Morning Folks!!
Last year was 2008 BC. Before the crash and before the meltdown. So is 2009....2009 AC? 2009 AFTER CRASH? In a word, no. It is 2009, YEAR ONE on the Internet. This year is the actual starting point of the net. Whatever happened before was just positioning. Just a test. Just whatever it was. But now 2009 marks the true beginning of the Internet.
Today, when somebody loses their job, they go and signup for unemployment and their next chore is putting up a website. Not for all, but for too many to even count. Millions upon millions. In 2001 and 2002 I stated “From the ashes domains would rise the true Internet.” It did in spite of Main Street and Corporate America and the media doing everything in their power to kill it. The newspapers saw their empires in jeopardy and they fought tooth and nail to destroy the Internet. Same with broadcast media. Story after story about security and only to scare folks away. Misinformation spread purely for their selfish survival needs. Well, it did not work! It worked for a short time, but now it is over. They have lost. They have been defeated. They have been annihilated. They won’t disappear completely, but just like the local Blacksmith, their time has come and gone. While there will always be a need for the blacksmith, there will also always be a need for newspapers and periodicals. They will just take a different form and the newsstand of tomorrow won’t look like the ones of today.
The blacksmith’s that survived likely put in a gas pump. A gas pump to keep up with the times. Those that did not, mostly disappeared. Same with media today. Those that put in gas pumps, I mean transform their business to websites, have a chance to survive. Those that actually embrace and are aggressive will have a chance to thrive. The NY Times is on life support, the Boston Globe in even worse shape. The Wall Street Journal, flying high because they adapted instead of fighting the losing battle of the others. Pretty simple stuff from where I sit. Pretty predictable from where I sit. Why did those in the boardrooms miss it?
So as we look ahead to the rest of 2009 and into 2010 I can tell you that transformation is in the air. The last phase of a 20 year plan is about to start. This phase will trump all other phases combined. You are about to witness an explosion of epic proportions. And while payouts are as low as I have seen, I am here to tell you that in the next 12-18 months payouts will once again reach record levels. Demand for targeted traffic will go up exponentially. You will see the fist signs of this as early as August 2009. Then of course the fall will be even more interesting. However we won’t yet be out of the woods. It will unfortunately be short lived. As prices early in 2010 will once again collapse as I see it. However that will be the end of the worst part as we go through 2010 things are going to firm up. By August 2010 get ready to rumble. This time it will be here to stay and we are off to the races. That’s how I see things unfolding. As always, time will tell. I could even be off by a year. Point is this IS what is coming. The only question is the time line.
Have a GREAT Day!
Rick Schwartz
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