Nov

29

MSNBC takes on the early adopters

November 29, 2007 |

Michael Rogers, on MSNBC.com, makes an interesting argument that I have been trying to make, but never quite put into the right words, for a long time:

The big Web 2.0 winners will be the ones who recognize that difference and aren’t afraid to adapt their products for a broader audience. Of course, the early adopters can be depended on to complain about the changes — but by then they’ll already be moving on to the next big thing anyway.

Citing Second Life, Twitter, Facebook and Digg as examples, he argues that for a company to succeed, the early adopters are only part of the equation. To go big, a company has to cater to the rest of the net as well.

And he sure has a point there. However, the great thing about a lot of Web 2.0 companies is that they don’t need to worry about that. They were written by early adopters for early adopters. Their overhead is so small that they don’t need 10.000 users to be successful.

But he is right in that for most Web 2.0 shops to go really big, they will have to cater to a ‘real’ audience. An audience that doesn’t have the patience to crawl around in Second Life (who ever thought that was a good idea is beyond me anyway). An audience that buys Apple products not because of a Steve Jobs keynote, but because it just works and because they read a David Pogue review in the NYTimes.

One of the things that continuously annoys me about a lot of hyped Web 2.0 stuff is that it is so clear from the outset that it will never go big. And a lot of times, that’s just fine. But don’t write a column for CNN saying that we will all be hanging out in Second Life anytime soon, or that everybody will be voting on Digg.

We sometimes have an inflated self of the size of our tribe here on the net. The reality is, that most people just want to consume news, not vote on it (hell, half this country doesn’t even bother to vote for its president). That’s why I am tired of hearing that the writers’ strike will make a difference for web video. It won’t, because those who are still watching TV will continue watching TV. Most people don’t even know that alternatives exist. Ask your non-techie friends what their favorite IPTV shows are. See if you get an answer…


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