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It's been almost three years since Tim O'reilly first officially coined the term 'Web 2.0,' and we've come a long way since then. This list looks at the 10 most successful Web 2.0 startups we've seen to date and provides researched information on each of them. The top 3? Surprise! MySpace, YouTube, and Facebook.
Web 2.0 is...
Quote:
Web 2.0, a phrase coined by O'Reilly Media in 2004, whilst refers to a perceived second-generation of Web-based services—such as social networking sites, wikis, communication tools, and folksonomies—that emphasize online collaboration and sharing among users. O'Reilly Media used the phrase as a title for a series of conferences, and it has since become widely adopted.
Not a style, design constitutions, use of specific web technology (E.g. AJAZ, AHAH, Ruby), hence MySpace being number 1. O'Reilly used the term to sell more books and conferences. The technology had already been there for years.
Anyway, These all had to be looked at as a Web 2.0 company (i.e. no eBay or Yahoo! or Craigslist), which I think we’ll all agree on. .
MySpace Launched: July 2003
Type: Social Network
Targeted Audience: 16 - 24 (teens, young adults)
Approximate Users: 150 million (100 million as of August 2006; growing at around 200,000 registrations per day)
Approximate Pageviews: 40 billion per month (as of March 2007)
Acquisition/Valuation: Bought by Rupert Murdoch’s Fox Interactive Media in July 2005 for $580 million
YouTube Launched: February 2005
Type: Video Sharing
Targeted Audience: 16 - 40 (teens, adults)
Approximate Users: Unknown
Approximate Pageviews: 4 billion per month (as of July 2006, serving 100 million videos per day)
Acquisition/Valuation: Bought by Google in October 2006 for $1.6 billion
Facebook Launched: February 2004
Type: Social Network
Targeted Audience: 20 - 25 (university students), this is changing since they have opened up
Approximate Users: 18 million (as of February 2007)
Approximate Pageviews: 22 billion per month (as of December 2006)
Acquisition/Valuation: Rejected $1 billion offer from Yahoo! in September 2006, asking for $2 billion
Wikipedia Launched: January 2001
Type: Wiki-based Encyclopedia
Targeted Audience: 10 - 80 (general)
Approximate Users: 50,000 active users (as of January 2006)
Approximate Pageviews: 6 billion per month (as of February 2007)
Acquisition/Valuation: Non-profit, has raised over $3 million in donations
Bebo Launched: January 2005
Type: Social Network
Targeted Audience: 16 - 24 (teens, young adults)
Approximate Users: 24 million (as of May 2006)
Approximate Pageviews: 4 billion per month (as of October 2006)
Acquisition/Valuation: Rejected $500 million offer from British Telecom Group, asking for $1 billion
Flickr Launched: February 2004
Type: Photo Sharing
Targeted Audience: 16 - 80 (general)
Approximate Users: 1.5 million (as of November 2005)
Approximate Pageviews: Unknown
Acquisition/Valuation: Bought by Yahoo! in March 2005 for an undisclosed price estimated in the lower tens of millions.
Meebo Launched: September 2005
Type: AJAX-based Instant Messaging
Targeted Audience: 13 - 40 (teens, adults)
Approximate Users: 500,000 users (as of October 2006)
Approximate Pageviews: N/A
Acquisition/Valuation: Has received around $12 million of venture capital to date; no acquisition rumors or linkups.
Netvibes Launched: September 2005
Type: AJAX-based Startpage
Targeted Audience: 20 - 40 (adults; technology-savvy)Has
Approximate Users: 7 million (as of February 2007)
Approximate Pageviews: N/A
Acquisition/Valuation: Has received around $20 million of venture capital to date; no acquisition rumors or link-ups of any kind.
Del.icio.us Launched: Late 2003
Type: Social Bookmarking
Targeted Audience: 20 - 40 (adults; technology-savvy)
Approximate Users: 1 million (as of September 2006)
Approximate Pageviews: 4 million (peak, as of August 2006)
Acquisition/Valuation: Bought by Yahoo! in December 2005 for estimated $30 - $40 million
Digg Launched: November 2004
Type: Social Content Bookmarking/Voting
Targeted Audience: 16 - 30 (teens, adults; technology-savvy)
Approximate Users: 1 million
Approximate Pageviews: 118 million per month (as of 2006)
Acquisition/Valuation: Rumored to have been in negotiations with Fox Interactive/Newscorp, asking for $150 million
Just a Note: Bebo is the most popular site brand amongst under 20s, and MySpace is more the 16-24 young adult audience, with Facebook, although now opening up, attracting the 20 - 25 university student audience.
MySpace
Does a good Job, Awesome for networking when it comes to companies and music labels and bands. Not the best of designs, and not a touch of web standards Used to be built in cold fusion, too I believe
YouTube
I don't waste my time on it, Google Video is always better when it comes to more informative videos or keynote speeches, and the player is better there too with simpler and easier download and viewing functionality. YouTube I visit when someone sends me a link, or occasionally.
Facebook
I have an account with a few friends though I don't "network" with it.
Wikipedia
I can safely say I use it almost every day. Usually anything and everything is on it. I tend to search for what I want using google.co.uk then typing wikipedia after it, which is usully better than the wikipedia search engine. You'll find that I quite from it in posts and articles quite a lot too, not really because its really reliable, but because its readily available and a good starting point.
Bebo
Again, I have an account; Its pretty interesting and easy to use, but I never "network" on it.
Meebo
Started using it through college as now everyone uses it to IM. Its like trillian but web based an AJAX. Pretty neat; my web based Im of choice.
Netvibes
Tried it and used it for a while but those homepage things usually end up never being used with me.
Del.icio.us
Used it occasionally, when I found out it was hard to spamvertise on I gave up Nah, Its not much use to me to be honest. Pointless like "Twitter" and the misspelt/vowel missing "Web 2.0" sites.
Digg
Use it to digg articles on iVirtua, and occasionally find some interesting news., but its reuters, google news and AOP for me in terms of news:)