I previously blogged that N=1 isn't just for consumers, and I used my company's software engineering meta-tool as an example of how N=1 can be applied in a sophisticated technical marketplace -- software engineers as consumers of software tools products. I also used the term "meta-vendor," which to my knowledge is new coinage. I'd like to expand on what I mean by that term.

First, let's pin down the term meta. I use it to mean "information about information," which requires a more abstract view of the information in question. It also offers the ability to manipulate that information in a more abstract, and therefore more powerful, way.

By meta-vendor I mean the vendor of a meta-environment the consumer can use to create a non-meta product according to his or her talents, expertise, and desired specifications. This puts the consumer much more in charge of the resulting product, which is what N=1 is all about.

I'd like to use two examples of meta: Virtualization, which is essentially a meta-hardware environment, and XML, which is a meta-information representation. Both permit a more sophisticated -- and tailored -- approach to their domains.

A hardware virtualization vendor provides a meta-hardware environment, with tailoring and management tools the consumer can use to create virtualized hardware instances and manage those instances. This permits the consumer to do all kinds of things that wouldn't be practical with real hardware: instances locked into a given application, server consolidation, sandboxes for security, etc.

XML allows you to represent your data in a self-describing way, using a schema (dialect) that's been agreed to by all participants. This enables lots of capabilities that would be impossible with a dedicated information transport protocol (such as the older EDI protocols): introspection, dynamic GUI generation, human-language independence, etc. XML's meta nature enables the creation of meta-information tools.

What does this mean in the marketplace? There's an old saying: "Give a man a fish, and you feed him for a day; teach him to fish, and he can feed himself forever." The word "empower" is overused, but it applies here: Meta-vendors empower their customers to create their own products.

What does this mean for vendors? It means it's the hour of the knife: They can only milk their locked-in proprietary-product customers as cash cows until the customers realize that buying from a meta-vendor unlocks and frees them. Furthermore, meta-products require a higher level of skill, experience, and talent to create and maintain, so vendors must be willing to attract and retain engineers with those attributes, and pay more for them as well.

What does this mean for customers? Realizing the benefit of meta-products, from meta-vendors, requires a higher level of employee skills and abilities. As with vendors, customers must be willing to attract and retain (i.e. pay) employees with those traits.

What does this mean for all organizations? It becomes harder for mediocre employees to survive in a bureaucracy; "meta" strips away the anonymity within which they hide. That, in turn, strongly encourages a meritocratic organizational structure, tearing down the typical pyramid. This is further encouraged by Web 2.0 communication capabilities, which race up and down the pyramid with little respect for level.

What does this mean for standards? To raise a product to meta level, there must be a set of conventions on which the meta model is built. Standards thus become even more critical to the advance of N=1. The key is to avoid the tendency of standards committees to sink to the lowest common denominator; standards must be well architected, so that the next level of innovation can be built on top of them by the marketplace that employs them.

As the creator of my company's software engineering meta-tool, I actually work at the "meta-meta" level -- I'm manipulating a meta-tool using meta-meta tools. (I even have a couple of meta-meta-meta tools, to manipulate those.) This obviously isn't required in the case of most meta-products, but it points out the need for a much more abstract approach to products and services.

The bottom line is that, for both vendors and customers, getting to N=1 requires a meta approach to your market, the products and services you provide or purchase, and even your employees.