Instead, there was dial-up access in all of its 28K or 56K glory. It delivered the Web in an agonizingly slow way but we were so amazed by this thing called the Web that driving in the slow lane was just fine.

That said, dial-up was not only slow but it tended to stop working for a variety of reasons. If someone picked up another extension, the connection would crap out. If someone called and left a voice-mail message, the connection would disappear. These Web interuptus tended to happen with alarming frequency when a download was 98% completed, forcing you to download the software again, which could take 30 minutes as opposed to 30 seconds.

This nostalgic look at dial-up burst on to the scene last week after learning a much-anticipated high-speed connection at a beach house in rural Prince Edward Island was, in reality, dial-up. The pain, the agony, the molasses-like slowness of it all.

After the purchasing of a U.S. Robotics modem (the last one apparently to be found on PEI), extensive support from Bell and some painful configuration issues, we finally got the dial-up connection up and running.

Well, I wouldn’t describe it as running; it’s more like a languid stroll or relaxed amble. Each page requested appears with glacial-like speed. In other words, it’s agonizing for anyone who takes a high-speed connection as a god-given right.

The upside is it makes multi-tasking easy because there’s so much time between the appearance of Web pages – there’s no instant gratification each time you decide to look at a different Web site.

That’s the crazy part about speed; the faster the connection, the less appreciation about the size and speed of the pipe. For anyone who thinks today’s high-speed connections leave something to be desired, try living with dial-up for an hour, let alone a day.

Of course, any kind of Internet access is better than no access if you’re digitally engaged and make your living from being connected. So for the next week, I’ll live with dial-up access even if means taking a long time just to check e-mail. And the best part is when I get home, my high-speed connection will seem ultra-fast.

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The negative reaction from “enthusiastic” Web users was not surprising given they’re the ones using a lot of bandwidth to download or stream music, movies and games, as well as surf the Web and use social media services. For most of the population, the bandwidth changes will likely have little or no impact.

There are two angles to Rogers’ bandwidth tinkering. By reducing the amount of bandwidth, Rogers has an opportunity make more money by selling additional bandwidth to customers. Along with higher-speeds, this is how Rogers grabs more of our dollars.

More important is the fact that tiered broadband pricing is going to become a hard and fast reality. While bandwidth caps have been in place, they haven’t captured much attention because they’ve been fairly generous and few consumers bump up against the limits. But in reducing bandwidth caps, it seems likely Rogers could be moving to a pricing structure in which bandwidth plays a more important role.

For consumers, it means the speed of their Internet connection will no longer be the only consideration. When selecting and paying for broadband service, consumers will have to cough up for speed and bandwidth. These tiered plans have been embraced by cablecos and telcos around the world such as BT. In North America, however, speed has been the name of the broadband game but with penetration rates getting pretty high, broadband players need new ways to generate more revenue.

In other words, we’re probably moving from an all-you-can-eat market to a pay-to-play market. Given there’s little competition in the broadband market and that consumers are using more online services, the size of your Internet bill is poised to increase.

So, what else does an online startup need to make it?

1. Perhaps the biggest “ingredient” is having a service that meets a need in a new or different way. Too many startups are vanity projects that cater to someone’s personal interests or needs as opposed to the larger market. They fail because they serve a niche that is far too small to create a viable company.

2. The service must be easy to “get” what the startup is offering and why a potential user should care. In the multi-tasking, time-strapped world in which we live, startups have small windows of opportunity to capture someone’s attention.

If consumers fail to quickly understand the service is being offered, they’ll quickly move on. This means a startup needs messaging that is clear, well-articulated and user-friendly. I’m personally a big believer in the power of the demo video because many people will watch a video before reading even the most well-written text.

2. The service or product has to do the job well. This is something that should be a given but you’d be surprised by how many startups create mediocre or, worse, bad services. This includes startups that launch an alpha or beta that instantly disappoints. Even if the messaging is clear, a bad service will quickly kill any interest from consumers.

4. The service has to be intuitive and user-friendly. Any hurdles, or “grit”, will quickly kill any kind of traction. This starts from the registration process to how quickly someone can start using the service or product. People have little patience, and want a gentle learning curve so having a service that is intuitive and user-friendly.

