Is dot com dead?
Andy Caddy
They are saying that dot com is dead. "They"
quite obviously means the same people who, not twelve months ago told
us we were at the start of a revolution and that things were never going
to be the same again yada yada. So Boo.com and Clickmango died. Good.
Now those Latte-drinking, twisted jean wearing Clerkenwell types will
have to go and find proper jobs and stop annoying us with poor propositions
that somehow squeezed a lot of money out of dumb venture capitalists.
And the share prices have tumbled. Good. Now those brainless sheep in
the city have stopped piling into TMT shares, the solid business model
can return as a basis to setting up business. Sure it's going to be tough,
but we can say goodbye to the NoChanceInANicheMarket.com's of this world.
But dot com, over? I don't think so. If by dot com we mean the revolution and innovation that the Internet has brought to business then that continues to progress at break-neck pace. If you mean the change in customer expectation to demand information when they need it about products that are appropriate, then anyone who has used Amazon, Streets Online, CDNOW will know they won't accept anything less. The Internet is now so intrinsic to way in which companies operate that to take it away would paralyse modern industry. Dramatic? I think not. Lets consider all the constituent parts that compose the 'Internet'. Well, for starters there is the world wide web as a sales channel. Not a lot of business there, but growing. Now consider the support tools that companies have - dialing in, remote financial reporting, fault diagnosis. They're all based on the web. And what about the Intranets that act as glorified phone books in some places, but in others are part of the company communication and culture. And while we are on the subject of communication, let's just think about those global companies who use virtual networks over the internet to connect their business. And then after all that let's consider the big one: life without email. Actually, let's not. If you really want to see this all in action, you don't have to go very far. 1993 in fact, a whole eight years ago. You can argue about technically when the Internet began, but in '93, Microsoft didn't know about the Internet, Netscape were akin to a hobbyist outfit, and you would be hard pushed to find anyone outside of educational institutions using email. Eight years! What other innovation has bound itself so intricately with the modern world in such a short space of time?
At this point you may have some internal dialogue about how I'm not talking about dot com at all and in fact all I am waffling on about is IT and the progress of the Internet. Precisely. Hallelujah. Whatever. Dot com isn't about b2b or b2c or any other flavour of the month acronym being pedaled by 'new media' types in the sushi bars of central London. That was just the fabrication of the media and the city who so wanted to make money that they believed anything was possible. Even shipping a bag of maltesers across London within an hour for a whole 40 pence profit. Dot com is the Internet and Internet is dot com. Anyone who tells you that dot com is dead is wrong. Dot com has barely started.