Now that GeoCities has hired a CEO
to turn the freebie Websteader into something resembling an online service,
what is this community possibly worth as rumors abound that it may go public?
GeoCities, the largest Websteader on the Internet with
its reported 1.7 million members, named Thomas Evans, president and
publisher of U.S. News & World Report and Fast Company,
and president of Atlantic Monthly, to the post of chief executive
officer. Evans will join the company on May 4, 1998.
Evans’ goal will be to turn GeoCities into a
media service. Whether or not a print-heavy publisher can do that is yet to
be seen, but Fast Company magazine seems to hold the same shoot
from the hip mentality that works well on the Web.
Given the challenges ahead, we estimate on a monthly unique user basis
(user numbers from Relevant Knowledge) that privately-held GeoCities may be
at a $310 million valuation. If it goes public, we forecast–depending on
its current revenue–that GeoCities may find a warm reception on Wall
Street and pave the way for other “community” or Webstead sites to do the
same, as Yahoo! did for its peers.
Mecklermedia’s WebSite
Value Index
WEBSITE | March | April 22 | April 29 | April 22 | April 29 | ||
VALUE | Unique | Market cap | Market cap | Percent | Value | Value | Percent |
INDEX | Users | or est. PMV * | or est. PMV * | change | Per | Per | change |
User | User | ||||||
(millions) | (millions) | (millions) | |||||
Yahoo | 32.5 | $ 5,425 | $ 5,419 | -0.11% | $ 167.06 | $ 166.87 | -0.11% |
Netscape.com* | 23.4 | $ 1,400 | $ 1,450 | 3.57% | $ 59.82 | $ 61.96 | 3.57% |
Excite | 19.3 | $ 1,447 | $ 1,411 | -2.49% | $ 74.84 | $ 72.98 | -2.49% |
Microsoft.com* | 18.0 | $ 1,750 | $ 1,800 | 2.86% | $ 97.13 | $ 99.91 | 2.86% |
AOL.com* | 17.7 | $ 1,500 | $ 1,500 | 0.00% | $ 84.57 | $ 84.57 | 0.00% |
Lycos -Tripod | 15.1 | $ 963 | $ 866 | -10.00% | $ 63.65 | $ 57.28 | -10.00% |
GeoCities* | 14.4 | $ 300 | $ 310 | 3.33% | $ 20.81 | $ 21.50 | 3.33% |
MSN.com/Hotmail | 14.4 | $ 800 | $ 775 | -3.13% | $ 55.49 | $ 53.76 | -3.13% |
Infoseek – WBS | 16.2 | $ 1,008 | $ 999 | -0.92% | $ 62.22 | $ 61.65 | -0.92% |
AltaVista* | 7.5 | $ 275 | $ 250 | -9.09% | $ 36.76 | $ 33.42 | -9.09% |
TOTAL | $ 179 | $ 14,868 | $ 14,780 | -0.59% | $ | $ | -1.17% |
AVERAGE | $ 18 | $ 1,487 | $ 1,478 | -0.59% | $ | $ | -1.17% |
) 1998 Mecklermedia,The
Internet
Media Company (NASDAQ:MECK); *PMV = est. private market value for
WebSite only
Netscape, meanwhile, tries to become a portal and saw its stock price
rise since our last WebSite Value Index April 22. On April 24, CEO Jim
Barksdale said he aims to turn Netscape into a media company (that’s what
they all want to be it seems). Netscape’s already got the number two Web
site in unique users, an advantage in leveraging the audience into new
features.
Yet as it moves into this space it competes directly with its former search
partners, those who paid $5 million each to be under Netscape’s search
button–agreements which expire this week. Lycos (NASDAQ:LCOS) reportedly
isn’t interested in this deal anymore. However, Infoseek (NASDAQ:SEEK)
reportedly gets a significant amount of traffic from Netscape so it will
probably re-ink.
MSN and HotMail await Microsoft’s pending launch of Start, its own portal
attempt, before we believe these assets have a meaningful place to call
home. And, as NT and Win98 rolls out, we think HotMail could be integrated
into these offerings as the e-mail service provider that allows both to
scale using the Web without heavy-duty coding of the software.
Our vision of Microsoft next year is Start fueling WebTV, MSN, Expedia,
CarPoint, Investor, and HotMail. Rivals may have a lot to fear here also if
Microsoft’s browser, Internet Explorer, gets “smarter” and coopts search
altogether. How so?
Imagine in the browser address line that you simply type “car” and you’re
at Microsoft’s CarPoint. Or type “travel” and Expedia pops up. Type
“Stocks” or “mortgage” and Investor shows up. The URL address line could be
the Internet battle field of the future as it becomes the search and find
and guide all in one.
And then where are today’s WebSite user values? Food for thought.
