jg21 writes "A brief essay on the SOA Web Services Journal claims there is a new phenomenon among startups, the 'momentary enterprise'. The article defines the term as a business that 'takes advantage of an opportunity that may only exist for months'. The piece claims that we're entering a golden age of technologies that can be glued together to create new types of information that fill an identifiable need. On example given is VOware like Groove, which is likened to IM on steroids. From the article: 'The ingredients for another wave of new companies are all around us - pervasively all around us. They include new wireless extensions of the wired network and the further exportation of technologies such as XML.' Intriguingly optimistic." New Golden Age for Outside-the-Box Startups? Log in/Create an Account | Top | 134 comments | Search Discussion Display Options Threshold: -1: 134 comments 0: 128 comments 1: 108 comments 2: 87 comments 3: 30 comments 4: 13 comments 5: 9 comments Flat Nested No Comments Threaded Oldest First Newest First Highest Scores First Oldest First (Ignore Threads) Newest First (Ignore Threads) The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way. Didnt we have this already? (Score:4, Insightful) by daxomatic (772926) on Thursday October 27, @09:35AM (#13888443) (Last Journal: Saturday October 23, @07:08PM) Everything your team needs for sharing documents blah blahIts called exchange? [ Reply to ThisRe:Didnt we have this already? by TedCheshireAcad (Score:3) Thursday October 27, @09:37AM1 reply beneath your current threshold.Party Like It's .... by LukePieStalker (Score:1) Thursday October 27, @12:08PM I wish (Score:4, Insightful) by Craig Ringer (302899) on Thursday October 27, @12:47PM (#13889884) (http://www.postnewspapers.com.au/ | Last Journal: Saturday August 03, @02:00AM) Things like Exchange are great /within/ a company. Well, except for the server admin. They suck bigtime outside a company and between companies.That's a large part of what these sorts of people are on about - working better within _and_ between companies - though I really don't know if they have anything interesting beyond hot air to offer. Anything that gives the customers at work a moron-proof interface to send us documents that DOESN'T involve email gets my vote. [ Reply to This | Parent Conference calls (Score:1) by fm2503 (876331) on Thursday October 27, @09:37AM (#13888461) From TFA:"The productiveness of a conference call definitely suffers because multitasking participants are only __slightly__ paying attention."Wow - who did they ask this question?Isn't participation in conf calls a bit like presence on the corporate IM system?Online and therefore must be working? [ Reply to This Re:Conference calls (Score:4, Insightful) by Lumpy (12016) on Thursday October 27, @10:04AM (#13888603) (http://timgray.blogspot.com/) Problem stems from the fact that 90% of all conference calls are useless wastes of time. If I did not join in from my desk and then mute the mic and then promptly ignore everything (I record to my iRiver though) I would not get anything done. On a specific project we have at LEAST 5 conference calls a week on the subject, typically going for 1 to 2 hours and talking about crap we covered the last 5 calls.conference calls are a waste of time now days because they are overused and nothing productive is done with them anymore. [ Reply to This | ParentRe:Conference calls by pete6677 (Score:3) Thursday October 27, @10:30AMRe:Conference calls by Taladar (Score:2) Thursday October 27, @04:20PMRe:Conference calls by danharan (Score:2) Thursday October 27, @11:23AMRe:Conference calls by rosciol (Score:2) Thursday October 27, @11:23AMRe:Conference calls by Doctor Memory (Score:2) Thursday October 27, @02:34PM Blah blah blah corporatespeak blah blah blah (Score:5, Insightful) by Cyburbia (695748) on Thursday October 27, @09:38AM (#13888466) "Such commodities will be expertly and automatically leveraged by super-deep, business-to-business automation, and new enterprises will start up by focusing their energy on differentiating their value in the marketplace rather than creating and supporting all of the associated accoutrements."Can we have a translation to English, please? [ Reply to ThisRe:Blah blah blah corporatespeak blah blah blah by OakDragon (Score:2) Thursday October 27, @09:41AMRe:Blah blah blah corporatespeak blah blah blah by Cyburbia (Score:1) Thursday October 27, @09:47AMRe:Blah blah blah corporatespeak blah blah blah by GreyWolf3000 (Score:2) Thursday October 27, @09:54AMRe:Blah blah blah corporatespeak blah blah blah by berbo (Score:1) Thursday October 27, @11:30AMRe:Blah blah blah corporatespeak blah blah blah by GreyWolf3000 (Score:2) Thursday October 27, @01:28PMRe:Blah blah blah corporatespeak blah blah blah by elemental23 (Score:2) Thursday October 27, @04:23PM Re:Blah blah blah corporatespeak blah blah blah (Score:5, Funny) by maxwell demon (590494) on Thursday October 27, @09:46AM (#13888513) (Last Journal: Wednesday August 14, @01:33PM) Here's the translation. All irrelevant stuff has been removed.