“Ce ne sont plus les start-up qui sont demandeuses d’un accès aux grands médias pour la diffusion de leurs contenus, c’est l’inverse.” — ‘Web 2.0 : le bon tuyau pour l’Internet‘, Libératiion (30 August 2006)
I’d of course known that Web 2.0 is defined by ‘user generated content.’ But I hadn’t before seen the pithy observation that Libératiion‘s reporters Christophe Alix and Laurent Mauriac mentioned — that startup companies no longer seek access to major media to disseminate their content; instead, the opposite is true.
Last week in León, Spain, the CEO of a major newspaper trade association asked me how companies such as YouTube.com can grow so big so quickly. The answer is simply that startups no longer need major media companies for promotion, marketing, and advertising. Indeed major media companies increasingly need to deal with (or buy) the successful Web 2.0 startups, for promotion, marketing, and advertising.