Changing Course
The Xpragmatic View #86
May 17, 2007
by Marc Buyens, Xpragma
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No, this isn't the announcement of the end of the Xpragmatic View. Neither is it the announcement of a fundamental change of its contents. No, it is only the title of a posting on Jeff Nolan's blog on April 30th, 2007. The Chronicle of a Death Foretold?
April 30th, 2007, Jeff Nolan announced on his Venture Chronicles blog that it was his last official day at Teqlo.
As he states: Teqlo is a fantastic concept and a potentially very disruptive business but it became clear that it needs more time in the oven in order to further develop and, more importantly, package the service.
So, Nolan is leaving because ...2 additional engineers would (currently) do the company far more in the way of value creation.
Is this the Chronicle of a Death Foretold? Is this the preannouncement of Teqlo entering Techcrunch's death pool?
We don't know but we do hope not.
As we discussed in The programmable enterprise, we think there is a great potential for Teqlo. We do hope that they have not shifted ambitions and that their current focus on mashups and the like is only a planned, mandatory transition to what they can really become: disruptive technology for the power knowledge worker.
Empowering the knowledge worker
Indeed, that is where the future business game will be played. This type of technology has the potential becoming one of the first solutions that really empowers knowledge workers and facilitates knowledge distribution and reuse.
Not by writing things down. Not by telling how they are doing things. Not by publishing stuff on the intranet. Not by documenting all their hidden and untold working methods and competences. Nobody is interested in doing that.
Instead, by leading by example. By using tools such as Teqlo that enable them to build, for their own interest and usage, small business tools that facilitate their daily working life. For them, it is simply a matter of convenience. Their intentions are not specifically focused on knowledge capture and transfer.
However, that is what they will be doing. Their little business tools will embed some of their hidden knowledge and by developing these tools, this knowledge is now somehow packaged in a "physical" thing. A thing that the company will retain when these employees are leaving the company and that novice users can use to improve their own competence and understanding.
Not by doing things the company asks them to do, but by doing something for themselves. That has always been the way things work.
Not mashups
Not the ultimate mashup tool for the masses. Mashups might be fun and given the right business idea, you might even develop a reasonably successful Web 2.0 business model with it. But it is not a lasting business model. It is the type of stuff you have to hype and then, rapidly sell, pursuing new career opportunities.
Mashups are not a lasting business model because they are too easy. They are available to anyone and therefore, too easily replicable. What's the use of developing your brand new real estate website that links the offering with Google maps, Flickr photo's and even Youtube video's? Anyone is able to do so. The real value of mashups is in the data stores that you access, but you do not own these data stores.
Empowering the knowledge worker is different. Here it is not about how you link things together, it is even not about what you link together. No, the key element here is why you link things together and how such linking provides a business advantage. That's the type of solutions enterprises are looking for.
However, these same enterprises will also be surprised how this type of solutions has the potential of overthrowing the business organisation. In the hands of the right individual, this can change corporations forever. And you do not need management for it.
You never did.
Categories: Software as a service (SaaS), Web 2.0
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