David D. Kirkpatrick and Jamie Heller
David,
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StumbleUponI'd pin the turning point for dot-com culture at this year's Super Bowl. Though I can't claim to have seen the game myself, I understand it was peppered by a revolting string of dot-com ads--just like the ones all over our buses and subways and radio stations (even NPR!). That event marked the peak of dot-com chic. Essentially, dot-com turned mass market, and cheesy to boot.
What changed? For a long time, the Internet attracted the least risk averse. If you go with the Americana lore for a moment, the entrepreneurial character is supposed to be an attractive one. We certainly found that to be true in our recruiting here at TheStreet.com. Sure it was tough to find people back in '96. But the ones that did take the leap were creative, pioneering types, most of whom are still with us today. (Yes David, it could have been you, but you've done pretty well for yourself! As has Rob Walker [Slate's "Moneybox" columnist], who enjoyed a similar overture from me.)
In the last year or so, the nature of online recruiting has changed. Now people apply to dot-coms not because they're unafraid of the Net but because they're afraid of not being on the Net. Essentially, dot-coms have become the safe route. Safe is never stylish.
Your Columbia B School examples only send home the point. What was exciting (and exhausting) about the Internet four years ago (I think Slate launched around then, too) was building something new, brick by brick. These days, though, the Net is too often seen as the opposite--an easy path to $$$.
While the Net's in its tarnished period now, I think it will eventually cast off that stigma. Basically, the Web and e-mail are becoming so integrated into "actual" culture that "virtual" won't be a separate label for much longer. Every "real" company will have a Web arm, every Web company some real-world "brand extension."
Who knows, maybe soon enough the Net will become so unremarkable that we'll be spared magazine essays from the chattering classes every time they have their first shopping experience online. Wishful thinking?
Jamie
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Reader Response from The Fray--to be read after the most recent entry:
I still don't understand how the stock market can be efficient in the long term and not the short run. And I'm not relying merely on Keynes' famous sentiments about the long run; my point is even simpler: when is the long run? Was Microsoft's long run value from 1990 to early 2000 or to today? Short run volatility must have consequences for people who claim long run efficiency. To my mind, and for many other reasons, believing in efficient markets is like believing in Santa Claus--there are correlations between expected results and reality, but people really ought to grow up and accept that no-one on Wall Street knows anything.
--Jeff
(To reply, click here.)
(5/22)
To Jeff: Various natural processes are long-term efficient without being short-term efficient, for example the downhill flow of water or the process of natural selection (aka evolution). Complex human processes seem to have similar behavior. Perhaps efficient is being confused with "optimal". The problem with most strategies that attempt to be optimal is that they often have truly horrendous failure cases, which wipe out all their interim or theoretical gains. Democracy has been called "the worst form of government, except for all the rest." It is hardly optimal, and in many cases very inefficient. A dictator could get the graffiti cleaned up and the trains running on time; democracy seems to have a hard time doing such things. But what about the failure case of a less-than-benign dictator or a dictator whose benign intentions diverge from many or most of the desires of the population? An example of short-term efficiency vs. long-term, in terms of human happiness.
That's not to say short-term efficiency is bad, or that we can't improve on raw systems. But it is possible for a strategy to be the best long-term one without exhibiting short-term efficiency.
--Paul Canniff
(To reply, click here.)
(5/23)