Techmeme has long been one of the most useful sites for technology news and this week it celebrates its tenth year.
For those, like me, who write every day on tech issues the site has been a godsend. Many a time with the end of the day approaching Techmeme has pointed me an article that has got the creative juices flowing.
Gabe Rivera, the site’s founder and CEO, tells of the lessons learned over the past decade with a repeated theme of ‘Techmeme killers’ regularly coming along.
Prominent among them was Google’s relaunch of its Blogsearch product which was billed as a ‘Techmeme killer’. Like so many of Google’s products, Blogsearch was quietly retired two years ago while Techmeme is still around.
Techmeme’s success in the face of an attempt by Google to take over their market isn’t surprising, marketing guru Seth Godin described how his startup, Knol, survived an onslaught from the giant company in 2013.
Despite Google’s cash and market strength, execution matters and often larger companies lack the committed evangelists that give the smaller businesses their energy.
Both Techmeme and Knol show that no company is guaranteed success, despite its resources or power.