So, don't stress out over what your mega-competition is doing. Look to your niche and focus on that. Ever tried emailing one of those mega sites? I have. You get auto-generated responses. No such thing as personal service. And how could there be? They're in a parallel universe, after all, where such things as basic customer service are delivered by autoresponders, not real humans.

For you and me, "mundane dot-com survivors", trick is to focus on *business* and not get caught up in hype and swirl of The Internet. We understand that internet is but a tool at our disposal, not some mystical plane where you can afford to throw out antiquated "old economy" principles such as fact that revenues must exceed expenses in order to make a profit.

The LA Times article profiled a small dot-commer who is thriving despite so called "melt-down". A sole-employee business, this entrepreneur "turned her idea for a coupon-clipping Web site into a profitable business by keeping expenses low". Fancy that. Keeping expenses low. What an epiphany. The business took a year and a half to turn a profit with expenses of around $800 a month. It has remained in profit ever since, generating a salary of between $75,000 and $125,000 a year for its owner.

Even more startling is fact that "the vast majority of Internet companies have never seen a drop of venture capital or had a public stock offering. Of about 10,000 dot-coms in United States, fewer than 500 have publicly traded stock. Only a quarter have received venture-capital money, depending instead on money from more patient private investors, their own checkbooks and credit cards or - remarkably - company revenues."

Wow. Now that's power. And along with that comes an incredible responsibility.

Now, on one of my web sites I give people advice on web, internet and other related topics. I give people insight on how to create sites which look good, produce results and perform their task.

I've received numerous emails from people explaining that I have changed their life in many ways. Some people have had their interest rekindled, others have learned things they didn't know. And still others began to get an understanding of how to be ethical on internet. In fact, some people even said they've learned that it's important to be ethical at all!

I humbly submit that we webmasters have a high responsibility to internet community.

- We need to communicate clearly - We need to communicate accurately - We must not tolerate unethical behaviors - We must not promote scams and frauds - We may make money, we must do it honestly - We must respect other's opinions - We must not flame, spam or engage in other unsocial behaviors

All of us need to understand how much power we have and use that power in a responsible way.