1 00:00:00,117 --> 00:00:03,769 So this is Anna Hazare, 2 00:00:03,769 --> 00:00:07,677 and Anna Hazare may well be the most cutting-edge 3 00:00:07,677 --> 00:00:10,914 digital activist in the world today. 4 00:00:10,914 --> 00:00:12,452 And you wouldn't know it by looking at him. 5 00:00:12,452 --> 00:00:18,099 Hazare is a 77-year-old Indian anticorruption and social justice activist. 6 00:00:18,099 --> 00:00:21,690 And in 2011, he was running a big campaign 7 00:00:21,690 --> 00:00:24,650 to address everyday corruption in India, 8 00:00:24,650 --> 00:00:27,521 a topic that Indian elites love to ignore. 9 00:00:27,521 --> 00:00:29,103 So as part of this campaign, 10 00:00:29,103 --> 00:00:31,025 he was using all of the traditional tactics 11 00:00:31,025 --> 00:00:33,241 that a good Gandhian organizer would use. 12 00:00:33,241 --> 00:00:35,297 So he was on a hunger strike, 13 00:00:35,297 --> 00:00:37,822 and Hazare realized through his hunger 14 00:00:37,822 --> 00:00:39,599 that actually maybe this time, 15 00:00:39,599 --> 00:00:41,345 in the 21st century, 16 00:00:41,345 --> 00:00:42,834 a hunger strike wouldn't be enough. 17 00:00:42,834 --> 00:00:47,126 So he started playing around with mobile activism. 18 00:00:47,126 --> 00:00:49,013 So the first thing he did is he said to people, 19 00:00:49,013 --> 00:00:51,084 "Okay, why don't you send me 20 00:00:51,084 --> 00:00:52,845 a text message if you support 21 00:00:52,845 --> 00:00:54,585 my campaign against corruption?" 22 00:00:54,585 --> 00:00:56,854 So he does this, he gives people a short code, 23 00:00:56,854 --> 00:00:59,470 and about 80,000 people do it. 24 00:00:59,470 --> 00:01:01,438 Okay, that's pretty respectable. 25 00:01:01,438 --> 00:01:02,375 But then he decides, 26 00:01:02,375 --> 00:01:04,495 "Let me tweak my tactics a little bit." 27 00:01:04,495 --> 00:01:08,970 He says, "Why don't you leave me a missed call?" 28 00:01:08,970 --> 00:01:12,039 Now, for those of you who have lived in the global South, 29 00:01:12,039 --> 00:01:13,531 you'll know that missed calls 30 00:01:13,531 --> 00:01:17,374 are a really critical part of global mobile culture. 31 00:01:17,374 --> 00:01:18,488 I see people nodding. 32 00:01:18,488 --> 00:01:20,596 People leave missed calls all the time: 33 00:01:20,596 --> 00:01:22,542 If you're running late for a meeting 34 00:01:22,542 --> 00:01:24,848 and you just want to let them know that you're on the way, 35 00:01:24,848 --> 00:01:26,571 you leave them a missed call. 36 00:01:26,571 --> 00:01:28,497 If you're dating someone and you just want to say "I miss you" 37 00:01:28,497 --> 00:01:29,883 you leave them a missed call. 38 00:01:29,883 --> 00:01:32,427 So a note for a dating tip here, 39 00:01:32,427 --> 00:01:33,552 in some cultures, 40 00:01:33,552 --> 00:01:34,834 if you want to please your lover, 41 00:01:34,834 --> 00:01:39,335 you call them and hang up. (Laughter) 42 00:01:39,335 --> 00:01:42,690 So why do people leave missed calls? 43 00:01:42,690 --> 00:01:44,140 Well, the reason of course is that 44 00:01:44,140 --> 00:01:46,898 they're trying to avoid charges 45 00:01:46,898 --> 00:01:50,264 associated with making calls and sending texts. 46 00:01:50,264 --> 00:01:54,320 So when Hazare asked people to leave him a missed call, 47 00:01:54,320 --> 00:01:59,997 let's have a little guess how many people actually did this? 48 00:01:59,997 --> 00:02:03,415 Thirty-five million. 