The Tech Egonomy is Bursting

I have just read the most accurate and ballsy reaction to the 'OMG the tech bubble is bursting' phenomenon going on right now. The Founder of Path101 wrote a great article on his blog about how the companies at risk here are those with no business plans that are just surfing the bubble 2.0.

Charlie compares Seesmic to Paltalk to justify his ideas. Basically, he comes to show how Paltalk has been building its business in a constructive manner, looking for the mainstream opportunities in a calm and wise way. Compared to this example is Seesmic, launched by a successful tech Frenchy, which business model looks like a rugby strategy: Just blow them off!

The story is climbing up Readburner, and shoul hit Techmeme in no time (don't even know if I'll have time to finish this article).

I think that Seesmic is just the victim of a really well-told story here. I agree that the idea of video commenting is not super stimulating, and that such a concept should have undergone repetitive pre-launch experiments to test people's penchant for video commenting. Still, the founder of the company had the balls to activate his whole professional network on an idea that could have been a killer. He's been an hyper-active user of his service, and a great representative of his company outside of his own Website's walls.

There's a lot of things that have been brightly applied, mostly on the PR side of the business. I have also seen some strategical abuse, like Wordpress integrating the video commenting system, even though there are no signs that Wordpress commenters are requesting it (which sounds like a 'can't-refuse-an-A-list-blogger-a-favor' kind of thing).

I meet a lot of tech startup Founders, and the word of wisdom is: if the users want it, then we will deploy it. Don't rush it. Don't impose your product. Don't turn your startup into your own ego-growing machine. It's not the tech economy that's bursting, it's the tech egonomy.

Can you say healthy crisis?