Most of us are boring and know it

by David Holtzman

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Reuters reports that Web 2.0 sites are not quite as participatory as the media hype would have us believe. Less than 0.16% of Youtube visitors upload, for instance. 0.2% upload to Flickr.

Yet overall traffic to these kind of sites are up 668%. This number represents 12% of all US traffic, up from 2% two years ago.

Significance? It's like cable access channels...a camera does not make an actor. Most people don't have anything entertaining to say or do and they quickly realize it. Much of the best stuff on Youtube is based on screwups, very little are professionally produced. Although check out this bit on George Washington.

Web 2.0 is, of course, doomed. Maybe not today, but soon. The idea of user-generated content is interesting, but not entertaining and I believe that realization of that is what drives these numbers. American Idol would lead you to believe that anyone is a potential Celine Dion, but the truth is that you would not pay to hear most people sing, or to watch most people dance or to listen to comedy from anyone who has a goofy face.

Posted on April 18, 2007

1 Comment
Technology

After all the years of speculation, I think that Tim O'Reilly has finally put together a succinct definition:

"Web 2.0 is about harnessing network effects to build applications and platforms that get better the more people use them."

This means that Web 2.0 is not just about user-contributed content, but also about how even modest interaction by the viewers works to improve sites. Google can improve the way it displays results and ads merely by analyzing how users click on them. And for every video uploaded to YouTube there are thousands of views, comments, and ratings that are working to establish which videos are worth seeing.

The talk about Web 2.0 will subside eventually, but only because people are going to forget the days when static content ruled the web.

Posted by Mike McCaffrey on April 18, 2007

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