I am not too worried about all the dot-com layoffs, even though I think it’s sad for those who are left without a job and are forced to compete with all the other laid off people for the small number of open positions. Statistics show that 4 out of 5 new business will fail within the first two years of operation. I’m not sure why people thought that this well-known fact didn’t apply to the online sector as well. I am also of the opinion that perhaps 8 out 10 dot-com employees were not necessarily well-suited for the online technology industry. My experience shows that a surprisingly high number of these people treated their job in the new media industry as cushy place where they can do just the minimal amount of work and spend the rest of the day emailing and instant messaging their friends and surfing the web. I could be wrong, but maybe it’s time for those people to leave the new media field.
Post-Bubble Thinking: What’s most interesting about a recession is the interesting and innovative ways companies will start using the Internet to save money. Note that this is a completely different way of thinking about the Internet when comparing it to many of the business plans and revenue models of failed dot-coms which tried to create a business on top of nothing more than hype, advertising revenues, and the salesmanship of their executive teams.
The companies to watch in the post-bubble market are those that promise to save other companies money by offering products and services that take advantage of the capabilities and connectivity of the Internet. This is especially true for everyone if the economy does head into a downward spiral or a recession.
Posted by Cameron Barrett at April 16, 2001 10:44 PM