In Web 1.0 there were a number of browser-based website creation platforms - e.g. Geocities, Angelfire, Tripod, Homestead and Brinkster (I myself used nearly all of those, back in the day). These apps were very popular in the mid to late 90's, because they made web publishing relatively easy. The most successful one, Geocities, was eventually acquired by Yahoo! in 1999. Do these tools still exist, in the Web 2.0 era?
Well, on the social web, blogging platforms such as blogger.com, LiveJournal, TypePad and Wordpress.com have to a large extent usurped Geocities. Not to mention social networks like MySpace and Facebook. However the 'read/write web' has expanded the market for web publishing exponentially, so there is still room for traditional website building platforms.
Geocities itself is still active in the website creation market. Here are some of its competitors:
Who's using these products? Website creation platforms are aimed at people who just want a regular website; for example people who want to chronicle their wedding or holiday, families who want to track their family history and growth, or retailers who want to build a web presence.
Often these tools have 'drag and drop' functionality, so you can create a new website in a matter of hours without needing to know HTML or have particular design skills. Lycos told us that their product Webon is "geared toward more casual users, e.g. parents, travelers, shutterbugs, who want more control and a more stylized web presence than typical blogging tools or social network profiles allow for."
Note that you could argue that DIY social networks like Ning are competing in this space, although Ning co-founder Marc Andreessen thinks otherwise. I'm inclined to agree with him, because social networks, blogs, wikis, and websites are all different beasts.
Website builder platforms in the web 2.0 era, where mashups and open data are common, typically offer ways to integrate with 3rd party apps. This can take the form of widgets, or even utilizing other sites' APIs. This is probably the biggest difference between Geocities 1.0 and the 2.0 era web publishing platforms. But also these platforms usually offer the ability to add blogs, RSS feeds, multimedia, privacy controls, and more.
Google Sites diagram, from their homepage
As an example of what these products now offer, Lycos told us recently that Webon supports the OpenSocial API "for thousands of add-ons and widgets (such as iGoogle gadgets and Google FriendConnect), with no HTML or CSS knowledge needed, as well as OpenID to enable DIY social network connections."
Another common feature in the new website creation tools is use of Ajax to build sites. While at the Web 2.0 Expo a couple of months ago, I dropped by the SynthaSite booth and was very impressed with the rich functionality and the ability to drag n' drop ajax widgets.
Geocities and Google Sites have the biggest presence, simply because of their bigco backing. Among the startups, according to stats from Compete, the leading small co is Weebly with SynthaSite showing positive growth.
An old cliche that Web entrepreneurs often wheel out at press time is that the market pie (for whatever segment they're in) is only getting bigger, so there's plenty of room for them and their competitors too. Well in the case of website creation tools, that's certainly true! One of the primary characteristics of the social web - aka web 2.0 - is that anyone can easily publish content to the Web. So there is a lot more need these days, compared to the 90's, for web publishing platforms of all varieties. Many RWW readers probably use blogging and/or social network tools, and micro-publishing tools like Twitter and FriendFeed. But for many other people, straight website creation tools - like Geocities and its many competitors - fit their needs better.
To finish, here's a brain teaser for you: what will Geocities 3.0 look like? ;-)
Comments
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WordPress is the website creation tool for Web 2.0 :-)
Posted by: 113.com | June 12, 2008 11:34 PM
@113.com
Richard was talking about hosted solutions. Geocities was/is still hosted, Sitekreator is hosted.
If you're talking about Wordpress.com then you're right, if your are talking about Wordpress.org then consider other software like that which are more suitable for website creation (Drupal, Joomla, and a horde or others).
Posted by: Mircea | June 13, 2008 12:28 AM
what about the Webnode (www.webnode.com)? I think it has way better Web 2.0 features than most of mentioned tools.
Posted by: dukass | June 13, 2008 4:04 AM
what about the Webnode (www.webnode.com)? I think it has way better Web 2.0 features than most of mentioned tools.
Posted by: dukass | June 13, 2008 4:04 AM
well i have the impression that you forget a lot of real big player in this industry like parallels sitebuilder, sitegallora, cm4all, etc. every one of them have at least 2 mio User around the world.
Posted by: lofwyrm | June 13, 2008 7:01 AM
why is weebly outperforming so much?
brilliance?
splog-farm?
what?
Posted by: mathew johnson | June 13, 2008 7:28 AM
Geocities 3.0 should allow you to create your personal independent site on the net, allow blogging within the site, use of Social Features across platforms, sign-up via OpenID, and tight connection with other platforms via dataportability. It will be a place where you'll present yourself to the world. In addition to your e-mail address, you'll be handing out your personal domain.
All of the above (except across plattforms) is offered by Jimdo (http://www.jimdo.com), a Start-Up based in Hamburg, Germany. We've launched a year ago and here're our USPs:
* very easy to use
* customizable designs
* integration of any kind of content
* social features
* blogging tool (currently closed beta)
* password-protected areas
* newsletter-system
* OpenID delegation (use your domain as your OpenID)
* available in seven languages (en, de, fr, it, cn, ru, es)
It order that our vision is to come true we really hope that the data portability discussion is gonna get going soon. There's so much talking going on but not much is actually happening.
[Disclosure: I'm a Co-Founder of Jimdo]
Posted by: Matthias | June 13, 2008 8:15 AM
Thank you for an excellent write up Richard.
Sampa (www.sampa.com) is part of the Web site creation 2.0 wave, but it can't be compared to Weebly or SynthaSite which are geared towards small business, techie crowd or people that want to make a buck on the Internet.
Sampa is about creating your personal private place on the web. Think Ning, minus "social network" plus "your network".
Your coverage of Sampa goes back to a time we were trying to figure out what we were. Since them we have changed dramatically and our focus is on communicating with your personal circle of friends and family.
Of all the services mentioned above, none of them have the depth and breadth of integration with Email like Sampa has. Email being the number 1 way that people share stories and pictures on the Internet.
Marcelo Calbucci
Sampa Founder & CTO
www.sampa.com
Posted by: Marcelo Calbucci | June 13, 2008 12:04 PM
I was about to say blogger is the new geocities, but yeah 113 is correct in stating that wordpress is the new geocities..
Posted by: bazaarstreet | June 14, 2008 9:33 AM
you forgot to mention OfficeLive for Small Business ;)
Posted by: Offbeatmammal | June 14, 2008 10:30 PM
Thank Zii:-For the Great topic!
Oh Pl visit http://www.uoha.com on August 1st and tell us what you think, your opinion will be appreciated:-
Posted by: Zii:- | June 15, 2008 3:35 PM
Hello,
I think the info is realy very interesting, and also want to share my thoughts and experience.
I tried a lot of sitebuilders but now I am using www.jubiipages.de (co.uk, fr, it, nl, es), of course it is a beta version but very fun to use it. I think it is very user friendly. Threr are some issues but I hope when it will be complitly live there won;t be any problems.
Try and tell your opinin.
Thanks
Posted by: Hracho | June 15, 2008 11:48 PM