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Technologies To Watch Fail In 2009
An anonymous reader writes "Microblogs, targeted advertising, social news, online video, streaming music, and enterprise social networking are among the technologies that will probably fail in 2009, according to a new report from Internet Evolution. The report cites revenue figures, failed or non-existent business models, and an overabundance of 'me-too' start-ups, combined with the current recession, as reasons the aforementioned technologies might not survive the year. 'Whereas the past couple of years have been defined by overcrowding and overfunding in the Web 2.0 space, and an onslaught of startups with no purpose or plan to make money, this recessionary year is likely to see more due diligence on the part of VCs, allowing strong companies and technologies to emerge from the smoldering pile of dead ones.'"
When I read the summary I was pretty annoyed - but I went and read the article (crazy I know) and that helped because it doesn't say these technologies will fail. It says some of the companies trying to make money off these technologies will fail. That's something completely different and I would agree that they are probably right. Of course most start-ups fail so making that kind of a prediction is a bit of a safe bet.
The thing is a lot of this stuff, I'm thinking especially of microblogging since that has really been something I've been interested in a quite a bit recently, will not go away because a lot of people really enjoy using the technology. That it is difficult to turn that into a way to make money makes me happy. So what if twitter fails? People can just move to identi.ca. Then no one needs to make any money off the platform - they just need to enjoy it and participate for motives other than financial benefit. The costs will still exist but they will be spread out across all the participants.
There is that segment of any new community that see it as a way to make money. Those people are rife in most social spaces ( web 2.0 or whatever you want to call it ) right now. People who just want to constantly talk about making twitter a part of your strategy to increase your fan base to make more money or how to use facebook to get rich, etc. I can't wait until they are gone.
What is exciting to me is that most of the alternatives that will step up to fill the vacuum left by the failed commercial attempts are open. That means I can enjoy interacting with a wide array of people all over the world but maintain control over what happens and participate on my terms.
It's hard to believe that's how Micronians are made. Why don't we see it right now by having you both kiss one another?
This kind of news got pretty popular lately. There was at least one similar story past week. And it's logical (and boring too). Of course some random stuff will fail in 2009, because we have a global recession. Now every kind of journalists are trying to make predictions, which is like playing lotto (for those journalists who are stupid and can't really make an indepth analysis, which is way too difficult, anyway). Then in 2010 it will turn out that some random journalist was right, and he will win the prize "I was right!". Meh.
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#\ @ ? Colonize Mars
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They are only about two months away from following Circuit City's path, due to more-and-more people streaming their radio off the net or off their cellphones, instead of satellite.
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
I'm not quite sure why they see microblogs failing. They might not work as a business model for a large enterprise, but as a method of generating extra personal revenue, they get the job done.
Just yesterday I was reading (it's behind a paywall I think, I get the newspaper) that online video views and more notably video ad views are going to be higher this year, and continue growth for the next few years. I don't know if everything listed will succeed, and I mentioned to a friend that I had doubts on Twitter making it through the year (I'd say they could start charging, but people just flock to the next startup like FriendFeed, then when that dies, something else), and he had mentioned he had the same thoughts.
I think that these things ARE monetize-able, you just have to start charging businesses who are using the stuff to 'connect' with customers for a higher API limit or something.
For context, click Parent.
About 6 months ago I signed up to Blyk, a "free" mobile network for 16-25 year olds, which gave subscribers 43 minutes call time and 217 texts free per month (plenty for what I use). It was supported by advertising, every day I'd receive either an MMS or SMS with an advert, typically for clothes and music (that's what my demographic is meant to waste its money on, isn't it? Well, that and booze.)
Anyway, I haven't had an advert since about Christmas, and yesterday got a text from Blyk saying they were changing the deal to £15/month free credit, which works out as less texts/minutes at their prices (8p per text, 24p/min call). Maybe the business model wasn't quite as good as predicted.
It's been a sweet ride, but goodbye Slashdot! See you on the other side!
