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My conversation with an Estonian

Work has its benefits.  Sometimes it results in chance meetings.  Like the one last night when I met a CEO of what might become a game changer business.  The CEO was from Estonia.

My first contact with the Baltic Rim.  Made of small states Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania (all former R's in the USSR) line the Baltic Sea, a small body of water stuck south of Scandinavia and forming the western shore of the former USSR.  The closest Russian city is St. Petersburg.

So this meeting happened through a mutual connection of ours who left the states and went to work for this CEO a few months ago.  The entire interview process he tells me was conducted by Skype, which as the CEO told me is how this relatively young independent state conducts its business.

In keeping with the whole Women's History Month theme I must point out that this CEO is a young woman and a mother of two, who has held other important positions in her career prior to embarking on this new project.  It is aimed at helping early stage businesses grow but using a form of currency that is very nascent in its origins.  A true Estonian by heritage including her husband she told me they were a proud people who have their own language and a 1,000 plus year history.  Invaded and occupied in large parts of their history by more powerful armies and egos today as a EU member nation they have their independence and are thriving economy made of technology and tourism.

I was somewhat curious to know how this new technology platform they have developed might affect the go to market plans of new early stage businesses.  I was more interested in learning as much about this place and the culture in the hour I got to spend together.

I learned that this country has deployed free Wi Fi everywhere in their large cities and also are enabling people to conduct a large part of their business online, including filing their tax returns which even for her was less than 10 minutes and where the government has done the work for you.  You review it and sign.  Compare that to the ballooning hours we spend here stateside to let the government know what they already know and having to pay exorbitant sums to figure out our imaginary tax obligations.

We talked a bit about the political theater and some more about raising children in the brave new world where discoveries happen in a more compressed schedule - it took centuries to discover electricity and then merely a few decades to get the Internet established.

What has followed has been fast evolution, not always good but by and large aimed at democratizing the vast populations on the planet in furthest corners.

A lot of children in the developed economies and Estonia is one of them, are virtually meeting friends and relatives, playing with peers and learning about the world we inhabit all without leaving their bed.

Is that good?  Time will tell.



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