John Hagel writes: "Attention is getting a lot of attention. Most recently, Robert Scoble from Microsoft blogged about an epiphany he had earlier this week during a visit to Silicon Valley. He is beginning to see the importance of attention and how it will shape value creation on the Internet. ¶ Attention is hugely important. It is the asset that will determine who creates value and who destroys value in the years ahead. Among other things, it will transform the nature and power of brands, as I discussed recently here, here and here. It is also reshaping the media business as I hinted in a posting on Martha Stewart a few years ago. ¶ But I worry that we are confusing attention with attention profiles – the historical record of where we have allocated our attention in the past. In the process, we may lose sight of what is really valuable and how to harness that value. ¶ Attention refers to the choice we each make regarding where we will focus at any point in time. It is also highly dynamic – each moment we have an opportunity to re-visit our choice and make a different choice. Attention is ultimately what counts – attention profiles have value only because our attention has so much value. I remain indebted to Michael Goldhaber for his seminal article on this topic - "The Attention Economy and the Net". ¶ Why is our attention so valuable? Because it is so scarce or, more accurately, because its relative scarcity has been rapidly increasing. Attention is a constant resource for each of us – we only have 24 hours in the day. It is up to us how we use those 24 hours. What’s changed is that we have more and more options competing for our attention. We face increasing abundance both in the production and distribution of goods and information about those goods. Some people think this is a curse. I happen to believe it is a blessing for many reasons. ..." Link: Edge Persepectives with John Hagel. This is an important post for us media types and I recommend you take the time to read the links, especially those by Scoble and Goldhaber.
Also see Fred Wilson's, The Looming Attention Crisis. Link: A VC weblog. --Dennis
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