49 00:02:03,415 --> 00:02:07,458 So this is one of the largest coordinated actions in human history. 50 00:02:07,458 --> 00:02:09,212 It's remarkable. 51 00:02:09,212 --> 00:02:13,712 And this reflects the extraordinary strength of the emerging Indian middle class 52 00:02:13,712 --> 00:02:16,684 and the power that their mobile phones bring. 53 00:02:16,684 --> 00:02:18,269 But he used that, 54 00:02:18,269 --> 00:02:22,488 Hazare ended up with this massive CSV file of mobile phone numbers, 55 00:02:22,488 --> 00:02:24,273 and he used that to deploy 56 00:02:24,273 --> 00:02:26,269 real people power on the ground 57 00:02:26,269 --> 00:02:29,683 to get hundreds of thousands of people out on the streets in Delhi 58 00:02:29,683 --> 00:02:34,033 to make a national point of everyday corruption in India. 59 00:02:34,033 --> 00:02:36,470 It's a really striking story. 60 00:02:36,470 --> 00:02:38,680 So this is me when I was 12 years old. 61 00:02:38,680 --> 00:02:40,392 I hope you see the resemblance. 62 00:02:40,392 --> 00:02:42,317 And I was also an activist, 63 00:02:42,317 --> 00:02:44,557 and I have been an activist all my life. 64 00:02:44,557 --> 00:02:45,887 I had this really funny childhood 65 00:02:45,887 --> 00:02:47,910 where I traipsed around the world 66 00:02:47,910 --> 00:02:50,704 meeting world leaders and Noble prize winners, 67 00:02:50,704 --> 00:02:52,990 talking about Third World debt, 68 00:02:52,990 --> 00:02:54,279 as it was then called, 69 00:02:54,279 --> 00:02:55,813 and demilitarization. 70 00:02:55,813 --> 00:03:00,045 I was a very, very serious child. (Laughter) 71 00:03:00,045 --> 00:03:01,950 And back then, 72 00:03:01,950 --> 00:03:03,384 in the early '90s, 73 00:03:03,384 --> 00:03:07,214 I had a very cutting-edge tech tool of my own: 74 00:03:07,214 --> 00:03:09,466 the fax. 75 00:03:09,466 --> 00:03:11,644 And the fax was the tool of my activism. 76 00:03:11,644 --> 00:03:13,202 And at that time, it was the best way 77 00:03:13,202 --> 00:03:15,097 to get a message to a lot of people 78 00:03:15,097 --> 00:03:17,535 all at once. 79 00:03:17,535 --> 00:03:19,981 I'll give you one example of a fax campaign that I ran. 80 00:03:19,981 --> 00:03:22,077 It was the eve of the Gulf War 81 00:03:22,077 --> 00:03:25,628 and I organized a global campaign to flood the hotel, 82 00:03:25,628 --> 00:03:27,109 the Intercontinental in Geneva, 83 00:03:27,109 --> 00:03:28,664 where James Baker and Tariq Aziz 84 00:03:28,664 --> 00:03:30,588 were meeting on the eve of the war, 85 00:03:30,588 --> 00:03:32,972 and I thought if I could flood them with faxes, 86 00:03:32,972 --> 00:03:34,050 we'll stop the war. 87 00:03:34,050 --> 00:03:36,243 Well, unsurprisingly, 88 00:03:36,243 --> 00:03:39,834 that campaign was wholly unsuccessful. 89 00:03:39,834 --> 00:03:41,488 There are lots of reasons for that, 90 00:03:41,488 --> 00:03:43,973 but there's no doubt that one sputtering fax machine 91 00:03:43,973 --> 00:03:47,300 in Geneva was a little bit of a bandwidth constraint 92 00:03:47,300 --> 00:03:50,142 in terms of the ability to get a message to lots of people. 93 00:03:50,142 --> 00:03:54,172 And so, I went on to discover some better tools. 