Democratization of Opportunity: The Impact of Exponential Growth of Technology on Society

Once upon a time, people were born successful.

Their parents attended the right schools, had the right jobs, and took the children on getaways to the Hamptons, Vineyard, or Cape.

Sure, people still achieved the American Dream. But kids with silver spoons had so many more open doors.

But now more than ever, anyone, anywhere, who has a solid idea, the ability to execute, and a small amount of cash can build a world-shaking company. I call it the "democratization of opportunity". 

Conditions have never been more favorable for someone to open any door.

First Came Faster, Affordable Computers

In the 70’s, Moore’s Law predicted that computing power would double every two years.

Moore was spot on.

Here’s one example of how that’s played out in reality: the software that powers Angry Birds is more powerful than the software that landed astronauts on the moon.

Computing power increased, and so did consumer demand. The increased competition from this classic Innovator’s Dilemma scenario resulted in faster, better, cheaper computers. The PC became affordable and ubiquitous.

And now smartphones are making the PC obsolete. Over a billion people connect to Facebook every day, often in third world countries using phones. It’s hard to believe how quickly this all happened.

Potential entrepreneurs everywhere have in their hands:

1. Computing tools more powerful than the Apollo mission systems
2. At an affordable cost

Then Came Off-Premise, Open Technology

Plus, they don’t need to build a server farm to scale out their ideas.

That might not sound like much to you. But not too long ago, just testing product-market fit might cost you $5 million. Now, you can accomplish the same thing for only $5,000.

WHAT.

What a paradigm shift!

This drastic cost reduction doesn’t even take into account the benefits of on-the-go access to your apps, data, and more.

Combine that with open source software. Anyone can build on top of the work of others, including giants like Linux, Mozilla, Google, and many more.

You’re getting the expertise of thousands of developers for no cost.

You Like Apples?

Now anyone can take a class from Harvard. How do you like them apples?

An Ivy League education doesn’t cost hundreds of thousands of dollars anymore. You can learn the same stuff just by paying your ISP bill.

Institutes like Stanford, Harvard, and MIT offer free massive online open courses (MOOCs) to students all around the globe.

Anyone who has access to the internet can take a course at a top school, learning from the best professors in the world.

Tech platforms like Khan Academy, Codecademy, Coursera, and edX have brought world-famous courses to remote corners of our globe.

And let’s not forget, Wikipedia’s pretty awesome too.

Turning Ideas Into Reality

The decrease in startup costs, coupled with unprecedented access to knowledge, hasn’t just opened doors for people. It’s blown the doors clear off.

Not only can people leverage cheap hardware, software, and computing power, but they have access to all the knowledge they need through open source and open learning models.

Successful entrepreneurs no longer have to be third-generation Ivy legacies.

It’s time to get over the hump of the VC herd mentality and invest in these exciting new opportunities.

This added diversity will only strengthen the startup ecosystem.