Everyone could see it coming. No matter how brakes were applied, a new course steered or the attempts to accelerate away from danger – it crashed.

Much discussion has been had about the demise of newspapers. The focus has been on the outdated business models – and how only on-line paywalls can hope to sustain excellent journalism. The crashes have already started to occur in the US regional newspapers – and was well illustrated in the excellent docufilm – “Page One – Inside The New York Times”. In the UK, there has yet to be a major crash. Although many would connect the closure of the News of the World as much with economics as Murdoch’s empire trying to distance itself from phone hacking.

The bigger crash I can see is the inevitable demise of the whole print industry. It’s a supertanker powering towards a reef. If I’d have said this 5 years ago, you would have thought I was mad. But now, it seems to add up. Will the printing presses be running in 10 years time? I don’t think so – except as a “side show” like black and white photography darkrooms.

I used one of the first digital cameras in 1994 at the Lillehammer Olympics. I was part of a select few to use these prototype models at the games. At that Olympics, professional photographers alone shot 700,000 rolls of film. The images were carefully selected – and a number of them used in newspapers, magazines and books. In the 18 years since that first breakthrough, more pictures are used because of so many digital platforms being available. There will be 5-20 pictures shown on newspaper websites to back up the 1-2 pictures used in print. No mainstream photography is created using film – and printing is limited to when a picture needs framing at home. I’ve seen it happen in one great industry – and the printing presses invented by Johannes Gutenberg in the 15th century are next on the crash list.

I am typing this sitting on a train heading through Switzerland. Around me, I cannot see a newspaper – but plenty of people tapping and viewing content on iPhones and Androids. I’ve just been through the airport – and Kindles/iPads outnumbered book readers (and it’s early days for these reading devices). I still love reading a book in print. I’ll never stop loving it (much like the desire to process a film, put the negative in the enlarger and create a print through trays of chemicals). All that nostalgia will pass though, and I am sure the screen will win.

There is no doubt that Steve Jobs led the revolution on devices to consume content. However, when we look back in history – the real destroyer of Gutenberg’s legacy will be seen as Mark Zuckerberg. He brought hundreds of millions of people from around the world to their screens to engage with friends and consume content on Facebook. Make no mistake, many media companies engage on-line – but Zuckerberg’s Facebook has made screen consumption – at the desk or on the move – mainstream.

I had a brief email exchange with Jon Ferrara of Nimble the other day. He’s quite a visionary. I’d forwarded an article from Chris Brogan saying to get things done it helps to write out 3×5 index cards and put on your desk. Jon’s view was that this was “too old school”. I think he’s right – although I don’t know if I can ever give up scribbling my to-do list and musings in my Moleskin notebook (I have tried many, many to-do list software solutions). Jon’s company, Nimble, is redefining how individuals do business – and it’s on-screen.

Last week, I went to a board meeting at home in Bath. There were nearly 50 pages to print – so I took my iPad with PDFs loaded. It worked well, I “saved a tree” – and got nearer than I’ve ever been to the old ideal of the “paperless office”. I also read that at this year’s meeting of GE’s top executives, presentation materials will be available only via iPads.

I’m sure those of my age and older have heard these arguments before. It happened when television came on the scene. Newspapers were definitely going to die.

It’s different this time. This new wave will not just take out newspapers in their printed format – it will leave in its wake bookshops, magazine stands, printing presses, ink makers and paper suppliers. I am sure Gutenberg would be delighted. His solution was built for no other purpose than to spread “the word”. Gutenberg was the 20th Century’s greatest inventor – this millennium has started with Mark Zuckerberg in pole position. Like it or not (and there are some elements I certainly don’t like) Zuckerberg is spreading the word (and it’s not with ink on paper). There’s a new “Berg” on the block!

My favourite section was the Trust Test. Chris and Julien have adapted a formula originally thought up by David Maister, Charles H. Green and Robert M. Galford in “Trust Adviser” (another one for my reading list!). They put forward that Trust has 4 components that can be put together in an equation that gives a value for trusworthiness! Cool… And here it is:-

(C x R x I)/S = T

So Trust is calculated by multiplying Credibility by Reliability by Intimacy and dividing by Self-Orientation.

Credibility = the quality of being convincing or believable. Higher score the better
Reliability = consistently good in quality and performance. They turn up on time.
Intimacy = the measure of the closeness of your relationship. Feeling comfortable with someone. It’s an emotional judgement
Self-Orientation = low self-orientation would be if you had enough confidence to recommend a better competitor. High self-orientation would be the guy who is only interest in you because they want to make a sale (and now!). Lower score is better here – as it’s divided in to the other factors.

It made me think about the people in my network who I inherently like – but often don’t totally trust. Later in “Trust Agents”, Julien and Chris hit the issue on the head – “RELIABILITY IS THE BIG SECRET”. Interestingly, the other factors are more linked to people’s character (and hard to change/train) – however, there is no real excuse for not being reliable (it’s a matter of personal commitment). None of us are perfect on that score (I have in my head a particular apology I need to send after completing this post to someone I forgot to thank for a bit favour – whoops!) – but reliability is the thing we all could work on to make sure we gain others trust.

Thank you Messieurs Maister, Green, Galford, Brogan and Smith for this equation and insight into Trust and Reliability in your Personal Network.

“By professional networking I mean a set of close contacts or associates who will help deliver my value to market. The key thing is that these are people who will ‘help’ you in the market, THEY ARE NOT THE MARKET. Sorry for the full-on letters, but my definition of a network is ‘people who will help amplify my personal capital in the market’, not a bunch of friends and colleagues to whom I try to sell under the guise of giving them a great opportunity. Active management of these people is not networking; it is client relationship management, a whole different ball game and one deliberately not covered in this book.”

I really like this comment – and Mick’s general ethos on networking. I particularly agree with the emphasis on the difference between CRM and Personal Networking. My personal interest in the area of Personal Networks started with investigating CRM. I see that CRM is much more about “keeping the score” and sharing contacts – your personal network is a very different thing.

HANDBOOK – The book is extremely thorough and introduces processes you can follow to analyse your network and evaluate your connections in a visual way. There are good illustrations throughout – and Mick produces detailed tables to support the writing. This coupled with the detailed coverage of every element of networking makes this a great bookshelf reference.

It might be easy to assume this book is out of date – first published in 2003 – but I think that networking is just networking (on-line or real world) … and this book keeps you focused on the basic principles. Don’t expect any tips on LinkedIn or Twitter strategies though!

Take a look – and consider buying a copy. It’s not quite the “bible” my FT Business Book was – but it definitely should be on the reference shelf for networkers.