I've started keeping a journal with random thoughts that occur to me and have decided to post some of them in order to share them and to have people help me further refine them. As they are fleeting and somewhat random thoughts they are by nature aphoristic, rough, and unpolished. I hope that does not detract too much from them. Here is the first one:
Electronic Information and Human Centric Businesses:
The distribution of information will be completely electronic. Therefore, brick and mortar businesses will have to become human centric. By this I mean that they will have to provide services and/or goods that require co-location with the client/customer. Thus, these businesses will have to place the human being, not their product, at the center of their planning. They will have to ask themselves: "What things do humans qua humans need and want that can only be provided to them when they are at hand? What services and goods can only (or truly can best) be provided in person?"
The first thing that comes to mind is real experiences, which quite possibly also are the most basic of these products/services. Perhaps in the future virtual reality simulacra will be able to provide all experiences, but to experience the real we have to go to it; it will not come to us. Mohammed must go to the mountain.
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You're asking consumers to put forth some sort of effort with these real experiences... that might not succeed.
ReplyDeleteNot at all. A real experience is something like going to the Pantheon. It cannot be substituted. Why would anyone go to the bookstore to get a book when they can get it on their kindle in 30 seconds? By real experience I mean something like going to a restaurant. That can't really be done electronically. At least not right now. So yes it requires some effort from the client but no more so than the effort they already put in right now.
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