Web Kidz Don’t Stop Believing (afterward)

 

More from the LATimes’ Michelle Quinn on overanalyzing the Web 2.0 crew’s video, “20 world Internet citizens met in the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus in October of 2008 for a week of reflections on life, love, and the Internet”. The Vimeo version was locked down on Friday:

The online record of the trip was discovered — and spread widely — during a week in which venture capitalists told their companies to tighten their belts and horde cash to help them get through the tough times looming, EBay said it would lay off 10% of its employees and tech companies saw their stocks crater even more deeply than the broader market.

So when the video of the bathing-suited vacationers was discovered, it quickly became too perfect a symbol of Nero fiddling while Rome burns. Or as VentureBeat put it, “Silicon Valley lip-synchs while market burns.” [link]

“The video gave me flashbacks to heedless-partying-until-the-bomb-fell attitude before the popping of the Web 1.0 bubble,” wrote Kara Swisher at All Things Digital, which is owned by the Wall Street Journal. [link]

“This video will always be associated with the end of Web 2.0,” said Michael Arrington at TechCrunch. [links here and here]

Dan Frommer of Silicon Alley Insider said he wasn’t sure whether the video was a great example of Web 2.0 tools at their best or a cry for help. [link]

Of course, it’s not fair to hold up a video of adults on a vacation they had planned long ago (and presumably paid for themselves) as an example of the end of the roaring bull market. This is no AIG situation, in which the insurance giant’s employees were taking a junket to Southern California’s swanky St. Regis Resort in Monarch Beach while the government was bailing out the company to the tune of $85 billion.

I’m with Michelle! I figure those kids have lost a great deal in this crisis. I’m glad to see the sunny optimism of young capitalists. And I thoroughly enjoyed their fun video. But I suggest you watch it now before it’s pulled again.