| By Salvatore Genovese |
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| October 27, 2008 09:45 PM EDT |
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4,067 |
As the headline says Web 2.0, Enterprise Mashups and Social Computing are not software business models. Any company that depends on these hip trends and B/S for their livelihood should lock up their doors and go home. They have no chance of staying in business, especially not after what happened this past week.
What is a mashup? Nothing. What are you mashing up with what? If you take Google Earth from under your feet, what’s left to mash with what and where’s the business model to make money? Nowhere.
Who will you sell your mashup software to after the election is over? How many software mashup companies does CNN need for Mr. King's election maps mashup magic show? None.
So if you bet your business model on Enterprise Mashups or mashup whatevers, the game is up.
Tomorrow morning when you wake up, call your lead developers and tell them you need to start something new somewhere in the clouds, something to do with, say, Virtualization, or something.
Oh, I almost forgot Social Computing. Social Computing is not a software business model either. How many customers can you possibly find to buy your Social Computing software solutions? All the sexual predators are already camping out either on MySpace or Facebook. Do you think you’ll sell a Social Computing software platform to a customer so they can start their own Social Computing network? That's B/S. There is no such business. OK, so if your company accidentally hit a dead end going in this direction, you need to call a meeting with your people tomorrow morning. Change your business to something to do with Virtualization, or move your business to the Clouds.
I’m very sorry to bring you the bad news, folks. You need to develop real technology for real times. Playing with Web 2.0, Mashups, Social Computing and other B/S is over. No more Web 2.0, no more stupidities, because you got real confused with YouTube, MySpace, or Facebook. Leave them alone and get real. You won’t get the huge VC investment for your Mashup solution, you won’t create the next Facebook. If they were to be created in some software kitchen, Microsoft, IBM and Oracle have bigger kitchens than yours, they could have done it. You bought a lottery ticket, you didn’t win. It's time to get back to work!
By the way, RIAs, AJAX, Ruby, Java and other essential technologies have nothing to do with Web 2.0, Social Computing, Enterprise Mashups or other nonsense, as long as they are used to solve real business problems and add real value to businesses.
Emerging technologies and platforms like Virtualization and Cloud Computing are viable software business models with huge potential, especially now. They have nothing to do with Web 2.0 B/S and its affiliated buzzwords Social Computing or Enterprise Mashups. Let's get real folks in these very real times.
