We are told that the Internet is the solution to every kind of problem. But is it true? Will Big Data help us to understand the world? Is the Internet really on the side of democracy? Does it make sense to make gamify everything? Is the Internet (still) the Frontier? Or is that era past us and we are now faced with the greatest concentration of economic power of all time?
It seemed perfectly normal to Jeff Jarvis, a famous American journalist, to ask: "What Would Google Do?" if the company based in Mountain View were put in charge of the public sector.
It apparently didn't occur to him that the rules and goals the public sector lives by are, or at least should be, different from those of a private company.
According to many, the Internet, this jumble of servers and communication protocols, is the greatest invention ever. But is it really so? And wasn't the same thing said of inventions such as the telegraph, the radio, movie pictures, television or nuclear energy?
Today the Internet is winning. To the point that it seems natural that it should win. But is it so? Does the Internet have to win? Is the Internet's impact positive for society?
Perhaps it's time to clear our minds and talk about the Ideology of the Internet.
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We will speak about...
- Advertising
- Apps
- Big Data
- Cloud
- Disruption
- Gamification
- Hippies
- Internet of Things
- Jefferson (Thomas, not George)
- Long Tail
- LSD
- Manifest Destiny
- Moore's Law
...and much much more!
I have worked or consulted for a number of start-ups from more countries than I can probably remember: Germany (Ciao); France (Meetic); Italy (Ennunci); Sweden (Twingly); Italy/Ireland (Zzub); Denmark (Atosho); Spain (Ducksboard); Italy/UK (VoiceMap); and Canada (Transit App). I started a blog at dotcoma.it well before it was fashionable to do so, and later wrote a book on the web, advertising and social media: What Happened To Advertising? What Would Gossage Do?