Note: The information on this page is reproduced here
for the participants in "Analysis of the Net", a course
at the Open University/Helsinki University
DEMISE OF THE WEB PREDICTED
[1995]
Mark Stahlman, president of New Media Associates, predicts the death of the
Web this year:
"Advertisers will dump the Web, and businesses that depend
on ad support will become uneconomic. But the cause won't be the poor
performance caused by `clogged pipes';... it's more fundamental. The Web
is a terrible place to manipulate people's unconscious fears, which is the
aim of consumer advertising... Advertising on the Web has to be
information, not manipulation. This is because the medium doesn't permit
the psychological games that `impact' a modern audience.... unless the Web
becomes television, as @Home and others hope. If the Web could readily
deliver video-server-based moving images, then the manipulative techniques
of TV ads could also be Web-delivered. But the bandwidth just isn't
available, and probably won't be for as long as 10 years... But there's
still a chance something quite new could happen. The Web is a medium for
information and education -- not unconscious mental manipulation. What if
the Web's real capability is taken seriously and it becomes the world's
largest adult education system?"
(Information Week 8 Apr 96 p100)
WEB PUBLISHING SHAKEOUT?
[1997]
With the recent demise of such Web publishing ventures such as Politics Now
and Out.com and the reduced activity of many others, industry analysts are
talking about a Web publishing shakeout caused primarily by the slow growth
of advertising support. Henry E. Scott, president of the parent company of
Out.com says: "I became increasingly concerned that the resources we were
putting into the Web product could have been better devoted to our core
product, which is the magazine. Having a Web site is no longer a sign of
being on the cutting edge. It might be a sign of not doing much original
thinking... Newspapers have a classified advertising franchise to protect
and just thinking about that you can make a pretty good case that newspapers
need to be involved in the Web. But it's entirely unclear to me that a
magazine Web site will ever reach profitability." (New York Times 25 Mar 97)
From
Edupage
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