/ The Arrow
"How lovely you are. So lovely in my straightjacket..." - Nny
In order to survive, many of these sites and companies will just have to do the unthinkable and evolve to keep up with web trends.
For a good discussion of where the trends could be going, read this article: http://tech.lds.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=371&Itemid=5
Sure, we are going back to untargeted advertising - just blast your ads out to everyone. Don't worry about the fact that you are wasting money trying to sell diapers to 12 year olds.
"Targeted advertising" has real problems. Ads on search results pages are valuable, because they're presented at the point that the user is actively looking for something. Vaguely relevant ads on other pages (the "Google Content Network" comes to mind) are a distraction, and far less valuable. Clicks on such ads are mostly from the 10% of web users who make 50% of the clicks, but don't buy much. Many advertisers have opted out of the Google Content Network (read Search Engine Watch). As we point out, about 36% of Google Content Network advertisers are "bottom-feeders", junk sites with no verifiable business behind them. There's been a slow decline in contextual advertising, and I expect that to continue, and maybe accelerate. Ad-supported sites will feel the squeeze.
Targeted advertising is effective if the advertiser has the user's buying history. Amazon exploits this successfully; they know exactly what you've bought. But spreading that information around creates privacy problems and loud objections. Merchants aren't keen about letting their competitors know who their best customers are. Payment companies like Visa and PayPay could in theory take that role, but they've been reluctant to do so for fear of regulatory backlash. Payment companies don't currently know what you bought, just who you bought it from. They'd need merchant cooperation to profile their customer base.
What this may mean is a network effect for broad-based online merchants like Amazon. The bigger they get, the better their targeted advertising becomes. Customers don't object, because they're dealing with one company which legitimately knows what they've bought. Amazon may take up the slack as brick-and-mortar stores go under. In consumer electronics, Circuit City, The Good Guys, CompUSA, etc. have all gone under, and Amazon is taking up much of the slack.
So my choices are pay money and host a server or see a little AD to have some other company do all the work for me? I think it's easier for me to have a little AD on the side of the page when I log into Twitter. Easier and free.
Or use adblock, and wait for twitter,facebook and Co. to go bankrupt when enough people join you... Then distributed, open alternatives will be the only option...
I agree with the perspective on microblogging as athe only thing a site does. I just don't see the revenue stream in something like that inherently. I do see the alternative possibility that Twitter becomes a brand name and licenses their presence to be integrated in other sites. I think there will be a focus on bringing together currently disparate aspects of 'social networking' and revenue strategies to evolve. Currently, I don't think the revenue streams can stand on their own, but social networking is too ubiquitous and popular for *no one* to get a rational business plan going.
I think the outlook on targeted advertising is particular. The only aspect that is potentially interesting is that too much money went in and set impossible expectations. However, the quality of the advertising I think too significant to discount. Interactive, targeted advertising is something leaps and bounds over television. There are a few hotspots on television where almost everyone will see advertising, and some shows with such a narrow fanbase it actually turns out to be kind of targeted. However, the production cost to participate is non-trivial, and viewers have to take it upon themselves to write down details to research it later if they have never heard of the product. Also, the ubiquity of DVR reduces the exposure to ads.
The statement on social news had nothing to do with the value of social news sites, and everything to do with neglecting a business plan. This is no surprise.
On online video, they claim that other than YouTube and Hulu, little will be left. I would support the statement, with the note that Porn content sites will continue.
On online radio, I would be reluctant to say that's out, but again the focus is not inherent flaws, but rather the recording industries being resistant towards that model and making life hard intentionally. The recording indutry is ass-backwards enough to sink an industry that would be highly valuable to them.
XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
DRM.
www.internetevolution.com is running on a ms web server and asp.
Maybe they don't know what they're talking about? Didn't asp die already?
I say things which affects my Karma negatively. (and I don't care) For instance; All religion is false.
I hope that articles over multiple pages just for advert-hits dies a death in 2009, along with webmasters who practice this.
