In 1996, Tim Berners-Lee said,
"what you actually see when you look at the Web is pretty much a corporate broadcast medium. The largest use of the Web is the Corporation making a broadcast message to the consumer."
Well, check this out - TorStar has launched a new site called ourfavs.com. It says its in Beta, it feels like a start-up but it is wholly owned and operated by TorStar (they neglect to mention this in the about us section - you have to go to the terms of use).
Looks like Web 2.0 is going the way of a corporate social media medium (say that 10X fast).
I dunno, maybe it's because I am an entrepreneur, but I like the idea of small companies starting and having users decide what is going to survive before it gets onto Yahoo or the TorStar website.
Having Corporations start their own start-ups? Something just doesn't feel right about that.
Tuesday, 1 May 2007
What Would Tim Berners-Lee Say Now?
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3 comments:
Meh. Not only is there no RSS - which is actually sin in my religion (umm... Sikhism?) - the almost stereotypical hipster-twentysomething vibe feels forced. It's possible, of course, that your posting has just made me biased.
P.S. Love this blog!
You'd think with every other marketing blog out there going on about transparency, authenticity etc. they would be more upfront that they are TorStar.
If you go to the team section, they have the 'creator and general manager' there, almost as if she is a co-founder. I am not sure going to a Corporate brainstorming meeting (and I am just guessing here) qualifies one as a creator even if the idea was yours. I mean if it did, I know a whole bunch of pple who should have had their names up on the old gmcanada.com website!
*sigh* someone who i know emailed me and told me i was being hard on Candice (the GM). Not the intent at all as I am sure she has put an amazing amount of work into the project. (and really I hate all the negativity going on in the Blogosphere sometimes so I wanted to clarify what my beef is).
My point is more about disclosure and the fact that I don't think you can be a co-founder if you haven't gone through the slog of raising money and all the ups and downs that come with that.
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