Gordon Moore | FutureofBiz.org

Gordon Moore on a fishing trip (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

As data whooshes out of every pore of the planet, powered by Gordon Moore‘s seismic explosion, knowing what’s useful has become the core skill.

Here’s a couple of data points just in, before I jump the snark and tell Twitter what to do.

First, LinkedIn is coining it. Hand over fist. Revenues up 89%. And multiple streams of it. Surprise, surprise; the stock price is rising. Details below.

Second, Twitter searches are far higher than Bing and Yahoo put together. Details and much more here.

If I ran the Twitters?

1. Think moolah. $10, $25 a month subscriptions. Offer special features, blah blah. Tens of millions of serious users would sign up in a 140. Some of us know we would pay far, far more than that. For the uber-tweeters, don’t we know, this is where social just go serious, personal, professional, essential.

2. Think search. It has made Google and could yet unmake it (though I think that unlike Facebook they may well adapt and thrive). It will move generic. The demand for subscription-based, privacy-enhanced, offerings will grow, grow, grow. I only want one platform open all day, and I want it to be this one.

3. Think governance. Let’s crowdsource a novel structure that pays off the entrepreneurs and investors well, but gives us multi-stakeholder governance. Wikipedia has been the only big platform to go the non-profit route. In a world of sparking social enterprise, let’s get creative. And drive a next-gen knowledge and comms platform that draws exponential strength from “social” and the fact the smartest guys on the planet are on here every single day.

K? Then later today we can discuss something else. On Twitter, of course.

Why Twitter Matters

LinkedIn Reaches 174 Million Members, Revenue Up 89% | The Realtime Report.

LinkedIn v. Facebook (futureofbiz.org)

Ray Kurzweil at Stanford Singularity Summit. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Ray Kurzweil is one of around a dozen figures who mark out the space between present and future – and us and technologies. He is an optimist as to speed of progress and its generally beneficent character, up to and including his “singularity.” Here he is noting, in general rather helpfully, that the future is easier to predict than some may think, in areas where exponential digital change is driving events (if you like, on Gordon Moore‘s moors.)

Of course the fun really starts when technologies bump into each other (convergence), when their disruptive impact is so great it’s just not clear what’s going to happen next, when people (yay, people!) decide to make decisions that shape what comes next, and so on.

I’ve written before about various aspects of all this (not least the rapid aging of companies that are out there on Moore’s moors – segue to Facebook‘s valuation, and so on). It’s handy to be reminded of the impact of the digital factor. Perhaps we can devise an impact factor that could be attached to companies, business models, and industries. Those close to pure digital will flourish rapidly and collapse/be superseded very fast. The search/social phalanx is slowly being followed by biotechnology as digitization and the management of huge data sets moves along (and, oh yes, typewriters and sliderules . . .). Random industries such as travel agency and cameras (sorry, Kodak) were hit hard and early. Publishing has taken longer and is going through an anguished process that will not soon be resolved. Education, especially higher education, has resisted with a fortitude and insouciance that would have been hard to resist.

So yes, some things are easier to predict. Some much less so. Some will always surprise. And then there’s the human factor.

Ray Kurzweil on Predicting the Future #WIFNY | Working Knowledge ®.