Seeking common factors in the Web 2.0 bubble

Keen is pretty good on the down side. He points out (for example) that Guy Kawasaki, original Mac evangelist and writer of one of the world's top 50 blogs, got 2.5 million "hits" in 2006, and Google paid him a trivial $3,350.00 for the advertising value of this. And that's the good news today.

But what about tomorrow? I watch CNet and I watch The Register, and I watch Salon; a host of gadget sites like Engadget and Gizmodo and Pocket Lint, all making real money for their founders. And guess what! - all these founders are not Web 2.0 long-tailer trash. They're experts, experienced journalists, publishers who spotted that simple rule: when the rules change, play the new game.

Andrew Keen was bruised by his early pioneering Internet ventures, back in the 90s. He spotted the new rules, but the audience for the game in those days wasn't big enough. That doesn't mean it will stay small. His analysis of the collapse of the CD music business is simply, wrong. It's not entirely due to piracy (though that comes into it) but also due to the fact that real music lovers don't just want a formulaic "hit" created by a cynical monopoly music publisher.

In the end, the "water cooler effect" means that people indulge in culture in order to discuss what is interesting. If there are only 10,000 people in the world who like a particular form of music, they can (today) gather around that particular water cooler and chat about it. Yes, that means fewer sales for OutKast and Norah Jones perhaps. But it doesn't mean that OutKast and Norah Jones are, necessarily, the superior product, or that there's no cultural value to the minority niche.

Keen's quite right to point to the horrors of Internet gambling and addiction to gaming, porn and other pernicious evils. Society will want to deal with those issues and frankly, I doubt that passing laws will be effective in achieving a resolution. I foresee tears.

In the end, though, a new forest will grow up. There will be centres of excellence in Web 2.0, and people will sit in the shade of spreading chestnut trees, and they will sit on humble grass patches to do so. Excellence will attract devotees, and time will winnow out much of the chaff.

"I hope you're right," said Keen, dubiously. "It's possible, but it's not what I see." Well, when he's done his apprenticeship in journalism, we'll see what he sees. I'm betting he'll learn!

* Yes, I do mean HCF, highest common factor. A lowest common denominator is a far, far bigger number than an HCF. If you have two people, you can probably find 100 things they have in common. If you assume they have 200 interests each, the lowest common denominator would be wonderful, in meeja terms: it would give you as many as 400 things to focus on. Instead, the HCF goes rapidly down as you add people, and by the time you have 200 people, your HCF is going to include nothing except porn and celebrity. Probably, something like Celebrity Big Brother, with Rula and an MP pretending to kiss on screen...

Yuck. ®