Almost Famous in ‘08

I’ve been pondering a “Predictions for 2008″ post for most of the month. I had all kinds of ideas for crazy things I could predict (for example: giant Internet crash leaving millions without Twitter updates leading to mass riots and utter chaos) but with my record for this year, I’d be afraid they would all come true and then I’d be held responsible. Instead, I wanted to talk about trends in 2007 and what they will mean for 2008. Boring, I know … :-)

Almost Famous

Originally uploaded by seminomad.

We’re at a crossroads right now on our march to the “open web”. If you’ve ever seen the movie Almost Famous you might know what I’m alluding to. There is a great scene with Philip Seymore Hoffman (playing Lester Bangs) and Patrick Fugit (playing William Miller):

Lester Bangs: Your writing is damn good. It’s just a shame you missed out on rock ‘n’ roll.
William Miller: It’s over?
Lester Bangs: It’s over. You got here just in time for the death rattle. Last gasp. Last grope.

What Lester is referring to is the fact that rock n’ roll was already a big business. It wasn’t a place any more for the romantic rockers fighting the system. It was the system and it took a visit from Jimmy Fallon’s character to make that clear to William Miller during the movie.

I’ve always been curious about what happens to an industry as it matures. We saw it with newspapers, the telephone, railroads, etc … you name it. Disruptive technologies always cause a proliferation of new businesses but over time we see massive consolidation leading to just a few big entities that decide how things happen and when. The barrier to entry in the market grows and competing with these big companies becomes virtually impossible as competition melts away. The Internet and web are no different.

We’re at the same crossroads that Lester Bangs talked about that rock n’ roll ended up at. The Internet has already seen massive consolidation in 2007 and its clear that the trend will continue. Even more, the US government’s ears have finally perked up and the possibilities (network neutrality - what an oxymoron) by people who think the Internet is a series of tubes is chilling. We’re on the verge of this whole thing being owned by a few companies and regulated by their proxies in public office.

But there’s hope.

If there is one thing we’ve learned in 2007 its that the power of the user is growing. Power to the people and all that. Users want control, they want their privacy if they ask for it and they are voting with their feet. We’ve also seen the emergence of and the realization of a lot of technologies that are helping to define the “open web”. Its these technologies that are helping to answer the needs of users by allowing them to maintain control and manage their privacy. We have to see more of this in 2008 or I’m afraid we go the route of rock n’ roll.

OpenID, OAuth and microformats emerged as the key building blocks to the open web. Everyone jumped on the “open” bandwagon. OpenSocial, Android appeared from Google. Verizon got in on the action. Facebook. You name it. But things are still pretty darn painful. We have some of the pieces for helping make sure the web and the Internet stay open for good, but we have a ways to go.

Looking across the social networking world, I’m still of the opinion that its not something you just do. Your social network is a tool and it should be available everywhere you go. Social networking should be a feature sites, not a destination.

Of course, I’m not alone in thinking this:

The future of social networking is coming into focus and it looks like Facebook-ish features will be increasingly be integrated into your everyday applications.

- Larry Dignan, Social networking: Quietly being subsumed by your everyday apps, 11/14/2007

and of course:

Now it’s practically a given that your time online is social time. Between commercial and peer pressure, you’re expected to maintain both a public presence for general interaction and a semi-private sphere for friends and family, both updated in real time with your activities, opinions, latest interests, location, and cultural tastes. The vehicles for this presence were homepages at first, then blogs, and now the widget-laden profiles on the social networking sites, along with an endless flow of pinging, poking and tweeting. It’s sort of funny that a system built by notoriously socially awkward geeks has turned into a mammoth, never-ending cocktail party. But that’s where we are, and right now, billions are being bet on monetizing the world of constant acquaintanceship.

- John Murrell, Good Morning Silicon Valley - SiliconValley.com

2008 to me will be about building the final pieces of the open web. I don’t see a world with one or two winners in the social networking space. I still don’t believe social networking is a destination; its a feature. How do we make that a reality? Well, we have to be able to interoperate among sites. Users need control of who they are and what relationship they have and those have to work everywhere they go. We need standards and protocols that are open to do that. 2008 will be about creating the final pieces of technology we need to make this reality and then it will be a mad dash to see it all come together.

I for one, will be working hard to make this happen … looking forward to a fruitful (and not Almost Famous) ‘08 … peace out!