I think success is a side effect of networking, everything else comes down to a tool for networking, this is why people not capable of networking (myself included) can never be successful.
Networking is necessary but not sufficient (unless you are a con artist or a bullshitter), and networking can be very broadly defined to include things other than schmoozing. Pushing open source code that gets attention is networking. Contributing to projects is networking. Creating stuff independently that people like is networking even if they never directly interact with you. Networking just means communicating with other people in any way so as to make them aware of your existence and that you can do something of value to them.
Networking is just like investing in the stock market.
It's the action that your body does , but both are based off the mental task of predicting.
Predicting social , economic and technological trends at the macro level is no different than predicting the reaction of a person you are talking to at the micro level.
And you constantly change your position on an idea or a topic and you can also venture into a different topic just as you would when you go long/short on the stock market, or when you close your position in General Electric to open one in Costco.
