Dotcom shakeout
('the times they are e-changing')
The first great Dotcom Shakeout took place in Spring 2000. As with the classic stockmarket falls (1929, 1987) the market reached an all-time peak, looked over the edge, held its breath and jumped. Clickmango.com (an American healthcare operation) and Boo.com (a European retailer) were 2 of the famous casualties. Lastminute.com symbolised the predicament for many. Its shareprice was fractioned but, by 2003, its fame and its alliances allowed a period life after death. Profits are widely predicted.
At the turn of 2000 analysts began to review the shakeout and the following points emerged from a Radio 4 discussion:
- The question 'what do dotcoms do?' yielded 2 main answers: publishing and retailing
- The question 'what can a dotcom do well?' yielded another 2 answers: cut costs and win market share
These principles are likely to guide the next stage of the dotcom revolution:
- All-brick operations must learn click-business, so there will be heavy investment in web design and web infrastructure. The cost of a web division is relatively small for a big company, and those who don't make the change may be left by the wayside. See retail dilemma.
- Cash is king' will replace 'Landgrab' as the leading idea behind web business
- Website architects must learn to care deeply about good navigation, web usability, user satisfaction and revenue generation: they must learn to monetize web content
As with the nineteenth century railway companies, only a few large pure dotcoms survived the Great Dotcom Crash: Amazon.com, Yahoo.com, Ebay.com. But some new Dotcoms have grown great since the crash Google.com has been a brilliant success. Walmart.com is doing very well.
As Bob Dylan put it, the times they are a-changing:
Come senators, congressmen
Please heed the call
Don't stand in the doorway
Don't block up the hall
For he that gets hurt will be he who has stalled
There's a battle outside
And its raging
It'll soon shake your windows
And rattle your walls
For the times they are a-changing
