I think your comments, Bob, hit this problem on its head. CMOZ sites may have no content problem whatever. But they appear to have a very tough existence problem. If a site cannot attract new customers it will atrophy as the old regulars gradually tire of it.
Their site names have no strong connotation. Itrack? Buckinvestor? I'd never pick that one out of a hat. (And if the stock market crashes, I'd look first for the name that rhymes with buckinvestor.)
CMOZ's glory derives from the days when you could merely put out a press release and praise yourself for adding gaming sites, stock sites, shopping sites, et al. That doesn't work any more.
And what happened to those promises from last year? What happened to the stock message site that was going to accumulate the messages from ALL message sites for investor one-stop reading. All that was supposedly necessary was to execute a few reciprocality agreements with some of the boards. What's happened to that?
For all I know, they could have done what they said they'd do. What good has it done CMOZ though? I'm out here on the stock boards (SI, RB, MF, Yahoo, Clearstation, Quicken, CBS MarketWatch, et al) every day. I have never seen a banner nor even a simple message link to this mythical board. And you well know that we post links to off-SI-site news and boards at the drop of a pin.
I'm just picking on one area because I feel more qualified to discuss it. But the big picture remains: a site with no links to it, no banners, no publicity, no e-mail spams (oh, how dare I suggest it?), has no visitors and produces no revenues.
So what is it that justifies buying into CMOZ? Immensely popular web sites? Doubtful. Internet incubator spinoffs? Few of those work and the spinner-offers don't climb in price (unless their name is CMGI).
What's left? Revenue/profit growth? No good numbers that I've seen. (Show me - I might be wrong!) Inflated press releases. Periodic company-paid penny stock promotions.
The way to profit in this company looks to be 'Buy Low' (like now?), Sell on the 'Pump' cycle. Is that what CMOZ is offering investors? |
