Vaporized: Solid Strategies for Success in a Dematerialized World

The inordinately handsome Robert Tercek has designed and created interactive experiences on every digital platform, including satellite television, game consoles, broadband Internet and mobile networks, launched startup ventures and also served in executive leadership roles at major media companies, most recently as President of Digital Media at OWN: The Oprah Winfrey Network, and previously as Senior Vice President of Digital Media at Sony Pictures Entertainment and earlier as Creative Director at MTV: Music Television. He has launched the first multi-channel television satellite in Asia, the first animated multimedia games for computers, the first Java-based multiplayer games on the Web, and the first streaming video on mobile devices and has provided strategic insight and advice to many companies, including Nokia, Motorola, AMD, Sony Computer Entertainment, Turner Broadcasting, PBS, CNN, Interpublic Group, and Reed Exhibitions. He is the Chairman of the Board of Directors for the Creative Visions Foundation in Malibu, California. It difficult to believe that VAPORIZED is his first book but he explains why he wrote it: ‘I believe that everyone on Earth can benefit from knowledge that is systematically harvested, organized, refined, and exploited for the purpose of making the economy and the rest of society more efficient. In the process, we have a chance to overhaul outdated government bureaucracies, crusty rules and regulations, old-fashioned education systems, and other relics from the industrial past. That’s what this book is about.Readers may approach this book with trepidation – lack of adequate information about the current state of technology taking on a threatening form – but Robert explains it all in such an accessible though brilliant manner. This is a book everyone should read and see the positive aspects of dematerialization as a key to our survival and not our obsolescence.In his excellent Introduction Robert states, ‘Nicholas Negroponte (who provides a vivid Foreword for this book) founded the MIT Media Lab to conduct interdisciplinary research into media, technology, science, and design. There, Buckminster Fuller’s coinage got an upgrade from “ephemeralization” to “digitization,” a feat of linguistic finesse that locates the phenomenon squarely in the realm of the computer. Negroponte, the director of the Media Lab, urged us to “move bits, not atoms,” and his book Being Digital conveyed the implications of a dematerialized society to a general readership. Since the publication of Negroponte’s book in 1993, we’ve seen many of his predictions come true: broadband Internet, smart objects, artificial intelligence, and ultracheap, pocketable supercomputers sporting novel interfaces. Today these breakthroughs are taken for granted by a generation that grew up with YouTube, smartphones, selfies, Siri, and Wikipedia, but there was a time not too long ago when they were bold — even audacious — ideas….What exactly are these bits that replace atoms? Software. Most recently, the computer networking industry has adopted a term called “software-defined” to describe what is coming next. The term is trendy in the information technology field: software-defined networking, software-defined storage, software-defined data centers, software-defined clouds, software-defined everything. This is a major tech trend that will replace stubbornly inflexible purpose-built systems embodied in physical hardware with highly flexible systems written in software. Software-defined architectures are adaptable. The entire system operates in real-time, responding to incoming data, as needs change and as demand ebbs and flows. In this term, “software-defined,” we capture some of the essence of the twenty-first-century society — not just because a growing part of our economy rides on top of digital information networks, but also because the rules that shape software are beginning to redefine the rules of everything that touches it, up to and including the rules that govern society…This idea, “doing more with less by replacing physical stuff with digital information-as-a-service,” began with networking technology but now touches just about every industry imaginable. What is being transformed? Manufacturing, distribution, retail sales, marketing and media, and the very concept of buying and owning physical products. That’s what we’re going to examine in this book. I believe that the phrase “Do more with less” is not just a hollow slogan; it is a global strategic imperative. Doing more with less is the right thing to do. Not only is this a valid choice in a world constrained by finite resources; it also happens to be the best business strategy in an economy that is, and will continue to be, defined by software. From this point forward, by leveraging ubiquitous telecommunications networks and computer technology to make efficient use of abundant information resources, all of human society — not just companies, but also our civic institutions, educational establishments, and governing bodies — really will be able to do far more with less. Our economy will become more productive, and we will all be collectively much richer while consuming physical resources more wisely, making better use of both raw materials and finished goods. These are big claims, so what makes me so confident about them? What’s the secret? Information.’This is only an aperitif for the feast of enlightenment contained in this fascinating book – a book everyone should read – now! Grady Harp, December 16

