War on Terror - Are we really that stupid?!

This is something that really bothers me. Why don't people stop and think?

First; War on Terror is a war on an emotion - good luck, we're human and that means we emote.

Second; "War is a conflict involving the organized use of weapons and physical force by states or other large-scale groups. Warring parties usually hold territory, which they can win or lose; and each has a leading person or organization which can surrender, or collapse, thus ending the war." (Source: Wikipedia) Let's look at that: Terrorists are hardly states or large-scale groups! they are by definition small groups and more commonly individuals. While many small groups may seem to be part of a larger movement, this is not a reliable assumption. Terrorists do NOT hold territory, at least not for more than a few minutes. Finally, there is no "leader" of terrorism that can be defeated/eliminated that would cause terrorism to cease.

Freedom is the ability to act without external constraint. In a free society, all members of the society have freedom. This includes the freedom to bomb, kill, steal, torture, and run naked through the mall. Society creates laws to discourage many of these acts by implementing consequences for committing these acts - they do NOT prevent the acts from ever happening. The only method for preventing the acts from ever happening is to eliminate the society's freedom. I say eliminate because freedom is actually not a continuum. You are free, or you aren't.

Now, here's a really interesting thing - It is almost impossible to take away someone's freedom without imprisoning them. Think about it. Regardless of how constraining the legal system is, you can still do anything you want. Even in our surveillance society of today - you can still act with impunity. The only difference between now and before is that you are less likely to get away with it, and you are definitely going to be "seen." You may need to be more careful if your chosen activity requires many "nefarious" activities to occur over time; obviously the forces of order will try to stop your actions if they think you're about to break the law.

So let's look at this objectively. In order to commit an act of terror, you must be free. In order to eliminate terrorism, you must eliminate freedom. The stated goal of our key "terrorist enemies," as put forth by the Bush Administration, is to destroy America's freedom. The only way to stop them from winning the "war" is to let them continue being terrorists. This is an unwinnable conflict (for either party). Terrorists cannot win, because they can never effect the changes they seek through terror. The "freedom fighters" working against terrorists cannot win because they would have to give victory to the terrorists in order to even attempt to eliminate them using conventional tactics.

Now, let's look at the recent track record. In the name of fighting terror in a post-9/11 world, we have invaded Afghanistan and Iraq, wasted thousands of lives, ruined already challenged social and economic structures, poured untold billions into the coffers of American defense contractors and created a strong distaste worldwide for all things American. This is touted as something good. Am I the only person who sees this as serious intellectual denial?! For starters - did anyone notice that the war on terror has not been about fighting terrorists, but about attacking nations that we "suspect" are harbouring them. It's somewhat like attacking a dictator because you "know" they have weapons of mass destruction. Oops, we were wrong! The terrorists weren't there, the weapons weren't either. Hey, let's take on Iran, they might have the bomb soon! Third time's the charm!

In addition, there are competent scientific analyses that show that there were no aircraft crashes in Pennsylvania or at the Pentagon (something blew up, but it wasn't aircraft); that there is no plausible explanation for the destruction of the WTC towers other than a professional demolition team. Just as a point to kick off your own research, find a photograph of either "crash" site that includes jet engines. The engines of an airliner will invariably survive any crash - there were none to be found at either site. (Note: Titanium does not vapourise in a kerosene fire). Also, get a copy of the video of the towers coming down, and time the decent. Do the math; there is only one way to bring a building down in freefall, and it doesn't involve aircraft or missiles.

The war on terror is not rational; the police state that is being created because of it is not going to "solve" any of the stated problems (it may be solving some unstated "problems," though). The entire process seems to be about increasing the amount of order/control (profit?) in the world. As any physicist can tell you, when you increase the order of a system, a balancing chaos will occur somewhere. I'm looking forward to seeing where this all ends up!

Privacy - A real kettle of fish

As I see it, there are two core issues to the whole privacy debate that we are facing on many fronts.

