What is Digg?165 Comments
- g0atbutt, on 10/10/2007, -7/+209If Dvorak thinks the bubble will burst, it most likely means everything is fine.
- anaesthetica, on 10/10/2007, -2/+65I agree. Not only because Dvorak is a consistent contrary bellwether (the opposite of everything he says becomes true), but because he doesn't really touch on what causes a bubble in the first place. He looks at a bunch of activity swarming around technologies he sees as unsustainable. Perhaps they are unsustainable, and perhaps 95% of companies in those areas will fall through.
That doesn't matter. What matters is whether speculative investment into such technologies is going on. That's what fueled the first bubble--venture capitalists and average joes alike investing egregiously large sums of money in startups with no profit, and no business model for achieving profit, only the promise of exponential growth which would somehow outgrow the problem of not having profit. Is this the case today? No. No one is wasting huge sums of money on unproven, unpopular, unprofitable websites. Websites get large investments *after* they've attracted thousands of users, not before. There is no bubble, because there's no oversupply of investment into high P/E ratio startups. - p0tent1al, on 10/10/2007, -14/+62Dvorak is an idiot, plain and simple.
- MiltonWaddams, on 10/10/2007, -5/+45What a tool. Comparing this to 2000 is retarded. Back then things burst because any company could get an IPO and be worth hundreds of millions overnight. Today it's almost strictly acquisitions. It's about 5-10 companies making almost all of these acquisitions and they are by and large doing very well. Some VCs will certainly get burned, but it is nothing that is going to seriously damage the economy like in 2000.
- merwin, on 10/10/2007, -4/+33Even a broken clock is right twice a day.
- inactive, on 10/10/2007, -2/+25i sure hope so. Just so I won't have to see 'Web 2.0' anywhere ever again.
- DKSINC, on 10/10/2007, -5/+27Yeah this article was lame. Basically the author just points out different facets of the Internet and says that they're going to collapse without giving any real reason as to why.
- inactive, on 10/10/2007, -4/+24More like his career is about to burst because everyone is sick of his lame write ups
- smith41, on 10/10/2007, -1/+20Yeah....this from the same guy who ADMITTED to hating on Apple just to increase his traffic.......and now he uses a mac.....
- OBKenobi, on 10/10/2007, -7/+25Heh, I love these anti-Dvorak comments. So much hatred.
- OsiVert, on 10/10/2007, -3/+19Do you know what Web 2.0 even means?
- Radionesiac, on 10/10/2007, -11/+27dvorak is a self-righteous, cocky prick
- PueSi, on 10/10/2007, -4/+19I agree with him, look at how things are: there are hundreds of sites doing the same thing and most of them probably are not even profitable.
Isn't Digg barely making a profit? AdBlock is killing the Web 2.0! - devzer0, on 10/10/2007, -5/+18A bubble is a STOCK MARKET bubble. There is certainly no stock market bubble. Certainly the VCs could stop funding Web 2.0 companies, but there's no reason to believe they will. Oh, and also, since you don't necessarily need VC funding to start a company ...
The only real thing that could 'burst' this 'bubble' is if people stopped using the internet.
Buried as inaccurate. - Gugel, on 10/10/2007, -3/+15This was extremely dumb. No compelling reasons were offered as to WHY there would be an economic crash in the first place.
- monkeyrun, on 10/10/2007, -1/+13but what's there to burst ?
I don't see those so called web 2.0 company going ipo and their stock rising through the roof. - Speciou5, on 10/10/2007, -1/+12I can see internet ads bursting when people finally learn about adblock (or when it gets packaged with a browser).
Really, it takes five seconds to set up. https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/1865 - OBKenobi, on 10/10/2007, -3/+14It's hit or miss with Dvorak. Usually miss, but you have to admit he's been right a few times.
I think advertizing revenue will not be so easy to get as more companies realize it isn't really profitable to spam people; the youtube and social networking clones are going to disappear, leaving only the innovators; HD video and live broadcasting will be the next big thing, because they'll be able to do product placement with it that can't be ad-blocked.
Having said that, I think it's the monopolist cable broadcasters that are in trouble. Why do you think they are so opposed to net neutrality? Good riddance to them. - Jack9, on 10/10/2007, -1/+10No. Next question.
