I think this problem is specific to today's web: I don't think slashdot and yahoo (or google) had a tribe. That is, another approach to marketing is to build s

I think this problem is specific to today's web: I don't think slashdot and yahoo (or google) had a tribe. That is, another approach to marketing is to build something that is just really good - much better than the alternatives. But this is extraordinarily hard to do, and it's much easier if you're in early, before it's mined out. That said, whenever it seems that a market is stable and everything that can be invented has been invented, that's the very time that is ripe for something unexpected, perhaps coming out of left-of-field (eg. a disruptive tech).