Brandon Donnelly — Daily insights for city builders. Published since 2013 by Toronto-based real estate developer Brandon Donnelly. — Page 1227

Albert Wenger is currently in the process of writing a book called World After Capital . The book isn’t finished yet. It still exists in a crude rough draft form. But already he has made it freely available online. You’re also welcome to comment and contribute to the book as he works on it.

Why has he done it this way? 

Because this format of publishing is in line with where he believes the world is heading. He believes we are headed towards a world where new forms of surplus – brought about by technological innovation – will create greater levels of freedom: economic freedom , informational freedom, and psychological freedom.

His overall thesis is that the world has been moving through a series of scarcities. As hunter and gathers, the scarcity was food. In our agricultural period, we learned how to create food surpluses (which freed up more of our time), but it then produced land scarcity. Once the industrial revolution hit we once again freed up more of our time through surpluses, but then the scarcity became centered around capital. We also started to negatively impact the environment. Today, as we clearly move away from the industrial economy towards a knowledge and information economy, Albert believes the new scarcity is attention. (I wrote a related post about a month ago.)

If you’re interested in this topic and don’t feel like diving into his book, I suggest you watch this 23 minute presentation by Albert Wenger . I watched it this morning and he talks about everything I mention above. 

Here’s one of his slides that I felt was important to share:

Why it’s interesting to think about this shift is because there will inevitably be positive and negative outcomes associated with it; there will inevitably be groups who, probably because of self-interest, would rather cling to the past; and because there are pressing global issues that we need to be focusing our attention on – issues such as climate change.

I can’t help but wonder about all the ways this shift could reverberate through the economy and our cities. Earlier this week I wrote a post about architecture as a tool for capital . But with our current fixation on “starchitecture”, one could argue that we have already transformed architecture into a new tool – a tool for grabbing attention. If you believe that attention is the new scarcity, then this makes perfect sense.

There’s a lot of talk about how venture capital investment has shifted from the suburbs to cities and how it is also concentrated in certain metro areas. But a new report from the Martin Prosperity Institute has dug even deeper to look at the top 20 neighborhoods (zip codes) in the US for venture capital investment.

Here’s a summary of what they found:

“The top 20 neighborhoods or zip codes for venture investment include nine in San Francisco, five in San Jose, three in Boston-Cambridge (one in suburban Waltham and two in Cambridge close to MIT) and one each in San Diego (close to the University of California, San Diego), Dallas, and New York (close to New York University).”

And here’s the full top 20 list :

Initially I looked at this list and thought that neighborhoods such as Menlo Park and Redwood City shouldn’t be labeled as San Francisco, since they are outside of the county. But technically they still fall within the San Francisco Metropolitan Area . 

It’s amazing how San Francisco dominates this list.

I am thinking about nonconformity and originality this morning because I just ordered a book by Wharton professor Adam Grant called,  Originals: How Non-Conformists Move the World . I ordered it along with another book that was recommended by a regular reader of this blog. (Thanks Daniel .)

I find this topic fascinating because there’s clearly a deep appreciation for originality and creativity in our society and yet I think we do a lot to encourage the opposite: conformity. Of course, part of this is that it’s inherently easier to conform. Think about how much pressure we have in our lives to please others and generally just “fit in.”

This is something that I think about and try to fight in my own life, particularly as I get older. As a teenager, I was a skateboarder with bleach blonde hair who rode around in a t-shirt that said “skateboarding is not a crime.” That’s clearly not me anymore (I prefer my natural hair color), but I continue to believe that a bit of rebelliousness can be valuable.

For instance, I don’t think it’s a coincidence that San Francisco – the epicenter of counterculture in the 1960s – ended up becoming such a hotbed of entrepreneurship.

To drive that point home even further, here’s a quote from a recent interview with Adam Grant :

“It often starts with a slight recalibration in perspective followed by a small, but defiant act. It’s the originals who keep pulling on that thread — they instinctively know that that’s the difference between inspiration and innovation.”

So there’s also a lesson here for cities. Most cities around the world believe in the value of a thriving startup ecosystem. They want entrepreneurs to start companies and create jobs. But we shouldn’t forget that starting a company is also “ an expression of nonconformity .” It is someone deciding to carve out their own path in life.

If that’s what we’re trying to encourage – and most places are – I believe we should also think about what we’re doing and not doing to encourage the right kind of nonconformity in our cities.