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> "While I agree that the enterprise is about control and the web is about emergence, I don't think this negative characterization is all that useful. It seems

by diN0bot 18y ago

> "While I agree that the enterprise is about control and the web is about emergence, I don't think this negative characterization is all that useful. It seems to imply that the enterprise's orientation toward control springs fully formed from the minds of an army of petty controlling middle managers. I don't think that's the case." Control and closed-ness is far more endemic. It stems from marketing and sales, which are much more important to the profit-driven stock owners who are really in charge. For example, Amazon tries to get users to stay on their site longer and buy more. It has little to do with technology coolness or a sincere connection with users. Contrast that with a web company trying to fain a foothold with innovation and collaboration. I don't get the rest of the article. Could he not plainly state that there is a difference in openness and closedness between the two cultures? He already mentions APIs, which sums up the point pretty well. Maybe he's trying to say we can learn from the bumbling insincerity of enterprises? My take is to stop writing about differences or produce more muck. Just focus on sincerely making good things. Lead by example without bullshit. I see great things happening all the time in this direction.

andreyf 18y ago
Strange that you left out the follow-up for that, I thought it was the most insightful part of the article: It seems to imply that the enterprise's orientation toward control springs fully formed from the minds of an army of petty controlling middle managers. I don't think that's the case. I suspect it's more likely the result of large scale system dynamics, where the culture of control follows from other constraints. [...] Once you have GAAP, Sarbox, domain-specific regulation like HIPAA, quarterly expectations from "The Street," decades of MIS legacy, and the talent acquisition realities that mature companies in mature industries face, the strange attractors in the system will pull most of those shards to roughly the same place. In other words, the IT enterprise is about control because large businesses in mature industries are about control. On the other hand, the web is about emergence because in this time, place, and with this technology discontinuity, emergence is the low energy state.

by diN0bot 18y ago

andreyf 18y ago

Strange that you left out the follow-up for that, I thought it was the most insightful part of the article: It seems to imply that the enterprise's orientation toward control springs fully formed from the minds of an army of petty controlling middle managers. I don't think that's the case. I suspect it's more likely the result of large scale system dynamics, where the culture of control follows from other constraints. [...] Once you have GAAP, Sarbox, domain-specific regulation like HIPAA, quarterly expectations from "The Street," decades of MIS legacy, and the talent acquisition realities that mature companies in mature industries face, the strange attractors in the system will pull most of those shards to roughly the same place. In other words, the IT enterprise is about control because large businesses in mature industries are about control. On the other hand, the web is about emergence because in this time, place, and with this technology discontinuity, emergence is the low energy state.