• by Diane Mermigas , June 12, 2008

Doc Searls, a veteran ad man turned scholarly blogger, cracked the code on interactive advertising and connections nearly 10 years ago in an Internet bubble treatise dubbed "The Cluetrain Manifesto," which he co-authored with several of his similarly visionary pals. It is as insightful today as it was controversial then.

It has taken a decade for the Internet to become mainstream and for digital interactive technology to bore itself into every facet of our psyche and existence. Only now can tech-fixated consumers, frantic advertisers ("vendors") and media executives appreciate the manifesto's 95-theses indictment of outmoded thinking. Despite its flaws and wacky self-indulgences, there is truth to be found in "The Cluetrain Manifesto."

It celebrates the power of the individual as the essence of the Internet's radical transformation of everything. The manifesto is, perhaps more appropriately today, a catalyst for ongoing change in thinking, working and living. It certainly is for Searls, who generally explores the meaning of digital life in his several well-read blogs.

As a fellow at Harvard's Berkman Center for Internet and Society, Searls heads Project VRM, aimed at developing the notion of Vendor Relationship Management, or how everything starts with the consumer. David Weinberger (who, along with Christopher Locke and Rick Levine, co-wrote the manifesto) is a co-fellow on the VRM project.

The core concept of VRM has its roots in the "Cluetrain," written in 1999 and published as a best-selling business book a year later. Searls frequently refers to the points in the enterprising document during his industry speeches and writings as a senior editor for The Linux Journal.

At a time when media, entertainment and advertising professionals are knee-deep in questions and complexities posed by the Internet Age, they should turn to this work for some relevant insights. Don't let the opening "People of Earth" radical hippie prose throw you, or the lapses of pretentious rant. The defiant tone is set with the warning: "If you only have time for one clue, this is the one to get... We are not seats or eyeballs or end users or consumers. We are human beings--and our reach exceeds your grasp... Deal with it!"

The bridge between the authors' cutting-edge (many say pompous) observations, and today's Internet-based reality is plainly grasped in this passage: "A powerful global conversation has begun. Through the Internet, people are discovering and inventing new ways to share relevant knowledge with blinding speed. As a direct result, markets are getting smarter--and getting smarter faster than most companies."

Indeed, the opening thesis, "markets are conversations," already has been realized in the blizzard of online social networks, affinity groups, chat rooms and blogs. The virtual marketplace provides one-on-one connections that were never possible in the mass media age of static newspaper, radio and television platforms. Some of my personal favorites: Hyperlinks subvert corporate and government hierarchies; networks create more informed consumers; relevance rules; intranets inside companies and organizations lead to democracy and innovation; and when connected to the Internet marketplace, defy the old "command and control" business structures. It was radical buzz then, and it's radical buzz now. Only 40% of the U.S. population over age 16 regularly accessed the Internet in 1999, compared with 80% of all adults today.

That reality has kick-started a new market relationship--and relating is the new frontier.

The customer is the new platform, and their demand for products and services will drive supply. The live Web will drive The Intention Economy, created by interactive buyers who know what they want and how to get it in the interactive marketplace. Bottom line: It puts marketers and other traditional media players out of business.

That means individuals electronically manage their own health care information rather than run the risk of inaccurately completing handwritten forms in doctor's offices. That means digitally locating the store (complete with directions) that has the precise product you seek, while walking or driving, without having to complete an online profile, or an expansive online search. That means mutually beneficial, flexible and accountable relationships between individuals and their cell phone service providers, cable operators and other vendors.

It also means allowing individuals to support the digital content and services they love by clicking on a "relbutton" (relationship button), as Searls has since explored in Project VRM. This allows them to "buy" or "make a voluntary donation" or "recommend" a vendor to others. And that will become the new public broadcasting solicitation, the new pay TV, the new prime-time series ratings. Why? Because the tech-empowered individual said so. Companies must become part of individuals' online communities to better understand them. That they must think like their consumers and respect them is imperative.

Agreeing with everything "The Cluetrain Manifesto" or Doc Searls has to say is not as important as thinking about it. Use it to guide the transformation that is well underway. Some of its "people of earth" tone is amusing. But much of it crystallizes thinking in the context of today's struggle to reinvent advertising and marketing, commerce and content, communications and civic action.

There are many disciples of the digital revolution worth reading, although not all of their catalytic discourse stands the test of time. "The Cluetrain Manifesto" does. Thesis No. 95 says it all: "We are waking up and linking to each other. We are watching. But we are not waiting."