Spiking the football, if I could
You know those guys who spike the football in the end zone and violently fist pump the air? Making no secret of their elation? And then you know those other players who casually cross the goal line, drop the ball, and walk away looking like it’s all in a day’s work?
I felt like the first type when I read a recent blog post about Daily Grommet. I know I’m supposed to just raise an eyebrow and be some calm CEO sphinx in the face of press. Press only goes so far when it comes to the real work of building a business. But this one delighted me because the writer, Dan Sullivan , had a new level of insight for what we are creating. I had to celebrate. Here’s my favorite bit:
I read about an online service called Daily Grommet, which introduces new products to tens of thousands of visitors every day….Robert Metcalfe, who co-invented Ethernet, talked about how these new online businesses and marketplaces continually create increasing value. Metcalfe’s law states that “the value of a telecommunications network is proportional to the square of the number of connected users of the system.”
What Mses. Pieri and Domeniconi have done is create an increasingly more valuable telecommunications marketing network that has built-in multipliers. Now that inventors of new products know about Daily Grommet, they will send their products to the site, hoping to be featured on each day’s “Daily Grommet.”
The multiplier here is that all of the research to keep the site going is provided by the potential sellers. As word spreads about the site – mainly through social networks such as Facebook and Twitter — the number of customers will continually grow. Day after day, week after week, the usefulness and value of Daily Grommet will grow almost automatically. This is a marvelously simple example of how, in the world of the microchip economy, things continually multiply in a way that was never possible before in human history.
So, heck yeah I am going to spike that football. The day I walk by some good news calmly is the day I should probably hang up my shoulder pads.
Jules Pieri 
One Response to “Spiking the football, if I could”
Wonderful acknowledgment of a visionary…yet humble…idea and execution! The human curation side of the story is at the heart of your work…then the multipliers kick in to advance the growth and virality. When this broken arm heals I am going to spike a ball for you guys as well. Congrats Jules, Joanne and all the Grometeers!!!