Show In Vegas

[Almighty Colin]

Our industry is in some aspects analagous to the formation of the radio, airline, electric utilities and motor vehicles industries. All had boom/bust consolidation phases. All had periods where the quick-to-market made tons of cash quickly. All had periods where the early-to-market were shaken out. In the radio industry 27 of the first 48 "first radio stations in their state to market" were our of business half a decade later. We've probably done a little better. Many people have one or more of these historical analogies in mind when they discuss the state of the industry. Railroad is another good example.

Some differences are the prevalence of the beer-money warriors, the lack of barriers to entry, and the lack of governmental influence and regulation. (The government won't bail us out and subsidize us).

Tropixxx and XPics have come and gone as surely as Pan Am and Eastern Airlines did. Others will too. Nothing bad has happened though. This is completely normal and exactly what many of us expected.

Earlier, it was said that you have to work harder today to make the same amount of money. This reminds me of a quote by the Red Queen in Lewis Carroll's "Through the Looking Glass". The quote is ubiquitious in pop-science books today and is used to illustrate the evolutionary arms race. The Red Queen said "in this place it takes all the running you can do to keep in the same place."

The "good old days" weren't really that good. It is a selective group of webmasters that remember them; the ones that survived. There were hundreds of webmasters on the boards five years ago that didn't understand the industry then and never did catch on. Remember the "I have a great logo. Why don't I make any money?" posts. How about the many dozens, probably hundreds, of webmasters that said "I'm starting a link site and will be bigger than Persian Kitty"?

Some of the older webmasters that left the industry and then come back do run into trouble. Their skill sets matched well with the uneven playing fields of yesterday but don't allow for any differentiation on today's internet porn gridiron.

Some of the older webmasters that once did well are not doing as well today. They have to reinvent themselves or maybe even take jobs working for large companies and desire to learn enough from these jobs to maybe venture out once again. I see some webmasters reiventing themselves and doing well and others struggling. Some go into periods of discovery and self-discovery and then re-emerge with new breath.

The sky is never falling and you would think Chicken Little would retire by now. How long before she comes and tries to scare us back into the field?

All is normal.
All is well.



Last edited by Colin at Jan 13 2003, 08:28 AM