How Can Personal Contact Effect Our Success In The Industry?

I was asked this last week, I believe all of my success so far has come from personal contacts. For starters direct contacts with my old school teachers, lecturers and peers and indirect contact through the work of people I aspire to be more like within the multimedia industry. Clearly these are a given, more direct responsibility for my current standing lie with my dad who got me loads of web developing opportunities over the summer. A colleague of his at work needed a simple website and my old man suggested I take up the job (this was HR Business Dynamics). From there the interest snow balled and Hexademic New Media was born. If it wasn't for my dad getting interest through his company I wouldn't have four work experience projects underway and quite frankly would be a bit worried by now if I didn't. Since Hexademic, I've had a lot more contact with clients and have since gained more client interest and job opportunities through my business partner Phil.

Something To Get Us Thinking...

The essential point of networking is human contact; business has killed networking by making it something for the career orientated. Discuss.
First thing I thought of this statement is even if networking has become no more than a business tool it still exists so It hasn't been killed, rather it has taken on a new role. Of course networking has become an invaluable part of the business world but social networking is currently at it's peak with the worldwide success of websites such as myspace and facebook. It appears there are two sides to the networking coin and they appear to co-exists quite comfortably.