- rasterbator, on 10/10/2007, -2/+10How does Dvorak continue to receive writing assignments? Of all the pasta he throws at the wall, only 2% sticks.
- 3zero3, on 10/10/2007, -2/+9Good grief, there isn't a shred of intellect anywhere in that piece of uninformed garbage he calls a column.
- joshshu, on 10/10/2007, -1/+8Gold bubble is about to burst, Wall St bubble is about to burst, Oil bubble is about to burst. Housing bubble - done!
- spectre_25gt, on 10/10/2007, -1/+7Not if it's a digital.
- darkfate, on 10/10/2007, -1/+7In lieu of John not being here, I shall say dvorak.org/blog.
- bloodguard, on 10/10/2007, -0/+4Dvorak is a bit of a "broke clock being right eventually" crank. That said, as someone who was caught in the last bubble, it's always a good idea to have an escape plan. Even before the wheels started coming off the dot.bomb I was working for I was networking around for a safe harbor. When the dust settled and everyone else was gone I had a plush gig baby sitting servers (kept up for contractual reasons) for 3 months + 3 months incentive severance and a firm start date with my current employer.
The only down side is they made me sit in an empty building on Walsh Ave. Upside is they stopped checking up on me after the first month. - alecm3, on 10/10/2007, -6/+10Jackpot! Business.com Sells for $350 Million
http://blog.wired.com/business/2007/07/jackpot-busines.html
I think the end of 2.0 is very near - Dangerman, on 10/10/2007, -2/+6"Every single person working in the media today who experienced the dot-com bubble in 1999 to 2000 believes that we are going through the exact same process and can expect the exact same results"
Uhhh...hi. I work in the media, was working in the media then and have worked with web technologies since well before 99 and I don't think what we are going through has anything to do with the irrational exuberance of the Dot-Com boom. Dvorak is a tool. - RawOysters, on 10/10/2007, -0/+4I kind of like Dvorak. He's that always negative, constantly complaining friend who is seldom right, but when he is, he nails it. I think I will make a file of these comments so I can repost them in 5 years. Could be interesting.
- FetalSage, on 10/10/2007, -1/+5Did anyone else get lost with his example of the CD-ROM bubble? What exactly was his point?
- juggrnaut, on 10/10/2007, -1/+4This will never be a problem for the same exact reason why IE is the most commonly used browser.
- kwolf, on 10/10/2007, -1/+4"something will happen." what? "not sure." when? "not sure." Great, thanks!
- whiteyMcBrown, on 10/10/2007, -1/+4Dvorak is not an idiot. He's been writing tech articles since before many on Digg were born. He has a good idea of general tech business ideas and very often, very specific knowledge of tech business. He does a good job at playing devil's advocate, at times, and doesn't always go along with the sheep. Many people know and acknowledge this and that's why he gets paid in dollars to give his opinion and some of you will never be paid in anything but diggs for yours.
That being said, I disagree with Dvorak on this one. While I see sites like Facebook and MySpace eventually slowing down, I think the nature of "2.0" is that visitors are generating much of the content, and therefore have a vested interest in visiting the sites – whether it's to stroke their own egos. check out their friends, or to just feel that sense of community. However, most of the money involved is businesses, who have nothing to do with these sites, advertising on them.
While the sites may fail, the businesses advertising on them (who sell real products and services and who usually employ more people) will just advertise on the next hottest site. The business of 2.0 is not the sites themselves, but the eyeballs they attract. That's why I think this one's gonna stick – again, not the sites themselves, but the nature of them. - whiskeyboarder, on 10/10/2007, -6/+9I am only digging in so much that you brought this article to my attention. Ultimately, the author did little to really convince me that "Bubble 2.0" isn't anything more than something to write about in an attempt to bring to end his apparent incessant boredom.
- MiltonWaddams, on 10/10/2007, -2/+5Digg doesn't have to be profitable. All they want to do is keep growing users/traffic and cash out to Google/Yahoo/MSN for a few hundred million.
- Dumbledorito, on 10/10/2007, -3/+6Aren't most pricks, by definition, "cocky?"
- xXShadowstormXx, on 10/10/2007, -0/+3http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_C._Dvorak
- PueSi, on 10/10/2007, -1/+4I kind of like him on Crankygeeks...bury me now!
