Archive of UserLand's first discussion group, started October 5, 1998.

Schrage writes an ETP manifesto

Author:Phil Wolff
Posted:1/20/2000; 7:08:01 PM
Topic:Schrage writes an ETP manifesto
Msg #:14673
Prev/Next:14672 / 14674

Michael Schrage wrote a column for Fortune (the issue with Jobs on the cover) titled "Hate the Web Master? He, Too, Can Be Replaced."
Cost management is complicated because organizations have grown more dependent on the people who manage the digital media that the organizations have grown more dependent on.
It starts off as a diatribe lamenting the absurd pay rates of scarce IT folks. but then...
Over 25 years ago software management guru Jerry Weinberg keenly observed, "If a programmer is indispensable, get rid of him as quickly as possible."
and...
The most provocative tomorrows will come when entrepreneurs pour their ingenuity into figuring out how to automate Web mastery for the managerial masses. If data mining, customer-relationship management, and tech support software can be made as easy to use--and as reliable--as a spreadsheet, then just how many in-house gurus would a corporation need? Using cheaper Web technologies to eliminate expensive Web technologists is precisely the delicious irony that much of the baby boom's managerial generation hopes to savor before retirement.

After all, a century ago worried telephone company executives calculated that everyone in America would have to become a telephone operator if Ma Bell scaled up to reach out and touch the nation. In fact, that is precisely what happened: Instead of operators dialing numbers, we do. Automated switches have created a nation of people who "program" the overwhelming majority of the calls they make. When that becomes the design metaphor for managing the net-centric enterprise, the war is over.

This sounds like a Userland community call to arms. Everyone an operator. Instead of calling the operator to make your call, dial it yourself. If you know your numbers, it's as easy as counting using your rotary phone dial.

cite:

http://www.pathfinder.com/fortune/careers/work/2000/01/24/
Vol. 141, No. 2, January 24, 2000
Michael Schrage is co-director of the MIT Media Lab's e-markets initiative.

- phil [http://dijest.com]



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