Idea generation #61: Expert networks

The Web has a given us a platform for experts across all areas to emerge. They can range from medicine to technical support to legal. How to identify and enable fluid access to these experts may be the next opportunity in social media. I think peer production only goes so far: sometimes you need expertise beyond what your immediate social circle offers.

This brings me to an interesting discussion I read today about measuring Twitter's authority. Able to identify authority is a first step to establishing experts. The next step would be to be able to reduce friction in terms of search costs to allow


What kind of businesses can be built from this? Roger Ehrenberg has identified one such segment: financial research. These buyers in particular are particularly willing to try out hard core technology in order to get more and better information faster than anyone else. So, for example, if you are derive meaningful insights from the conversations of these different experts using Twitter, there might be a market ready to purchase such insights from you.


I wonder what other subtainable business models can be build around the concept of expert networks.

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