I've been watching Netscape's re-launch. I've been a fan of the work that they've done there -- but consumer traction isn't following and I'm wondering why.

I read today that In three months, and since the debut of Netscape's venture into presenting news channels influenced by visitors' recommendations, its popularity has plummeted, according to analysis by Alexa.com.

Three months ago, Netscape.com was the 238th most visited site. This week Alexa calculated it was in 438th place. It's been downhill for Netscape since late 2004, despite numerous efforts at reformatting and re-launching.

Why don't consumers care?
My quick take is :

I'm too in touch with subtle changes to sites and movements in the marketplace and that causes me to over-value differences which aren't apparent to consumers
Jason is doing a good job building buzz in the 2.0 community but that hasn't been communicated clearly to consumers (this is hard to do)
Re-launching a property isn't an easy thing to do
Getting a blip in traffic is not hard to do -- the hard part of building a real web property is figuring out the secret sauce and impressing customers each and every day with something unique and different

All these thoughts will be important for me and my organization to keep in mind as we move forward.