Yes, I was alive in the 60’s. And yes, blogging reminds me of the 60’s. I was just up in the Haight-Ashbury district of San Francisco a few weeks ago and I reminisced about the free concerts, sit-ins, and general feeling of openness and community that used to thrive on the edge of Golden Gate Park. I always loved the view from Buena Vista Park and felt like something was happening in this place on top of the city, where you could see the world.

So, here we are 40 years later. The web is in full bloom and web logs are the new way of expressing yourself to the world. (I had to say “web logs” because I have this thing about remembering from where we have come.) The view from here is amazing! You can actually see the whole world (wide web).

Anyway, welcome to my little corner of the internet. In my “intelligence” blog, my hope is to communicate openly, invite you to dialogue (yes, I want to hear from you), and spark the kind of conversation that can potentially open new doors to the world of “intelligence.” We have barely plumbed the surface of what can be done with the insight that is still locked away in oceans of data. Kudos to the men, women, and companies who are driven to dig deeper and find the nuggets of knowledge that will change the way we do business and live life.

So, why an “intelligence” blog? I thought of doing a blog on “business intelligence,” but I wanted to go beyond business. Business intelligence is only one piece of what I want to talk about. Customers still matter most. Just in time delivery of goods still drives down costs and increases profit. And business performance delivers value to everyone that matters to your company.

We all know about intelligence that can make a dollar, but what about intelligence that makes a difference? Think about intelligence that could lead us to the cure for cancer; product data that could reveal the way to a cleaner, greener planet; social intelligence that could give us insight into how to meet the needs of third world countries; or, at a personal level, productivity intelligence that could give us back two extra hours a week to be with our families.

That’s the intelligence journey I’d like to take with you…