Bob Buckman, chairman of Buckman Laboratories, wrote his ideas for the ultimate idea-sharing system back in the 80s–before the web existed.

His seven points, as I read in If Only We Knew What We Know, describe the perfect intranet:

1. One transfer step in the transmission of ideas between individuals, to avoid distortion.

2. All employees have access

3. All employees can contribute content

4. Available anywhere, 24/7

5. Search function that indexes every word

6. Users contribute in their native language. Translation provided where appropriate.

7. Content updates automatically.

I can’t get over how prescient this list is. Or that it’s taken this long for “idea-sharing systems” that meet most of this criteria to be widely available. In fact, I’m not sure if there are more than one or two systems that can fulfill step #6. (We can.)