94 00:03:54,172 --> 00:03:56,814 I cofounded Avaaz, which uses the Internet to mobilize people 95 00:03:56,814 --> 00:03:59,412 and now has almost 40 million members, 96 00:03:59,412 --> 00:04:01,972 and I now run Purpose, which is a home for these kinds of 97 00:04:01,972 --> 00:04:04,268 technology-powered movements. 98 00:04:04,268 --> 00:04:06,088 So what's the moral of this story? 99 00:04:06,088 --> 00:04:07,596 Is the moral of this story, 100 00:04:07,596 --> 00:04:12,705 you know what, the fax is kind of eclipsed by the mobile phone? 101 00:04:12,705 --> 00:04:14,935 This is another story of tech-determinism? 102 00:04:14,935 --> 00:04:18,125 Well, I would argue that there's actually more to it than that. 103 00:04:18,125 --> 00:04:20,798 I'd argue that in the last 20 years, 104 00:04:20,798 --> 00:04:23,036 something more fundamental has changed 105 00:04:23,036 --> 00:04:24,741 than just new tech. 106 00:04:24,741 --> 00:04:27,561 I would argue that there has been a fundamental shift 107 00:04:27,561 --> 00:04:29,709 in the balance of power 108 00:04:29,709 --> 00:04:31,228 in the world. 109 00:04:31,228 --> 00:04:33,145 You ask any activist how to understand the world, 110 00:04:33,145 --> 00:04:35,619 and they'll say, "Look at where the power is, 111 00:04:35,619 --> 00:04:38,077 who has it, how it's shifting." 112 00:04:38,077 --> 00:04:41,079 And I think we all sense that something big is happening. 113 00:04:41,079 --> 00:04:43,523 So Henry Timms and I — 114 00:04:43,523 --> 00:04:45,371 Henry's a fellow movement builder — 115 00:04:45,371 --> 00:04:47,273 got talking one day and we started to think, 116 00:04:47,273 --> 00:04:49,274 how can we make sense of this new world? 117 00:04:49,274 --> 00:04:50,463 How can we describe it and give 118 00:04:50,463 --> 00:04:52,906 it a framework that makes it more useful? 119 00:04:52,906 --> 00:04:54,136 Because we realized that many 120 00:04:54,136 --> 00:04:56,950 of the lessons that we were discovering in movements 121 00:04:56,950 --> 00:04:59,657 actually applied all over the world 122 00:04:59,657 --> 00:05:01,779 in many sectors of our society. 123 00:05:01,779 --> 00:05:03,656 So I want to introduce you to this framework: 124 00:05:03,656 --> 00:05:05,876 Old power, meet new power. 125 00:05:05,876 --> 00:05:09,307 And I want to talk to you about what new power is today. 126 00:05:09,307 --> 00:05:11,271 New power is the deployment 127 00:05:11,271 --> 00:05:14,460 of mass participation and peer coordination — 128 00:05:14,460 --> 00:05:16,102 these are the two key elements — 129 00:05:16,102 --> 00:05:18,599 to create change and shift outcomes. 130 00:05:18,599 --> 00:05:21,687 And we see new power all around us. 131 00:05:21,687 --> 00:05:22,971 This is Beppe Grillo 132 00:05:22,971 --> 00:05:25,116 he was a populist Italian blogger 133 00:05:25,116 --> 00:05:28,536 who, with a minimal political apparatus and only some online tools, 134 00:05:28,536 --> 00:05:31,034 won more than 25 percent of the vote 135 00:05:31,034 --> 00:05:33,455 in recent Italian elections. 136 00:05:33,455 --> 00:05:34,817 This is Airbnb, 137 00:05:34,817 --> 00:05:36,566 which in just a few years 138 00:05:36,566 --> 00:05:38,728 has radically disrupted the hotel industry 139 00:05:38,728 --> 00:05:41,646 without owning a single square foot of real estate. 