Hacking the Industrial Economy
discussionleader.hbsp.com
discussionleader.hbsp.com
What you're missing is that "administration" as you're grokking it is optimized for industrial economics, not the low cost, low risk, high speed world of networks (globalization, mobile phones, etc).
Also suggest that you go back and read the previous article on "Hacking Detroit" with a keen eye on the "auto making platform" strategy.
To borrow a meme from today's Venture Hacks:
"Bug Labs for cars"
BOING!
There isn't anything new in the auto industry. Hybrids are typically laughable. Diesel electric power systems (that is, "hybrids") are basically what replaced the steam age. Everything else is marketing.
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Now, I'm all for good and modern, but it doesn't have to be labeled "hacking" to be so.
You may find that his articles "lack substance" because Umair generally works within a kind of Socratic method that demands more of the reader than spoonfed pedantry like TechCrunch, et al.
PG has said a lot of this implicitly or explicitly in his essays.
The first thing I did as I started reading this article was share it on Google Reader. I was obviously putting plenty in.
Then, after I got to the end, I removed the article from my Google Reader, for the simple reason that this article doesn't just require you to put something in - it requires you to put the entire substance in.
There is no discernible pattern in what it describes as "hack". "Hack", going by this article, is anything that the author (and the reader) consider good and that was done in the last 10 years. So effectively, it means "good change". It provides no pattern which could be used to help generate more of those hacks, however.
The best way to expose this is to summarise the article.
The summary is: "Cool stuff, wow, please do more."
Now, I have nothing against an article which conveys that message - but it needs to do so honestly. This article pretends to be presenting a good idea, when in fact it is completely idea-free.
This is my opinion and you may of course disagree, but please formulate that disagreement with fewer TechCrunch innuendos and other patronising devices.
Also, if you disagree, it'd be good to hear what ideas you think Umair actually puts forward in this essay.
I'd point to the link on P&G's Connect & Develop strategy as something that has a TON of concrete value for startups/hackers/etc.
Finally, I probably get more excited about this kind of thing than hackers who already practice the naive idealism, pragmatism, and humble irreverence that Umair describes for the reason that I outlined in my comment on the original article: the more people that look at problems through a hacking-esque mindset, the better off the world will be.
(Also, I didn't really mean the tone of my comment to be directly at "you" per se, just in general...there's a lot of "this lacks substance" blowback about Bubblegeneration...I was just trying to be short (but not curt); sorry!
(Disclaimer: I am not an official spokesperson for hackers at large, nor do I intend to suggest I am, and so I'm speaking for myself)
I don't think the hacker idealism is naive, or humble for that matter. You could call it naive, but only in the sense that it's willing to question everything. As for humble, there's nothing humble about believing that everyone else might have had it wrong for the last 50 years and that you might know a better way :-)
Being a proponent of that approach, I certainly agree that the world could use even more idealism, pragmatism and not-so-humble irreverence, though :-)
Your last sentence really sums it up for me. THE POWER of what Umair is saying is: "I have done the research, and it is razor-sharp, economically-grounded strategy to be idealistic/irreverent/naive/etc."