a business if it takes off (and is this any different from a business using its capital to speculatively enter a niche?).

Alternatively does “ebusiness” apply to any activity between two organisations and/or individuals? In which case it is going to be difficult to avoid “doing business” even in the software arena, due to the presence of network effects in open source projects.

[1] Do charaties play a role? And if so are they a 5th grouping, or rolled into one of the others?

Shortening Waves in Technological Innovation

08. February 2012 · Write a comment · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: , ,

Block 1 Part 1 references “Strategies for E-Business: Creating Value through Electronic and Mobile Commerce” by Jelassi, T. and Enders, E. in suggesting that one explanation for the shortening of waves (increased pace of innovation) in Schumpeter’s Model is business and government increasingly seeing value in committing resources to R&D. This would seem to have a parallel to the argument against the Technological Singularity that increased pace to date is more due to the effects (and feedbacks) of an increasing population. In the case of the “Value in Reseach” argument as the global economy increases in size there is also a greater amount that can be invested in R&D.

Bearing this in mind while looking at the technologies identified in each wave they do all seem to have the ability to have major impacts on production ability.  However, with the exception of the first wave, they all also seem to have the ability to have a more direct impact on comprehension and research, with technologies that either help with collaboration, understanding. (Note that although not obvious from the technologies mentioned there is also an improvement over time of our ability to measure/observe as well, which plays nicely with both the other two, and with improvements in manufacturing/distribution)

  • The second wave (1845-1900) includes mentions of rail, steam, and iron. These are clearly components of the railways; an improvement in travel that helps people to physically meet up to collaborate in real time, but also shortens mail delivery times thus improving distance collaboration as well. The rise of Morse Telegrahpy also had an impact on distance interaction and news reporting around this time.
  • The third wave (1900-1950) mentions electricity, chemicals, and the internal combustion engine. Again improvement in moving people around (the car) which aids collaboration. A well known and noticeable event during this time period would be the code breaking at Bletchley Park, which was aided by electro-mechanical devices. A foreshadowing of the ability of computing devices to aid understanding of observations.
  • The fourth wave (1950-1990) mentions petrochemicals, electronics and aviation. Possibly the last (for now) major disruption in travel – the aeroplane. This time period also covers rising adoption (if not yet ubiquity) of computers in the home, education and business (aids, at this point, to comprehension).
  • The fifth wave mentions digital networks, software and new media and seems to mark a sea-change from improvements by moving people and things around, to moving data around. Improvements in software and new media aid understanding while the rise of networking is a major aid to long distance collaboration.

Looked at from this point of view I would suggest that there is already an argument that the fifth wave should revolve around the rise of computer processing power and “wired networking”. This would leave “wireless networking” as the sixth wave, a major change in the power of networking (probably analogous to the organised vs adhoc differences between the train (second wave) and the car (third wave)).

I would hazard a guess that the seventh wave will be home/on-location manufacturing, starting with 3-D printing. Here the transmission of data results can result in material objects, and the ability to manufacture and test your own designs moves into capability of the average hobbyist. This will vastly lower the barriers to entry for creating manufacturing related businesses. As these devices (and related technologies improve) it will also improve the ability of the hobbyist to create custom devices for research purposes as well leading to observation/measuring improvements.

Schumpeter’s Model and/vs Accelerating Change

07. February 2012 · Write a comment · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: , , , ,

Reading through Block 1 Part 1′s description of waves in Schumpeter’s Model reminded me of the Technological Singularity and Accelerating Change with their logarithmic graphs of paradigm shifts.

So, re-reading up on ideas about accelerating change I was surprised to see  co-construction used as an argument against accelerating change; the argument apparently boiling down to the idea that a technology cannot advance if there is insufficient profit in exploiting it, and that this acts as a limiter on the rate of (adopted) change.

Once again this seems to me to reflect on the idea of seeing technologies as evolving within an environment of academics, businesses and personal users. You wouldn’t follow a single mutated example of a species, see that it fails, and conclude that evolution has been stalled. Evolution trials new ideas on a massively parallel scale. Applying to technological determinism: there are large numbers of academics, corporate researchers and hobbyists actively looking for new profitable technologies (and applications of technologies). The failure of a single technology, or even of dozens or hundreds of ideas, does not (on its own) mean that progress is being slowed. It is an essential component of (unnatrual) selection.

Technological Co-construction & Evolution

01. February 2012 · Write a comment · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: , , , ,

“Advances” in technology in society seem to follow an evolutionary model. More specifically, the waves of Schumpeter’s Model remind me of the Punctuated Equilibrium model of evolution.

The objection that immediately springs to mind is “What about Betamax?”. But this is making the mistake commonly made concerning evolution of looking at fitness by our subjective standards, rather than simple success in a (complicated) environment. So here the technology is the geno/phenotype (technology does not have the split that biology has) and society (business, personal and academic) is the environment; hence the co-construction.

For a technology to succeed it must do more than just have the best specs; it must spread through the marketplace. To do this there must firstly be a need/want (read: niche) (even if the want is only to do an existing task more quickly/cheaply), and be among those technologies that meet the need (exploit the niche). Word has to spread sufficiently for other people to adopt the technology (reproduce); this may be through word-of-mouth, marketing, experiencing the technology etc.

To take the stages of a wave in the Schumpeter Model:

  • Irruption: refers to the initial emergence of a more useful innovation (mutation/crossover) , or combination of innovations (where punctuated evolution comes into the picture).
  • Frenzy: As the innovation begins to flourish, a combination of the existing beachead, plus still having (solution) space to explore, leads to an explosion in explorative variations.
  • Turning Point: For this I guess we need to anthropomorphise Evolution itself. As the (solution) space fills up Evolution “realises” that the niche will never sustain so many variations. The fitter variations start to muscle in on the territory of the less fit.
  • Synergy: The remaining successful variations refine themselves.
  • Maturity: Little room for change in terms of the innovations that defined the wave. “Wait” for the next wave.

 

Why this blog?

31. January 2012 · Write a comment · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: , , ,

I’ve started this blog largely to force/shame me to write about and around the subjects highlighted in my current Open University course T320 Ebusiness technologies: foundations and practice.

I’ve basically reached the point in my studies where I need to start studying properly if I want to get a decent degree classification. Given that repetition, recall, and considering how what you learn fits into what else you know, are all strategies for aiding memory I hope that this blog will help me gain a decent pass in the course.

(Having just created the link for the course details above, I’m now wondering why it refers to “pod cast course” in the url!?)