140 00:05:41,646 --> 00:05:43,001 This is Kickstarter, 141 00:05:43,001 --> 00:05:45,898 which we know has raised over a billion dollars 142 00:05:45,898 --> 00:05:48,319 from more than five million people. 143 00:05:48,319 --> 00:05:50,249 Now, we're familiar with all of these models. 144 00:05:50,249 --> 00:05:53,450 But what's striking is the commonalities, 145 00:05:53,450 --> 00:05:55,576 the structural features of these new models 146 00:05:55,576 --> 00:05:57,725 and how they differ from old power. 147 00:05:57,725 --> 00:05:59,394 Let's look a little bit at this. 148 00:05:59,394 --> 00:06:02,552 Old power is held like a currency. 149 00:06:02,552 --> 00:06:04,531 New power works like a current. 150 00:06:04,531 --> 00:06:07,033 Old power is held by a few. 151 00:06:07,033 --> 00:06:10,473 New power isn't held by a few, it's made by many. 152 00:06:10,473 --> 00:06:12,980 Old power is all about download, 153 00:06:12,980 --> 00:06:14,706 and new power uploads. 154 00:06:14,706 --> 00:06:17,240 And you see a whole set of characteristics that you can trace, 155 00:06:17,240 --> 00:06:20,356 whether it's in media or politics or education. 156 00:06:20,356 --> 00:06:22,422 So we've talked a little bit about what new power is. 157 00:06:22,422 --> 00:06:25,587 Let's, for a second, talk about what new power isn't. 158 00:06:25,587 --> 00:06:29,383 New power is not your Facebook page. 159 00:06:29,383 --> 00:06:32,208 I assure you that having a social media strategy 160 00:06:32,208 --> 00:06:34,756 can enable you to do just as much download 161 00:06:34,756 --> 00:06:37,618 as you used to do when you had the radio. 162 00:06:37,618 --> 00:06:41,146 Just ask Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad, 163 00:06:41,146 --> 00:06:42,888 I assure you that his Facebook page 164 00:06:42,888 --> 00:06:47,015 has not embraced the power of participation. 165 00:06:47,015 --> 00:06:50,413 New power is not inherently positive. 166 00:06:50,413 --> 00:06:52,702 In fact, this isn't an normative argument that we're making, 167 00:06:52,702 --> 00:06:54,514 there are many good things about new power, 168 00:06:54,514 --> 00:06:56,331 but it can produce bad outcomes. 169 00:06:56,331 --> 00:06:58,336 More participation, more peer coordination, 170 00:06:58,336 --> 00:07:00,123 sometimes distorts outcomes 171 00:07:00,123 --> 00:07:01,198 and there are some things, 172 00:07:01,198 --> 00:07:03,297 like things, for example, in the medical profession 173 00:07:03,297 --> 00:07:06,293 that we want new power to get nowhere near. 174 00:07:06,293 --> 00:07:09,296 And thirdly, new power is not the inevitable victor. 175 00:07:09,296 --> 00:07:10,875 In fact, unsurprisingly, 176 00:07:10,875 --> 00:07:13,864 as many of these new power models get to scale, 177 00:07:13,864 --> 00:07:16,334 what you see is this massive pushback 178 00:07:16,334 --> 00:07:18,083 from the forces of old power. 179 00:07:18,083 --> 00:07:20,292 Just look at this really interesting epic struggle 180 00:07:20,292 --> 00:07:24,675 going on right now between Edward Snowden and the NSA. 181 00:07:24,675 --> 00:07:27,059 You'll note that only one of the two people on this slide 182 00:07:27,059 --> 00:07:29,238 is currently in exile. 183 00:07:29,238 --> 00:07:30,653 And so, it's not at all clear 184 00:07:30,653 --> 00:07:32,743 that new power will be the inevitable victor. 