Great post by Fred Wilson on Silicon Alley Insider today. Interesting to see a VC look at the market through the two lenses – the investor that can make tremendous profits off the M&A activity of the major media companies and the personal Internet user that lives with the inferior services these acquisitions make.
Wilson talks about the biggest players in the Internet sector’s desire to roll everything up into one master service. Yet people seem to gravitate toward variety and diversity.
But advertisers demand scale. Publishers grow by having more to sell.
Lots of options designed to please passionate collections of users and a publisher that allows this diverse group of media entrepreneurs to earn a good living of their work without becoming a cog in the giant wheel. Hmmmm. Sounds familiar…
I often wonder what would have happened if the Flickr team was left to themselves. Or Tacoda… Think Fred may have a point.