Is it technology or just a new generation?

There is not an industry at this point that has not been touched by reinvention well except perhaps our Government.  Is the reinvention of almost every vertical have to do with technology or just a new generation?

You can go back and history and now read those points where the noise was loud as an industry went down a different path.  The noise on my end is deafening right now.  I have the unique pleasure of investing in a wide range of start-up companies and it is fascinating to see the shifts in every single one.

We are witnessing massive shifts in the retail world.  It starts with the demise of the big stores, the rise of the smaller is slowly happening but not as much as we would like.  They can’t survive with the cost of real estate so we are seeing many people open stores in smaller communities.  There is a drive back to the local.  With that drive comes companies who figure out how to get rid of the middleman who has been the pinpoint for escalated costs in order to keep the margins high enough to pay everyone and create a profit.  All businesses are connected to these shifts because it is always about the end-user no matter who and what you interface with.  Once that change has taken place, to create and curate unique places, the consumer market will react.  It is a draw back to localized as Millennials need to have their own personal brand too and that connects with what they buy, do and experience. Unfortunately, it also leaves a tremendous amount of people without jobs that they are qualified for or not enough physical jobs period.  We can also toss the rise of machine manufacturing into the ring.

There is a dramatic shift taking place that seems to be disconnected from how our Governments are being run and the decisions and laws that they are making.  Each party has created a disdain among their own members and that includes me.  They all seem power hungry with big blinders on about where we are going, how we are evolving, what we need and how they need to Govern.

Perhaps it is technology that has just been the driver of this inevitable evolution that seems to be moving so fast and that is why we have such a big divide around the globe.

 

 

 

Comments (Archived):

  1. Michael Babich

    “There is not an industry at this point that has not been touched by reinvention well except perhaps our Government.”Well: Construction, Education, Healthcare. Soon all money made in every other industry will be spent on these three. No innovation and huge increase in prices.

    1. Gotham Gal

      There is massive amount of technology pouring into these 3 industries over the past decade.

      1. pointsnfigures

        Agree. Seen a lot of it at Techstars and other places.

      2. Michael Babich

        There are tool on the edge improved, but in general the industries are not reinvented, disrupted, or in any way changed–they just became more and more expensive and unfriendly for general population. Here is Marc Andreessen 2 minutes on this (start @ 19:20): “Those are the sectors of the economy that technology having almost no impact on”.https://youtu.be/F63zWfQwqz

    2. JLM

      .Have to side with Gotham Gal on this one. There is a huge amount of tech pouring into each of these industries.As a CEO coach, I work with a couple of medical device companies and the work they are doing is incredible. They are, literally, saving lives.JLMwww.themusingsofthebigredca…

    3. Bridget Goodbody

      Curious: where in education technology investment is this paying off for students? I see innovation for sure; not so sure, however, I see disruption…

      1. Gotham Gal

        There is no silver bullet in education. It’s all over the place

        1. Bridget Goodbody

          My universe is art and I’m appalled at what’s happening (or not) in art history ed tech, especially since visually literacy is more important for success than ever. LMS are more sophisticated, for sure, but they still rely on last century paradigms of knowledge. And they don’t teach you to see very effectively! So, to your point, is it tech or next gen, IMO next gen will have to drive it: once you get beyond the basic foundation, what my universe considers knowledgeable feels totally up for grabs. I’d love to know what you’re seeing anything interesting art-wise.

  2. JLM

    .To your point about retail, the realignment of how retail is discovered, manufactured, marketed, and sold is fundamental and staggering.At the same time, there are gargantuan retailers who are simply putting old wine in new bottles.Today, Sears (a failing retailer burdened with a millstone of brick and mortar locations which it is cutting as fast as it can) announced it would begin selling its Kenmore line of appliances on Amazon.Who ever thought you would be able to buy appliances over the Internet and have them “postal” delivered to your house?While revolutionary for someone like Sears, it is not even remotely revolutionary for others.The pricing differential of comparison pricing on the Internet is incredible. Recently, I had occasion to buy “polished nickle” kitchen hardware for a renovation. My brand was Newport Brass which is expensive as Hell.I was able to comparison shop on the Internet and dramatically reduce the price using a site Build.com. The savings made the enormous premium for polished nickle disappear and the delivery was easy as pie.The plumber, relieved of the burden of having to deal with a customer buying something like that, is ecstatic. I even bought expensive farm and vegetable sinks in the same manner.This is a whole new world and, yet, there will be a Walmart Supercenter (which sells goods and groceries) in every middle American city. They will become Internet pickup locations.This is going to get very interesting.JLMwww.themusingsofthebigredca…

  3. pointsnfigures

    The best thing about Bitcoin/Blockchain is its potential to return power to individuals over governments. That scares bureaucrats