By Tom Foremski, Silicon Valley Watcher

I agreed to be a columnist for Always On, Tony Perkins' latest online venture (yes, Tony of Red Herring former fame [not the current one--the pre-dotcom dotbomb Red Herring].

I asked to be paid to be a columnist. I said my kids need to eat, but they said they don't pay columnists. They see a value in my association and I guess my payment is the Always On brand association with Silicon Valley Watcher.

Fine, I said, I'll do it anyway. I can eat at the SF soup kitchens such as Aqua, and Boulevard, and Rubicon where many of my evening industry roundtables are held, and my kids can forage.

And hopefully, I won't have to pay for extra bandwidth this month due to rising numbers of pesky readers ;-)

[Some of my readers were so bored during the holidays, they were averaging 15 SVW pageviews per visitor! Which is damn good...]

Sooner than later, I think people will pay for content because isn't that the differentiator? You can get an algorithm and a server anywhere.

I think I know what the end game is going to be. But in the meantime there is a mid-game--which is where a lot of people are focused. One more bubble, or a least a decent bit of foam, and they are out.