Its The People Stupid

by Micah on November 11th

My last two posts have been about relationships. Social networks are popping up daily. All the blogs are a-buzz about Facebook, OpenSocial and ClosedPrivate (well, not really).

Un-Conferences (which I still dont “get”), StartupWeekend and other events meant to drive interaction are exploding on the scene as well.

What does it all mean?

Its The People Stupid.

My good friend, Andrew Hyde, the Grand Puba of StartupWeekend writes:

“The thing that has defined my life in the last year is community.”

Therefore, by definition, Andrew is also defining the communities of which he is part. We all do that. What has been lost in all the discussion around social networking is that the most effective communities allow for 360 degree interaction. Facebook was big prior to opening its platform to developers, but now its H-U-G-E.

When I review businesses, both from an investment and a partnership standpoint, I always default to the people. The people in the organization, the people using the business’ products or services, and the people behind the business.

In my list of investing rules, 3 of them focus on people. The first comment discusses people.

So, when you are about to build that world changing business, go beyond asking who is your target audience and think about your target community–not just in terms of user base, but how that

community can define your company, not just the product.

After all, we all know what a “MySpace person” is like, and how they differ from a “FaceBook person,” even though the products have basically the same functionality…