I believe you miss the point of the analogy.
The analogy is not about people selling services to the gold diggers, it's about selling tools to the gold diggers.
The services market would be akin to the people who sell food to the miners.
The analogy is not about people selling services to the gold diggers, it's about selling tools to the gold diggers.
The services market would be akin to the people who sell food to the miners.
Kind of apropos... I got stuck on a trip recently without a book, and grabbed a copy of Heyday off a shelf. It's a historical fiction novel about the gold rush period and how things in CA played out. Not a terrible read, if you're into that kind of thing.
It's not clever to think there is more opportunity in selling B2B products : the market is MUCH tougher and the competition is a lot more skilled.
This gold-digger analogy is seductive because it fits in so perfectly with the programmer mindset, but look outside the bubble: most money is made in selling goods to consumers, not to businesses.
1. Salesforce's Force.com
2. Amazon's EC2
3. Google's AppEngine
4. Microsoft's Windows Azure
5. VMWare/Salesforce's VMForce
6. Makara
7. CloudBees
8. PiCloud
9. PHPFog
10. DuoStack
I'm not sure it's obvious that PaaS is "winner take all", but even if it is, right now there are several deep-pocketed companies fighting to be that winner. Sounds pretty good if you're looking for an exit.