About a month ago, I wrote about how Netscape dumped its social news component into its own site, Propeller.com and wondered rhetorically how it would turn out — with the subtext being, perhaps, how *Netscape* would really fare now that its social news component was on its own.
Well, a month has come and gone, and I think that if Alexa is any indication (and yes, it certainly has its problems), the answer might be “substantial”.
Now, granted, the people who use Alexa are probably the same folks who have Alexa tool bars installed on their browsers; also, the people who like the traditional 1999-style traditional site that is up on Netscape are folks who probably *don’t*.
Having said that, I think it does provide a good idea, all other things being equal, of what kind of percentage of people who *are* social news buffs out of the “old” Netscape site … who are now, of course, propeller-fans/heads/geeks.
But it certainly does give a picture that the move to break off the social news site into its own URL was probably *good* for Propeller, it certainly looks like it wasn’t a good move for Netscape — at least amongst folks who like to install Alexa toolbars.
And at least it validates Jason Calacanis — and indeed all the hard work Netscape folks have done over the past year or so to cultivate a community in Digg’s shadow — that so many of the people at Netscape were genuine fans *of* social news.
As a footnote, if, all things are equal, what’s kind of interesting is that the traffic for *both* sites are also trending downward over the past month. Now, this may be evidence of a more general “September dip” that many sites are experiencing as folks head back to school. If anyone questions this, just ask Facebook, as I do believe this is a genuine phenomenon, and not, for example, “stupid”. :)
October 11th, 2007 at 11:12 pm | Permalink
Hi Dr. - I think you miss one thing.
If you know that the local deli serves ham, and you like ham, you go there. Then one day they say they don’t serve ham anymore, only salami. But they say we serve ham over here now across the street. You go across the street for your ham. A year later the deli decides to serve ham again, but you have no idea so you continue to eat the ham at the new place.
there is why the traffic is down on netscape.com.
October 12th, 2007 at 12:21 am | Permalink
What’s surprising (to me), is how many people actually enjoyed the ham enough to leave in the first place, as evidenced by the drop in traffic (but also influenced, of course, by the kind of people who install the Alexa toolbar).
And if that’s the case (which I think it is), then I don’t think I’ve missed a thing. Or rather, perhaps, that we both understand that certain people like ham, and are willing to find another place that has it if their favourite deli does not. :)
October 12th, 2007 at 1:40 am | Permalink
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October 12th, 2007 at 11:33 am | Permalink
I still agree with Allen, but in any case, you did miss that netscape.com now redirects to netscape.aol.com though :-)
The only use of *.netscape.com today seems to be search (search.netscape.com), which would explain why the drop is not to the very bottom. The portal’s gone (moved, technically)
October 12th, 2007 at 5:23 pm | Permalink
[…] Tony Hung. His commentary and opinions are almost always on point and accurate. However last night he wrote a piece that had an incorrect diagnosis. He should know that a doctor can’t just look at a chart and […]
October 13th, 2007 at 12:56 am | Permalink
RBA — I think you’re right on about Netscape re-directing to the the aol.com domain.
But I think Allen and my arguments are still the same. Netscape’s traffic is down. Its because people moved. THe reason people moved is because the only ones left were social news nuts.
… and there’s the business of the netscape.com –> netscape.aol.com now as well. ;)
October 18th, 2007 at 1:45 pm | Permalink
Tony,
Where you at these days? The blogosphere needs more of you. :)
October 19th, 2007 at 12:14 am | Permalink
Mark,
Things are blogging lite for the rest of the month, sadly. See the next post :)