Marco Antoniotti  <marcoxa@copernico.parades.rm.cnr.it> wrote:
+---------------
| ... it is all in economic theory regarding "network effects". The
| first owner of a fax machine did not really have any "value" (not the
| correct terminology - please bear with me) at hand. Then a second fax
| machine got bought and suddendly the "value" of *both* fax machines
| increased. Why did a third guy decided to buy a fax machine? Hey those
| two guys were sending faxes to each other like crazy. Maybe he should
| join the crowd.
+---------------

This has recently come to be known as "Metcalfe's Law": The value of an
open/shared/interconnected product or technology increases as the square
of the number of users/nodes/connections.

"Unleashing the Killer App: Digital Strategies for Market Dominance", by Larry
Downes & Chunka Mui <URL:http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/087584801X>
claims that the driving forces for all the "downsizing" & "outsourcing"
lately are Moore's Law, Metcalfe's Law, and Coames theory on the relation
between transaction costs and the optimal size of the firm. [Hint: Which
direction are Moore's Law & Metcalfe's Law driving transaction costs?]

If anyone is serious about trying to make a business out of Lisp (or almost
anything else), I strongly recommend reading this book. [Yeah, it's got
a hokey title, but just ignore it. There's some solid economics inside...]


-Rob

-----
Rob Warnock, 8L-855		rpw3@sgi.com
Applied Networking		http://reality.sgi.com/rpw3/
Silicon Graphics, Inc.		Phone: 650-933-1673
2011 N. Shoreline Blvd.		FAX: 650-964-0811
Mountain View, CA  94043	PP-ASEL-IA