}Until fairly recently, very large organizations have been more successful than
} the alternatives that were available, but that is changing now that more
} successful alternatives for organizations are appearing. What we're seeing
And more to the point, now that technology allows new businesses which
can benefit from such alternative organizations, as opposed to the clear
economies of scale found in heavy industry. I fail to see how
increasing fragmentation in information industries will challenge
Alcoa's dominance of aluminum processing. Programmers can split up and
freewheel (Microsoft? Economy of scale in advertising...) and mail
order PC companies can scrounge for best parts, but those parts, the
hardware the programs run on, are produced by decreasingly few
companies. Billion dollar plant costs bite. Nanotech might change
that, but it's not too immediate.
Note that food production is an even more necessary manipulation of
physical realtiy, but much fragmentation and competition is possible and
present there, so farmers don't run the world.
Merry part,
-xx- Damien R. Sullivan X-) <*> http://www.ugcs.caltech.edu/~phoenix
A priest was walking along the cliffs at Dover when he came
upon two locals pulling another man ashore on the end of a rope. "That's
what I like to see" said the priest, "A man helping his fellow man."
As he was walking away, one local remarked to the other, "Well,
he sure doesn't know the first thing about shark fishing."