Thanks for all the great posts. I'm not sure Bezos and Andreesen really count in my mind. I'm talking about people who, taking advantage of the supposed level playing field of the net, used it to get their writing or music or whatever out there, and moved on to household-name status. This was the original promise of MP3.com -- it was supposed to let unsigned bands bypass the record label machinery and reach the masses. I don't think any of them really did. Harry Knowles is a good example, but he's not quite a household name -- probably 1/25 as big a name as Ebert. I agree that the Web's architecture encourages microniches, which discourages stardom, so it's the opposite of Hollywood. And I like the point about the lack of video. If everyone gets broadband, and it becomes cheap to post video, will that change things? Another question: How do you account for the exceptions, like Drudge, Mahir, Knowles, Danni Ashe?