October 9, 2006 was the day that "Web 2.0" became "Web Who.0."
That was when TechCrunch confirmed that Google had acquired YouTube for $1.65 billion. No small change, especially as the video-sharing site had no apparent revenue stream.
So what do I mean by Web Who.0?
Things had moved on since cool new sites sprang up -- normally ending in "r" like Flickr, for example -- with blue and green logos reflected in a shiny white background with nice rounded corners. Internet group hug.
Anything could be done on the Web. Applications were shared, people logged in and corrected information using Wiki software and the Web was once again one big community, run by the users and not the corporations. They had to scramble to keep up and adapt. Rupert Murdoch saw the light a while back and snapped up MySpace for a -- with hindsight -- bargain price of $580 million, now valued at around $6 billion [his words]. Even though millions of people use it every day, it still looks shit.
But that's not the point. The point is that people don't care how something looks or works, they just want to see themselves on it: "Hey, Grandma Scratchett, this is Timmy. I just uploaded a funny video of me falling in a puddle of water on YouTube, come and check it out! 234,754 other people have!" Web Who.0.
Or: "We're a new band called Satan's Sweaty Socks, totally cool and the NEXT BIG THING! Come and hear some of our music on MySpace. Even Lindsay Lohan and some dude called Tom are our friends, they linked to us!" Web Who.0.
There was an article I spotted yesterday about Metacafe shopping themselves around for a buyer. They value themselves at around $300-$500 million. Just a figure thrown out there. The question is who will buy them, not for how much. Web Who.0.
I joined Web Who.0 by setting up this blog. It's about me. Using Blogger, no big deal, there's lots of free blogging applications out there. Who is this guy? Why should we read his blog? What is he doing? What has he done? Who links to him? Who subscribes to his RSS feed?
And the all-important one... who will he be working for next?
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And that's why Rupert Murdoch isn't such the great mogul he'd like us to believe ;-)
ReplyDeleteI once read how he ran News International and he sounded a real tyrant - not someone to get on the wrong (or even semi-right) side of.
It's weird looking at this 2-year old post and looking at how MySpace is perceived now. Still sh*t, perhaps even more so. Will it last much longer in its current state? Who knows? Interesting times ahead.