Yahoo!
Coming back to my blog a few days after I wrote the piece about Yahoo!, the title struck me completely different than what I intended. Yahoo! podcasting site is closing sounds like the celebration of a Web site’s demise. I started thinking, in print, a negative story about Yahoo! can be a challenge to write. Here are a couple of hypothetical headlines:
Yahoo! Earnings Decline for a Second Straight Quarter
Yahoo! Executive Caught in a Compromising Position
Yahoo! Manager Injured in a Freak Boating Accident
Yahoo! Podcasting Site is Closing
Just read an article on Read/WriteWeb about Yahoo! closing it’s Podcasting site. I visited the site when it went live, but I didn’t sense a buy-in from Yahoo! There’s also this latent prejudice I have against Yahoo! that is kind of like the old prejudice against AOL…it’s for noobs.
It’s not bad that Yahoo! is for noobs. It’s an important, valuable and necessary position. It matters, though, that podcasting, so far, has been adopted most intensely by earlier adoptors. That’s why tech shows tend to dominate.
Yahoo! probably jumped on board too soon and they’re probably cutting the cord too soon. The next wave of popularity in podcasting, I’m willing to bet, will be entertainment news. Just like we work to be the engadget of podcasting, someone is going to become the egotastic of podcasting. We would try it but Cali can’t be mean and that’s kind of the bottom line in entertainment news. Entertainment news is for noobs and there are way more noobs in the world that early adopters.
Read MoreBlogger Elitism
So Web 2.0 is about “user generated content,” right? Not really because bloggers in silicon valley and alley don’t recognize “users” who don’t publish from the valley.
We spoke at Gnomedex 7.0. One guy said he walked out on our speech because he thought Cali was pretending to be interested in tech so she could get a cushy job working at home. That guy is an idiot. The sixteen+ hours Cali works a day on building the Geek Brief brand is nothing related to cushiness. Anyone who thinks someone can pretend an interest in tech and be successful is a dork because tech is boring if you don’t love it.
Web 2.0 is about opportunity. I have a dream. You have a dream. Web 2.0 makes the dream obtainable. If you criticize the exceptional opportunity provided by the current Internet…well, you’re probably not doing anything with your talent. You should start because the world needs you! 