The Starfish and the Spider

In their book “The Starfish and the Spider” Ori Brafman and Rod A. Beckstrom highlight the differences between traditional enterprises (“spiders”: rigid hierarchy and top-down leadership) and the new breed of enterprises (“starfish”: distributed leadership and peer relationships of power). Peppered with great examples, it’s a fresh read – especially if you’ve already canned that new year’s resolution and are looking for a legit-looking tome to curl up in front of the fire with.

Brafman and Beckstrom serve up a fascinating list of spiders and starfish. For the purposes of this blog we’re most interested in software companies. One entrepreneur, Niklas Zennstrom has come up with more starfish than the average Joe – specifically Kazaa (a music-sharing application similar to Napster) and Skype (the Internet telephony system that’s giving the traditional ‘Bells a run for their money). According to the authors, Skype usage mushroomed from 15 million users in December 2004 to 57 million by the end of 2005. What was it that motivated so many people to jump from the traditional telephone to a peer-to-peer application on their computer? Cost, obviously was a major contributing factor. Per the authors “Skype capitalized on new technological advances to offer a previously monopolized privilege for free.” But cost really is just one axis of the chart. “Free” only gets you in the door. The application itself has to offer something compellingly different in order to develop “stickiness.” And Skype is sticky, as I learned on a recent two-month jaunt around Asia. Every computer in every Internet café already had the Skype client installed, ready for any traveler to plug in their headset, log into their account, and start chatting with anyone in the world. That’s a pretty big value proposition compared to MCI, my long distance carrier. I had no problem making calls via MCI in Thailand, but what about Bhutan and Vietnam? Not available, sorry. (Caveat Emptor: To the best of my knowledge there was no MCI service available in those countries. I’m not omnipotent, but I’m reasonably competent. If I can’t find a contact number after an hour of tapping internet sites, directory enquiries, hotel concierge desks, friendly locals; then as far as I’m concerned it doesn’t exist.)



So one axis on the Skype “value proposition” graph is cost. The other is certainty. In exchange for installing a small desktop client, I get the certainty that I can communicate with other Skype users worldwide. Because it’s a true starfish, Skype is completely decentralized. There is no concept of a “server” failing; there is no server, other than the one used to serve up ads and take credit card payments. You install the client, get an account, and you’re good to go. However your call gets routed through cyberspace is entirely immaterial to you. It will go through.



We at Content Circles think there’s a lot to be said for this starfish model when it comes to collaborating with team members near and far. Without blowing the lid off our product-under-wraps, we’re pretty confident that the same value proposition (certainty) that made Skype a must-have for phone conversations in the virtual enterprise also applies to managing and sharing documents. Certainty is binary – either you need or you don’t. And if you need it…