Entrepreneurship and Internet age "Entrepreneurs"

Hi there, hope you’re having a good ride on Eagle’s Eye.

While gathering my thoughts about this post, I hoped it doesn’t sound too “academic” by the time I put everything down in black and white. Out of adventure and the quest to acquire relevant academic skills (and qualification) that would provide me with the much needed balance in today’s world where financial freedom matters a lot and everything seems to revolve around the word “business”, I decided to take a course that combines Physical Sciences with Entrepreneurship. This will certainly equip me with the skills needed to be an ‘innovator’ and also for the commercialisation of my innovation. Little did I know that my definition of the concepts I was taking interest in was incorrect.

I once listened to a preacher say to his congregation that “physical needs require physical solutions. If a man needs money, you don’t give him ‘prayers’ or ‘anointing’. Sow into his life!” Expectedly, this aphorism has gained so much popularity among people of the Christian faith especially the younger generation within this group who live in today’s world. Knowledge, they say is Power but financial freedom confers so much relevance and ‘peace of mind’ on an individual or nation, it cannot be ignored. Paying attention to the importance of this issue, I’d add to the above maxim that “…as much as rests within your ability, do not just sow into that man’s life, show him how to get seeds for himself!” Otherwise, he’d constitute himself a nuisance to you and possibly the community. Take it from me, except for some naturally lazy and short-sighted few, no man is happy going to his friend or relation to bail him out of a financial crisis especially if it becomes recurrent.

In today’s world of rapid changes and economic revolution where everyman stands an equal chance of making it to financial Canaan, it therefore becomes important for each individual to equip himself with the tools which are necessary and adequate enough to ensure he is not left behind. People, Market, Technology e.t.c are rapidly changing it’s hard to believe. I believe one of the best things that has happened to man in this 21st century is the revolution in Information Technology; I’ll call this a Tool which has forced itself upon us all as an indispensable towards achieving success almost by any definition in any area of life.

Wait a minute; I am not writing about Info Tech. But Information Technology has arguably turned many to what I call overnight-entrepreneurs at a rate no man would have imagined a few decades ago.

As a student who had sat under the tutelage of some of UK’s renowned entrepreneurship dons, I can authoritatively brand majority of the people who have taken advantage of opportunities such as the internet to make “quick money”, opportunists. These guys have done nothing and absolutely NOTHING wrong. They are just being smart opportunists. I can only laugh at the humour it presents when I hear some say things like “I'm an online Entrepreneur”. And here is a guy who sits at the comfort of his room, subscribes to some "buy one get 10 free" website (which is not bad, mind you) and rakes in some easy dollars. His creative mind is not engaged. Many of today's so-called online entrepreneurs practically do nothing more than introduce a few friends to a network in order to build “a line” and they sit back to watch the cheques rolling in. The guys who convert these online-preneurs initial capital to stream of income are the ones doing the job and your guess is obviously as good as mine; what the online-preneurs get in return is a fraction of the real yield.

You cannot separate Entrepreneurship from Innovation. Now, Innovation is not all about you going to the University to learn how to design a rocket or how to build the world’s latest computers. Innovation does not necessarily need to involve invention of a tangible element or substance. Over the years, Innovation has been confused with Invention. These are two different concepts. Apart from the fact that they are spelt and pronounced differently, their meanings are entirely different, of course, to the mind which is knowledgeable enough to distinguish the difference. Innovation, simply put is the commercialisation of an invention. Your invention may be a tangible or intangible substance. By intangible substance I mean, an idea, a concept, something that cannot be physically handled. There is no gainsaying that originality is very crucial to the success of any Innovation if it would make sense and would not lead to frustration. A tangible substance would therefore by inference be the opposite, i.e a "real" substance such as a new design of your BMW, or an advancement in design of your TV box.

So then, what makes a true Entrepreneur? I’ll attempt to explain in my next post.

Got to catch some sleep now. Later.