The Changing Shape Of Business

You might have noticed that over the last year or two there has been an economic crisis going on around the world. Some places are hit worse than others, while Europe and America have been surfing the waves of ‘will they’ or ‘won’t they collapse’ places like Australia were not hit as hard.

The effect of countries like Ireland, Greece, Portugal and Spain crashing and requiring to be bailed out does mean that countries like Australia will and have been affected even though their economy wasn’t mixed up with the awful greed and mismanagement of the banking systems here in the northern hemisphere.

Picture courtesy of NyTimes.com

But let’s put those economic woes aside for a minute and think about what else is going on. You see the world we know is a lot different to the one we knew 20 years ago. In fact it is a lot different to what it was like only 10 years ago.

Back To The Future

I am 39 so I am going to use my experiences as examples of the changes. You see I feel relatively young, well mentally, my knees do now have a bit of a creak but I put that down to years working in the building trade. I still feel like I am in my late teens – early twenties and that really doesn’t feel that long ago yet, unfortunately it was 20 years ago.

When I went to the big Helter Skelter raves at Milton Keynes the DJs would mix vinyl records that were often carried into the event by the DJs friends in big boxes. These days music is mixed on laptops and memory sticks. Some might still use CDs but then the format of the music is probably MP3.

Just that one example will explain why big stores like Woolworths and HMV have been on the decline; you see the way we buy things has changed massively. Very few people buy vinyl these days and why would you? When you can buy music by any artist from anywhere in the world instantly as an MP3 from shops online like iTunes and download them straight to your mobile phone or MP3 player?

In fact, MP3 players will soon be a thing of the past themselves, with smart phones and tablets becoming more powerful, well they are actually hand held computers with a huge amount of memory that can not only do tasks like ‘call people’ …

·         They are cameras that can hold thousands of images which can be modified and shared with the world in seconds.

·         They can access the internet and search thousands of websites worldwide and connect to all of your favourite social media networks like Twitter and Facebook.

·         You can check your bank account, send and receive money and pay for items with them.

·         They can hold and play more songs than what you will find in the average music fans CD library.

·         They can now hold and play full high definition movies thanks to the MP4 format

And get this…

·         They can live stream TV, films and webinars from the internet!

·         Oh and did I mention that you can set your TV to record a show or turn the lights of at home from anywhere in the world?

So believe me when I say that MP3 players will be a thing of the past even though they are relatively new gadgets.

So you can see, technology is changing and it is changing fast. Stores that were selling records, CDs and DVDs have been closing down in droves and that doesn’t have anything to do with the economic crisis. It might not have helped but it was a dying market anyway, the fact people couldn’t afford to buy music or film like they used to is irrelevant, if they could then the majority would most certainly buy them in MP3 and MP4 formats.

It’s Not Just Music & Movies

Things like clothing and food is now bought online in increasing amounts by more and more people. I myself posted T-shirts all around the world when I used to have a T-shirt printing business on eBay. My father used to run a local corner shop selling groceries and believe it or not renting out videos to the local community. He relied on the people living in the surrounding area and passers-by to earn his income.

He was amazed when 20 years later I was sending parcels out to places as far away as Moscow, Singapore, Australia and The USA etc, all from my own home. Only bigger companies with money were able to import and export stuff but now virtually everyone has access to this thanks to sites like eBay & Amazon and companies like UPS & DHL who have improved global postal delivery.

The End Of The World Is Nigh

The world is changing and we must change with it, years ago when industries were being closed down like Coal Mining. People really thought that was it for the country. Thousands were out of work and people feared the future employment for the children.

It might have been only 30 years since we had the Miners strikes and closures of the coal fields in the UK but the world our children live in today is a million miles away from those days.

In fact I am one of the children from that era and I have worked since I left school and have had a lot of different opportunities that they thought were not available. Much of the work I have done was not even thought possible at that time. Imagine telling someone 30 years ago that I get paid to write articles for people overseas that I have never met or spoken to and that my money is in the bank that very same day.

They wouldn’t believe it was possible, but it is and so are many different new and exciting opportunities. Today people are creating software and apps to go on phones, tablets and now even smart TVs. We have people who can now set up services like TV on Demand and the greatest invention for any television addict pausing live TV and recording it without a video tape or disk.

All of this new software and technology needs to be designed, made, packaged and delivered so even for those people who cannot use the internet as a way to work such as being a freelance writer or social media manager the internet and modern advancements are still creating jobs for them.

The future isn’t bleak, it is what you make it and we are at an exciting time in our history to make more money than we ever thought possible with all of the advancements in technology and the great connections and networks we can now make thanks to them.

Not only can you get paid to write content for websites that are owned by people you have never met but you can hire people overseas to write a lot of it and then sell it on for profit after you have checked it.

There are so many ways to make money these days with the internet and modern technology. Isn’t it time you started to utilise it and take your share?