Back in 1996, when I started my internet company, people would say, “On the web, content is king.” What they meant at the time, was that in the new web space, quality content would rule the day. More and more people would be surfing the net, and therefore there would be an appetite for content like never before. Mass content, niche content, all kinds of content. A great marketplace of content. Also, the predictions went, the control of content would be democratized. Users could decide– not big studios or publishing companies– what kind of content was published and consumed. Content would be both subscription-based and ad-supported.

Then, the dot-com nuclear winter happened. A lot of sites failed, and content sites seemed anything but kingly. People at the time were also laughing at ideas like

• An online grocery business succeeding.
• People buying luxury goods (diamonds, houses, cars) online.
• The arrival of broadband on every desktop.
• Community sites making money.

No one’s laughing any longer. Continue reading →