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Posts Tagged ‘web 3.0’

Everybody I know is tired of hearing about Web 2.0. But some people are determined to shoot themselves in the foot with very old bullets. Here’s what happened this week.

Where transportation is headed.

That Mule Doesn’t Look So Good

There I was, tearing through marketing sites this week,  searching for treasure, poking, digging, muttering, like one of those crazy old miners lost in the desert. Right before I went completely nuts and started talking to my pack mule, I hit gold. I found a link to a new marketing guy! Time for big ideas, fresh insights, the latest cutting of edges.  I’m all excited.  I pat the mule on the head, grab some coffee, and sit back to enjoy my haul.

As soon as I brush the dust off the site and take a good look, guess what I see? Web 2.0! He’s a Web 2.0 expert! Wow. And nobody in the universe knows Web 2.0 like he knows Web 2.0! He has Web 2.0 books, Web 2.0 videos, Web 2.0 courses, Web 2.0 consulting, and several sites with “Web 2.0″ right in the name.  Not only that, but he’s building more Web 2.0 stuff every day. If you’re really smart you’ll get out that wallet and jump on his stuff quick! This guy really is the king of all things Web 2.0.

There’s just one problem. Uhhh… Web 2.0 was old news like 5 years ago. In internet years that’s older than Methuselah. It’s like selling a mule AFTER it fell over dead, after it got good and ripe, and after the coyotes nibbled it down to the bone, and then the sun came out and bleached the bones blinding white like your granny’s favorite set of teeth.

How You Got the Mule

So is this guy insane? Well… in a word, yes. For the non techies, let me clear things up. The phrase “Web 2.0″ was coined by a brilliant marketing guy, and his friends, back in 2004. After the big Dot Com Bust they were trying to think of some ways to get people to seminars, and get the general public excited about the internet again.

They looked at emerging technologies (primarily Ajax) and at emerging trends (primarily social networking and  ”internet OS”) and they came up with the concept of Web 2.0. Basically they were thinking of it as the answer to the Dot Com Bust. To them it meant the “second coming” of the internet. Instead of the internet being over, they knew it was just taking off in new exciting ways, and they wanted a way to describe it.

So Web 2.0 is just a marketing term used to excite interest about some trends which were emerging five years ago.  These trends and technologies were not futuristic, they were already being used back then. They were at least developed well enough, 5 years ago,  that these marketing guys could coin a phrase to describe them. So they weren’t really that fresh back then. But the public didn’t know much about them.

My Mule Never Felt So Old

These things seemed so new back then, that they really seemed futuristic. But now they are just basic, ordinary things we all take for granted. They are so common place now we actually just ignore them.  So telling somebody you’re going to teach them about the exciting new world of Web 2.0 is like telling your teenager, “If you’re good, I’ll teach you how to turn on the television, or use the microwave, or maybe even dial the phone!” THAT is what Web 2.0 has become.

I can’t help thinking that my new friend, the “Master of Web 2.0″ is probably going to lose so much business pretty soon that he’ll be  jumping off a building. (He’ll probably call it suicide 2.0.) Things just change so fast now. It’s just like ox carts. Yes, I really said ox carts. You see, you could probably sell ox carts someplace in Mongolia, and say they’re the newest thing in transportation. Even though they’ve been around awhile,  you’ll probably still sell some. But one morning somebody is going to drive past your clients in a Pontiac.  Done. You just sold your very last ox cart.  On the internet, five years is the difference between ox carts and Pontiacs.

Keeping a Better Breed of Mules

So what do you do? It’s really not about products; it’s about the technology the products use. You can’t tie yourself so closely to things which can be “dated”, like specific technologies and buzz words. When you create your product lines, and names, and marketing plans, use a broader approach. Don’t be the guy who sells “lead paint”, just be the guy who sells “paint”. If the technologies change you’re ok. Don’t be the guy who sells “rotary phones”, just be the guy who sells “phones”. If you talk-up a technology as a selling point, be sure the core of your company, and the core of your marketing, is built on something more stable and durable. This is especially needed in technology fields, where everything will keep changing so quickly.

So what about the guy building his whole company on the term “Web 2.0″? Well, he’s a marketer, and he’s building his marketing business on a fairly nebulous buzz word. Now nebulous can be ok, but the problem is that the word is dated.  He should have sold himself as a “marketer”, and then qualified that by saying he keeps up with all the latest stuff. Then he could have specified what the lastest stuff was. Then he could have just gone  about calmly, and switched  technologies in and out of his portfolio as needed. He would have stayed above the fray.  Right now, every single thing he does, every book, video etc., is exclusively about Web 2.0. When Web 3.0 comes, (or whatever displaces web 2.0 conceptually) he has to throw all his products in the trash. He has to throw his websites in the trash. He even  has to throw his reputation in the trash, because it too is built exclusively on one thing, Web 2.0.

Dressing Your Mule For Success

Just for fun, how soon do you think Web 3.0 will come out? Remember these are just marketing buzz words, so you can call anything Web 3.0. But just for fun, I googled Web 3.0 and found  people writing about it all the way back in 2006.  Again, it just shows how dated Web 2.0 really is. Some guys would never even drive last year’s car, but they’d drive some worn out old marketing buzz. I know some hot marketing girls who would never wear last years hose, or shoes, or lipstick, but they’d make their company wear a bunch of dated marketing hype.

I used to have a bunch of neon T-shirts from a decade I won’t even mention. My fiancee at the time just went through my closet, and tossed them all out. She didn’t even apologize. Why? Because I looked like an idiot. I thought I looked cool. I thought moth balls existed so you could preserve your clothes and wear the same shirts for ever and ever. She just looked at me and said I still looked like an idiot. If you want to wear something horrendously dated, that’s fine. But just realize what you’ve done. Don’t try to tell your girlfriend how clever you are, and don’t try to tell the cool kids you’re one of them. It’s the same with your business. Don’t plaster something on your business that makes you look stupid.  Just say no.

So what do you do? In technology you don’t have to know everything, but you better know what the trends are. You better know if you’re wearing last decade’s stuff. Read, ask questions, stay aware. This stuff will NEVER stand still for you. Old movies are cool, old music is cool, old furniture is cool; lots of old things are cool…  but old technology is never cool.  And you can bet your favorite pack mule  or ox cart on that.