It is more than that, no doubt about it, but I maintain that ATHM PR and IR are major reasons for the collapse of the stock. The initial acrimony between ATHM and the street began last year when subscriber numbers were not coming in at the initial projected rate. Ever since the stock has been in a freefall. The Excite cloud did not help matters, the Portland situation has been weighing on us etc. In both of these cases if there had been more spin, more clarification, more excitement, I dont think the stock would have fallen as far as it did. But without direction from ATHM people were left out in the cold and the big, bad dragon of uncertainty reared it's head. In the market that we are in and have been in for a while, people need to be lead by the company- they need direction. Without it they are on their merry way elsewhere.
The BB portal is just another example, BTW. It should have been a much bigger deal than it was, both technically and from a PR standpoint (although without the first I dont want the latter). It ended up being a complete non-event. That in itself speaks volumes about ATHM's ability to promote itself.
Anyway, hopefully today is something we can buid on. If one has a 5 year time horizon none of this stuff really matters. I rarely have a 5 year time horizon for anything, so I have been a bit miffed at ATHM's lack of self-promotion.
|
