Page 22 - AC/E's Digital Culture Annual Report 2015

Cultural business models on the Internet22currently performed personally to intelligent agents, which will act as genuine helpers from networks – not just the Internet.Does this mean that we are heading towardsa world in which humans will merely be “owners of digital agents and robots” and will not have to do anything? Probably not in the twenty-first century, but we will see the dawn of a civilisation very different to the one we have today in which, I wish to hope, we will all find our work – whatever it may be – more gratifying and motivating than ever.What is of no use is to believe that after the crisis everything is going to go back to the same as it was before. Nothing will ever be the same again – from the fact that powerful people end up in prison when they commit crimes, because nobody can escape the pressure of voters united by the social networks, to the fact that compa- nies that nobody knows can be among the best known and most profitable in the world in five years’ time.Today more than ever, humans are social beings, but the current transparency of the Internet calls for rethinking concepts we believed to be immovable. On the Internet prestige is provided by the users/readers/customers who follow or read us and any error soon becomes known to everyone. We must recover the humility of he who “knows he knows nothing” and learns daily from new impulses that generally come from new scientific fields and researchers who really believe that they are discovering, step by step, many of the secrets that nature has jealously guarded for millenniums.In the field of culture we are witnessing how musicians and authors need to rethink their “modus vivendi” beyond selling the direct product, be it a song, a piece of music, a novel or a play. Closeness to their followers provides them with many opportunities but denies them others. As with all aspects of the Internet, it is increasingly necessary to achieve volume in order for it to be a business. What we could formerly achieve with 20,000 fans is now an environment of 200,000 or a million. Our perspective has changed and we must be increasingly close to our customer, follower or fan and realise what they want us to offer them.Innovation in today’s world is achieved with the involvement and help of customers, followers or fans.New ideas arise every day. Technology allows us to do more for less, with a greater distribution capacity, and “more of the same” is of no use. We must be innovative and that, in today’s world, is only achieved with the involvement and help of customers.Nobody has the perfect answer; it is necessary to constantly try out new things. Most do not turn out well, but from time to time a WhatsApp emerges that within less than five years is used by 500 million people all over the world and has revolutionised how we communicate. Who nowadays does not have two or three contact groups in their family with whom they commu- nicate regularly?Challenges of the twenty-first century. How to adapt a company to the twenty-first century