Trust Ajit Balakrishnan of Rediff to be candid with his views and candid he was at the recently held IAMAI Digital Summit.
Ajit Balakrishnan said “The internet industry needs 22 year old Computer Science graduates who can create products that have inherent network effects. Products like twitter and facebook are there because of the network effects.”
He also said “The industry needs to support and encourage such young entrepreneurs by providing them funding and hand holding to build such products”
When asked about content he said “Content has become a commodity and in my view machine learning which if applied to products to deliver network effects is what will create the next internet company with a 100 million $ revenue”
Ajit Balakrishnan was of the opinion that the next big internet company would be created by a young 22 year old who would do something radical and revolutionize the internet space. He said “This is because 22 year olds don’t see constraints that we older folks see”
Our Take
Well for starters I feel bad because Im 2 years too old. Im 24 years old! That said I did start WATBlog at 21 so I hope that counts for something! 
Jokes apart I couldn’t agree more with Ajit. The smartest people Ive met or worked with in the internet space have been people who have been younger to me. This doesn’t mean that the people who are older are not smart! Well the older guys have more business sense, experience and know how to make money here and now. While the younger guys are more in tune into what they want and Internet and India both are very young as a medium and country. Hence as far as products are concerned young kids have far better insight as they are active and in many cases addicted users of the space. They evolve faster learn faster and can foresee product needs much faster as well.
A case in point for my own example. How many of you would pay for gmail? or mail in general? Well I did! I just paid 5$ to increase my gmail account by 20 gb more in size! Why you may ask? Well because I find deleting mails cumbersome, boring and a complete waste of time! Also I like archiving stuff especially digital stuff.
Now this example illustrates as to how evolved a user I am of email. Im probably 1 in a million who paid Gmail for the upgrade! Similarly younger folks (people 24 and below.. Yes Im still young 
) would have extreme usage of the web and would easily be able to identify gaps which in turn could be converted into great product ideas.
This is my take! Any one who wants to counter this analysis should comment! This topic needs to be discussed so all you 30 year olds and above we want to hear you!
amazing one guys! I am 22 and I am starting my strategic Digital Marketing firm soon. So this is super interesting article that boosts confidence in me. Thanks & Regards
Nice to see that Ajit read – http://indianstartupgyaan.wordpress.com/2009/11/01/why-the-great-indian-media-companies-will-fail-on-the-internet/ – and has realised that Content has become a commodity.
Rajiv — I am not sure you got the point that AB was trying to make. He said someone young and from the CS background to revolutionize the way internet works and not how it is consumed. But, i don’t think that revolution will happen from India… for the simple reason India is country which produces vast amounts of illiterate graduates of no quality. When was the last time you heard of a product sold internationally which was developed and marketed from India… the ans to that is NONE. But I believe that countries like S. Korea, Taiwan or China for that matter will be countries that will change the way internet evolves. As far as India is concerned, even today I don’t see anyone working or developing a product or service that the world can consume… VCs have funded their friends and families and spent a lot of money on lot of me-too ventures and there are organizations like TiE, proto.in etc which are just basically event management companies masked as start-up platforms. We need an revolution of the mind to occur first in this country before we can start innovating great products and services. Most Indians live in CARB in a POT syndrome, this applies to the government as well.
While I do agree on the point that young people drive the internet and so one of them will create the next big thing, I necessarily don’t agree see Facebook and Twitter as the benchmarks. These are companies that are still grappling with the question of how to make money off a business – a question that probably was never asked in the thousands of years business existed – simply because business came with a monetization model.
It is not about the numbers as bragged about by the Facebooks and Twitters but the value the users bring to the company. LinkedIn is a great example. And so are Indian companies like Zoho which have great potential looking into the future.
yea, well iam 21 and now launching new social portal next year ie indias first social aggregator with more than 1000 revenue models and partnerships more than 800 business partners and 600 sites integrations !!! watch out everyone on jan
Oooh…and I’m launching a time machine soon
Ha ha.
Apologies for the sarcasm…but couldn’t resist it after the comment by viraat.
@viraat 1000 revenue models 800 business partners 600 site integrations…..ha ha ha gud one
agree with almost everything, but not sure which content has become a commodity, as per AB
content is still the king, and as HBO exemplified in US in first half of this decade, and as so many examples in India exemplify —- content from such content creators — good or bad — drives the readership or viewership
cheers
@ Prashant – Many examples in India?
Youtube, facebook and twitter are platforms on which content is generated. Mainly by your friends and other users.
But its a platform first.
Do you log on to facebook only to follow the activities of your favourite celebrity or brand? Which too is content which has been paid for by Facebook?
Do read the post which I linked to. It kinds explains what a ‘product’ is.