The key premise of this book [New Rules for the New Economy] is that the principles governing the world of the soft--the world of intangibles, of media, of software, and of services--will soon command the world of the hard--the world of reality, of atoms, of objects, of steel and oil, and the hard work done by the sweat of brows. Iron and lumber will obey the laws of software, automobiles will follow the rules of networks, smokestacks will comply with the decrees of knowledge. If you want to envision where the future of your industry will be, imagine it as a business built entirely around the soft, even if at this point you see it based in the hard.