185 00:07:32,743 --> 00:07:35,686 That said, keep one thing in mind: 186 00:07:35,686 --> 00:07:38,575 We're at the beginning of a very steep curve. 187 00:07:38,575 --> 00:07:40,216 So you think about some of these new power models, right? 188 00:07:40,216 --> 00:07:42,328 These were just like someone's 189 00:07:42,328 --> 00:07:44,874 garage idea a few years ago, 190 00:07:44,874 --> 00:07:48,010 and now they're disrupting entire industries. 191 00:07:48,010 --> 00:07:50,679 And so, what's interesting about new power, 192 00:07:50,679 --> 00:07:52,695 is the way it feeds on itself. 193 00:07:52,695 --> 00:07:54,719 Once you have an experience of new power, 194 00:07:54,719 --> 00:07:56,909 you tend to expect and want more of it. 195 00:07:56,909 --> 00:07:59,789 So let's say you've used a peer-to-peer lending platform 196 00:07:59,789 --> 00:08:02,323 like Lending Tree or Prosper, 197 00:08:02,323 --> 00:08:04,607 then you've figured out that you don't need the bank, 198 00:08:04,607 --> 00:08:06,544 and who wants the bank, right? 199 00:08:06,544 --> 00:08:08,982 And so, that experience tends to embolden you 200 00:08:08,982 --> 00:08:11,919 it tends to make you want more participation 201 00:08:11,919 --> 00:08:14,264 across more aspects of your life. 202 00:08:14,264 --> 00:08:15,809 And what this gives rise to is 203 00:08:15,809 --> 00:08:17,380 a set of values. 204 00:08:17,380 --> 00:08:18,690 We talked about the models 205 00:08:18,690 --> 00:08:20,284 that new power has engendered — 206 00:08:20,284 --> 00:08:22,116 the Airbnbs, the Kickstarters. 207 00:08:22,116 --> 00:08:23,645 What about the values? 208 00:08:23,645 --> 00:08:25,315 And this is an early sketch 209 00:08:25,315 --> 00:08:27,878 at what new power values look like. 210 00:08:27,878 --> 00:08:31,009 New power values prize transparency above all else. 211 00:08:31,009 --> 00:08:33,231 It's almost a religious belief in transparency, 212 00:08:33,231 --> 00:08:35,495 a belief that if you shine a light on something, 213 00:08:35,495 --> 00:08:36,926 it will be better. 214 00:08:36,926 --> 00:08:39,676 And remember that in the 20th century, this was not at all true. 215 00:08:39,676 --> 00:08:42,643 People thought that gentlemen should sit behind closed doors 216 00:08:42,643 --> 00:08:44,925 and make comfortable agreements. 217 00:08:44,925 --> 00:08:48,330 New power values of informal, networked governance. 218 00:08:48,330 --> 00:08:50,974 New power folks would never have invented the U.N. today, 219 00:08:50,974 --> 00:08:52,807 for better or worse. 220 00:08:52,807 --> 00:08:54,522 New power values participation, 221 00:08:54,522 --> 00:08:57,317 and new power is all about do-it-yourself. 222 00:08:57,317 --> 00:08:58,806 In fact, what's interesting about new power 223 00:08:58,806 --> 00:09:02,519 is that it eschews some of the professionalization 224 00:09:02,519 --> 00:09:03,994 and specialization that was 225 00:09:03,994 --> 00:09:06,384 all the rage in the 20th century. 226 00:09:06,384 --> 00:09:08,194 So what's interesting about these 227 00:09:08,194 --> 00:09:10,160 new power values and these new power models 228 00:09:10,160 --> 00:09:12,455 is what they mean for organizations. 