--- begin of translation ------ end of translation ---Hope this helps. [ Reply to This | ParentIt's the new anti-dupe strategy by Morgaine (Score:2) Thursday October 27, @10:54AM Translation (Score:4, Insightful) by EraserMouseMan (847479) on Thursday October 27, @09:48AM (#13888527) Companies will use B2B to quickly build a business and the required market relationsips. Then narrowly focus on filling a niche and will stay focused on that niche (instead of becomming a larger one-stop-eShop). [ Reply to This | ParentRe:Blah blah blah corporatespeak blah blah blah by pubjames (Score:1) Thursday October 27, @09:48AMRe:Blah blah blah corporatespeak blah blah blah by Bill Dog (Score:1) Thursday October 27, @09:50AMRe:Blah blah blah corporatespeak blah blah blah by stupidfoo (Score:3) Thursday October 27, @09:50AMRe:Blah blah blah corporatespeak blah blah blah by protoshoggoth (Score:1) Thursday October 27, @10:31AMRe:Blah blah blah corporatespeak blah blah blah by mykdavies (Score:3) Thursday October 27, @10:32AMRe:Blah blah blah corporatespeak blah blah blah by elemental23 (Score:2) Thursday October 27, @04:26PMRe:Blah blah blah corporatespeak blah blah blah by sonamchauhan (Score:2) Thursday October 27, @12:06PMRe:Blah blah blah corporatespeak blah blah blah by Kent Recal (Score:2) Thursday October 27, @05:24PM4 replies beneath your current threshold. Grand (Score:5, Insightful) by grasshoppa (657393) on Thursday October 27, @09:38AM (#13888467) (http://tpno-co.org/ | Last Journal: Friday August 13, @12:03AM) So we're going to have more people getting VC for ideas that won't last more than a few months.Well, I guess that's an improvement over the last bubble: Those guys didn't have a plan beyond getting the VC. [ Reply to ThisRe:Grand by Moby Cock (Score:3) Thursday October 27, @09:53AMRe:Grand by flokati (Score:2) Thursday October 27, @09:58AMRe:Grand by btarval (Score:2) Thursday October 27, @10:40AM Tech (Score:2) by kevin_conaway (585204) on Thursday October 27, @09:39AM (#13888470) (http://pyscrabble.sf.net/ | Last Journal: Thursday April 28, @02:48PM) And of course what allows all this magic to happen? Why SOA of course! [ Reply to This XML technology is so amazing (Score:5, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 27, @09:41AM (#13888486) It harnesses the power of an ASCII text stream!!!I predict this XML technology will soon take over the internets. [ Reply to ThisRe:XML technology is so amazing by greg_barton (Score:2) Thursday October 27, @11:06AM1 reply beneath your current threshold.Re:XML technology is so amazing by 21mhz (Score:3) Thursday October 27, @11:15AMThankyou by Craig Ringer (Score:2) Thursday October 27, @01:05PMRe:Thankyou by 21mhz (Score:2) Thursday October 27, @05:31PMRe:XML technology is so amazing by Zerbs (Score:1) Thursday October 27, @12:11PM I love the department name (Score:5, Interesting) by K.B.Zod (642226) on Thursday October 27, @09:43AM (#13888503) It certainly could be the beginning of the next bubble. Joel Spolsky doesn't think much [joelonsoftware.com] of the "Web 2.0" hype, which I think this article may be buying into.The bit in the article about how XML will solve all our data interchange problems is particularly curious. C'mon, it's just text files with a bunch of angle brackets, when it gets right down to it. [ Reply to ThisRe:I love the department name by Kjella (Score:3) Thursday October 27, @10:04AMRe:I love the department name by dslauson (Score:1) Thursday October 27, @10:21AMRe:I love the department name by Eric Giguere (Score:3) Thursday October 27, @11:08AMRe:I love the department name by K.B.Zod (Score:2) Thursday October 27, @01:43PMRe:I love the department name by Generic Guy (Score:2) Thursday October 27, @11:18AMRe:I love the department name by justins (Score:2) Thursday October 27, @01:13PMRe:I love the department name by greg_barton (Score:2) Thursday October 27, @01:29PM1 reply beneath your current threshold. erm, huh? (Score:2, Insightful) by Bill Dog (726542) on Thursday October 27, @09:45AM (#13888507) (Last Journal: Monday October 17, @03:03PM) Also, the fact that their life spans will be measured in months or a short number of years will not be grounds for dismissal from Harvard Business School. A successful business model doesn't need to be measured by its staying power.Who's going to purchase an IT solution from a business that