1. Information Assymetry, and
2. Public/Peer Judgement.

Information assymetry is a major issue facing society on many fronts. It is a key factor in many activities in life: In markets, buyers and sellers both think (and often do) know more or different things than the other; negotiation is founded upon it - although enlightened negotiation endeavours to eliminate it as part of the process; the justice system in most democratic societies is based on the recognition of the existence of this assymetry and although it is designed to eliminate it, lawyers inevitably try to increase it. In terms of privacy, it is present in many forms. In the ideal fully private society, the knowledge of your activities rests with you alone and with those with whom you share those activities. In addition, none of your activities are recorded unless you yourself record them for personal use (such as a journal). Until the last century, this was a fair description of life on earth. With the advent of computers, gathering and analysing "transactional information" (an interaction, even if not commercial in nature, can be considered a transaction) which was once far too labour intensive, has become simple and valuable. Customer relationship management is a business process that is designed to gather as much information as possible about transactions between a business and its customers. As we conduct more and more transactions online and governments and businesses gather more and richer information on those transactions, we begin to exist in a "surveillance" society. All this, without discussing the pervasive deployment of video cameras throughout our world, all with effectively infinite storage capability. Here we have a significant assymetry because there is a veritable mountain of information in the hands of a few, while the rest of us have only our personal information - much of which is no longer private and therefore has no value in the balance of assymetry.

Judgement is the issue that causes us the true problem with our growing lack of privacy. Few people would really care if the world knew that they had purchased a Starbuck's double tall soya latte on Tuesday at 8:46 am at the Pine Street Starbuck's in Seattle. They might be less happy about people finding out about the singles community web sites that they frequent (especially if they are married!), and they would probably be very upset to have their juvenile sexual assault charge (never convicted) brought to the attention of their community. Now, all of the above (assuming the acts are factual) are in and of themselves innocuous. What makes them disconcerting is not the "record" but the judgement of others regarding the record. I don't really care if everyone knows all the embarrassing things I've done in my life - but I do care if people choose to judge me badly (and therefore treat me poorly) because of it. Since general social behaviour predicts that the one almost always leads to the other, we get very up tight when we find out that our entire lives are being monitored and we have little or no control over the disposition of the information.

So what do we do about this? Unfortunately there is little an individual can do alone, except conduct themselves in the most exemplary and invisible manner possible.

Especially in the US, information gathering is becoming a real problem, as government attempts to augment their already considerable database of personal data, with the data from other sources such as telecom company account records, search engine query histories, and business' customer databases both online and offline; and businesses are constantly developing new methods of capture and inference to increase the value of their customer data assets.

There are very few people in western society who would support the disclosure (say to the press or their peers) of their private activities. So risk number one (thanks to the Judgement issue) is that the holders of this data could use it for extortion purposes. However, it is important to note the distinction that this is really only an issue in a situation where there is information assymetry. If everyone already knows (or can know easily) a piece of information, then the value to those who attempt to profit from assymetry or judgement is non-existent.

Given that the data capture and surveillance capabilities of technology are going to only increase in the future, and there is little hope that regulation of any kind will be able to keep pace with technology, we are left with little to do in terms of reining in the gathering and consolidation/analysis of our personal information. That leaves us with only two options;

1. No More Secrets: Make all information gathered, as well as all derivative works, available to everybody.
2. Everybody Secret: Create an infrastructure that anonymizes everything in our lives.

The No More Secrets concept appears at first blush to be ridiculous. Who would agree to have all of their private information made available to everyone anytime, even knowing that it would be the same for everybody? But if you have ever spent any time in a small town, you may have a sense of what it would be like. There are very few secrets in a small town, and yet there is also a sense of propriety - just because you know something, doesn't mean you make it a public issue - you keep your counsel and everyone else does, it's the polite thing to do. Now just bring that up a notch, to worldwide - people would be more polite, I suspect. While this would cause a whole bunch of upheaval, especially from those who regularly profit from assymetry, it would create an environment where abuse would be very difficult indeed.

The Everybody Secret concept is much more difficult to implement, because it requires constant updating of systems, and a trusted third party organisation to manage those systems without disclosing internal linkages. The solution would work similar to some of the new "virtual credit-card" services currently in use for internet purchases. Users would register and prove their identity to the trusted third party; they would then be provided "virtual identities" for every activity they undertake including financial transactions. Shipping would be handled by anonymised mailing systems and disconnected from the purchase wherever possible. There are hundreds of components that would need to be developed and then constantly evolved as technology evolved. It is not a trivial project and it would effectively render "customisation"
systems, customer management systems, and most law enforcement systems useless. People would be able to operate with exceptional privacy, at least online. Obviously, being able to operate completely anonymously online will not remove real world surveillance, but it will seriously reduce existing capabilities in many countries to monitor criminal activity.

