Verna Allee gave a presentation at MeshForum 2006 on Value Networks. I think this is a great presentation. She describes:
“A value network is a way at looking at any purposeful organization, company, or network. It is any web of relationships that creates value through complex, dynamic exchanges of tangible and intangible value.”
She makes the case that the economic theory for the new economy is still undefined. She also details how companies have no good way to measure the value of intangible assets. She says the traditional measures are tied to the the creation of tangible assets, which is then reinforced by current economic theory and practice. My favorite part comes at 36:07 minutes into the podcast, she makes a case for using Living systems as a way to think about the new economy (built on intangible assets like Information, talent, capability). At this point she describes why living systems are so great, because the are capable of renewal and are intelligent (an Autopoietic system). Living system’s are Autopoietic because of two types of exchanges; the first type is an exchange of matter and energy, the second type is an exchange of Intelligence (a.k.a. cognitive exchanges). I think she is on to something.
The cognitive economy is really about exchanges of intelligence. If you have not really followed my posts on the Cognitive economy listen to this presentation.
Steve Gillmor if you haven’t heard this presentation yet, you should listen to it. Ed Batista you will also find this presentation interesting. I will have to listen to this one again, I know I’m not doing the presentation justice.
Check it out.
Link Summary:
MeshForum 2006
Verna Allee presentation Value Networks at MeshForum 2006 via IT Conversations
IT Conversations RSS feed
More from Verna Allee
More on Autopoiesis via Wikipedia
Tom The Architect 
I am working on a mashups of the Meshforum2006 talks with Eileen Clegg’s visual journal images and, if you are interested, will link the result to you when I am done. The purpose of the mashup is to provide a set of audio snippets and a tagcloud from the talks and use the graphic as a user interface to the key elements in the talk. In this way I hope to address the problem of attention scarcity in helping listeners "sample" key snippets from the full audio, and if they are interested in hearing the full talk, give them the opportunity to add it to their podcast playlists. You can see an alpha version of this concept here: Thoughts Illustrated: malcolm 2
Very cool, that’s a great idea. I would greatly appreciate the link to the mashup when your done.