Tim Howell’s Weblog

Much has been written about Web 2.0, mashups and how there are a whole slew of opportunities made available using technologies that facilitate accessing and combining data from multiple sources.

No doubt there are new opportunities, but any entrepreneur needs to be wary about what influence they have over data for which they may become totally dependent. Typically, a third party - particularly an unknown one - will have virtually no influence over this data.

And not only may they become dependent on the availability of this data, but also its quality. If the data sources aren’t accurate, the integrity of the service suffers. And if more than one service is inaccurate, then the problem is compounded exponentially. Nicholas Carr recently discussed data accuracy and its importance in a recent posting.

The value of any of these services is ultimately derived from the raw data that is provided by the core services. Mashups, while innovative, should not get recognized for being anything more than what they are: aggregators and re-publishers of base data over which they have limited control. Any attention (or valuation) these companies receive surely must recognize these dependencies and risks, not to mention the likelihood of what they’re doing to be copied.

No doubt it’s an exciting area, but whether there’s a business model outside of advertising revenue remains to be seen.