Of the two solutions, only one effectively deals with information assymetry. Both (to varying degrees) deal with the judgement issue.

As I see it, these are the extremes on the continuum of solutions to the privacy debate. I would love to hear other models that could address this issue.

The Labour Industry - Knowledge work is not factory work!

I've been speaking with a lot of headhunters recently. I have noticed some very interesting things about the way the recruiting process is accomplished. Employers invariably specify a set of skills, a broad stroke set of desired experiences (including educational) and sometimes a set of "tasks" that the role is required to perform. Recruiters then take those criteria and attempt to find matches within their database of existing CVs. If they can't find one, then they will post the role to the general public (via sites like Monster.com and/or print media) hoping to get a match among the inevitable hundreds to thousands of responses.

Now, there's nothing wrong with this if you are seeking a tradesman or low level/entry level staffer. This is because at this level you are hiring for a role that either has a very well defined set of actions that can be performed by anyone with the appropriate skills training, or has no complex skill requirements at all (a parking attendant for example - my apologies to any parking attendants reading this, but I calls 'em as I sees 'em). This model applies to pretty much any role with well defined "technical" requirements: plumber, carpenter, software programmer, network administrator, lawyer, etc.

However, there is a problem with this model as soon as you begin to move into more creative roles. While there are basic technical skills required by any artist, their relative value to an organisation is rarely a function of their technical skills, but rather a function of their less tangible talents: interpersonal ability, capacity for "free thinking," broad cultural and social awareness, insightfulness, IQ and EQ (both notoriously hard to accurately measure) etc. Now you may think that artists are a fairly small group within the overall workforce, but I would disagree. Let's think about who the artists are:

• A large portion of all "C" level people (all the notably successful ones)
• Most Architects (systems, software AND buildings)
• Most non-institutional consultants
• "Effective" team leaders (from team leads to VPs)
• All "entrepreneurial" types ("taking from between" is an art, not a science)
• Anyone working in R&D SHOULD be an artist
• Successful sales people/business developers
• Almost anyone in marketing
• Some CMAs (that's right, accounting has an art component - often invisible)

The list is HUGE and growing - why is it growing? Because the "knowledge" economy workforce is becoming a larger and larger percentage of the overall workforce, and most of the workers in this community have a much higher "art" component to their work than traditional industrial roles.

Now, what does this mean to the recruiter? It likely means that they are sending inappropriate people to their clients who fit the "skill matrix" but are completely wrong for the role, as well as skipping over, or entirely missing, candidates who are perfect for the role, but don't have the skills matrix.

So how do you manage this talent acquisition gap? There are many things that can be done, some of them counter-intuitive;

• Use more creative methods to create candidate profiles; Many companies now profile candidates as part of the interviewing process using psychology based testing suites. These profiling systems should be included as part of the standard profiling process for all candidate screening - effectively, these profiles should become part of a standard CV. Traditionally, many short employments over time indicate a problem - however, in the modern world, jobs may only be valuable to the employee (and sometimes the employer) for as little as 12 months. A candidate with 5 jobs in 10 years has a valuable breadth of experience that a candidate with 2 jobs during that period cannot. It has been often documented that the true power of Silicon Valley was the cross pollenation that occured because of the extremely mobile workforce that changed jobs on average every year.
• Change the method of describing roles in order to attract a broader candidate population; Invariably, in most "artistic" roles, the company does not require many specific technical skills. A software engineer who has a history of working primarily with C++ will rarely have a problem working in a Java environment. Moreover, many "artistic" technologists will have no problem moving laterally across industries and technologies. This is because their value is not in any specific technology, but in their understanding and artistic appreciation for the underlying realities of technology. To improve the search process, there needs to be a role profiling engine that assesses the adaptability, breadth, creativity, as well as the core required technical abilities for a given role within an organisation, and marries those to a set of business targets for the role. "Solution Architect with java, j2ee, presentation skills, networking, and project management for the publishing industry" will achieve a certain type of response vector - likely a lot of mid level java programmers looking to move up. "Software application oriented team leader and problem solver with strong interpersonal skills to design, build and manage a web based catalog and data mining service" will get you a much broader response with fewer java programmers and a lot more design professionals with the appropriate skill sets. (Both job descriptions are describing the same role).
• Interviewing should be about cultural fit and relationship clarification; If the candidate gets to the interview, then the only "technical" question should be - "Did you lie or dissemble in your CV?" The rest is about ensuring that the candidate understands the role they are to undertake, and the employer is comfortable that the candidate's personality is a fit for their organisation and the team in question. These "soft" tests can be accomplished using role based questions and situational explorations and should be very open. One thing that should definitely occur in these sessions is the "uncomfortable" question - and ideally, they should go both ways. Employers need to realise that the interview process is a two way street - especially when we get to this level of employment - "Artistic" candidates are not common (yet) and are therefore able to be picky about who they work with. I have often felt that the true role of the HR rep at an interview process where they are not the interviewer should be that of mediator, facilitator and sometimes instigator; and hiring managers should gage the quality of an interview by how animated THEY get during the process.

