Rob Paterson writes Why do corporation die so soon and cities don’t? Corporations are Machines and Cities are Networks. Along the way he brings it back to WordPress and the Wikipedia.
Rob Paterson writes Why do corporation die so soon and cities don’t? Corporations are Machines and Cities are Networks. Along the way he brings it back to WordPress and the Wikipedia.
Here’s Geoffrey West, the guy whose ideas Paterson writes about, talking at TED earlier this month in the dramatically evolved city of Edinburgh:
http://www.ted.com/talks/geoffrey_west_the_surprising_math_of_cities_and_corporations.html
No offense, Matt, that was quite a trip to get to WordPress, but a good analogy. I tend to disagree on cities not dieing. They may still exist, but most are mere shells of what they used to be. Take downtown Tampa, Fl. About all that is left is office buildings, Federal and County courthouses and shops like UPS, Kinko’s, etc. Office support shops. A large, but not the main, post office and the main library. No more actual stores. Pass through downtown on a Sunday morning and you’d swear it was dead! If you do have to go downtown on business you fight to find a close parking spot as most are taken by workers that pay by the month and on-street is limited to 15 Min or 1/2 hour. A lot of businesses die because they can not compete with say China. Some move their operations overseas, others just close up. Used to be if you worked somewhere for 5-6 years, you had a job for life, unless you really messed up. Now, the company may be closed in a year and you’re out looking for a job! It isn’t the way it was, that’s for sure! That’s the problem with getting old, Matt, you see too many changes! So, don’t get old!
I am big fan of you Matt. I love using WordPress. Most of my earnings comes directly from WordPress. I build WordPress Themes. I first saw you from a Video from BigOmaha and just started using WordPress since. I believe in WordPress and I know it will grow as big as it can be.
Thanks
Neeraj Agarwal
India
Actually, cities, towns and villages do die. Look at history. It has happened repeatedly. In fact, on our land there was an entire village long ago (1700’s, 1800’s) and all that is left is our old farm house. It was perhaps the first house here and it is the last. All the others got gradually abandoned, fell down, burned, etc. Times changed. The mini-ice age over a century ago decimated the town, as it did much of our state. There are other towns I know of that also vanished. In one case, the state put a high way through the town obliterating it. In another case the highway bypassed a town sucking away all the business that used to support the local merchants and the town gradually died. It still lingers a little but there isn’t much left. These are small, the ones I know of directly but big cities have also died historically. Study archeology. Cities die too.
The fact that cities can tax me, incorporate me, and provide services to me while obscuring the actual cost I pay, and companies can do none of those things, may have something to do with it.
Sure cities die! But I come from a city that died and resurrected a couple of times. The last time, Hitler had it raised with ground, and ordered to turn it into a lake. The entire city became a huge Ground Zero.
Today it’s young and thriving, with some great music festivals (Chopin and jazz esp.). Every 3rd citizen is a student.
People rebuilt Warsaw, often working for free, because they cared. Many, many people all over the world care about WordPress and Wikipedia, that’s why they won’t die. You just have to make sure they feel it’s theirs.
See the death and resurrection here: http://youtu.be/dMbjZJiK39I
WorPress won’t die because it will grow like a city. its a live wire that will continuously keep the online world from moving up to the next generation and i believe in that. Keep up the good work and thank you for sharing good words matt
Corporations and cities die for the same reason. A lack of purpose and no one to lead them out of apathy