Square Galaxy

On the LDS Media Talk Blog, there was a post about the growth of the Internet.   I wondered if the growth has been increasing or decreasing, or if it is reaching a plateau.

To answer that question, I decided to plot the numbers on a logarithmic scale:

Using a logarithmic scale, it is easy to see the rate of growth.  As you can see, up until 1997 there was a very substantial growth.  In 1996, for example, the Internet grew by 900%.  Between 1998 and 2001 growth slowed so that it only (on average) doubled in each of those years.  Since then, we’ve established a slower, yet still substantial rate of doubling only every two or three years.

According to a Slashdot article, 62% of Americans who access the Internet with a slow, dial-up modem, don’t want to upgrade to a high-speed connection.

This may seem alarming to many. Why wouldn’t people want a faster connection to the Internet? I think cost is the biggest factor. I keep seeing TV commercials for dial-up accounts for under $10 per month. A broadband connection, on the other hand, would cost at least two or three times that amount. Why should people pay perhaps another $150 per year just to download their email and favorite recipes a few seconds faster?

Interestingly, about 3% of the visitors to this website access it through a dial-up modem.

Another interesting stat, for an e-commerce site that I run, dial-up visitors generate the highest per visit value. Dial-up visitors are more likely to make a larger purchase than broadband visitors.

A couple of weeks ago, I claimed that I was prepared to ditch Yahoo! if Microsoft bought them. Now that Microsoft has withdrawn its bid for Yahoo, I’ve decided to make efforts to use Yahoo more than I have in the past.

Yahoo’s ability to withstand a Microsoft bid was based in Yahoo CEO Jerry Yang’s claims that Yahoo has more potential and is worth more than Microsoft was willing to pay for it. Yang wanted Microsoft to pay $37 per share, and Microsoft only offered $33 per share. Now today, analysts are saying that if Yang is on a limited time line to get the trading price of Yahoo stock above $33 to prove he was right about not selling out to Microsoft.

I believe that Microsoft ownership of Yahoo would be very bad for the Internet. While Microsoft has currently withdrawn its bid, there is always the possibility that Microsoft will, in the future, attempt again to buy Yahoo. High stock prices are the biggest deterrent from future buyout attempts.

I want to do what I can to allow Yahoo stock prices to increase. I figure that I can do this by giving Yahoo as much legitimate business that I reasonably can. The easiest way to start is by switching the default search engine in my web browser to point to Yahoo. Perhaps I’ll find additional ways to give Yahoo more of my business. This is my small role in keeping Yahoo away from Microsoft.

A Cnet News blog claims that Yahoo! might be bought out by Microsoft this week. If this happens, I am prepared to cancel all of the Yahoo! services that I currently use. I have little or no faith that Microsoft’s management of Yahoo! services will be satisfactory, so upon any sort of merger announcement, I will start looking for replacement services that I believe will better serve my interests.

As a developer, I currently trust the openness of Yahoo! developer APIs, but I would have serious concerns if I could depend on a Microsoft Yahoo for continued support of these APIs.

Some reports say that the Microsoft bid is simply to buy Yahoo!’s user-base. I refuse to be bought like that, and will remove myself from the user-base when it comes time.

I went looking for domain names today, and I found a couple interesting ones. They are available, unless of course the person who read this five minutes ago registered it:

• http://hardh.at
• http://enscri.be
• http://xenopho.be
• http://jacobbrunson.us.com

I think the .at domains are going for about $50, while the .be domains are just $18. If you want a .us.com domain (not like anyone is going to remember it) you can dish $150 out to Network Solutions.