Now while this may fly in the face of some more traditional HR theory, I think that the first major recruiting site that begins to create candidate profiles this way and requires their clients to list their openings in a more quantitative as well as qualitative manner will experience a hockeystick event in terms of successful matches and both client and candidate satisfaction - not to mention profit, if the site is connected to a recruiting firm!

Just the kernel of another idea that occured to me today. Please feel free to pick it apart (intelligently, please) or improve upon it! Click the comment link below!

Broadcast Television - Why?!!

Why is television programming still linked to the clock?

There are very few broadcasts on offer in today's television industry that require being linked to the clock. News (Events, Politics and Financial news for example) is the most obvious one that has value as a real-time streaming medium - the rest of the video entertainment on offer is only connected to the clock by the inherent limitations of the traditional broadcast model: Viewers can only watch one channel at a time, and the most popular show in any given "time-slot" will receive the lion's share of advertising revenues. This model is already failing with the proliferation of choice in the marketplace - there are so many channels now, the viewer is being forced to use VCR/DVR/PVR technology to manage all the content they want to view.

Given the fact that most households in the "cable/satellite ownership category" also have broadband IP connections, wouldn't it make more sense to publish episodic and other programming as discrete downloadable files? Viewers could set up automated downloads for episodic content, browse and flag events and other aperiodic content for download and could also download "trailer files" to view trailers for new programming and events coming soon, etc.

Using current/future P2P mesh network models would significantly reduce bottlenecks and bandwidth charges to the producers, and creation of a highly optimised UI applet for users and a supporting back end database engine, would make finding and flagging shows much simpler than any current technology.

This would obviously flip the existing industry on its head. The existing advertising model has been to "force" viewers to intermittently sit through ads that interrupt their desired viewing in order to get their capitive attention. The initial model worked because viewers were too "lazy" to get up and change the channel. Then we got the remote control - and networks responded by (to a degree) synchronising their advertising slots - so surfing to avoid commercials became pointless. Then we got VCRs, and we could record our shows (commercials and all) and then fast forward past the commercials. Finally, we now have PVRs, with software that can actually auto-skip over commercials, so that we view the program uninterrupted. All this has eroded the "value" of broadcast television airtime for advertisers. The new model would need to provide some way for advertisers to benefit while allowing viewers to view the content they want when they want.

I would propose something along the lines of the following;

A easy to use client application with rich searching and flagging utilities that allows a viewer/user to select the shows they want to see, flag "missed" episodes for immediate download, and flag future ones for download upon release. This could include existing formats such as sitcoms, serials, and movies, as well as new content forms yet to be invented. Microsoft is already heading in this direction with their "set-top" PC Media Center technology on the front end. The back end needs to be P2P.

Revenue models would include advertising space available in the client application, 1 or 2 short advertising spots at the beginning of a program (potentially), product placement within the medium, pay-per-view, pay per product, as well as subscription revenue to specific programs or production company's libraries.

Under this system, viewers would be able to flag their desired programming and watch it at their leisure, including being able to watch "trailer sets" which would allow them to discover new programs that might be of interest.

Production of programming would be funded by production houses that feel they have programs that will attract many viewers (world wide distribution is free afterall) and therefore be valuable vehicles for product placement and/or able to command significant viewer revenue through viewer payment models.

