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The Web 2.0 World is Skunk Drunk on Its Own Kool-Aid
Young Urban Professional
This is a sad time for the web. It's as almost somber as the time just before the last bubble burst in 2000. I was working in PR with dot-com startups at the time and the way I feel now is how I did back then. I wish I didn't, but I do. Something needs to be said. Even if no one listens or cares what I think.
Now, it needs to be noted that I am as optimistic about technology's long-term impact on business, society and marketing perhaps as much as anyone you know. I bet my career on digital marketing. However, since I started this blog lots of people have rightfully made fun of how much I touted every little new site to come along. Their criticism is accurate.
However, over the last year my thinking has evolved dramatically. I have become less interested in every new shiny object and more engrossed in the social changes it, slowly, effects. This is in part a byproduct of the tech blogosphere getting drunk on its own Kool-Aid.
Many people I know, love and respect are heralding every new site as like it's Jes.usR.com. No one's casting a cynical eye anymore. No one's looking at valuations and reality - or at least very few people are.
The endless dot-com parties are back. So are the countless trade shows/conferences that regurgitate the same "new paradigms" the last 10 events did - with no end in sight. And yes, the ridiculous BS press releases are flying into my Gmail box. This is why I don't speak at or attend very many Web 2.0 conferences anymore. I don't have the heart for it. I would be stirring the big pot of Kool-Aid.
Let's face it, we're skunk drunk and it's because of money. It's almost like we all need to enter Betty Ford Clinic 2.0 together. This time, it's not stock market money but private equity, M&A, VCs and to some degree the reckless abandonment of logic by some advertisers who are perpetuating what is sure to end badly when the economy turns. Hubris is back my friends.
The bubble really began in earnest on October 9, 2006 when Google bought YouTube. That's when every person with an entrepreneurial itch woke up and smelled the hype and money. Prior to then, startups were more focused on the entrance, not the exit. But the Google YouTube deal and many others that followed (including big time investments) really opened up the floodgates to money and it changed the attitude of the web.
Meanwhile, the sleeping giant many of us mocked - the big media - got with the program. CNET's CEO talked about this today. The TechCrunches and Gizmodos of the world aren't a threat to his business. They're a boon because they send his sites traffic. Beth Comstock from NBC echoed a similar theme.
I am sorry to be a party pooper on conventional wisdom, really. But I miss the days of 2004 when the class that includes Flickr, del.icio.us and others started. They really were about changing the web, not making a quick buck (they did so only because they added value). There are companies still out there like them. Twitter is one I believe takes this approach. Automattic (the company behind Wordpress) appears to be another. Dave Winer also shares this spirt. He creates services like NYTimes River because it's fun and he thinks it will add value to our lives (and he is right).
However, most of the rest of today's net startups are only after the almighty dollar and while that's capitalism, it saddens me because it has done little but breed hubris.
Reader Comments (59)
I can only hope you are incorrect with you assessment - simply because the trend is not the same as you might think.
Sure, google bought YouTube for an unseemingly large amount of money. Yes, Microsoft way overpaid for a sliver of Facebook to stretch its valuation beyond the recognizable. But consider that the actions were not of valuation - but of desire on the part of the companies and the need for those niches.
I am not worried too much over these issues - since the financial rivers that flow will continue as long as the companies are on some relative solid footing and meet a need or desire for the valuations to come. I have not see silly dogfood.com acquisitions - but ones that have metrics that matter to the purchasers.
I would also add the purchase of Skype to that list of part of this boom - but note that eBay took a hit on the purchase - and the market commented.
I am happy to be an entrepreneur at this time - if only for the fact that creating companies is hard - and the people that try and fail, or try and succeed are the people to be with. Boom or bust, they are there making a difference.
Keep up the enthusiasm all. And make something happen.
more here:
That's what I hear: http://tinyurl.com/28bgoc .
- Amanda
You're right, it's not like the early days anymore. The early days NEVER last. Ever. In the course of human history, no time period has remained permanent, and the early days of social media, while sad to see go never had a chance of remaining in place forever.
We're not in a "bubble" and it's not a "repeat" of the late 90s. We're in a period of excitement, where many more people than I had ever previously hoped are starting to see value in what we've been talking about for so long. We should be happy that the rest of the world is seeing what we see, not bitching about how we're not the exclusive cool kids with the cool toys noone else really understands.
The fact is, industry types (including me and you) get tired of the cutting edge stuff FAR before the rest of the world tends to even learn about it on any scale. (My grandparents only recently started using email, for instance) Just because we've grown bored, just because there's excitement and/or investment burst (especially in Silicon Valley) doesn't mean that the rest of the world is going to go or has gone batshit on Bubble Hype.
But hey, it sure is fun to prove your cool factor to the SV Kids by perpetuating the meme, no?
But as Doug and some of the others imply, the bubble just may be a natural part of the evolutionary cycle. In which case, smart money is out there working overtime, trying to guage the fittest to survive, while the rest of us sip another glass... er, and mix our metaphors.
Great post -- thanks for kick-starting my brain today!