admittedly is only going to be around for several more months? [ Reply to ThisRe:erm, huh? by cgenman (Score:2) Thursday October 27, @10:04AMRe:erm, huh? by Nykon (Score:1) Thursday October 27, @01:43PM2 replies beneath your current threshold. Welcome to 2005! (Score:2) by myspys (204685) on Thursday October 27, @09:45AM (#13888509) (http://septum.org/) Seriously, who'd buy software from a company (to avoid OSS zealots) that doesn't seem to have enough money to invest in a website?I mean, have a look at the website VOware [virtualoff...ftware.com] have, it looks like it's from the 80s [ Reply to ThisRe:Welcome to 2005! by BewireNomali (Score:3) Thursday October 27, @09:54AMRe:Welcome to 2005! by gentlemen_loser (Score:2) Thursday October 27, @10:10AMRe:Welcome to 2005! by HermanAB (Score:2) Thursday October 27, @10:13AM2 replies beneath your current threshold. Nothing to see here (Score:2) by mustafap (452510) on Thursday October 27, @09:47AM (#13888523) (http://www.drivesentinel.co.uk/) Statements such as"Advances in image-processing algorithms now enable computing networks to actually understand scenes."and"It is now trivial to litter an environment with video-capture devices because the costs and wiring complexity have been nearly eliminated."Suggest that the overall content may not be of very high value ;o| [ Reply to ThisRe:Nothing to see here by stupidfoo (Score:2) Thursday October 27, @09:59AMRe:Nothing to see here by mustafap (Score:1) Thursday October 27, @10:05AM Great! (Score:2) by Quiet_Desperation (858215) on Thursday October 27, @09:50AM (#13888540) Another wave of shorting stocks and I can retire. :-)Can I short these guys on the day of the IPO? [ Reply to This Not another "new" economy. (Score:5, Informative) by plasmacutter (901737) on Thursday October 27, @09:53AM (#13888554) there is a new phenomenon among startups, the 'momentary enterprise'. The article defines the term as a business that 'takes advantage of an opportunity that may only exist for months'.I'm a student of economics, and I can say with authority that this kind of market trend is not one we want to gravitate toward.Such short term viability of a firm or product detracts from economic stability and societal welfare.A firm which does this kind of work can't take advantage of economics of scale for it's market, meaning higher costs for producing a good or service which will not be demanded in the long term.Even if there are strong IP protections, such short term niches would not provide compensation for a large development effort.Would you want to be employed by a firm whose products were projected to be worthless by year's end?The article speaks of "reconfiguring, lego like" to pursue the next momentary opportunity, but that creates tremendous uncertainty and volitility.on that one I ask:-How would you behave with your money if you weren't sure the next "opportunity", or 2, or 3, or 4, that your small business pursued woud gain you a profit?(i know in such uncertainty i would spend less, and if the population collectively spends less then recession takes hold, making the uncertainty a self fulfilling prophecy).-How comfortable would you be investing your retirement or college fund in stocks or even bonds for a firm which behaved like this?(It's not the kind of sector in which you can expect a career/pay stable enough to raise a family, i'll tell you that one.)I think it would be an economic nightmare if this were to become predominant business practice, but I'm happy that most managers would never sanely consider such a strategy as their primary business plan (if i did, i'd be in constant fear of being fired by the directors during a time when my prediction as to what the "new momentary market" was). [ Reply to Thisargument from authority by tjic (Score:1) Thursday October 27, @10:29AMRe:argument from authority by plasmacutter (Score:1) Thursday October 27, @10:43AMRe:Not another "new" economy. by danharan (Score:2) Thursday October 27, @11:00AMRe:Not another "new" economy. by Generic Guy (Score:2) Thursday October 27, @11:04AMRe:Not another "new" economy. by vertinox (Score:3) Thursday October 27, @11:28AMRe:Not another "new" economy. by khallow (Score:2) Thursday October 27, @02:51PMRe:Not another "new" economy. by cpeterso (Score:2) Thursday October 27, @04:15PMRe:Not another "new" economy. by Thing 1 (Score:2) Thursday October 27, @10:13PM2 replies beneath your current threshold. But who do we sue? (Score:5, Interesting) by G4from128k (686170) on Thursday October 27, @09:53AM (#13888557) Sound like this might creates some apoplectic lawyers. If a company lasts only a few months, it's going to be a difficult target for lawsuits. By the time the plaintiff finds a lawyer or the case goes