Piracy (which occurs today) would still occur, however, a useful point of pricing analysis would occur here, since overpriced programs would show up on pirate networks with high volume, while properly priced programs might not even show up at all. - In the former case though, product placement advertisers are still getting their value.

As an extension, we may revert to an older model of TV production, where the advertiser owns the program and outsources production. Coca Cola may buy the rights to CSI, lock in product placements and exclusivity and find it cheaper than current advertising methods simply because there is no need for distribution costs or advertising fees.

I do not have all the answers, primarily because I haven't asked all the questions yet. Please ask any that occur to you in the comments section!

The Record Industry - Clawing at the inside of its coffin

The Record - what a lovely piece of nostalgia. Initially a physically graven drum, then disc, then a magnetic tape, then a compact laser disc, and now the demise of physical media.

People don't need proprietary physical media to get access to their audible entertainment. What does this mean? In my estimation, it means that the production side of the recording industry is as good as dead. Let's remember why these businesses evolved; It was to create economies of scale in the acquisition, leverage and exploitation of talent with the goal of mass producing and distributing as many physical "music storage media" as possible to the public. With the advent of online music sales, much of the record industry's infrastructure is redundant. Further, they are harder pressed to compete for eardrums with new online outlets for indie music. Classic marketing channels are wasting away as the iPod generation eschews the radio altogether and instead joins iMix and other playlist services - driven by independent community members unlikely to be swayed by marketing execs, largely because the "swaying" would spell their doom among their peers.

How about the artists? Traditionally, a record company would pay the fairly steep costs of studio time and production expertise to produce a recording, then take on the marketing and promoting of the artist in the hopes of getting a significant return on their investment. In order to minimize their record companies cultivated A/R (artist and repertoire) talent who became the gatekeepers of "stardom" and marketing departments focussed on ensuring that the talent supplied by A/R was promoted to the point of profitability, regardless of quality (it was asssumed that A/R only provided quality). While we have yet to see an artist or group achieve fame without the help of a record company, I don't believe we are going to be able to say that in 5 years.

So where am I heading with all this?

What if . . .

. . . some enterprising soul figured out the following;

1. Production costs for recordings have declined to almost $0. The infrastructure required for that production has dropped to as little as $3000.00 for a computer and some recording software. Anyone with the will, a little cash and a bucket of talent can create a professional recording in their own home.
2. The "cost" of marketing (or creating "buzz") on a global scale has dropped to $0 in real terms. Yes, you need some smarts and time, but social networking sites are a perfect example of what is possible with little up front money. Leveraging these environments, or a new one, to act as a "clearinghouse" for artists is not a significant mental stretch.
3. Radio (and record company marketing departments) along with media critics, have long been part of our natural filtering mechanisms - providing a "service" which narrowed our choices to something "manageable." As many have noted, "playlist" sites are cropping up everywhere. These provide the same "service" as radio, critics and peers - but are more widely distributed and offer much broader choices.
4. Systems such as Pandora are advancing the art of filtering to new levels - making it possible to broaden our artist base without straying uncomfortably far from our artistic comfort zones nor relying on the whims of other musicophiles. Currently the drawbacks here are licensing issues with major labels and the (current) lack of recognition by the labels of the growing role of services like this in their own marketing.
5. That P2P, and especially bittorrent provides a method to "host" a massive library, without having to purchase mammoth bandwidth.
6. Music lovers don't mind paying for good music.
7. Music lovers DO mind;
   - paying for crap,
   - being limited in how they can use music they have purchased,
   - being overcharged for music,
   - being forced to buy a bundle when they only want a song,
   - watching everybody but the artist get rich from the artist's work.

. . . that enterprising soul decided to build the music industry infrastructure for the world?

A single site, multilingual, global reach where;

• An artist/group would have their own sub-site where they could create their marketing, manage and interact with their community, make sample works available for immediate download, directly sell their works, as well as manage (license, co-promo, etc.) their "published works" within the greater catalogue of music available on the network.
• A critic, pundit, DJ, former A/R rep, music lover would create their own sub-site where they create downloadable "radio" tracks or "channels," review the works of other artists, publish playlists, and generally contribute to the culture of the network.
• A producer would have their own site, and (having the huge base of all artists on the network to draw from) promote themselves and the works they "produced" as well as participating as any other artist would.
• A music lover could join, pay a small subscription fee as well as per track fees. They could then download their purchased tracks as many times as they want, whenever they want, download "radio" tracks at their leisure (radio tracks are lower quality and include some announcer voiceover and possibly some minor ads) as well as grab promotional snips from artists.

