Scott VanDenPlas

Communications trends have 2 primary fluid variables: collaboration and scale.

The most interesting activity inside of the realm of communication is the actual vector of change and the variables that decide that vector. Human beings are prone to nurture communications technology that offers them the greatest advantage, and we decide that advantage using two primary variables that effect one bottom line. Both collaboration and scale have the largest effect on communications efficiency. More efficient communication offers us a more accurate message, delivered to an increasingly interested audience, with less work by a dominant individual. As we scale up, our ability to reach our audience is growing as more people are connected to each other in more ways than previously possible. Our ability to find an interested audience is also growing, the fastest growing company in the world over the last 10 years has built an empire on targeted marketing. The data that we are offering is also getting better with less centralization. We are standing on the forefront of the collaborative economy, supported by vastly scalable collaborative systems allowing us to take a smaller piece of a much bigger pie.

The variable of communication with the most remodeling throughout history is scale. One to one communication evolves to the town hall meeting. The meeting becomes acquainted with the masses via written press, radio, and television. The masses evolve to become the new publishers of content via technology. The scale quickly escalates. If I have something to say, that people want to have said to them, I can now reach an audience of millions in a matter of minutes if not seconds. In one sense, there is a limit to scale. It is possible that every single human being on the planet will be connected via one globally unified communications network. At that point, scale cannot simple function by reaching more people but will go through a metamorphosis. Universal connectivity will become the new standard, and the focus will become pure network efficiency. After all, the basis of universal connectivity is to delivery an efficient message, and if you cannot reach your audience, it certainly is not efficient. We will continue to scale the content and the form of the message rather than the omnipresence of the network.

We already have made headway into scaling the content through the second variable of change, collaboration. In a collaborative environment, the end product is decentralized with many authors. As I explained with the democratization of the edge of the communication structure, the nature of the data is also pushing towards democratization. The fuel for this is twofold. First, we have seen a new type of economy shifting from value of goods and services toward value of information. Second, we have produced a steadily growing network with a deep reach into our own lives. We have fostered an environment where this new information is accessible and valued. A consequence of the pervasiveness of this network is new forms of social contribution. We are able to coordinate and produce new information within a contemporary infrastructure. Efforts to increase the accuracy and depth of information are the beginning of the next level of scale in communications, and collaboration is the tool we are using to arrive there.

This trend in communications has an effect outside of the technology and the message itself. There are impacts in economics, human development, politics, and a nearly infinite number of other areas. We have also seen a change in the hierarchy that I mentioned before, a new form of the structure based on collaborative contribution. This meritocracy is based not on economic position, but on personal knowledge contribution. It is a self organizing organic structure that is the result of any one individual or group’s intellectual donation, a direct measure of the value added to a community.