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Netscape.com Loses Its Identity
wh0pper writes "Digital Trends has a great opinion piece about how Netscape has lost its identity again in regards to their wanna-be Digg portal. One interesting fact I was not aware of is that Jason Calacanis is the person behind the new beta Netscape portal. A choice quote: 'If this business model sees the light-day and it looks like it will, Netscape readers will change from the baby-boomers of yester-year to a younger audience more interested in Jessica Alba's Bikini or Britney Spears than real intellectual news.' I've tried using the new beta Netscape site, and personally hate it. The little link to the external site and the frame to keep you on Netscape's site are deal killers for me. Does the general audience think it can compete?"
As far as I can tell, AOL has never been entirely sure what to do with the Netscape brand name.
They seem to have bought the company mainly to use the browser as a bargaining chip against Microsoft ("We'll switch to Mozilla if you don't give us a good deal!"). Since they secured the new deal for the IE engine and jettisoned the browser development staff they've abandoned Netscape-the-browser at least twice, both times changing their minds. There was the surprise release of (IIRC) Netscape 7.2, which as near as I can tell involved merging the latest Mozilla Suite with their local tree, and then there was the outsourced chimera of Netscape 8.
They aren't interested in Netscape the browser, but they have this brand name that they don't want to waste, and they keep trying to come up with something to do with it. They tried it as a classic portal, they tried it as a low-cost dialup service, they tried it as a webmail service, they tried it as a toolbar, now they're chasing another trend, trying to jam the square peg into yet another shaped hole.
It makes about as much sense as it would make for, say, Coca-Cola to buy Dr. Pepper, then retire the soft drink flavor and start marketing Dr. Pepper spice racks.
(Oh, and Britney Spears -- does the youth audience still care about her, or is she already passe?)
http://www.beta.netscape.com/
et tu, slashdot? ;)
I have the pleasure of working as the lead developer for the new netscape.com.
We've been in beta for approximately 31 hours. We haven't even taken over the domain yet (and won't for awhile). The response has been overwhelming. It's the most valuable feedback we could have ever asked for though (and frankly, we expected a lot of it...) The frame navigator and the pop up new windows for instance, are things that annoy folks to no end -- duh, right? Well internally, it's an odd 50/50 split -- they are both designed from the start to be user preferences, configurable for each person. We'll get there in time, right now we're focused on measuring reactions to features and design changes. I know the definition of "beta" has changed.. but.. uh... it's beta. ;)
Are we attempting to be a "digg killer?" Not at all. We're attempting to iterate on the concept of social news for a completely different demographic. We're trying to create an honest, fun, interesting portal. Did digg kill slashdot? It's faster and has more daily content, yet people come here for discussion -- Slashdot's strength. We may not be "there" yet, but again, this thing is a brand new project, about 4 months old, and has only been publically accessible for less than two days.
Thankfully, we all have pretty thick skin here. It's been enjoyable talking to folks and seeing what the concerns are. Hopefully we can evolve this thing into the great product we all have in mind. I do appreciate everyone who has taken the time to send us their thoughts by e-mail or blog post. We're actively reading them and responding as much as we can. Let us know what your concerns are, and we'll try to address them (where we can, that is.. we don't like tons of ads just like everyone else.. just the nature of our position right now)
"to a younger audience more interested in Jessica Alba's Bikini or Britney Spears" who the fsck isnt interested in that? at any age?
slashdot troll = you make a compelling argument I do not like the implications of.