I’m not sure how I feel about the proposed $400 million stock-swap deal
between Media Metrix and Jupiter
Communications , but I do know how I feel about both
Web firms. Both start-ups are a couple of nothing burgers. For the sake of
fairness, let’s just take ’em in alphabetical order.
There’s hardly a prospectus or sound bite on the information superhighway
that doesn’t quote the ubiquitous so-called media research firm Jupiter Communications. You just can’t seem
to shake this magic cyber-eightball who mysteriously manages to spit out a
new study for every flavor of the month.
B2B? No problem. Why, just yesterday, the company announced that the
domestic business-to-business market is expected to balloon to more than $6
trillion in online trade by 2005. Says who?
Waving its proverbial pom-poms since the mid-90s, Jupiter has gained a
reputation as one of the Net’s most zealous cheerleaders. The company has
built a mountain of credibility, despite so little accountability when it
comes to its research. Jupiter’s own skipper boasts a tour of duty as a
freelance writer for Cosmo magazine and little else. Ditto for many of the
firm’s army of analysts.
But, it’s a two way street. Analysts and journalists simply love to
sprinkle some of Jupiter’s quotables to top off their next column. The same
goes for the companies who stand to benefit from a favorable research
report or glowing forecast. More than 600 clients have hopped on Jupiter’s
bandwagon, and it’s predictably hard to find one with a harsh word for the
firm.
One rival with an axe to grind, although ironically cut from the same
cloth, is Julio Gomez. After jumping ship from Forrester Research
a few years ago, the Gomez Advisors CEO opined that Jupiter’s
best asset wasn’t compiling and analyzing industry data but rather “finding
a parade and getting out in front of it.”
Touche.
Media Metrix has made a name for
itself publishing those make-believe traffic yardsticks for the Internet’s
most visible Web properties, quoted by companies and analysts ad nauseam.
But if the average Jane takes a peek under the hood at the methodology
behind the numbers, it’s an archaic guessing game at best.
Despite all the raw data zipping around the Web in bits and bytes, Media
Metrix uses old-fashioned direct mailings and cold calls to lump together
50,000 home and at-work volunteers who’ll install tracking software on
their PCs. Based on a crude sampling of U.S.-only Web users, Media Metrix
preaches its renowned Top 50 lists like gospel.
Webmasters from Yahoo! to AltaVista are crying foul. And there’s
a silent majority too afraid to speak up over Media Metrix’s oft puzzling
rankings. If you have a bone to pick, you’d better bury it, because the
Web’s Nielson ratings firm knows how to hold a grudge.
With both companies built largely on a pocket of hot air, it’s only fitting
the two should walk down the aisle together. But on the bright side, the
duo competes in a crowded field of me-too rivals, so a consolidated effort
is likely to prove beneficial for the newlyweds. Just don’t light a match
around these two.
Any questions or comments, love letters or hate mail? As always, feel free
to forward them to kblack@internet.com.
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Hot Air Rises
