Freshtech Friday by Steve Guengerich

In his new book “Grown Up Digital: How the Net Generation is Changing Your World,” Don Tapscott talks about a new generation “bathed in bits.” The research in the book identifies eight “net gen” norms that Don goes on to examine and extend into discussions about the coming transformation of institutions and society. Like any great major transformation, seeds of this change were planted years before.

It was nearly a decade ago that Scott McNealy, CEO of Sun, famously said “There is no privacy..get over it.” Fast forward to a headline article this week in the NY Times – “Banks Mine Data and Woo Troubled Borrowers” – which speaks to the vast array of personalized information available for sale.

That NY Times article got me to thinking about the subject of this week’s FreshTech Friday post. What if there was a way for people to monetize the data about themselves? Rather than accept that others control the buying and selling of our data, what if the individual was able to get in on the action? Here’s some random thoughts to string together:

-ever since Seth Godin published the bible on permission marketing, the net generation largely accepts that the best we can do is barter our private data for little online trinkets, more or less valuable at a moment in time. Why not get cold hard cash?

-ever since David Pullman rocked the investment world (literally) with Bowie bonds, there’s clearly a proven market for an individual’s capacity to produce value over their lifetime (way beyond what the insurance industry’s actuarial tables would indicate). Why let rockstars have all of the fun?

-and ever since Facebook started morphing towards the social operating system and Google revealed that Personalized Search was their friendly way to let you know that – yes indeed – everything that you had ever searched for was filed away somewhere to be mined by you or them (or maybe…?), there is a vast new, highly personalized set of data that each of us creates and incrementally refines – for free! – every time we use these services.

Any marketer worth their salt knows that the name-of-the-game in mastering profitability of initial customer acquisition and retention is understanding lifetime value. And the more they know about you – your profile, your activities, and your relationships – the more they can personalize offers and the products or services that go with them.

What if there was a new kind of social network service, where you could receive a fee for your participation in the network? Sure, you’d have to agree to be audited, as well as truthfully and accurately complete a comprehensive profile (including things like your detailed health records, down to your genetic makeup, like that available from 23andme, along with a commitment to use the paid network as your primary (exclusive) social platform. But, why not if, in effect, all of that same “private” information about you is available already for a fee?

It’s the ultimate form of personal information arbitrage – and you’d be the direct beneficiary. So, rather than all of these clever new gps-powered services for the iPhone being the ones to charge advertisers for the ability to have their restaurants or coffee shops presented to you because of the free twitter stream that you generate while you are on the move, why can’t you be the one to receive the royalty for letting the advertiser know that you are going to be in the area and, by the way, happen to be awfully fond of lattes in the afternoon?

Come discuss.