Combating Boredom
Thursday, June 26th, 2008
Over the past several weeks there have been some interesting posts surfacing about about web 2.0 boredom, the dead or dieing exit market, and topics surrounding the usefulness of applications currently being developed. An interesting post by Fred Wilson regarding web 2.0 investments really got me thinking about for what reason, if any, are the majority of popular apps developed. Certainly there are some reasons that fall outside the scope of money and ‘fame’, but there aren’t many. The push to develop things that matter is certainly there and several companies are trying to truly create economic growth and development with these applications but it is hard to say if/when that will be successful. The immense amount of data and development that does exist could provide enormous opportunities for people/communities that are not currently being reached in the web 2.0 sphere.
In the same light, ReadWriteWeb had an interesting post that basically mirrors these same thoughts occurring throughout the industry.
While a healthy dose of social media is fun and sometimes informative, it rarely taps into our desire to feel as if what we’re doing has meaning or purpose. Being “social” online tends to be a casual activity where you make friends or share news, and not one where you’re fighting to solve the world’s problems.
Whether or not current applications will be able to shift towards promoting social well-being is one question and whether or not they should is an entirely different one. Developing for fun is a great thing and saying that the web should be one way or another defeats the purpose of its structure. There will always be a place for new, fun, and maybe totally useless applications because they are needed and essential to the web culture.
Above all, it has been very interesting and rewarding watching the greater Startup Weekend community play a role in building applications on both sides of this issue.
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Tags: web2.0
