A second Internet revolution? Not really...

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Evolution over Revolution

Dan,

I'm glad you left the part "Lightweight user interfaces, development models, AND business models" 'til last.

Like the ice dancers who move with such facility, grace, speed, synchronicity, and precision, there is a lot of hard work, sweat, and tears (including, and I'm just being brutally honest here, leaving some behind who could not make the cut) to make it look so easy, so effortless. The creation of lightweight business model interfaces is still a little way off, and to my eye development models is still a mish-mash of ideas that usually compete (often for good reasons - this is not a 'Can't we all just get along' message).

On the whole I have to agree. Thinking about the Net in terms of phases is misleading - even counter-productive.

I am still amazed to meet people who crow that the dot-com bust was the end of the Net. One or two have even said to me 'That's the last we'll see of that' - ignoring the fact that every agency business has already been re-invented by the Net (and continues to be...), that every retailer is feeling real financial pain as their customers move more and more to the Net, and that some industries (big global ones too) are finding that they must work together to embrace this phenomenon before its next wave overwhelms their current business models.

I am cautious on Gartner's forecast for micro-charging. The card companies, of course, have adjusted their industry to cope with some of these small charges - thus squeezing new (Amazon-style) entrants into the payments market. If some of the charges they now handle more readily than they did five years ago were included the micro-payments market would already be much bigger than $30bn.

Gartners have, of course, had their fingers burned before when they predicted natural growth curves for Net commerce - so they are understandably conservative. Personally, I can see micro-charging growing much faster - and I have advised a micro-payments company on that basis.

Posted by: Stephen Wheeler   Posted on: 10/18/05 You are currently: a Guest | Members login | Terms of Use

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