A decade of networking. The 2010’s was the development and dominance of Google, Facebook, Twitter, Youtube, Instagram, Snapchat and Tik Tok.
Think of any social media platform with millions of users. The network effect is in play. Meaning the more people on a platform, the more utility and value you derive from it.
Remember sneaking a peak at your ex’s profile and new squeeze on Facebook… don’t lie… we all have done it.
Whether you’ve used the network effect for nefarious, pleasure or thumb numbing time wasting. But network effects are so 2010’s. Welcome to the 2020’s. And today we’re talking about what will be the next biggest decade-long dominance coming to us since air driven hand-pieces.
Everyday, we wallow in our own data. The nuance of living is a continuous data stream.
Let’s break down the simple act of eating breakfast into a data stream. What was eaten? Was it the same cereal eaten since they were a child? How often do they switch the apple for the banana? What time did they eat at? What was their glucose reading before and after their meal? What was the number of times the distal lingual cusp of #14 made contact with the opposing tooth in masticating their millennial hard boiled egg with avocado toast?
The answer to these questions could all theoretically be measured, plotted and used as data.
And you’re contributing to this data steam. By streaming all those Tik Tok cute Orthodontist floss dances, you’re making a dent in the data production stream. 2.5 quintillion bytes of it. Now put on hard drive space somewhere. In just the last two years alone, we’ve created 90% of all the computer crunching data in human existence.
So why such a data heavy talk this week? It is because we are entering what will be deemed the Data Decade. The companies, large or small, who leverage the data produced in or outside of their business will have a material advantage over their competition.
Because I’m a Tesla fan, I’m one of the current million Tesla car owners out there. On board my car is a slew of cameras, sensors and me inputting data to the steering wheel and pedals. Every night, my car uploads the plethora of data to the Tesla mothership and they process it. 
At this point Tesla has processed over 3 Billion miles of autopilot data. In comparison, their nearest competitor Waymo has driven and recorded over 3 Million miles. A 1000X material difference. It is a clear data advantage for someone trying to develop software to someday drive us from point A to point B without needing a driver.
An easier analogy for us dentites to understand how much of an advantage this is, is to imagine being given a Thousand Dollars. And the next person I would give 1,000X the amount. They would get a Million Dollars. Would you rather have a thousand or a million dollars?
There is so much data being created in a dental practice every day. The consultants already tout KPI’s and spit at you mantras to track # of active patients, new patients, collections, case acceptance and daily production.
You don’t need a computer science or an artificial intelligence robot to process your data. You just need simple systems to record consistently, accurately and make informed decisions to keep pulling your practice in the right direction.
Once you leverage data you produce in the practice, you’re performing at the same level as the Googles, Facebooks and Tesla’s in this world. Just on your own dentite thriving scale with less nerdiness!
Cheers,
Lam