Great post Nikhil and clearly some food for thought on these morphing boundaries between consumer and enterprise focus. I suspect we may see even more change happen as AI based services deliver even faster technology adoption.
As regards names, I like Hydra for the mythical element that comes with extreme change!
PS: my understanding of 'prosumer' was "a person who both consumes and produces a product or service."
If a startup can become an island of coherence in entropic waters, it seems to resonate well with the trickster archetype that Lewis Hyde speaks to in his brilliant survey, "Trickster Makes This World": "Trickster is the mythic embodiment of ambiguity and ambivalence, doubleness and duplicity, contradiction and paradox." Since animal names seem to stick, I'd propose something of that kind. A chameleon?
I once called it B2B2C2B but it's quite a mouthful :) Having worked at Facebook, Dropbox, Plaid, AngelList, I share your view that the best companies dare to be both consumer and enterprise!
Hi Nikhil and thanks for the continued thought provoking poking.
I’d like to suggest some additional dimensions to your reorientation of the B2B and B2C landscape - let’s say C2B and C2C.
My company, The Pixie Network is proving that AI + mature cloud infrastructure can give individuals affordable enterprise level capabilities to deal with businesses and other consumers as peers.
To start with, we are disintermediating high value personal professional services and in time we believe delegated agents will combine consumer advocacy with more autonomous management of the business of digital life. My own ‘old’ essays on this topic are at pixienetwork.net. Would love to compare more notes 😁🧚
Thanks Nikhil. Really crystalises a lot of my thoughts. Limit your sequence but not your ambition.
I have been thinking about this new "breed" of company as a Centaur. The human part is very focused and has clear offer for the consumer. The horse part has the endurance, speed and scale that the enterprise is looking for. I think part of me is thinking back to the Garry Kasparov centaur chess which contains a AI history less in itself.
Great post Nikhil and clearly some food for thought on these morphing boundaries between consumer and enterprise focus. I suspect we may see even more change happen as AI based services deliver even faster technology adoption.
As regards names, I like Hydra for the mythical element that comes with extreme change!
PS: my understanding of 'prosumer' was "a person who both consumes and produces a product or service."
If a startup can become an island of coherence in entropic waters, it seems to resonate well with the trickster archetype that Lewis Hyde speaks to in his brilliant survey, "Trickster Makes This World": "Trickster is the mythic embodiment of ambiguity and ambivalence, doubleness and duplicity, contradiction and paradox." Since animal names seem to stick, I'd propose something of that kind. A chameleon?
I once called it B2B2C2B but it's quite a mouthful :) Having worked at Facebook, Dropbox, Plaid, AngelList, I share your view that the best companies dare to be both consumer and enterprise!
💡💡
Hi Nikhil and thanks for the continued thought provoking poking.
I’d like to suggest some additional dimensions to your reorientation of the B2B and B2C landscape - let’s say C2B and C2C.
My company, The Pixie Network is proving that AI + mature cloud infrastructure can give individuals affordable enterprise level capabilities to deal with businesses and other consumers as peers.
To start with, we are disintermediating high value personal professional services and in time we believe delegated agents will combine consumer advocacy with more autonomous management of the business of digital life. My own ‘old’ essays on this topic are at pixienetwork.net. Would love to compare more notes 😁🧚
Thanks Nikhil. Really crystalises a lot of my thoughts. Limit your sequence but not your ambition.
I have been thinking about this new "breed" of company as a Centaur. The human part is very focused and has clear offer for the consumer. The horse part has the endurance, speed and scale that the enterprise is looking for. I think part of me is thinking back to the Garry Kasparov centaur chess which contains a AI history less in itself.