to court, the company is gone.I suppose you can go after the principals, but if most of the money came from (and went to) a set of legally-insulated investors (e.g., in an LLC), then the managers of the company won't be the deep pockets that lawyers love. Can a dissolved entity be reconstituted (and money taken back from investors) if that company is later found liable for something? [ Reply to ThisRe:But who do we sue? by Phanatic1a (Score:2) Thursday October 27, @10:21AMRe:But who do we sue? by goldspider (Score:3) Thursday October 27, @10:56AMBut do LLC's protect investors forever? by G4from128k (Score:2) Thursday October 27, @11:32AMRe:But who do we sue? by LaCosaNostradamus (Score:2) Thursday October 27, @03:40PMRe:But who do we sue? by goldspider (Score:2) Thursday October 27, @03:53PMRe:But who do we sue? by frn123 (Score:1) Thursday October 27, @04:46PM1 reply beneath your current threshold.Re:But who do we sue? by Thing 1 (Score:2) Thursday October 27, @10:20PM Y'know... (Score:5, Insightful) by Otter (3800) on Thursday October 27, @09:54AM (#13888559) (Last Journal: Monday October 17, @10:42AM) I'm not one of the people always yelling that stories here are paid ads: "Slashvertisement! Astroturfer! Roland Picqupiale!!!!"But I'm thinking Zonk got taken on this one. That VOware link is informative, why? [ Reply to ThisRe:Y'know... by plasticmillion (Score:2) Thursday October 27, @01:56PM Hi! BIG BUSINESS DEAL NOW!!!111 (Score:3, Funny) by simp (25997) on Thursday October 27, @09:54AM (#13888560) Hi! I have a super duper business idea for you. But it will only last for a few months, so be quick! Please send all your VC money asap to my nigerian bank account manager so that he can leverage your business opportunity. Feel free to synergize your partners to maximize the cummulative profits streams to me.I await your business proposal, please send accurate paperwork so that we can leverage the moment and exchange funds in this great enterprise 2 enterprise opportunity.Vice-Prince Mike Okelewa, the 2nd. [ Reply to ThisRe:Hi! BIG BUSINESS DEAL NOW!!!111 by museumpeace (Score:2) Thursday October 27, @11:16AMRe:Hi! BIG BUSINESS DEAL NOW!!!111 by Hugonz (Score:2) Thursday October 27, @02:00PM Boom and bust (Score:2) by HermanAB (661181) on Thursday October 27, @10:11AM (#13888649) Well, I don't think having companies that go boom and bust quickly is really such a great idea, especially after having worked for two of those... [ Reply to This trouble keeping up? (Score:1) by jtroutman (121577) on Thursday October 27, @10:13AM (#13888662) (Last Journal: Monday July 04, @11:49AM) Over the course of the last hundred years the speed of change in almost every aspect of our existence has increased dramatically. New technologies and new ways to use existing technology are coming faster than ever. The multitasking cellphone that the writer feels has "so many functions that one could get lost just trying to find them all" is only one example. Obviously this will allow business models to evolve that take advantage of these changes. This idea is not new however, these are simply new applications that have adapted to the latest technology. There have always been businesses that are here one day and gone the next, from trinket vendors following the trail of Roman Legions to the pop-up hotdog stands that show up wherever there is a large gathering of people. This is the same thing, just utilizing the latest technology. Mankind's greatest ability is not language or the use of tools, but his amazing adaptability to new situations. [ Reply to This Start your company now! (Score:5, Funny) by Tumbarumba (74816) on Thursday October 27, @10:13AM (#13888663) (http://www.exubero.com/) Hey, here's the perfect page [andrewwooldridge.com] for this topic. It will generate the name of a Web 2.0 company and product description in seconds! [ Reply to ThisRe:Start your company now! by StarfishOne (Score:1) Thursday October 27, @10:44AMRe:Start your company now! by Nf1nk (Score:2) Thursday October 27, @12:08PMRe:Start your company now! by se7en11 (Score:1) Thursday October 27, @12:54PMRe:Start your company now! by mrjb (Score:2) Thursday October 27, @04:12PM1 reply beneath your current threshold. What About Patents? (Score:2) by HeelToe (615905) on Thursday October 27, @10:26AM (#13888763) (http://slashdot.org/~HeelToe/) It seems to me this idea is a bit too much wishful thinking in the current patent litigation climate. Combine 3-5 technologies in a unique way for solving some problem that will be acute for a few months time, get hit with patent lawsuits from three different directions.Of course, maybe you can rake in the cash in solving that acute problem for a few months, close up shop and get out