The system above does several things that reduce the end-user cost of music, and increase the artist's revenue:

• There is no physical media to deliver, and bittorrent significantly reduces the bandwidth requirements to serve the entire library simultaneously.
• Piracy will never vanish, but this platform will reduce/eliminate the benefit to end users of pirating music, as well as make the "crime" less victimless, since 80+% of the fees for tracks will go directly to the artist - pirates are no longer "fighting the man," they are stealing from someone they actually appreciate.
• The small amount of sharing that will occur (among friends etc.) will be the best marketing an artist could ask for.
• Because there are literally no "costs" to the platform (infrastructure costs should be covered by ad revenue), the price per track per user should drop to less than 50 cents.
• Users can listen to lower quality full versions of the music they want for free - when they buy, they know they want the music.

A business model where money goes the right places

• The network owns the "banner" are on all pages;
• The sub-site owner owns the rest of the ad space - the network serves the ads on their behalf, but all ad revenue for those impressions goes to the sub-site owner.
• Ad revenue pays for the infrastucture costs of the network
• 5-10% of transactions revert to the network to fund updates, expansion and financial costs.
• Offshore foundation of systems and corporate entity means no tax issues to the organisation or users/clients (until they repatriate funds).
• 80+% of transaction revenue reverts to the artist/group/producer
• So long as user continues to pay subscription fee, the system will maintain their "library" online and they can re-download anything in their library as often as they want, forever.

The technology to accomplish this exists, and could be assembled in no time by almost anyone with a little technical knowledge and management ability. With the right set of models, it could easily supplant existing platforms such as iTunes and effectively (hopefully) create a renaissance in contemporary music. With the ultimate goal being to decimate the existing content owners' revenues to the point where the network could acquire their libraries and artists merging them into the network and becoming the custodian of mankind's musical culture past and present.

Would this be the ultimate Microsoft play for the music business - hell no! In my ideal, the controlling interest in the network would be held by a shareholder trust, controlled and owned by all active subscribers and clients to the system. - No one would be able to hijack the system without decimating the trust of its users - which would simply cause the network's demise, as users migrated elsewhere (and took their tracks and artists with them).

Think big or go home! :-)

As always, I would love to hear suggestions for improving on this rather generalised overview. And of course, making this a reality would be a wonderful thing! I'd be happy to help anyone who thought they could make it happen!

Banking - something broken

I don't get it. Technology has been around long enough that we should be seeing huge economy-of-scale level benefits in the banking world. As it stands, credit cards are no cheaper in terms of fees to customers and merchants; interest rates on savings accounts are still pitiful; most accounts now carry transaction fees for all but the most innocuous transactions; and interbank or international transactions (while somewhat easier) are as expensive as ever. Don't even get me started on brokerage, although at least there is some improvement thanks to technology in that sector, but not enough by far. I have been involved in the tech industry internationally since pre-1990, and I can only come to one conclusion about the lack of "technology market forces" in the banking industry; No one WANTS it, except the customer, and the customer's voice is being ignored because they CAN ignore it - where else can you put your cash?!

I have been wondering about this for almost a decade now; I even drew up a business plan and technical architecture. Unfortunately, I got hooked into a different project and that was that. Well, here we are several years later and no one has done it yet - so the question begs, why not?!! In the interest of pursuing an answer to that question, I though I'd post the idea and get comments from as many folks as I could.

The comments to this blog are moderated, so don't bother sending posts that add no value to the discussion, or "me too" messages.

