The new Web era is about the mainstream. This is when millions of small businesses and digital free agents make a good living by providing better products to a much more savvy market. This is the point in the Crossing the Chasm model when all the innovation stops, start-ups get consolidated into a few mega players and it all gets a bit boring until the next wave of innovation hits us.

This is the third in a 3-part series, by Bernard Lunn, on the new Web. Part 1 was The Whatchamacallit, Post Recession Phase Transition, Part 2 was The Emerging Main Street Web.

The Chasm model applies to the discrete waves of innovation and consolidation in specific technology markets that Moore was describing. It is less applicable today when the market is the Internet and the Internet touches the lives of billions of people every day; and is the primary communications, work and media tool for hundreds of millions of people. That market cannot consolidate down to a few players.