Anyway, 1 page version of the article:
http://www.internetevolution.com/document.asp?doc_id=169817&print=yes
...to fail in 2009. Not all of them, obviously. Second Life will continue to trundle along (although they've lost about 3000 servers the last few months due to a rather unfortunate series of "gotcha" price increases), mostly due to its user content.
There's an entire industry of virtual worlds stuff, and almost every single startup in this space does the exact same thing: Take Second Life, remove the user content, add in dancing, music, and social networking embedding. Voila! Instant startup. We're talking dozens of companies doing the exact same thing over and over again.
So those guys are dead.
PS3's Home is dead on arrival (no user content). Google Lively's already dead. Any "enterprise" use of virtual worlds is in the research phase (or just using open source alternatives like OpenSim).
Anyone investing in virtual worlds tech in 2009 is a chump, sorry.
hookers and grits.
a streaming radio service using the wireless Internet, the vast majority of cellphones offer no such facility. Even when they do, you're going to have to find a streaming service worth listening to
Podcasts and streaming audio work fine on my Windows Mobile HTC Titan on Sprint as I drive. I personally like the Resco Radio application but there are at least five other mature media players that do streaming. I can also use Orb to stream my *own* audio (and video) from my home server over the net. And then of course there's Last.FM and Pandora.
Between all these options there are several thousand "channels" to choose from. Lack of choice is not a problem. How many channels does Sirius offer?
Da Blog
DRM all over again. and again. and again.
If you can read this, I forgot to post anonymously.
I'm a blue water sailor. I use Sirius off shore and in the Bahamas and in the Caribbean. Without Sirius we will be forced to resort to old fashioned analog short wave radio, with the squawks and crackles.
I don't use it for music, but it's irreplaceable for news and NPR. Next Tuesday I'll use it to listen to Obama's speech. Still haven't seen that man's face on TV, but I'm familiar with his voice on Sirius.
I can hardly claim that blue water sailors and cruise ships and others outside Internet/phone coverage are a significant market segment. Still, it would be a unlikely shame to see any segment of society forced to abandon digital technology for tired old analog stuff.
The Sirius/XM satellites will still be there even after bankrupcy. Perhaps a new owner could buy them for 1 cent on a dollar, wipe out the original share holders and bond holders, and make a profitable business out of keeping them operating.
p.s. I'm not at sea today. Otherwise I couldn't get Slashdot.
and an onslaught of startups with no purpose or plan to make money
Is it just me or does this sound like the 2000 bubble all over again?
Bitter and proud of it.
Startups need to compete with t-bills for money. Expect most of the technology money to go into t-bills to fund government economic plans. The economic plans are so far focused on housing & social services.
With the price of oil so low and still sliding, all those green energy startups that started up in the last couple of years are now bleeding money and have little chance for profitability. Their only hope is massive government subsidies or a miraculous economic recovery to bring back the price of oil to $100+ a barrel.
There are two companies that refuse to die despite the fact the the original concept failed miserably almost 50 years ago. Trisenxâ(TM)s scent dome and DigiScents' iSmell both have been promising to produce "smell-o-vision" for computers for years. I'm not sure whether they're actually this clueless themselves, or whether they're hoping to latch onto an even more clueless venture capitalist. Either way, here's hoping those involved suffer a Blinding Glimpse of the Obvious and let the poor crippled idea die.
"I may be synthetic, but I'm not stupid." -- Bishop 341-B
Drrrrrr
Online distribution of hi definition content is the future. We're seeing services like Netflix, and Amazon unbox flirting with the idea, and I'm convinced that this will kill bluray like bluray killed hd-dvd.
that Linux on the desktop finally dies?
That's why people invented add-ons for Firefox, such as NoScript and AdBlock. When more people adopt these the ads will stop... the ads will stop.
"The best way to accelerate a Macintosh is at 9.8m/sec^2" -Marcus Dolengo
Well. I guess that you can found bad companies again when the next hype phase comes.
stream radio over an expensive EVDO connection.
