Is this the ‘Nerd Economy’?
I think so. The future of the economy and economic recovery lies with the ‘nerds’- specifically, those nerds that code. And this is a good thing. They are smart. There has never been a better time to be a nerdpreneur. San Francisco may be the hub, but this is a global movement. Marc Andreessen touched on this in the WSJ: Software is eating the world.
From Marc’s WSJ post:
Why is this happening now?
Six decades into the computer revolution, four decades since the invention of the microprocessor, and two decades into the rise of the modern Internet, all of the technology required to transform industries through software finally works and can be widely delivered at global scale.
Over two billion people now use the broadband Internet, up from perhaps 50 million a decade ago, when I was at Netscape, the company I co-founded. In the next 10 years, I expect at least five billion people worldwide to own smartphones, giving every individual with such a phone instant access to the full power of the Internet, every moment of every day.
On the back end, software programming tools and Internet-based services make it easy to launch new global software-powered start-ups in many industries—without the need to invest in new infrastructure and train new employees. In 2000, when my partner Ben Horowitz was CEO of the first cloud computing company, Loudcloud, the cost of a customer running a basic Internet application was approximately $150,000 a month. Running that same application today in Amazon’s cloud costs about $1,500 a month.”
A New Crop of Companies Is Emerging
This isn’t the first time software and technology has been at the forefront. But it’s the first time developers are front and center. Not CIOs. Not IT solution sellers. DEVELOPERS. Redmonk has been talking about how developers are The New Kingmakers and wielding unprecedented power thanks to the cloud, open source, and other macro trends as Andreessen wrote about. I agree. We see it every day.
Think about it. Splunk worth $3B with $100M+ in revenue from log file search. Facebook defining their culture as The Hacker Way. Github is being wooed by big time investors (which they don’t need or care about!). CodeAcademy and Udemy are signing up more students than probably all the ivy league schools combined. Heroku was bought for a quarter billion dollars. Apple is one of the most valuable company in the world. Tried to hire a developer recently? It’s hard. Even my 8-year old daughter said she wants to learn to code (which is just plain awesome!). TechCrunch just wrote about the “great engineering shortage of 2012“. It’s good to be a nerd right now.
Today, companies can’t even succeed without a data API for hackers. Ask Box.net. Ask Salesforce. Ask any relevant software company. Social. Mobile. Global. Big Data. APIs. These software strategies are more critical than ever before.
“Be nice to nerds. Chances are you‘ll end up working for one.” - Charles J. Sykes
Tweet #TheNewKingmakers
This isn’t temporary. This is the future. More and more (and more) businesses will be going public and/or profiting on the creative leadership of innovative developers. New Relic is one of these companies, but there are dozens more. Atlassian, Github, Twilio, ActiveState, Amazon AWS… (Did I mention New Relic?) We’re all enjoying the developer’s rise as a buyer and influencer within companies large and small.
Build tools for developers. Then Win.
It’s good to be a developer. In 2012, it is also good to be providing tools to the developer. DevOps and NoOps and Kinda-sorta-ops is real. We think these guys and gals who sling code are going to be the ones who change the world and drive the next wave of growth for the world’s economy.
Note/Question: We don’t use the term “nerd” in a derogatory or negative context. Quite the contrary. We’ve given out thousands of shirts with “Data Nerd” on them. Our customers seem to love ‘em. If you don’t like the term – do you have any other suggestions? Geek? Hacker? I could say “Developer Economy” but it doesn’t have the same energy.
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The more demand for coders, the more demand for people to manage them. That’s where I come in.
Posted: 30 April 2012 at 8:12 am by JAnon
Yes, I would love to name this coming future the same one my country once wanted to build for all humanity. It was called “communism” then, the world which is built by united workers for the prosperity of everyone. For the English-speaking world the word “communism” bears negative connotation though, then a suitable word could be the world’s family, well, acttually two words. The question is for these united powerful workers, the Masters of this family, to remove weapons from the world and give to everyone adequate information for living and controlling the manufacturing processes and distribution of goods.
