October 19th, 2008
Jeff Bezos on the Internet Gold Rush at TED 2003
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While browsing through TED videos, I stumbled across this amazing TED 2003 talk on the Internet Gold Rush by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos —
Speaking in the context of the dotcom meltdown, Jeff Bezos says that while it’s tempting to see the Internet using the California Gold Rush analogy, it’s more useful to apply the electricity analogy.
Both electricity and internet are thin horizontal enabling layers that go across multiple industries. The web applications we have seen so far are, in fact, similar to the first wave of electric appliances. For instance, just like web applications use the physical network infrastructure laid out for long distance telecommunications, the first wave of electrical appliances used the electric network laid out for the light bulb. So, it’s only to be expected that web applications, like the first electrical appliances, will include both life changing innovations and amusing failures.
I believe that Jeff Bezos’ conclusion in 2003 — “there’s more innovation ahead of us than behind us” — is equally valid in 2008, and that’s true for both the protocol/ platform and the application/ user interface layers. Which is a good thing, especially for those of us who missed both the dotcom and the web 2.0 booms.