My "expensive" EVDO connection costs $30/month for unlimited internet access and texts, and includes voice minutes as well.
As regards your conflation of "uncommon" with unavailable, I dispute that. Most of the cheaper, consumer phones from Sprint now seem to come bundled with SprintTV (a rebranded MobiTV) and some sort of music streaming service. I gather it's similar with Verizon and the otherc arriers. Personally, I avoid those "value added" services because they incur an extra monthly fee.
how you do it is convoluted and unlikely to be considered user friendly
Hmm. Slide to unlock phone. Click "Radio". Click "Favourites". Click channel. Listen.
Yes, you're right. That's desperately convoluted. How could that ever "just work"?
Da Blog
"the ads will stop... the ads will stop." I can understand what the GP is saying. But do you really want the ads to stop completely? Are you planning to pay for every website that you visit?
How many scandals have there been in which major bloggers on (insert subject here) have been bribed to post favorable reviews.
Lets drift a bit from the internet as well, how about hannity and faux news? Multi-million person audiences watching the media equivalent of a strip-club garbage chute.
VLC FOR MAC IS DYING! IF YOU DEVELOP, PLEASE SAVE IT!!
You're kidding right?
Cruise lines are a massive market. There are entire shipyards dedicated to them.
A properly managed Sirius/XM could shift focus from average customers to cruise lines (while still keeping single user service)
Tangentially, I listen to WRAS where I am, and while it's been getting watered down lately it's much much better than anything else nationwide. I'm thinking of moving to a better job market and am checking into satellite radio to see if they're carried.
VLC FOR MAC IS DYING! IF YOU DEVELOP, PLEASE SAVE IT!!
I only read this post, not because I cared what technologies someone else think would fail, but because I was curious if there was some new technology that I didn't know about yet.
News sites reliant on Economic Fearmongering
VLC FOR MAC IS DYING! IF YOU DEVELOP, PLEASE SAVE IT!!
I should have known there would be an invocation to iTunes somewhere in all this...
based upon a clumsy interface that's a liability when placed in a car.
I was dumbing it down for you. For driving I actually use the voice interface for the phone. I want to call someone, I can say "Call X". I want the radio, I can say "Play Radio". It just works. The voice command program came built in courtesy of HTC and it seems to work pretty well. I know there are more advanced voice control software programs but this one works fine.
And you missed the bit about Orb. I am not limited to only what other people choose to play. I can stream all my own content and playlists, or I can stream my Pandora or Last.FM lists.
You are in any case actually missing the main point entirely, which is that there are several different ways for people to get content delivered to moving vehicles. Every year brings another few. Which together none of these may amount to the same single domain penetration of satellite radio, together they represent in aggregate an alternative to satellite that will be "good enough" for a sufficient number of people so as to make the business model of satellite extremely problematic (with its massive capital requirements predicated on the idea of a virtual monopoly in content delivery to moving vehicles).
You're also missing also entirely the idea of a custom software radio. You see, one of the beauties of a bitmapped screen is that you can make the interface look like pretty much whatever you want. In this case, the Resco thingy looks like a hybrid between a 1970s-style AM/FM radio and an mp3 player. I like having big buttons on screen that I can mash with my finger. If I wanted something more like J River Media Center or iTunes, with fiddly little lists of things that I'd have to scroll or swoosh through, I would use CorePlayer.
And as for "expensive", well, I decided to get cellphone service. The fact that, on Sprint with SERO plan, the Internet effectively comes free with the $30/month voice plan works out very well. I get to make calls, and if my minutes go over, I can just switch to Skype on the phone and use broadband instead. I also get to tether the 3G connection and use the phone as an AP, also for free. All in all, it's far from what I would call a "desperate" service.
Thanks for the "geek" epithet. On /. that means a lot.
Da Blog
You forget, that money not spent on marketing also makes our products cheaper, giving us the money to pay it.
Of course, what company would stop marketing. How would you then know they exist?
Any sufficiently advanced intelligence is indistinguishable from stupidity.