Adam Wiggins (![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} adamwiggins) wrote,@ 2008-03-27 01:29:00 |
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Institutions
Up-and-comers challenge the status quo. They offer increased speed, or productivity, or enjoyment, or whatever - over the standard. If the difference is big enough, it spreads out and soon everyone knows about it or uses it. Slowly it transforms from an upstart into an institution.
Institutions are part of the fabric of our lives, or society, or the economy, or all of the above. They are defenders of the status quo. More: they are the status quo itself.
Some recent upstarts-become-institutions include Wikipedia, Google, cell phones, and the internet. All of these things still have traces of their shiny newness, and upstart spirit from the recent past, hanging about them like a halo. But in a decade we'll be cursing them for being curmudgeonous, slow to adapt, out of step with the times. And it will be hard to remember when they felt like the hip newcomers.
The infinite series of societal progress is the appearance of these up-and-comers; their apparent uphill battle to gain traction; and once a tipping point is crossed they quickly and systematically obliterate the previous approach. And now there is a new status quo, awaiting a new challenger to do it all over again.
Up-and-comers challenge the status quo. They offer increased speed, or productivity, or enjoyment, or whatever - over the standard. If the difference is big enough, it spreads out and soon everyone knows about it or uses it. Slowly it transforms from an upstart into an institution.
Institutions are part of the fabric of our lives, or society, or the economy, or all of the above. They are defenders of the status quo. More: they are the status quo itself.
Some recent upstarts-become-institutions include Wikipedia, Google, cell phones, and the internet. All of these things still have traces of their shiny newness, and upstart spirit from the recent past, hanging about them like a halo. But in a decade we'll be cursing them for being curmudgeonous, slow to adapt, out of step with the times. And it will be hard to remember when they felt like the hip newcomers.
The infinite series of societal progress is the appearance of these up-and-comers; their apparent uphill battle to gain traction; and once a tipping point is crossed they quickly and systematically obliterate the previous approach. And now there is a new status quo, awaiting a new challenger to do it all over again.
