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Along all the .com era, all new companies that have been created were after all "traditional" companies, meaning pyramidal structures with managers, employees, offices, etc.
In the last few months I have met (most of times virtually) some very smart people from all parts of the world I would like to work with: to start new projects, to create new technologies, to develop new solutions. But when I think about how this could work out, I keep bumping in the same old "company" idea. We could work together, with the ultimate goal of creating a new company.
But is this really the way to go? With the kind of collaborative technology that we have today, do we really still need companies?
Well, of course, the answer from many points of view is still yes, but it could be a whole new breed of company: a P2P company.
It could be something between a secret society, where all members are somehow guaranteed by other members and are supposed to help each other (of course, this should not be secret!), eBay, where everybody has a "digital reputation" (co-workers and customers commenting on different members of the group) and a true P2P network, where everybody is both a client and a server (there's just people working together, not necessarily anybody is working for anybody else).
This would imply extending worldwide the offer that the group could provide. Potentially, anybody in such a group could find and manage a customer, but at the same time anybody could work for some other member's project.
Everybody could be at the same time a salesman, a programmer, a consultant or whatever else he or she is good at.
In these pretty hard times, with the economy looking far from promising and a possible war behind the corner, I believe that this kind of organization could keep a low profile, find good business and be able to survive. A large organism made of smaller ones, each highly specialized and intelligent, working both for his own benefit and for the group's.
At some time this organization could also be exposed, could be something customers turn to find solutions even if they are not talking to a monolithic traditional company.
All this could be relatively easy held together with weblogs and other collaborative software that is currently available (or that the group itself could develop).
A lot of details still need to be solved, but it could really be something new.
Thoughts?
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