{"id":13139,"date":"2024-10-29T10:20:47","date_gmt":"2024-10-29T10:20:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/topat10.com\/?p=13139"},"modified":"2024-10-29T10:20:47","modified_gmt":"2024-10-29T10:20:47","slug":"we-were-wrong-an-oral-history-of-wireds-original-website","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/topat10.com\/?p=13139","title":{"rendered":"\u2018We Were Wrong\u2019: An Oral History of WIRED\u2019s Original Website"},"content":{"rendered":"


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Kevin:<\/strong> When we went to do the IPO, it was very, very clear that the digital side was far more valuable than the magazine side. That was the beginning of the craziness. Here\u2019s a magazine that has a lot of revenue, respectability, great enthusiasm, and support from the readership. And here\u2019s this really weird digital side that’s worth 10 times the magazine.<\/p>\n

Jane:<\/strong> When Cond\u00e9 Nast bought WIRED and Lycos bought HotWired, the company combined was worth less than the company separated. To this day, we liken it to Nike deciding to sell their footwear to Puma and their apparel to Adidas. Why would you do that? Why would you take the premier brand that had both the technical credibility as well as the upside of the lifestyle and culture stuff and pull it apart?<\/p>\n

Jeff:<\/strong> It was a very traditional and typical tech acquisition where the startup gets acquired and comes into the bigger corporate culture. It just doesn’t work very well.<\/p>\n

Jane:<\/strong> Louis and I were so crestfallen, heartbroken, and devastated, and everyone\u2019s like, \u201cYeah, but everyone got rich.\u201d That was not the point. It was a very, very difficult time.<\/p>\n

June:<\/strong> Almost all of us started to feel a pretty profound sense of loss and grief that the culture we knew, the values we believed in as innovators and creators, had been lost. That the industry was no longer about innovation, invention, creativity, and certainly not about democratization. That everything was about money.<\/p>\n

Well, maybe. There are 5.45 billion internet users on planet Earth, and sure, some of them are bad actors\u2014no argument from WIRED. But most of us are still raving around the internet, hanging with pals, cruising for jobs and mates, catching up on gossip and news, buying and selling stuff, and finding fellow travelers who share our woes and our passions. And, yes, a slice of us are into fraud, abuse, and bad ideology. Did HotWired not anticipate that humans would be human?<\/em><\/p>\n

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