How everything on the web is quickly becoming useless...

Sometimes things move so fast, you don't even feel yourself spinning.. kind of like standing on the earth...or moving in a fast car.... you are moving - but you just don't feel it.

Well guess what - the Internet right now is moving faster than ever - and I am not sure its going the right direction (or atleast if it is - its leaving everything else behind).

People refer to the current web as "Web 2.0" - but I think that may have been a premature name - assuming you believe 2.0 has some reminense of 1.0. Sure we still have millions of 1.0 websites out there - but they are quickly becoming obsolete.

Nobody goes to websites anymore. We are not in Web 2.0 - we are in new dimension of the Web (lets call it WebOS - kind of catchy old name, for new Web).

So what does this mean? The Web is a platform for utilities (e.g. Applications). User behavior has changed.

BEFORE: Web Marketing = Lets launch a website. Register a cool domain.
NOW: Don't bother, noone will go there - and domains don't matter anymore.

BEFORE: Lets link to other websites, and get links back to our website
NOW: Nobody clicks on links anymore - the web is becoming homogeneus.

BEFORE: Hmmm, this banner ad looks interesting.
NOW: I hate any ad, and for spite I refuse to click.

BEFORE: Let's "surf" the web - click around and explore
NOW: I don't have time to surf or learn new sites - I know where to go to get what I need.

BEFORE: I want to Blog.
NOW: Noone is reading my Blog - I have no audience... I WANT TO POST!

BEFORE: Let me email my friends to see what is going on.
NOW: Why bother emailing, I'll just look at their Wall.

BEFORE: Let me search the web, and see how I can do that
NOW: There is an app for that.

As you can see my point is simple. User behavior has changed, and I am not sure its good for the web. The average number of websites a user hits per day is decreasing NOT increasing. The average user spends more time on a few sites (e.g. facebook), and doing less discovery.

This new phase of the Web, is less about the Internet (the magical tubes that connect us) and more about the Humans behind the device. And you don't need thousands of websites to connect humans. You only really need a few. (Is that good or bad?)

We are molding the Internet into a Human media, and building form factors and tools around specific functions (applications), and ignoring the old "websites". We don't realize it, but with every Tweet or Poke - we are killing a website. Our window to the web is shifting to mobile devices (which have never been web friendly). Take the Iphone. Do you use the IPhone to surf old websites? Probably not. You download an app, and run the app. Going to the browser becomes more of a hassle.

Why are websites dying? Its actually pretty logical if you think about it. A website isn't human. It doesn't talk. It's doesn't communicate. It doesn't show emotion. It's not real-time.

If you think about it - we should be surprised they lasted as long as they did.