I love this coming future , it makes sense to live !
Vladimir Romanovskiy
President of
United Programming,Ltd
Russia
Posted: 30 April 2012 at 9:11 am by Vladimir Romanovskiy
Exactly, Mr. R!
Posted: 30 April 2012 at 10:59 am by Nicole
“The future of the economy and economic recovery lies with the ‘nerds’- specifically, those nerds that code.”
These are exciting times but you need to get a grip on your hubris.
Posted: 30 April 2012 at 3:38 pm by Clyde Smith
It’s the Nerds Plus economy. So it’s great to see the democratisation of “making”, with 3D rapid prototyping FAB becoming the new sheds. See @wellymakerspace in Wellington NZ – innovation at the end of the earth! So it’s about the C&D economy, collaborate and develop. And the social commerce infrastructure that will set up around them. Epiphyte capitalism is coming your way.
Posted: 30 April 2012 at 5:26 pm by Marianne Doczi
“The more demand for coders, the more demand for people to manage them. That’s where I come in.”
And that’s where I start my own company, leaving you to manage the interns.
“Those who can’t do, manage.”
I’m about over it.
Posted: 1 May 2012 at 6:33 am by Peter Hanley
I want to code!!!
Posted: 9 May 2012 at 10:19 am by Liz
Is this video on youtube too?
Posted: 18 May 2012 at 12:34 am by Davide
How about “Date a nerd” to start production of replacements.
Posted: 18 May 2012 at 9:54 am by Steve Tait
As long as nerds are being framed as male, and coding as tech, something big and essential is missing!
Imagine an X-shirt beside the T-shirt and change will flow.
10com is a not for profit agile grassroots initiative that strives to empower and protect the EU and it’s (coprorate) citizens for the Age of Digital
Posted: 23 May 2012 at 1:27 am by 10COM
““The more demand for coders, the more demand for people to manage them. That’s where I come in.”
And that’s where I start my own company, leaving you to manage the interns.
“Those who can’t do, manage.”
I’m about over it.”
And I’ll still be sitting atop you all either sorting your finances out or laughing at you for being unable to do so. Good luck fixing an economy without economists and accountants.
Posted: 25 May 2012 at 6:05 am by Alex
Nerdpreneur? Last year I started to use the term entreprenerd to describe myself.
Posted: 25 May 2012 at 7:31 am by Sjoerd
“““The more demand for coders, the more demand for people to manage them. That’s where I come in.”
And that’s where I start my own company, leaving you to manage the interns.
“Those who can’t do, manage.”
I’m about over it.”
And I’ll still be sitting atop you all either sorting your finances out or laughing at you for being unable to do so. Good luck fixing an economy without economists and accountants”
And I’ll be at the start, making software. Good luck being an accountant without software.
Posted: 2 June 2012 at 4:02 am by Dan
As always the demand in the world is for the progression of technology and science and luckily for us ‘nerds’ at the moment it is coming through innovations in code – the question is for how long?
Posted: 3 June 2012 at 4:16 am by Devon Barrett
ahah ! cool !
Posted: 4 June 2012 at 1:52 am by Luciano Lucci
Microsoft? They’ve been a big company for a very long time, which considering they’re one of the first software only companies should have gotten into your list before Apple given they’re less about coding these days and more about hardware. Well they’ve always have been about hardware, it’s just more obvious now.
That and you should be focusing on managers, economists, all the needles bureaucracy that’s in the way between a coder and a product. Or focus on the internet, there’s lots of places on this earth where people are still relegated to dial up or satellite dial up. Africa, Australia, anywhere rural. Dead spots are pretty common and tend to screw up digital only products. That and 2 billion out of 7 is pretty low. You could work on hardware for the next ten years and still be more secure than digital.
Posted: 12 June 2012 at 11:38 pm by CJ