I did not get tagged for 2007 Predictions (I think there's another tag game going on for 2007 Predictions) but I'm going to go ahead and give my 2007 Web Predictions now.
Web Predictions for 2007
1 - Google buys FeedBurner and Quantcast - merges both platforms into it's own - providing the first Web Analytics Platform/Product that provides RSS Feed/Podcast data and Audience Measurement/Geo-Demographics data in one place.
Google Analytics becomes the De Facto analytics package/platform for small and midsized businesses. The remaining big 4 Web Analytics vendors (Visual Sciences/HBX, WebTrends, Omniture and Coremetrics) will fight over the high end customers while giving up entirely on the low end customers. ClickTracks will be stuck in the middle to fight it out and will have a harder time.
2 - Google Fatigue starts setting in for many as Google's growth continues to lead it to act similar to Microsoft, HP and IBM. Google's motto of "Do No Evil" is slowly continuing to erode, and this has already been noted this year; Google becomes too big to be as revolutionary as it has been (yet this is what people expect Google to be). Nothing much changes but people start looking for the next big thing - which may not be Google.
Google's shares stay in the 400 dollar range. Google considers splitting itself into 4 divisions to maintain nimbleness - but waits till 2008 to restructure (and lays off about 10% of it's workforce in the restructuring - again, in 2008).
3 -Certain Web 2.0 Widgets become very popular in 2007 (ie: 3D Avatars from Gizmoz - everyone wants their own) - Widget Analytics comes into it's own and the Page view is no longer considered a metric worth looking at (it's already dead and buried but people still collect the data - we'll no longer bother to collect pageviews by end of 2007).
4-Online Video continues gain importance and YouTube becomes crucial as communications medium for Politicians running for office, as we're already seeing with John Edwards - and this is just the start - Much more to come. RSS Feeds will become crucial (which is another reason why Google must buy FeedBurner - see prediction 1) to politics and FeedBurners' metrics for Feeds and Blogs are the most widely used.
5 - Second Life becomes crucial for many businesses (which it's more of curiosity for most now); right now most Large Corporations are in the process of creating presences in Second Life and in 2007 many more small and medium businesses will do so. By the end of 2007, there will be close to 7 million residents of Second Life - almost triple the current population of 2 million+.
6- Ultra Mobile PC's begin to replace mobile phones in 2007 as the dominant device people use to collect information. Certain Ultra Mobile PC's have mobile phone capability added to them - and the price of Ultra Mobile PC's continues to drop with a major Ultra Mobile PC being available for 399 by next Christmas.
That's it. I think many of my predictions have a good chance of happening. I hope to get 4 out of 6 (or better) a year from now. I don't have any predictions for Social Media right now, or Net Neutrality, or Governmental Controls of Media - or anything in particular for Blogs - I think it will all continue to grow - won't set any marks as to where all this will be at the end of 2007.
I wouldn’t know about the google and pageview ones but i think you are right on the spot with youtube and second life.