5. Fanatical customer service is also a key ingredient, particularly in the early days when a service is still being developed. The ability to quickly and effectively deal with problems or issues and actively solicit suggestions and feedback can make a huge difference.

6. Identify and nurture your champions and evangelists. As much as great messaging, terrific customer service and being active within the social media community are must-dos, the real marketing magic happens when a user is so excited with a service that they enthusiastically and actively start telling anyone and everyone. By identifying and supporting these people, a startup can jump-start its marketing and sales efforts.

There are, of course, a lot of other variables that go into creating successful startups such as having terrific employees and, if required, financing, but the ones above are “low-hanging fruit”.

What do you think are the most important “ingredients” for a successful startup?

I have come to the conclusion that this approach is untenable because there’s too much risk and uncertainty inherent in the belief that a business model will eventually emerge. As a result, I think start-ups should have a revenue-generating business model from the start, even if it’s a freemium model with a free, basic service.

Given this philosophical approach, it was interesting to hear Sean Ellis’ presentation at meshU yesterday. In a nutshell, Ellis believes many startups should launch their services without charging for them. Instead, he suggests start-ups focus on creating services that resonate with a small group of engaged users, who will provide them with insight, guidance and feedback on how to evolve a service so can have broad appeal.

This is a process Ellis describes as the “gratification engine” – something that start-ups need to spend more time focused on as opposed to trying to attract more users by adding features.

When the start-up has a better idea of the service and how it meets the needs of consumers, Ellis said it can introduce a paid service, while providing the original users with a discount as a reward for their contribution.

When I pushed back about coming out of the gate without charging for services, Ellis said making money from early or beta users is somewhat irrelevant given the more significant revenue could come, in theory, from the large amount of users who come on board afterwards.

To be honest, I’m still not completely convinced that only having a free service is the right way to go. If people want to pay for premium services, there should probably be a way to take their money.

So, what is this new and mysterious tool? The answer is Prezi, which can be used to create presentations online, and then, if you want, have them downloaded for off-line use.

Prezi is a freemium service with a free versions, and two premium versions selling for $59/year and $159/year. The company started in Budapest before opening an office last year in San Francisco. Its investors include Sunstone Capital and TED Conferences.

Curious to learn more about Prezi, I fired off an e-mail to CEO Peter Arvai while attending WordCamp Toronto on Saturday.

1. Why did Adam Somlai-Fischer and Peter Halacsy decide to start Prezi?
Adam and Peter working on Prezi in 2007 as they felt slides limited their ability to develop and explain ideas. They were frequent presenters before working with Prezi and thought that Prezi could help them in their work.

2. How is Prezi different from other presentation software and services?
Prezi works with a big canvas instead of slides. This allows users to develop their ideas in an uninterrupted way. Presenting with the Prezi canvas offers a new presentation style: you can skip the slide-by-slide approach, show the big picture and then drill down in the topic that interests the audience.

3. Do you see Prezi as a rival to Powerpoint, or complementary?
We think slideshows are good for monologues aimed a large crowd (the path walkthrough of a Prezi works like a slideshow). The canvas approach is better for smaller meetings where dialogue, questions and brainstorming plays an important part.

4. What’s the target audience? If other words, who are the people out most likely to use Prezi?
Prezi is for anyone who’d like to develop their ideas and communicate them on a single surface. We see a lot of users who are used to presenting ideas as part of their everyday work, e.g. marketers, sales people, teachers, students, project managers.

5. Are you surprised by how Prezi has been embraced, particularly in the presentation market?
We’re very happy and proud of the embrace of Prezi.

6. How is Prezi’s freemium business model been embraced.
Our model has worked well so far. Its aim is to encourage both users who can and can’t afford to pay for services. We have asked our free users to publish their presentations so that they contribute with the content they create.

That’s incredibly impressive but it got me thinking about how Flickr might have been different if Yahoo hadn’t snapped up the company for a reported $40-million in 2005. Would Flickr be any different than it is today?

It’s obviously impossible to determine either way but I think Flickr would have been a much more interesting, innovative and progressive company. For one, I think Flickr would have embraced video much earlier as opposed to its dip-a-toe-in-the-water entry earlier this year. It’s not to suggest Flickr would have been YouTube but Flickr could have been much more than a photo-sharing service.

