Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

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Pastimes : Silicon Investor ThinkTank -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: James Randall Ingram who wrote (1331)	6/6/2000 8:06:00 PM
From: greenspirit	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 3372

James, my impression from reading the various threads is that no large drop off of membership transpired as a result of changing the web-site. Although the transition didn't go well initially, I believe Bryan's team recovered rather well in the end. And the site continues to improve. The internet is growing by leaps and bounds. And people are becoming more familiar with and comfortable posting on bulletin boards which offer dialogue. The growth in membership on the other sites you mentioned, is no doubt benefiting from this trend. The Free/Pay model is a tricky issue. I personally agree with the premise that a free site, with proper enforcement of codes of conduct, offers the largest potential for success long term. I also thought SI devised a clever strategy by first offering free membership via a partnership with NDB in order to minimize offending previous paying members. Eventually, I have little doubt that a completely free model will win out, over the pay or subscription/pay one. The moderated thread offering is one way to control the quality of postings as SI adapts to a new model. SI Bob will need some help once the service is offered completely free. Marketing via click through's is dominating the internet. And I only see it gaining strength in the next few years as "getting noticed and bookmarked" becomes more and more costly and difficult. One additional "loyal customer" is worth many times the subscription fee to SI. I realize many of my SI brethren are very much against the free model. But business is business, and when you're running a technology company, you either grow, or die. Michael