229 00:09:12,455 --> 00:09:14,963 So we've spent a bit of time thinking, 230 00:09:14,963 --> 00:09:17,229 how can we plot organizations 231 00:09:17,229 --> 00:09:19,493 on a two-by-two where, essentially, 232 00:09:19,493 --> 00:09:21,549 we look at new power values 233 00:09:21,549 --> 00:09:22,813 and new power models 234 00:09:22,813 --> 00:09:24,614 and see where different people sit? 235 00:09:24,614 --> 00:09:26,503 We started with a U.S. analysis, 236 00:09:26,503 --> 00:09:28,879 and let me show you some interesting findings. 237 00:09:28,879 --> 00:09:30,858 So the first is Apple. 238 00:09:30,858 --> 00:09:33,393 In this framework, we actually described Apple 239 00:09:33,393 --> 00:09:35,515 as an old power company. 240 00:09:35,515 --> 00:09:37,169 That's because the ideology, 241 00:09:37,169 --> 00:09:39,457 the governing ideology of Apple 242 00:09:39,457 --> 00:09:42,331 is the ideology of the perfectionist 243 00:09:42,331 --> 00:09:44,355 product designer in Cupertino. 244 00:09:44,355 --> 00:09:48,427 It's absolutely about that beautiful, perfect thing descending upon us 245 00:09:48,427 --> 00:09:49,778 in perfection. 246 00:09:49,778 --> 00:09:52,401 And it does not value, as a company, transparency. 247 00:09:52,401 --> 00:09:54,064 In fact, it's very secretive. 248 00:09:54,064 --> 00:09:56,890 Now, Apple is one of the most succesful companies in the world. 249 00:09:56,890 --> 00:09:58,262 So this shows that you can 250 00:09:58,262 --> 00:10:00,951 still pursue a successful old power strategy. 251 00:10:00,951 --> 00:10:03,921 But one can argue that there's real vulnerabilites in that model. 252 00:10:03,921 --> 00:10:05,945 I think another interesting comparison 253 00:10:05,945 --> 00:10:08,122 is that of the Obama campaign 254 00:10:08,122 --> 00:10:11,238 versus the Obama presidency. 255 00:10:11,238 --> 00:10:18,700 (Applause) 256 00:10:18,700 --> 00:10:20,447 Now, I like President Obama, 257 00:10:20,447 --> 00:10:24,403 but he ran with new power at his back, right? 258 00:10:24,403 --> 00:10:26,230 And he said to people, 259 00:10:26,230 --> 00:10:28,203 we are the ones we've been waiting for. 260 00:10:28,203 --> 00:10:29,654 And he used crowdfunding 261 00:10:29,654 --> 00:10:30,865 to power a campaign. 262 00:10:30,865 --> 00:10:32,266 But when he got into office, 263 00:10:32,266 --> 00:10:35,458 he governed like more or less all the other presidents did. 264 00:10:35,458 --> 00:10:37,822 And this is a really interesting trend, 265 00:10:37,822 --> 00:10:39,820 is when new power gets powerful, 266 00:10:39,820 --> 00:10:41,391 what happens? 267 00:10:41,391 --> 00:10:43,155 So this is a framework you should look at 268 00:10:43,155 --> 00:10:44,647 and think about where your own organization 269 00:10:44,647 --> 00:10:45,611 sits on it. 270 00:10:45,611 --> 00:10:47,184 And think about where it should be 271 00:10:47,184 --> 00:10:48,732 in five or 10 years. 272 00:10:48,732 --> 00:10:51,197 So what do you do if you're old power? 273 00:10:51,197 --> 00:10:54,162 Well, if you're there thinking, in old power, 274 00:10:54,162 --> 00:10:56,062 this won't happen to us. 275 00:10:56,062 --> 00:11:01,229 Then just look at the Wikipedia entry for Encyclopædia Britannica. 276 00:11:01,229 --> 00:11:03,625 Let me tell you, it's a very sad read. 277 00:11:03,625 --> 00:11:05,044 But if you are old power, 278 00:11:05,044 --> 00:11:08,837 the most important thing you can do is to occupy yourself 279 00:11:08,837 --> 00:11:11,491 before others occupy you, 280 00:11:11,491 --> 00:11:12,819 before you are occupied. 