I think we would have seen a lot more cool projects such as shape data, which Flickr unveiled last week. If you haven’t check out what Flickr did reverse-geocoding, you should check it out, especially if you’re interested in geotagging and location-based services.

I think Flickr would also have been more ambitious in terms of offering photo-editing services. Until it struck a deal with Picnik.com earlier this year, the photo-editing tool-set was pretty rudimentary.

And, finally, I think Flickr would have been more aggressive and innovation about making money while still being true to itself and its large community. Things like premium and value-add services, third-party partnerships and – yes, I’ll say it – more advertising might have been explored more enthusiastically.

That said, Flickr has done incredibly well within the Yahoo empire. Perhaps the best part is Yahoo hasn’t ruined Flickr by trying to make Flickr something it isn’t.

Technorati Tags: flickr, yahoo

If people are going to make purchases, many of them will be bargain-hunting – waiting for increasingly anxious retailers to have sales, or live without something new until they can afford it or their existing computer, jeans, car, etc. no longer works.

Amid this consumer landscape sits Craigslist, which has supplanted eBay as the leading place online to find bargains. If consumers are going to be penny-pinching, Craigslist will be the place to do it. On Craigslist, the bargain is still very much alive and well if you’re willing to do a little work such as picking up your purchase as opposed to have it mailed to you.

For example, hockey equipment – a particular interest of mine – can be purchase for 75% below retail prices. For the most part, it’s relatively new equipment purchased by people who thought they were going to be playing but can’t anymore, or people who just want to sell extra equipment.

If the recession takes hold and the consumer orgy that has thrived for the past decade comes to an abrupt end, Craiglist is poised to thrive. You’ll have motivated buyers looking to save cash, and motivated sellers looking to “monetize” stuff they no longer want/need.

More: Other online companies that could benefit from the recession are:

- Kijiji, whose growth seems to have plateaued in the U.S.; Priceline, Hotwire.com, Skype and Paypal.com. It is interesting that Kijiji, Skype and Paypal are owned by eBay so perhaps this post should have been eBay will thrive during a recession.

Technorati Tags: craigslist, recession

That’s it: 1,000 positions?

Not to be disrespectful or dismissive about the idea of 1,000 people losing their jobs but Yahoo is being timid when it needs to be bold. It’s nibbling at the edges right than take a big strategic bite, which seems strange given Jerry Yang’s infamous 100 Days Promise.

While reducing $100-million of operating senses will gain some approval, what Yahoo really needs to do is determine what it wants to be. This is a particularly urgent mandate given it will more difficult to hide assets that are performing well or strategically valuable when economic times are tough.

One area that Yahoo has yet to address is its huge portfolio of online services, including the many startups it has acquired in recent years (Zimbra, Blue Lithium, Maven Networks, Right Media, Flickr, del.ico.us, MyBlogLog, etc.)

In many respects, Yahoo is trying to be all things to all people but it means a scattered focus. Although this is far from the best time to be pruning assets, Yahoo needs to look at whether some businesses need to be closed or sold. Yahoo operates a vast empire so there must be some room for a more focused approach.

Update: Yahoo is embracing the “open” movement as we move to – shudder – “Web 3.0″ but it strikes me as more of a distraction than being focused.

Technorati Tags: yahoo

It is becoming increasingly apparent, however, that having a .com domain is becoming less important. Part of it has to do with the fact it’s so difficult to come up with a half-decent .com domain, which forces companies to invent silly monikers. The other reality is it’s now possible to not have a .com domain without missing a beat.

This move away from .com has been evident with a wave a new startups that have emerged in recent months. For example, there’s:

- identi.ca (.ca is Canada’s top-level domain)

- Cli.gs (the domain for the Sandwich Islands off the southern tip of South America)

- Bit.ly and – Present.ly (.ly is Libya’s domain name)

- Chi.mp (the domain for Northern Mariana Islands)

- Nouri.sh (the domain for the Island of Saint Helena)

With little space left in the .com market, creativity has literally become the mother of invention. It may take some time before everyone becomes accustomed to not using a .com domain but eventually people will stop thinking about it when using .mp or .ly.

Update: There’s a new service called Domai.nr that is trying to leverage the idea you can use different domains.

Technorati Tags: domain names