Do the Giants Win?

Posted by: Heather Green on October 05, 2005

Fred Wilson has started an interesting thread about whether point services (think Flickr) or end to end ones (think portals) are going to win the masses. His question really struck a chord with me, because just last week I was wondering about the future of del.icio.us, the pioneering tagging startup that Wilson is invested in as a VC.

Here’s why. Last week, we met Bradley Horowitz, one of Yahoo’s big thinkers in search. Horowitz showed us My Web 2.0, a beta service that the company recently launched. I hadn’t taken a look at it before, but as I did, all I could think was that Yahoo had taken the del.icio.us bookmark tagging services and added more on top of it, including selective social networking.

Essentially, Yahoo just swallowed del.icio.us. So, where does that leave the startup? It’s too early to tell and I didn’t ask Wilson or del.icio.us about it. But clearly the question that Wilson is asking—who wins the masses—is one that’s going to be played out with increasing frequency because of the state of rapid innovation we’re in.

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Reader Comments

Jeremy Pepper

October 5, 2005 08:44 PM

Good post from you, Heather.

It makes me wonder - to the general public - how much does del.icio.us matter, or for that matter, how much does tagging.

That's just the thing. For the technology folks, for the early adopter, these things matter alot. But, grab that Mom or Dad off the street, and tagging means gang graffiti, and there is likely very little interest beyond keeping neighborhoods tag free.

divya

October 7, 2005 05:49 AM

I think in either case simplicity will win.

Adding more features doesnt mean it makes it better, del.icio.us loads fastest, has excellent auto tips when I have to blog, has an API which supports several software.

Also, Yahoo's acquiring Flickr did not go well as far as the registration screen is concerned. People were disappointed at the end of the fun cool company that was flickr and are now wondering where it will all lead to.

mark slater

January 6, 2006 04:37 PM

simple answer - they acquired them.

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In Blogspotting Senior Writer Stephen Baker and Associate Editor Heather Green take a look at how cutting-edge technologies are changing business and society. Whether its blogs or wikis, data crunching or data targeting, technology’s advances are reshaping the world that we live in.

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