August 19, 2007

Cyberspace is a Meritocracy

I love the article in September's Fast Company about 17-year-old Ashley Qualls who has a Website called Whateverlife.com that attracts more than 7 million individuals and 60 million page views a month. According to Fast Company, "that's a larger audience than the circulations of Seventeen, Teen Vogue, and CosmoGirl! magazines combined." In fact, Ms. Qualls' site ranks number 349 out of more than 20 million sites! Yes, she's 17.

What this so clearly shows is that cyberspace is a meritocracy. Got a good idea? No one is going to stand in the way of you developing and implementing it. No barriers. No one saying you've got no experience, you don't have the skills, you haven't got enough education...whatever. Nike's slogan belongs to the Web: Just Do It.

What does Ms. Qualls' site consist of? Wonderful designs for MySpace pages.

With 200 million members - and new sign-ups at the rate of 2 million per week - MySpace has not only created a cultural phenomenon, but it has also spawned a slew of related businesses...like Whateverlife.com.

It's All About Community

MySpace is the poster child for community. People want to be involved, to engage, to create content, not just be exposed to it. And so we see YouTube, Facebook, and more.

The YouTube debate was groundbreaking. Ask almost anyone for the one question they recall, and they'll tell you the one with the snowman. The snowman was asking what each candidate would do about global warming. Contrast the indelibility of that question coming from the snowman vs. if it had come from a talking head moderator. No comparison. Suddenly, thanks to the ingenuity of some individual citizen, a question was posed in a compelling visual manner. (Would that the responses were as compelling.) Finally, someone was using the medium of television appropriately.

Now...will someone explain to me why the Republicans initially refused to have a YouTube debate apparently because of the snowman question which they thought was debasing in some way. Or was it that they didn't want to get that close to the people, or are that out of touch with today's culture of community and involvement. What a shame.

Consequences of Woman Power

I read somewhere that two economic consequences of women's buying power have been the boom in the home improvement industry (women rule at Home Depot and Lowe's...they outpace, outshine, and outspend us men in home improvement by a mile) AND the boom in democratized luxury. Mass luxury has been a result of women having money AND spending it.

Today's New York Times has an article about a new book, Deluxe: How Luxury Lost Its Luster, in which the author, Dana Thomas, writes that the quality, craftsmanship, and personal service once associated with luxury goods has disappeared. Now that everyone has easy access to the once-exclusive brands, they have lost their luster. New brands can now come in to take their place. Opportunity!