The image of the Knowledge Economy (Open Teaching - Network Sherpa, n.d.)
Knowledge is the new asset to possess in order to suceed in the 'Age of Acess' (Rifkin, 2001) but how does data become knowledge? Code become Commerce? Raw data input by humans is processed by increasingly efficient and speedy processing chips into code. The technology that underpins the Web (networks, TCP/IP protocols and HTML) enables that code to be transmitted around the world where it is indexed by search engines, transforming it into information.
However, whilst there is an incredible array of information on the net there is still only 24 hours in a day and the human attention span is certainly much less than that so the advent of the internet and the Web does not explain why knowledge has suddenly become so valuable.
"The advent of the new economy was first noticed as far back as 1969, when Peter Drucker perceived the arrival of knowledge workers. The new economy is often referred to as the Information Economy, because of information's superior role (rather than material resources or capital) in creating wealth (Kelly, 1997).
Firstly what is knowledge and how does it relate the the online world?
Knowledge may be defined as "expertise, and skills acquired by a person through experience or education" (Wikipeida). Knowledge in the context of its commercial value can be split into two types - explicit (written depositorys or codied knowledge) and implicit (gained by doing and related to non verbal components of language and experience). Implicit knowledge is more emphemeral and changes from person to person so is not easily codified. Ergo is becomes the most valuable of all.
Ownership of physical capital, however, once the heart of the industrial way of life, becomes increasingly marginal to the economic process. It is more likely to be regarded by companies as a mere expense of operation rather than an asset, and something to borrow rather than to own. Intellectual capital, on the other hand, is the driving force of the new era, and much coveted. Concepts, ideas and images - not things - are the real items of value in the new economy. Wealth is no longer vested in physical capital but rather in human imagination and creativity.
(Rifkin, 2001, p. 5), Entering the Age of Access.
