Regardless of whether or not you were using a Mac or a PC, your early days of the web were probably spent browsing using Netscape Navigator, really the first widely distributed browser. What most people don’t know is that Netscape Navigator was based on another breakthrough product, called Mosaic.
Developed at NCSA, Mosaic was the first browser that was easy to use and install. It was also ported to several different systems including the PC. Being the first browser to support in-line images, it suddenly made browsing “sexy”, or as sexy as it could be in 1993. Suffice to say Mosaic was a great success. A game changer. It led directly to the development of Netscape Navigator, and was even licensed and sub-licensed until it found its way into the kludge we know as Internet Explorer. The thinking, design, and overall functionality originally included in Mosaic still exists in most browsers today. But nobody uses it, and most people have never heard of it. In fact, nobody uses Netscape either. The once might and popular browser, which was based on Mosaic technology is nothing but a nostalgic geek memory.
This is a pattern that tends to repeat itself when it comes to technology. The process of natural selection process applies itself here too. Usually not new, sometimes not the best, but the timing, strategy, and execution will be enough to make a technology or solution the dominant one. However – like any large creature – it is burdened by its own weight. Unable to keep up to date with new markets, methodologies or innovations it may no longer be able to use its size to effectively ward of predators, and succumbs to the forces of nature.
Amazon is currently the biggest creature at the moment. Many hosting providers, and companies fear the impressive size, momentum and presence of such a magnificent beast. After all, how could someone hope to stop a business with such a successful, innovative product.
But as you pay attention to the technology choices and draw their lineage into the future you notice a few dead ends, and more importantly see a lot of opportunities. Amazon doesn’t do a lot of things, and some of the things it doesn’t do well enough. These little pain points, minor though they may be, represent opportunity for some enterprising statup, entrepreneur, or group of consultants to build something better. Something even easier, more secure, flexible. Something that can evolve itself using the rudimentary building blocks of internet infrastructure.
15 years from now will we still talk about Amazon as the defacto cloud? Or will it just be another Mosaic, an evolutionary stepping stone to a smarter, more robust, nimble species.