So here we go;

The Network Bank

The following set of questions acted as the catalyst for the conception and creation of the network bank idea;

• Why do I need separate accounts within the same institution for checking, saving, investing, trading, foreign currency and borrowing?
• Why do I need separate accounts with separate institutions for trading different financial instruments and/or trading on different foreign markets?
• Why does a bank charge a transaction fee for moving numbers from one record to another in their account database?
• Why does it take hours, days and sometimes weeks for cash to be transfered electronically?
• Why are currency exchange rate spreads often as much as 100 times those of the spot market?
• Why aren't the performances of all financial transaction professionals (fund managers, traders) available in real time with all fees calculated? (This data is available)
• How can a bank act such that it becomes a non-profit organisation, feeding back all excess gains to its account holders?
• How could you provide complete transactional transparency to regulatory bodies while also maintaining absolute privacy for your account holders?
• If you created communities of people with common interests and financial goals/capabilities - wouldn't they be capable of self-serving financial services with no requirement for "bank" intervention? (i.e., small business loans, mortgages)
• Couldn't a bank leverage its internal access to data to provide services such as automated simple income tax filing for its account holders - using highly leveraged tax expertise?
• Why is a merchant account separate from a current account?

Using those questions as a foundational thought framework, I designed a conceptual bank. Here are some of the highlights;

• Completely internet based, with phone support 24/7 (quality focussed for the internet challenged) - There is NOTHING that you can conceive of doing at a bank, that will not be possible to do online with this bank.
• Domiciled offshore in a tax free environment.
• Initial deposits arrive via electronic transfer (SWIFT, Visa, etc.)
• No service charges for online transactions (aside from those imposed by external organisations)
• Currency exchange at the spot rate, no commissions.
• Discount broker level commissions for all financial markets.
• Personal data kept in escrow, but not "online linked" to account information. Privacy is king.
• Single universal account:
• Has a single default currency which can be changed at will
• May hold portions of its value in any other currency(s) the holder my desire
• May hold positions (including margined) in equities, derivatives, currencies or any other financial product from any major financial market in the world
• Can monitor and manage positions in real time from anywhere via the web
• Can accept payments directly into the account via SWIFT, credit cards, e-checks etc., via a personal payment web page hosted by the bank
• Can make payments via internet using direct payment platforms and/or randomised credit card number tools.
• Has an attached private Visa/MC debit card (no credit cards, LoC can be attached to account).
• If the account holder is a trader/financial manager, they may create published profiles of their trading activity. These profiles will promote the individual's performance to all account holders and allow them to subscribe to the manager's program if they wish. Automated risk management systems ensure that the client's risk is managed (as well as the manager's) as much as possible. This function will permit traders to realise maximum value for their talents, since they focus solely on performance in their own account, the systems handle the "super sizing" of their executions as well as all reporting and client management. Fund managers will now have not only traditional asset classes to work with, but will now have a very effective and transparent performance based roster of trading talent to augment their funds. To the investor/account holder, the difference between a fund manager and a trader will be negligible in terms of interface - only the risk profiles and performance parameters will differentiate them.
• Long term, as deposits increase, move into self insuring.
• The solution is 100% electronic and is keyed to the idea that soon, we won't receive or send funds any other way.

All of this may sound simplistic, and in a sense it is - there are huge administrative issues that need to be dealt with, such as custodial services, risk management, licensing, account insurance (for account holders), not to mention the risks to be faced by doing this (you will make a lot of enemies in the banking world).

As time goes by, the cost of creating and launching the software/systems side of this business continues to drop like a rock. Current estimate is less than $1 Million to build it and launch the first usable version. Significant resources will be required to gain all the interconnections required to have access to world markets at competitive rates, and there is the need for human resources to support the users as they come online and begin to discover the environment. These requisite resources though can be accomplished as effectively through networking as through fundraising.

So, as I see the overall thing - You need some cash, a few savvy banking types with big rolodexes, and probably balls of steel to go out and do this thang. But once it was launched, it would attract almost anyone just on principle alone, and force a major change in the way financial markets work, simply because a large part of the information assymetry of that space will be vanishing due to the new bank.

I'm sure I've missed tons of things here, but I think this is a good place to start the discussion. As comments and discussion ensue, I will try to update this primary post to reflect good ideas or corrections (with credit of course!). What I am hoping for is to enrich this concept to the point where someone thinks it's worth doing, or we uncover a very good reason why it would never work.

PS: Yes, I know that payment gateways like PayPal and other interesting services like P2P Loans etc., exist already - what is missing is a fully integrated financial platform for everyone that gives them everything available (banking, credit, investing, trading, currencies and exotics) in one interface at the best value possible.