Denver

Keynoter Andy Kessler kicked off Defrag with a bang. I guess with a title like “Be Soylent, Eat People”, no one should have been surprised at his controversial talk.

He started with an interesting premise (and visual) that we need to boost productivity by “defragging” the economy – reducing waste, improving efficiencies, having people spend less time on busy work and more time on value add.

If he’d just stopped at that point, we would have had some interesting discussions, some pro/con chatter on the backchannels, and everyone would have gone on about their day.

But he didn’t stop there, instead he continued…

People are either creators (those who add value, making stuff)  or servers (everyone else) .

Okay…

For the lowest level servers, those who just move stuff from one place to another without providing value, we should automate those tasks or ship them overseas.

Well, okay, we have managed to add automation into many of these types of jobs already. Look at those huge robots in car plants or watch Unwrapped sometime.

Luxury goods companies (or pretty much any successfully branded companies) are also sucking the productivity potential dry because they’re charging way more for their products than they’re worth. (Example: Why buy a Rolex when you have a free clock on you iPhone.)

Yeah, totally disagree on this one. I mean, I’m not saying that a Rolex isn’t over-priced, but a) it’s definitely not the same as the clock on my iPhone and b) who determines that value? Where do consumers fit into this economic paradigm? Are you saying that the size of the economic pie is fixed – that if I spend my  money on a Rolex, I’m not going to spend somewhere else?

We can squeeze productivity out of the “Sponge” servers by removing the false limits on supply (i.e. licensing, education requirements, etc.)

Yippee. Let’s remove all licensing. I mean, if I want to be a doctor, I shouldn’t have to be falsely limited by a stupid medical degree, right? Who needs a reference librarian when we have Google? Teachers, smeechers, let’s just find our content online. (Yes, this is where the tweet-revolt really started heating up in earnest.)

But when it comes to Wall Street, yeah, they may be servers, but they’re critical to the economy because they “grease the gears” of capitalism. Without them, we wouldn’t have these great deals happening that are keeping the economy moving.

Excuse me? School teachers don’t add value, but the Wall Street guys are critical to capitalism? Mega company mergers keep the economy moving? (Yeah, this was one of *my* hot buttons.)

Finally, if we could just tap into that final reservoir of productivity that exists in the band of “thieves”, those industries and businesses with a government mandated reason for existence (cable, utilities, telephone, etc.)…

Ok, the cable company is not a shining example of efficiency. Nor is the telephone company, or my wireless provider, but many of these regulated monopolies were created and are sustained for the public good. I may not like my phone provider, but I can make a phone call to almost anywhere in the world. Would that have happened without government involvement? Yes, there probably are some OSHA requirements that are ridiculous, but how many lives have been saved or injuries prevented because of those same requirements.

Like many other Defrag attendees, I didn’t agree with most of Andy’s talk. Even if we were able to implement some of his suggested changes, what would we now do with those people who are out of work? Are we turning janitors into Google founders? What if the highest and best use of your time is being a waiter? Should your job be automated so you can do something “more productive”, like compose music?

But even with the fundamental philosophical disagreements, I actually gave Andy good marks for his keynote. He was entertaining and memorable. He provoked discussion (which has continued even through today). He brought people together (through their dislike of his topic, but still.)  I’d take another Andy Kessler talk over a sleepy PowerPoint product pitch any day.

Related articles

• Andy Kessler’s keynote at Defrag stunk (petewarden.typepad.com)
• Andy Kessler and the rise of Feudalism 2.0 (cloudave.com)
• Mike Rowe celebrates dirty jobs (TED.com)

Photo by Doc Searles / CC BY-SA 2.0

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