The Quest for the Next Big Thing

Every day on my commute, I pass within yards of a monument to technology's failed dreams. It's a sprawling office complex along Silicon Valley's main highway that once housed Internet portal Excite@Home. Drawn to it one day last year, as if to a haunted house, I parked and tiptoed up to peer inside. Utterly empty. Spooky. I remembered catching glimpses, as I whizzed by at 65 mph, of people bustling inside the green tinted windows, and I wondered where they all went. The collapse in 2001 of Excite@Home ended the bid of what was once a strong contender for tech's Next Big Thing.

The complex is still empty today. But a few blocks away, another startup has taken residence in Excite's original headquarters. Ingrian Networks (SUNW ) is a promising software security startup backed by the high-powered likes of Sun Microsystems Chief Scientist Bill Joy. That set me thinking that technology innovation works a lot like a forest: Fires periodically sweep through, seeming to destroy everything. Yet before long, grasses and wildflowers sprout from the ashes in a timeless cycle of renewal.