One late night in Soho, Mamading invented the phrase “economies of agility.” I thought it was brilliant and encompassed an enormous core idea that we all talk around and include in our discussions without having a simple, clear term of art for it.

In the industrial age, mass production by firms exploited the economies of scale. We are however transitioning to a postindustrial age, the network age where emerging Peer Production by networks will be driven by the economies of agility. Economies of scale are about driving down costs of manufactured goods by producing them on a large scale. Economies of agility in contrast are about quickly being able to switch between producing different goods and services in response to demand.

Read the rest of Mamading’s post on economies of agility.