- rationalist, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2Why would anyone need a "mouse"?
- LowRentDiggs, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2How much public investment is there tied up in these sites and how many IPOs have their been lately? I have no doubt a lot of these companies will go under but it's not going to plunge the economy into a recession like it did in 2000.
- rationalist, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2"Coing" - is that the sound your nose makes when it hits the keyboard?
- opticorey, on 10/10/2007, -1/+3I can't take any writer seriously who puts together sentences such as: "This scene is totally out of control and will contribute to the collapse for sure."
- inactive, on 10/10/2007, -1/+3whats so bad about supporting a website. unless its ads that take over your screen whats the big deal?
- tle105, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2It's a shame that people use adblock, all it does is remove the funding/profit from a web site's development, which then will end the development of the next big thing. Not supporting the websites you use sounds pretty unintelligent to me.
- velox, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2Wait, I read this again and it's even more silly than I previously thought. Is Dvorak trying to forecast certain aspects of fad-derived economics?
"WATCH OUT FOR THE WEB 2.0's"
"THE WIDGETS LEVEL ISN'T LOOKING TOO GOOD TODAY!"
"WOO BUDDY, PUT ON YOUR JACKET TO WATCH OUT FOR THEM FEISTY SOCIAL NETWORKS!"
I mean, I know the guy has to just find something to complain about any time PC Mag needs some filler text for their product catalogs disguised as a useful source of information, but at least put a little more effort into something than just vomiting your ***** thoughts out into keypresses. That might be acceptable for a random nerd rant (see: this post), or not, but it's definitely not acceptable for something that's supposed to be a-- wait, this is supposed to be a Discussion?! Discussion about what? Oh, I see, he's made a real attention-whore of a post to get people into their forums. Is that why he's always bitching about stuff like this? Why the ***** does pcmag.com still have a table-based layout? How much content do they have on there? I suppose it might be quite a bit.
Oh hey, look, I just wrote a Dvorak column. It's awful. - grumpyrain, on 10/10/2007, -1/+3I will save you the time:
1984: "There is no evidence that people want to use these things"
Any he was right, I mean, who uses a computer mouse
1999: "I suppose I shouldn't say this, but I can only describe it as a "girly" machine"
Yep, those iBooks will never take off.
2006: "If Microsoft ever makes its OS take advantage of multiple cores, you can be sure it will be for something mundane."
He is talking about Vista. He must have forgotten that Windows NT 4+ take advantage of SMP. - RyGuyX, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2I don't see what that has to do with Web 2.0
- tech42er, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2I don't use adblock. If a site wants ad revenue, fine. Non-intrusive adnsense ads don;t bother me and I'm getting content for free. The least I could do is glance at some ads.
- controltheweb, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2He describes a competitive web economy and tries to make us believe that it's not competition, it's over-saturation. But there are tons of successful companies. They aren't going anywhere.
- sintaks, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2Sounds like a bunch of pessimistic patter, meant to incite riots among our kind.
The largest difference, as many have noted, is that most of the companies thought of as "Web 2.0" today are either independently funded, micro-funded, or are made big as part of an acquisition.
So people want to make a YouTube clone. Who cares? Amazon's S3 storage makes it cake to handle storage space and bandwidth at an affordable price. Pownce is a prime example of how a small team of people (albeit, with a bit of clout) can do something like host user-files for thousands of users without having to buy expensive hardware. They charge 3 bucks per run of ads. At $0.15/mo per GB for storage and $0.10/mo per GB for bandwidth, I think they can handle the load.
Sure. Digg got funded, but they're making money off advertising partnerships. Sure, Facebook got funded, but they're making money off advertising partnerships. And demographic data and analysis.
Sure, some kid might try to create the next Web 2.0 app and fail miserably... just as miserably as if he had started a lemonade stand on Main St. And he'll probably be out the same amount of money, if he's smart about it.
Web 2.0 isn't just about flashy websites and social media. It's also about how *easy* it is to start something with minimal risk and monetary commitment. If it doesn't take much to blow the bubble, not much will happen when it pops. - blackcap, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2Who knows, I got confused as well. I never realized there was a CD-ROM bubble! Maybe it's all in his mind.
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