Techcrunch reports that Pincus the man behind Zynga says that in 5 years time we will all be dial tones. Not just that, we will have a dial tone for our friends, for music, for games and so on. Reading through the piece and the comment I read this one comment by TahoeBlue who also happens to be the moderator of the forum. It says and I quote him here : "When I first read the remarks ("we'll all be connected to each other", and "we'll all be dial tones"), my first reaction was that Pincus was suggesting that individuals and entities on the web would be talking peer-to-peer, and not through a "social portal", in 5 years.
Given the pace of change in both the resources and capabilities of networking, the prospects of each person maintaining their own 'network' of friends, colleagues, and services on computing infrastructure domiciled on servers dedicated to, and controlled by, individuals and not monolithic portals like Facebook would seem to be both attainable and desirable."
The first thought that came to my mind is Diaspora (joindiaspora.com seems to be down at the moment, it could be a localised problem with my internet connection too. You can read about diaspora here) and a few lines below his original comment TahoeBlue also agrees with the thought.
People owning their own social networks is a powerful thought and in time it might become a default standard like owning a telephone or a cell phone connection. One might want to snigger at the mavens at KP and their large $250 million fund, but the truth is that the connected mass of people will become more and more social and it will not just be about poking someone or liking a story or even recommending the a new cafe. Social networks make it easy for people to keep in touch without the costs of keeping in touch. It is similar to the way email changed communication. Only this time the people will also want to share their thoughts and ideas and issues with people they know. Eventually there will be two kinds of social networks - an individuals private space meant for family and close friends, another for their co workers and finally one for their outer circle. Social networks mimic the real world and the quicker we realise this the easier it will be for us to adapt and adopt.
In time this dial tone world will learn to pick out the lines it wants to connect to and ignore the rest. If Google and search gave the connected world the sum total of intentions of humanity. The next generation of social networking platform will give it its voice. We can already see it being reflected in the status messages and the tweets around us, but imagine a global connected thought, of grief and joy and rising. It feels complex and at the same time feels liberating.
Mark Pincus thinks in 5 years the world will change again and these dial tones will be the signal flags of the global connected human mass. It sounds profound, and to imagine when Google started, search and then social networking seemed like geek toys!
Think of how it will change the consumer, consumption, media planning, buying, selling advertising. Each will need new models and new initiative, either the incumbents evolve fast or a new breed of people will start knocking the doors of the VCs for funds to power themselves.
What fun!
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