State of the New Economy

Emily Levine

Stand-up Commentator
Los Angeles, California

The old economy-new economy dichotomy has a deeper meaning than Dow Jones versus NASDAQ. It's classical economics versus new economics. In classical economics, the economy is a rational, reductive, linear system. It's a closed system ruled by negative feedback -- a "Just Say No" economy. In new economics, the economy is an open system. It's interactive, dynamic, alive -- as well as unpredictable and turbulent.

For me, it's exciting to be on the cusp of such a big shift in thinking. It's a chance to change our "doing": How can we realize the values of diversity, cooperation, and interaction in the way that we "do" business?

The thing that disturbs me the most about the new economy is that everything I'm excited about has a downside. Take, for example, the concept of flow -- the idea that the economy is an organic, natural force. The motion of flow reminds me of the dragon that snakes its way through the streets of Chinatown on the Chinese New Year. But here's the problem: The dragon isn't real. It's animated by many hidden people. With so much of the workforce invisible -- either overseas, in prison, or below the radar of our economic indicators -- it's hard to practice what French philosopher Emmanuel Levinas said makes us human: the ability to respond in the face of another.

Emily Levine's (buttonl@aol.com) career as a stand-up comedienne and a TV-sitcom writer didn't sufficiently exploit her honors degree from Harvard. So she created "e-Levine.universe," a one-person show in which she explores the relationship between our cosmology and our ethics. Next up: a show on the "e-conomy."

Jay Walker

Founder and Vice Chairman
Priceline.com
Chairman
Walker Digital
Cofounder
Priceline Webhouse Club
Stamford, Connecticut

What charges me up about the new economy? The fact that companies, like money, have the ability to reach millions of people quickly and to scale a business with a value proposition that changes people's lives for the better. It is now possible for a business to go from a concept to a company with 5 million customers very quickly -- literally in less than a year. Never before in human history has this been possible.

That is also what keeps me up at night. It's the truly powerful challenge of the scale: Even as you grow from an idea and a few people into a global company with millions of customers, you have to service your Web site and satisfy your customers. And that requires the ability not only to deal with complex software but also to develop that software with teams who haven't worked together for very long. It is a managementand leadership challenge of the first order -- one that I suspect will keep Internet-company CEOs up at night for years to come.

Jay Walker (walker@walkerdigital.com) has more than 40 issued patents to his credit and roughly 325 pending U.S. and international patents -- all of which emanate from Walker Digital, an intellectual laboratory that he founded in 1994. At Walker Digital, some 60 inventors develop proprietary business models that use the new tools of the Digital Age to solve business problems, apply for patents, and then spin those models into companies like priceline.com.

Nathan Myhrvold

Cofounder and Copresident
Intellectual Ventures LLC
Bellevue, Washington

Of all the great historical revolutions, I prefer the Internet Age -- because it's a revolution of the mind. The new economy is about rethinking and reshaping what has already happened. It's about producing fertile ground for radically new ideas. Workers with good ideas, or the ability to generate ideas, can write their own ticket. We're talking about the democratization of power.

I'm excited about the overwhelming sense of human potential in the new economy. Of course, for every good idea, there's a glut of bad ones. We'll see a boom-and-bust cycle that's caused by less-than-good ideas. The result? An unsettling phenomenon: Companies go public when they should be rethinking their business models. When those companies fail, some people write off the whole revolution. They punish the legitimate companies, thereby hurting their ability to attract capital.

We can't claim victory -- not yet. We must first revolutionize the economy, and we're less than 10% of the way there. What we've created is a new approach, a new set of tools, a new model that can be applied to almost anything. Ten years ago, we didn't have the technological leverage to change human interaction totally. Now we do. If we look at where we are today, we'll see that in 20 years, we will have transformed human behavior.

Nathan Myhrvold (nathanm@intven.com) cofounded Intellectual Ventures LLC, a private partnership that explores entrepreneurial pursuits in technology and in biotechnology. Previously, he worked for 14 years as chief technology officer at Microsoft.