Will Netscape eat itself?

bergman@everyday.se ((bergman@everyday.se))
Thu, 5 Oct 1995 13:52:16 -0700

Matt Marnell seems to think he has most of the answers. Maybe he knows which
committee created the proprietary standard we know as Windows? Talking about
Microsoft, the chances Netscape have are very much linked to what in
marketing is known as focusing. Doing one thing better than everybody else
is easier than doing everything (MS). After all, MS does not dominate all
software categories. A specialist always has higher credibility (when
wellknown) than the big "do-it-all". MS domination (and attitude) in many
areas makes more and more people, all else being equal, prefer a non-MS
product. Overtaking Netscapes 70% share isn't that easy, not even for MS.

Talk about being a mark-up or presentation language is really irrelevant. Of
course everything on www is out there to be presented to someone, in the
BEST way possible. Content is king, but shape and style still matters quite
a lot (what clothes do you wear?). If you don't like the frills there is
always gopher.

Matt wrote:
<i>>So Netscape will have a proprietary standard. Since they've</i>
<i>>demonstrated how poorly they write standards, it's not one I'd want to</i>
<i>>get into. Now style sheets, something Netscape should have been working</i>
<i>>on instead of writing bad extensions, are where to look in the future.</i>
<i>>Oh, that's right, you have no truck with the committees. Pity because</i>
<i>>that's how things are done on the Net, and there is a much bigger brain</i>
<i>>trust behind those committees then Netscape could beg borrow or steal.</i>

Sure about that? What about the freedom of the net? Someone creates
something, a lot of people likes it and starts using it, and suddenly a
"standard" has evolved. Like it or not. 70% of users is more than I'd call
"proprietary". Very few things are CREATED by committees. One reason for the
quick rise of www are the continously growing technical possibilities. If
some people make ugly pages that take too long to download, that's just a
misuse and really their own problem, because nobody will look at their
presentations. When DTP emerged you saw lots of things printed with
sometimes ten different typefaces on one page. So, should you have limited
those possibilities within the programs?

Some things can't be controlled. That is really what has made the net grow
like it has. Not some heroic committee effort! You'll just have to learn to
live with some of the technical shortcomings this might mean. It happens all
the time (look at Windows).

One thing that will come out of all this is the need for skilled help if you
want to do something good on www. Just because you can spell doesn't mean
you can write beautiful lyrics. Those who still want to do it themselves
will hopefully learn with time to keep things uncomplicated.

You just can't expect everything to be perfect at once. And limiting the
possibilities is not the cure!

Anders

Anders Bergman
EDW
Stockholm, Sweden
bergman@everyday.se

----
This week's sponsor:
Marketing to Women Online Conference &amp;lt;&lt;a href="<a href="http://kelseygroup.com/kelsey">http://kelseygroup.com/kelsey</a>"&gt;http://kelseygroup.com/kelsey&lt;/a&gt;&amp;gt;

Sponsor the Internet Marketing Discussion List! See the URL
&amp;lt;&lt;a href="<a href="http://www.popco.com/hyper/internet-marketing/sponsor.html">http://www.popco.com/hyper/internet-marketing/sponsor.html</a>"&gt;http://www.popco.com/hyper/internet-marketing/sponsor.html&lt;/a&gt;&amp;gt; for details

Return to top-level of current discussion

Return to Internet Marketing Home Page

Search the archives

Enter keywords


Post a message to this group by filling in the form below.

From:
Subject: