All the points that you make, Dennis, are solid and right. It is true that the bottom line is that the Project Better Place’s success is rooted in social/cultural science and on the ability to deviate and enhance social behavior (see the tangent below for more on that).

The question is so what? Should an entrepreneur shy away from social behavior oriented ventures? I argue not. I argue that this is exactly where and entrepreneur with such qualities as Agassi (strong brand name, large network of connections, a proven track record and excellent charisma) should focus his attention.

As for Mark Charmer’s comments, here I strongly disagree. Maybe I misunderstood him but for me it seems like he observes technology-driven dynamics such as telecommuting and efforts such as Project Better Place as being mutually exclusive. This is wrong, there is no contradiction between the two. No matter how technology will evolve there will always be enough cars (or other personal transportation apparatuses) left on the road for initiatives like Project Better Place to make sense and add value.

Tangent - note that I wrote deviate and not change which by that I meant that it is more about taking the current social behavior and building on it vs. completely changing it. Might be seen as a nuance but is actually an important distinction. For social behavior related ventures to succeed it is important to:
1. Identify the behavioral concepts that are core to the user experience and then maintain and enhance them
2. Identify user experience concepts that are adjacent to the core and that are desired by the user. Then revolutionize on these concepts and enrich the complete user experience
Example – at the early days of the virtual communities revolution there were many that argued that this journey will never succeed as this will require a social behavior change and that people will never be willing to replace their personal/real interaction with a virtual one. Well it turned out that this was a wrong assertion. To follow the above paradigm:
1. People weren’t asked to change the core of their social behavior namely being able to have a personal/live/real interaction. Also, they were able to continue and control other experience concepts such as controlling the integrity and quality of their presentation/reputation on the web
2. On the other hand the new offering was bale to build on adjacent concepts such as allowing people to more easily reach out to their community and even extend it which turned out to be an attractive concept to the generally social creature called man
If one reads carefully Project Better Place’s presentations s/he can easily observe the fact that the venture follows closely the above paradigm. There is much emphasis on maintaining the core user experience concepts such as driving experience, quick refueling time, etc while adding to these some attractive adjacencies such as reducing Total Cost of Ownership and increasing environmentally friendliness.

Taking all of the above under account I am a strong believer in the venture.

Thanks for your considered comments Amid. I think the core point here is that none of us truly knows what it will take to bring change. Shai’s infrastructure approach is but one piece in a highly complex jigsaw that connects people to technology and without overtly defending Mark’s position - he can do that for himself - I generally agree that this is not a slam dunk. We should not forget for instance that there is cultural bias so while the project may succeed in one territory, it may not in another.

As to Shai’s abilities - I’ve met him, I know people who have worked with him. He’s a great performer and when set to task he can deliver. But as we all know, past success is no guarantee for the future. I do of course wish him all success. It’s a worthy cause.

Amit, I appreciate your comments. My argument was that concepts such as telecommuting and Project Better Place should *not* be treated as mutually exclusive. Rather we need ways to tackle lots of interconnected social and technical factors.

There is space for more problem-solvers here. Shai does what he does brilliantly but his chosen approach is surprisingly low on ‘digital’. Most of it could have been implemented in 1978, or 1987, if the politics and energy pricing equation had been right. That’s fine, but it’s quite surprising, and just a tiny bit disappointing, given his background. If anyone could have done it, it was him.

Project Better Place has huge potential and yes, it can really make a difference. Agassi has a lot to do and is going to have to stick to implementing his chosen solution for a few years to come.

So we can’t wait for him to be ready to solve the next problem. We need a line of Shais, rethinking the myriad aspects of how we move, and some of them need a deep rooted understanding of software and systems, and how they can shape paths to adoption that are not currently obvious. People who can influence vehicle flow, invent better usage and sales models, and address the deeply problematic relationship cars now have with cities, or rather city authorities have with cars. The people with answers are out there. We just need to encourage them.

I completely agree with both of you Dennis as well as with most of your statements Mark. The only thing that I will challenge is that the PBP approach could have been implemented before. I think that many developments were made recently that make this scheme more feasible. Would it be from the batteries perspective (after all you do need a battery technology that will allow to drive at least 40 miles per charge) or from the social dynamics such as putting a lot of emphasis on environmental issues.

At the end of the day that all of us agree about one point, the market is ripe and in need for innovators and PBP is a worthy project. It is about implementing it and finding other supporting (and not necessarily mutually exclusive) initiatives.

Good luck to us all.