- communities can scale (although their numbers show that revenue per repeat visitor for community sites is lower than other types of site);
- most major marketing efforts didn’t work (i.e. $25m spend per quarter to recoup $30m a year);
- traditional models are working on the web (i.e. match offers to segments, control and understand line extensions, concentrate on core technology).
More insight into the race towards broadband. Apparently xDSL will win. Looks like I’ve chosen the right one, then?
And finally (!) some insight into what benefits the eMarketplaces are actually providing:
- Expanded market reach for buyers and sellers
- Lower prices for buyers
- Reduced cost for the buyers operations
- Identify best practice
Interestingly, they mention the now-defunct Chemdex. However, the basic message – work out what it is that you do that makes people use you and exploit this – still holds true.
Useful interview with Lawrence Lessig, including this peach from Adobe. It’s worrying how much control copyright holders could have on their work in the US if all of this stuff goes unchallenged.
A little later than some others, this is still a useful summary of how to write for the web. It made me think: shouldn’t pages use a larger font (12pt) for reading text and a smaller (10pt) font for the nav, links, etc. The Standard article does this to some extent, but could be better: e.g. the links are distracting, but the nav isn’t.
Interesting challenge to the relational database model. Sentences has more details / demos. The more I read, the more brilliant this model is.
Upside has a reasonable look at the state of play of the portal market. I love the between page navigation in this piece. Specifically compare it to the McKinsey piece or almost any of the above.
Amazing: the US version of Popstars appears to be working!