of Dodge before the lawsuits do much harm. Put the money overseas in a non-patent-litigious society's banks and kick back? [ Reply to ThisRe:What About Patents? by sane? (Score:2) Thursday October 27, @11:52AM This is crap (Score:3, Insightful) by Dikeman (620856) on Thursday October 27, @10:34AM (#13888822) (http://www.mindbus.nl/) Starting up a bussiness is not and has never been restricted by the cost of setting up an infrastructure.What makes every company (and especially IT companies) expensive to start?EMPLOYEESIt's hard to get good people and after you get them together you will spent by far the biggest part of your budget on their salaries.And my guess is that this will always be the case. People want a salary, no matter how many nifty 'Hybrid PDA's' you throw at them.Every VC will laugh his ass of if he reads this article. It's a load of bull that makes my stomach turn. [ Reply to ThisRe:This is crap by vertinox (Score:2) Thursday October 27, @11:32AM New Old Things (Score:3, Informative) by scoove (71173) on Thursday October 27, @10:42AM (#13888861) new phenomenon among startups, the 'momentary enterprise'.Actually, Tom Peters dealt with the concept extensively in his 1993 book, Liberation Management. [amazon.com] While it's certainly pre-momentary business technology in some respects, it does a good job addressing the higher-level conceptual issues associated with this business construct. One example referred to was Peter's video publication business that existed for about a month and included experts from numerous fields who came together to create a business exclusively for the production of the video, and then disbanded and went onto other projects.*scoove*You know you're getting old when the new things aren't. [ Reply to ThisNew Old Things-Just add water. by Anonymous Coward (Score:1) Thursday October 27, @11:30AMRe:New Old Things-Just add water. by scoove (Score:1) Thursday October 27, @06:36PM2 replies beneath your current threshold. From the title... (Score:2, Funny) by Massif (875445) on Thursday October 27, @10:56AM (#13888953) I thought this was an article about booting from a network device. Woe is me. [ Reply to This Slow Tuesday Night (Score:2) by ghostlibrary (450718) on Thursday October 27, @11:06AM (#13889023) (http://slashdot.org/) Sounds a bit like kitbashing, only with software ideas instead of model kits.Fortunately for wannabe startups, R.A. Lafferty already covered the details in 'Slow Tuesday Night', where a typical entrepreneur can go from rags to riches 3, 4 times in one evening. Instant (POD) publishing, channels for quick creation and distribution, even rapid divorces, a lot of the stuff we use today.Of course, that was in 1966. [ Reply to This There definitely IS a downside to lining up VC $ (Score:2) by museumpeace (735109) on Thursday October 27, @11:14AM (#13889089) (Last Journal: Monday July 18, @07:18PM) time to market stretches out...the more groundbreaking your idea, the more time it takes to convince a group to fund you [a single investor going it alone in a big bet on your business idea is rare...VC's like company when they take the plunge]. I know. I was employee # 6 at a 1996 start up that met its first VC over a year earlier...and lost out in the end to Vermeer [which got bought and became Front Page" because we were on hold for a very precious year. You have any idea of the difference between getting in on a boom, say the "dot com" boom the year BEFORE its a household word and trying to get in the year AFTER every body with a server thinks he is a player? [ Reply to This Life Imitates Art? (Score:2, Insightful) by rprime (671195) on Thursday October 27, @11:16AM (#13889106) Funny how this article came out while Cory Doctorow is serializing a novel [salon.com] about small temporary businesses that just glue together the resources available. I think some of the text in the article was lifted directly from the first chapter. [ Reply to ThisRe:Life Imitates Art? by 3waygeek (Score:2) Thursday October 27, @02:30PM Ooooo.... (Score:3, Funny) by istartedi (132515) on Thursday October 27, @11:20AM (#13889137) (Last Journal: Thursday April 18, @08:50PM) I'm so anxious to work for a compnay that has to get all its cash from revenue right away, then folds in 4 months. Will the next "visionary" please step forward? No, the stick is perfectly harmless. Step closer, it's OK... [ Reply to This somthin' fishy here (Score:2) by museumpeace (735109) on Thursday October 27, @11:24AM (#13889165) (Last Journal: Monday July 18, @07:18PM) Grove network is not in anyway an example of the business models that the article proposes. Its actually Ozzie's addition to microsoft [com.com]. [ Reply to This Real Journal Article (Score:3, Informative)