Why Care About (DATA) Standards?

We don't consider how much standards play a role in our lives. They are truly everywhere. People who study standard break them into 3 or 4 groups - I offer a four part compartmentalization below:

1. Compatibility/Interface Standards (networks) - These sorts of standard enable ready entry into a market for compatible products or to join a communications network. (eg. TCP/IP, Bluetooth, WiFI)
2. Minimum Quality/Quality - Creates confidence amongst buyers that products and services will be fit for purpose. This group includes health and safety and environmental standards. (eg. OSHA, FDA, USDA)
3. Variety Reduction - Conformity to a standard reduces the number of different product offerings but enlarges the market, reducing production and distribution costs for suppliers and search and testing cost for buyers. (eg. Nuts and bolts and socket sets)
4. Information Standards - Facilitates trade and market development, codifies knowledge enabling dissemination and take up. Transaction and search costs are lower and markets work more efficiently. (eg. See below)

If we take #4 and expand upon it we can find numerous standard at play. Here are a number of them:

• Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) – Credit card and PayPal communication
• OpenTravel – Travel related services: American, Hilton, Hertz, Expedia….
• iCalendar – Calendar events used by Google, Microsoft….
• vCard – Electronic business cards
• Electronic Heath Records (EHR) – Hospitals, Labs, Doctors, Patients
• Interagency Group (IAG) – E-ZPass electronic toll systems in 14 states
• OpenDocument – Google Docs, Microsoft Office, Lotus, WordPerfect
• MISMO – Real estate: Originators, Servicers, Brokers, Attorneys, Borrowers

I promised yesterday I'd speak about why people should care.

Often we hear about how standards bring efficiency, accuracy, lower business risk and these are all GOOD things. But let me offer that innovation and the opportunity that standards create are the truly GREAT reasons to care.

William Sellers in 1870 thought there should be a standard for the nut and bolt (after about 50+ years of an industry floundering). Major industry and the government agreed and through those published standards we got the industrial revolution, the assembly line and unforeseen economic growth.

Consider in 1973 DARPA put together standards for TCP/IP protocols and then in 1989 the HTML standard language was released. I doubt that DARPA or even Tim Berners-Lee could have imagined what the internet is today. AND keep in mind that devices like the iPhone would be nothing without the internet.

We should care about standards because they create new baselines for us to advance forward as societies. We may not know what will come but we should be in some agreement that history has proven that standards grow industries and economies.

MBA Commercial/Multifamily Servicing and Technology Conference

Today I'm departing from the MBA Commercial/Multifamily Servicing and Technology Conference in NYC with more optimism regarding data standards within commercial real estate than I have had in the past 8 years of participation.

First I should probably answer the questions:

1. Why did I get involved in the first place?

2. Why do I, and why should others still care today?

Quite candidly, the reason I got involved in the first place was because of the platform we were building for environmental (ESA) and engineering (PCA) reports for commercial real estate. Like others, we saw huge inefficiencies in the process of authoring, managing and reviewing these types of reports. We saw data standards as helping us make our product and our company real.

Today, the vision is MUCH bigger. I care because I want to see the pie grow and know that the opportunity that data standards will bring will be amazing (it will be fun and interesting and I LIKE fun and interesting). Mark Linne (Appraisal World) often references Thomas Friedman in his presentations who stated in his book The World is Flat that data standards in real estate can be the next big thing. When someone says a trillion dollars of opportunity, I pay attention (and in this case I believe it).

Real estate is a real asset. Land is being created and destroyed at similar rates in nature. We can't create more in any size-able quantities. It is a finite and valuable asset. Knowing more about this finite asset will give us insights and create opportunities that we have not even considered. Tomorrow, I'll give some indications of why I believe this.