Google is part of the new economy, says Paul Saffo
With stocks plummeting, unemployment at 6.5 percent, cars sales off by nearly a third and retailers suffering the biggest monthly drop in business in 26 years, it is clear a significant downturn has gripped the U.S.
Less obvious is that America is migrating to a new kind of economy, just as it has several times in the past century or so, says futurist Paul Saffo, a technology forecaster.
Saffo says the central character of the new economy isn’t the consumer, who was at the center of the previous economy, or the worker, who helped drive the industrialization that took place in the economy before that.
The central actor will be the “creator,” he said – sometimes ordinary people who create things even while they consume or pursue other activities. Look at Wikipedia, for instance, the online encyclopedia created by volunteers. Or YouTube, where content comes from amateurs making their own videos.
Saffo singles out new economy companies such as Google, where people create something of value even while they are consuming. That something of value is the “search string” they type into the search engine, which Google then uses to monetize its business.
In the new economy, the biggest companies will be the ones that can harness the smallest bits of human activity, he says.
And there will be a company that will dwarf the size of Google, maybe by harnessing a single click as a creative activity, says Saffo.
