There is nothing more inspiring and humbling than the study of complexity.  Everything is revealed to be biological, variations competing contextually and endlessly to create an order to which all things tend, but an order that trembles on the edge of chaos.  Great stuff.

The problem is that humans -- and particularly humans selling products and services to the rest of us -- use "complexity" (the word) as an imprecation.  This has its effects, and I'm worried that too much dependence on the metaphors of biology and complexity will backfire. Or, on the other hand, we could work really hard at capturing the joy and benefits of "complexity" (the word) for ourselves.  But we have an uphill fight in front of us.

Let me illustrate.  I recently listened to a debate among Craig Mundie, Halsey Minor, and Larry Babbio at the August 2004 PFF summit on the Future of the Internet.  In answer to a question about where opportunities lay in serving consumers vs. businesses in the future, Halsey M. talked about the fact that 90% of online traffic is now coming from consumers.  He said that there is a huge opportunity to make the internet more productive for businesses, and that we'll be retooling businesses to take advantage of the internet's possibilities.

Then he began to analogize [broadly paraphrasing]:

Just as the utility grid allowed centralization of complexity -- and the industrial revolution allowed people not to have to worry about producing power any more -- the internet allows businesses to consume centralized complex services from others.  Google centralizes the complexity of search.  This means that companies can stick to their core competencies.

Craig Mundie agreed with him, saying that the complexities of infrastructure and identity mechanisms would be overcome by a few very large companies, and adding that "Without this scale [of services being provided by large companies], businesses can't change and grow."

These were eminently reasonable comments.  But they point to the "complexities" of identity management (a subject focused on particularly by Mundie) being handled by a few very big players, and, generally, to "complexities" created by the internet being smoothed for the consumption of businesses and consumers.

Complexity = bad for business.  That's the lexicographical development.

Complexity involves, by its nature, lots of choices, and a good deal of confusion if you are trying to predict the future.  But if you look at a complex system from the outside, you see emergent order - like the miracle of food delivery happening every day in the city of New York.

If identity management is something that is too "complex" for individual businesses to handle -- much less individuals -- and the perception is that it must be given over to a few large entities in order for businesses to function, we're heading in the wrong direction.  We need to take back the language of complexity -- or perhaps come up with another word.