The consultants' view point

It would probably be a very good arrangement for the consultants. It would involve reading the entrepreneur's ideas as they were evolving and being able to have interesting discussions with a peer group regarding the subject matter. Their contributions would require no more than a few posts a month and, if the subject matter was of interest to them in their professional capacity with their own business dealings, the discussions could provide them with valuable knowledge and information.

This would be particularly valuable if the discussions would enable them to raise their own problems and get opinions themselves from the discussion groups. Looked at in this way, a consultant not only gets a fee, but, also the benefit of having their own opinions checked out by a peer group. In addition they will be exposed to a variety of new ideas and inspirations.

Now consider what might happen if the entrepreneur suffered a serious setback in her financial situation such that she was no longer able to pay the consultants the two hundred dollars a week. Would it be rational for all the consultants to immediately pull out? Certainly they would not be getting the original incentive, but, by pulling out they would also be losing the benefit of the knowledge and experience they were gaining from being part of this collaborative group. They may well decide that despite the loss of the two hundred dollars a week, the effort of participation was amply rewarded by the benefits they were getting from these discussions.

They might take the same view as the entrepreneur when she set up this discussion in the first place. They might look at the loss of income as a lump sum – which might amount to ten thousand dollars in a year and consider that the benefits they were getting from the discussions would probably result in a their own earning prospects being improved by at least as much as this. If this were so, then although they weren't actually being paid this amount of money by participating they would in effect still be earning it.

After all, this was the way in which the entrepreneur would have seen it. Having the advantage of the opinions and comments of fifty consultants would greatly enhance the prospects of eventual success. It was highly likely that along the way several e-business opportunities might emerge, in which any of the collaborators might become actively involved.

Looking at the cafe from this view point, would see it as a non zero sum game where everyone can gain. As everyone can benefit from this situation it becomes one of those enigmatic sources of wealth generation that we are looking for in the environment of the Internet.

Everyone contributes a little effort for little or no commitment and everyone can gain far more than they are putting in.