Fishes and ponds

Forty years ago the news stand had a pretty limited selection-- Time, Newsweek, People, Good Housekeeping. Those were the magazines that everyone turned to, they covered a variety of topics and the writers were really big fish in a really big pond.

The barrier to entry was incredibly tall.
If you were into kayaking you could write a specific article and chances were it wouldn't get published. Society was into learning a little bit about everything.
Look at Dear Abbey. She could jump from pond to pond and still be big.


Look at a newsstand today. There are hundreds of magazines, with millions of writers and contributors. Each a really big fish in a really small pond-- dare I say puddle.

So what happened? Everything became specialized. Rather than learn a little about everything, each of us has decided to learn a lot about a little.

The barrier to entry is still incredibly tall.
Now there are millions of small ponds each with big fish, when before there were only a few ponds with big fish.
Interestingly enough, there are so many puddles, that a big fish in one pond is a minnow in another. Today there are hundreds of "Dear Abbey's", most newspapers now have their own.

So what's point?
If your a company that wants to be in a certain pond you need to understand the pond before you jump in. You need to a look at the fish in the pond and yourself and ask this all important question-- "If I am going to be a big fish in this pond how do I attain the status without alienating the other fish? And why will people listen to me?"