281 00:11:12,819 --> 00:11:15,592 Imagine that a group of your biggest skeptics 282 00:11:15,592 --> 00:11:17,944 are camped in the heart of your organization 283 00:11:17,944 --> 00:11:19,823 asking the toughest questions 284 00:11:19,823 --> 00:11:22,751 and they can see everything inside of your organization. 285 00:11:22,751 --> 00:11:25,501 And ask them, would they like what they see 286 00:11:25,501 --> 00:11:27,776 and should our model change? 287 00:11:27,776 --> 00:11:29,639 What about if you're new power? 288 00:11:29,639 --> 00:11:32,273 Is new power kind of just riding the wave to glory? 289 00:11:32,273 --> 00:11:33,753 I would argue no. 290 00:11:33,753 --> 00:11:35,709 I would argue that there are some very real challenges 291 00:11:35,709 --> 00:11:37,401 to new power in this nascent phase. 292 00:11:37,401 --> 00:11:40,903 Let's stick with the Occupy Wall Street example for a moment. 293 00:11:40,903 --> 00:11:43,893 Occupy was this incredible example of new power, 294 00:11:43,893 --> 00:11:45,736 the purest example of new power. 295 00:11:45,736 --> 00:11:48,267 And yet, it failed to consolidate. 296 00:11:48,267 --> 00:11:50,164 So the energy that it created 297 00:11:50,164 --> 00:11:51,605 was great for the meme phase, 298 00:11:51,605 --> 00:11:54,406 but they were so committed to participation, 299 00:11:54,406 --> 00:11:56,040 that they never got anything done. 300 00:11:56,040 --> 00:11:57,831 And in fact that model 301 00:11:57,831 --> 00:12:00,623 means that the challenge for new power is: 302 00:12:00,623 --> 00:12:03,162 how do you use institutional power 303 00:12:03,162 --> 00:12:05,233 without being institutionalized? 304 00:12:05,233 --> 00:12:07,866 One the other end of the spectra is Uber. 305 00:12:07,866 --> 00:12:09,250 Uber is an amazing, 306 00:12:09,250 --> 00:12:11,303 highly scalable new power model. 307 00:12:11,303 --> 00:12:13,329 That network is getting denser and denser 308 00:12:13,329 --> 00:12:14,589 by the day. 309 00:12:14,589 --> 00:12:16,748 But what's really interesting about Uber is 310 00:12:16,748 --> 00:12:20,489 it hasn't really adopted new power values. 311 00:12:20,489 --> 00:12:24,561 This is a real quote from the Uber CEO recently: 312 00:12:24,561 --> 00:12:29,009 He says, "Once we get rid of the dude in the car" — he means drivers — 313 00:12:29,009 --> 00:12:32,901 "Uber will be cheaper." 314 00:12:32,901 --> 00:12:35,876 Now, new power models live and die 315 00:12:35,876 --> 00:12:38,058 by the strength of their networks. 316 00:12:38,058 --> 00:12:39,991 By whether the drivers and the consumers 317 00:12:39,991 --> 00:12:42,332 who use the service actually believe in it. 318 00:12:42,332 --> 00:12:45,833 Because they're not an exercise of top-down perfectionism, 319 00:12:45,833 --> 00:12:47,781 they are about the network. 320 00:12:47,781 --> 00:12:49,477 And so, the challenge, 321 00:12:49,477 --> 00:12:51,727 and this is why it's in no way surprising, 322 00:12:51,727 --> 00:12:55,983 is that Uber's drivers are now unionizing. 323 00:12:55,983 --> 00:12:57,583 It's extraordinary. 