Blessed Are The Tech Pioneers:Learning The Lessons Of TheTelegraph

The Internet bubble was caused by a confluence of technological,financial and social factors.

We learned that the financial markets can be misleading and thatWall Street does not necessarily reflect Main Street.

We also learned that good ideas still need infrastructure todeliver on the vision. And that future success will come to thosewith feet squarely planted on the ground, sporting business modelsthat can generate profits and/or reduce costs.

And if you think that this is the first time such an era hasoccurred, think again.

I just finished an interesting book (a quick read by the way) byTom Standage, entitled: “The Victorian Internet” (Berkley Books,New York). He chronicles the invention of the telegraph in the 19thcentury and points to the similarities between the telegraph andthe Internet.

And considering the fact that messages traveled by horse andboats in those days, a telegraph network that was able to sendmessages across long distances in minutes was indeed a revolutioncompared to what the Internet brings us today.

He closes his book by saying that if Victorians arrived today,they would be impressed by heavier-than-air flying machines andspace travel (thought impossible in those days). But as for theInternet, they would say, “we had one of our own.”

Many of the current issues such as privacy, security, crime,pornography and fraud are similar to a few of the pasttechnological and social advances.

The telegraph was widely seen as a panacea at the time.Curiously, the words used by people today to describe the “InternetRevolution” and the “New Economy” are strikingly similar to pastevents and reflect similar patterns of skepticism, exploitation andpublic hype as we all recently witnessed.

Perhaps the most revealing point of Mr. Standages book issomething we all can understand–that people do not change as fastas technology.

We are not going to change human nature, but we can learn a fewlessons from the past. And perhaps the first one is something thatI have heard Bill Gates of Microsoft say repeatedly–that we tend tooverestimate the short term but underestimate the long term.

The fact remains that the crude telegraph has had a profoundeffect upon us all through the years. It gave birth to many otherinventions (such as the telephone, fax and Internet) and hasinspired many new ways of doing business. The Internet will do thesame and more.

But unlike the telegraph, every human on Earth can be connectedtoday. And this requires the same agreement on standards as thetelegraph did in the 19th century.

Without standard protocols and codes (like the one from SamuelMorse) or collaboration among the business partners, the advanceswould never have come about. Thanks to all who persevered.

Life on the other side of the Internet bubble might not beeasier, but is certainly less crazy. Rather than seekingfirst-mover advantage and quick (and often illusive) profits byusing the Internet as a revenue play, our members are now focusingon more fundamental changes to the business. And this bodes wellfor the future of e-business.

Yes, the stock markets went crazy, logic went out the window,and our 401k plans might be worth a bit less as a result.

But connected networks (with ACORD industry standards) offerpromising potential for our business.

Competitive advantage will be based more on “open” systems,self-service applications, alliances and sharing information amongsuppliers, distributors and customers. Legacy, proprietary systemsmight not disappear overnight, but middleware and customer-facingapplications will be open and standards-centric to be sure.

In fact, standards are no longer expedient, but crucial to thatend. And like the telegraph, without them, the promise would neverhave been realized.

The good news is that we have dot-com survivors and a new andhealthy respect for the Internet and what it can bring to ourbusiness. And in contrast to Federal Reserve Board Chairman AlanGreenspans famous comment, we now have a more rational exuberancefor what lies on the horizon.

I was on the program with Ray Thomas, chief executive officer ofZurich North America Small Business, at an insurance industry eventa number of months ago and he said that “its not about e-business,its about business.” How right he was.

E-vision should not be separated from traditional businessvision. The difference is in the tools we use to get there. Andalthough we lost a number of forward thinking, innovative dot-comsin the recent storm, we will all be better off in the long run as aresult of their voyage.

Blessed are the pioneers.

Gregory A. Maciag is president and chief executive officerof ACORD, the non-profit industry association based in Pearl River,N.Y., with offices in Belgium and the United Kingdom. ACORDdevelops and maintains standards for the insurance and relatedfinancial services industries and promotes effective use oftechnology to facilitate e-commerce and reduce costsworldwide.

Reproduced from National Underwriter Property &Casualty/Risk & Benefits Management Edition, September 17,2001. Copyright 2001 by The National Underwriter Company in theserial publication. All rights reserved.Copyright in this articleas an independent work may be held by the author.

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