This is a masterful work, possibly one of the best business books written in the last 25 years. Where most business books are either written from the perspective of an academic/consultant that has no firm grasp of operations experience, or worse, that of a CEO with an agenda to burnish his or her image, Mr Tercek's years of experience in the media industry clearly shine through in example after example.He takes simple principles that have become articles of faith here in Silicon Valley: Moore's and Metcalfe's Laws, and explains how they have been applied in major industries: publishing, music/media, advertising and even beverage distribution. Technology jargon is well explained and simplified for the non-technical executive, but more importantly he illustrates how waves of entrepreneurs have been able to use these principles to "vaporize" these industries, much in the way industries were reshaped in the gilded age with the advent of new innovations like railroads, internal combustion engines, electric lighting etc. He also offers examples of companies that "get" these principles and have managed to both survive and thrive in the face of the disruptive innovations of our information age.But instead of stopping at this point, Mr Tercek, confidently wearing the hat of a futurist, makes bold statements like Anything that Can be Commoditized Will Be; Everything that Can be Measured Will Be; Everything that Can be Measured Will Be...and so on. And to prove that he is a real futurist and not just a connector of dots, skilled at pattern recognition and spotting early trends(Tom Friedman's books come to mind,) he goes on to point out specific industries where these principles are ripe for application. I know this because one of those industries is one where my company, founded just a year ago is focused and Mr Tercek has effectively predicted the founding of our company.The utility of such predictions is tremendous. For the entrepreneur its a double edge sword. On the one hand you are on the right track, but on the other it is a reminder that competition will be fierce and fast and the spoils will go to one or just a few winners in a given disrupted industry. For the established industry, it is nothing short of a revile call, heralding that the last days of doing things as you have always done them are numbered. Leaders either need to disrupt themselves, by applying innovations that add value or be wiped out completely.Mr Tercek goes well beyond the realm of the near future and explores artificial intelligence and even the possibility of a company that runs on artificial intelligence. He outlines the Optimistic and Pessimistic outlooks for such a future society, and clearly lands on the side of optimism, listing over 100 jobs, many of which did not exist more than 5-10 years ago, which offer rewarding opportunity to those who sign on to explore this future as it unfolds. If I had to pick one element where he is off the mark, it would be the impact of these principles on education. He is very dismissive of American higher education in particular which to him seems too mired in politically correct thinking, drinking and sexual assault scandals to make real forward progress via innovation. To this I point out that the fruits of our era's disruptive innovations are largely the product of American higher education, albeit one largely fueled by the contributions of highly educated technical immigrants who have come and stayed in wave after wave of innovation, attracted by Silicon Valley's perfectly seasoned gumbo of first class education, risk appetite, access to capital and skilled developers, and tolerance. For me the lesson for higher education in America is simple: in addition to driving our government to reform immigration for the right reasons(attracting skilled developers if we cannot attract enough domestically), our colleges and universities need to step up their game since with MooC's, Kahn Acadamy and other online tools, certain transfer of knowledge and even diplomas have become commodities as well. But critical thinking skills are as essential to innovation as technical skills. The key is asking the right questions to determine the industries and the timing where and when these basic innovation principles should be applied. As Marc Andreesen points out...American-designed "software is eating the word," but more importantly the greatest entrepreneurs of the age who have learned how to both build from the bottom up and also see the big picture will win to see their software eat hearty.

Vaporized takes a look at the ongoing change to our world and economy through digital technology and gives insight into how businesses need to change to survive and thrive. Tercek looks back at the past, to the roots of the technology and ideas that have come together to make digitalization of companies possible. I liked that he showed how different industries began to change far earlier than most would think, showing that this change has not been over-night, but rather expands across the past few decades. He relates stories to make several points, such as the move of anything that can be shared will be, any products that can be digitalized will be, and the effects this will have on how businesses must operate to survive.In one great example, Tercek relates a story that he used to work as a runner for a media business, where if they wanted to use a different type face for products he had to go to different businesses to have them make up the product using the business owned type set. Today, a word processor gives you access to a variety of fonts, something that completely put those businesses out of work. Now, their formally proprietary products are shared freely without thought or knowledge of the past. Tercek explores how this process is continually happening, and that people and businesses cannot live in denial over these changes.I loved that this book looks at the history, the present, and the future, and does it in a way that makes sense of the ever-changing digital world. It offers insight as well as asks questions that left me contemplating what I take for granted, and what is bound to change.

Excellent read!