324 00:12:57,583 --> 00:12:59,872 Uber's drivers are turning on Uber. 325 00:12:59,872 --> 00:13:01,166 And the challenge for Uber — 326 00:13:01,166 --> 00:13:03,093 this isn't an easy situation for them — 327 00:13:03,093 --> 00:13:06,389 is that they are locked into a broader superstrcuture 328 00:13:06,389 --> 00:13:08,074 that is really old power. 329 00:13:08,074 --> 00:13:11,082 They've raised more than a billion dollars in the capital markets. 330 00:13:11,082 --> 00:13:13,610 Those markets expect a financial return, 331 00:13:13,610 --> 00:13:15,527 and they way you get a financial return 332 00:13:15,527 --> 00:13:17,924 is by squeezing and squeezing 333 00:13:17,924 --> 00:13:20,169 your users and your drivers 334 00:13:20,169 --> 00:13:21,464 for more and more value 335 00:13:21,464 --> 00:13:23,931 and giving that value to your investors. 336 00:13:23,931 --> 00:13:27,534 So the big question about the future of new power, in my view, is: 337 00:13:27,534 --> 00:13:30,093 Will that old power just emerge? 338 00:13:30,093 --> 00:13:31,876 So will new power elites just become 339 00:13:31,876 --> 00:13:33,765 old power and squeeze? 340 00:13:33,765 --> 00:13:36,378 Or will that new power base bite back? 341 00:13:36,378 --> 00:13:38,139 Will the next big Uber 342 00:13:38,139 --> 00:13:40,519 be co-owned by Uber drivers? 343 00:13:40,519 --> 00:13:43,302 And I think this going to be a very interesting 344 00:13:43,302 --> 00:13:45,204 structural question. 345 00:13:45,204 --> 00:13:48,486 Finally, think about new power 346 00:13:48,486 --> 00:13:50,853 being more than just an 347 00:13:50,853 --> 00:13:52,489 entity that scales things 348 00:13:52,489 --> 00:13:56,205 that make us have slightly better consumer experiences. 349 00:13:56,205 --> 00:13:58,371 My call to action for new power 350 00:13:58,371 --> 00:14:00,779 is to not be an island. 351 00:14:00,779 --> 00:14:03,935 We have major structural problems in the world today 352 00:14:03,935 --> 00:14:06,191 that could benefit enormously 353 00:14:06,191 --> 00:14:08,505 from the kinds of mass participation 354 00:14:08,505 --> 00:14:09,842 and peer coordination 355 00:14:09,842 --> 00:14:11,570 that these new power players 356 00:14:11,570 --> 00:14:13,966 know so well how to generate. 357 00:14:13,966 --> 00:14:17,479 And we badly need them to turn their energies and their power 358 00:14:17,479 --> 00:14:20,703 to big, what economists might call 359 00:14:20,703 --> 00:14:22,276 public goods problems, 360 00:14:22,276 --> 00:14:24,322 that are often beyond markets 361 00:14:24,322 --> 00:14:26,332 where investors can easily be found. 362 00:14:26,332 --> 00:14:28,222 And I think if we can do that, 363 00:14:28,222 --> 00:14:31,207 we might be able to fundamentally change 364 00:14:31,207 --> 00:14:34,738 not only human beings' sense of their own agency and power — 365 00:14:34,738 --> 00:14:37,596 because I think that's the most wonderful thing about new power, 366 00:14:37,596 --> 00:14:40,348 is that people feel more powerful — 367 00:14:40,348 --> 00:14:42,129 but we might also be able to change 368 00:14:42,129 --> 00:14:43,892 the way we relate to each other 369 00:14:43,892 --> 00:14:47,003 and the way we relate to authority and institutions. 370 00:14:47,003 --> 00:14:49,051 And to me, that's absolutely 371 00:14:49,051 --> 00:14:50,622 worth trying for. 372 00:14:50,622 --> 00:14:51,718 Thank you very much. 373 00:14:51,718 --> 00:14:53,810 (Applause)