It was a decade in which nothing good happened, and none of the optimistic things we were supposed to believe turned out to be true.

Paul and I smoke insanely different tobacco. As an entrepreneur that has managed a hedge fund now for 11 plus years through bubbles and crashes, I almost take offense.

When 2000 started I was living pretty high on the hog. Stocks only went up and they did so 50 points at a time. By March of 2000, that party ended. In March of 2009, if the same stocks moved $50, they would have been -$49 and change. BUT, by December 2009, the S&P is only 28 percent below all-time highs.

That’s definitely SOMETHING.

This decade was all about two things, creative and greedy destruction. Both hit all-time highs in 2009. In ten years we will see dizzying new highs again.

Here is a list of great creative destruction and economic wonderous things we did not have a decade ago (thanks @gregory for the fast list, great post and super cool Listorious ):

Skype
Wikipedia
Gmail
Facebook
YouTube
Twitter
adWords
Amazon AWS
iPod
WordPress
iPhone
Google Docs
Flickr
etc……………………

If anything, this decade did not see enough creative destruction…see AT&T.

As for creative greed , count me as a wounded, frustrated casualty. In 2000, I was way green and soft. When bad stuff happened to me I was a victim godammit! In 2009, when bad stuff happens to me, I blame myself. That’s a little growth.

In 2001, I was caught up in ‘collateral damage’ and I learned about diversification and humility. My lawyer was my best friend and saved/guided my ass (I love you Sara). I have written a few posts about it over the years . In 2009, I know that if my lawyer is my best friend, I am in trouble. That’s something.

Since my personal economic bottom in 2002, I have had many big victories . There was an insane amount of hard work, a lot of good fortune and a little luck. In 2005 I discovered blogging when I typed ‘term sheet’ into Google’s search box. I was directed to Brad Feld’s blog. I was inspired by Brad and his wicked blogroll of entrepreneurs and venture capitalists. That term sheet was one I was writing for an angel investment in GolfNow.com .

As you know though, blogging is a waste of time and of no economic value.

In 2006, I started Wallstrip. In 2007, Wallstrip was purchased by CBS. Booyah!

In 2008, I co-founded Stocktwits. In 2009, True Ventures and Foundry (yep Brad Feld) invested. In 2010, someone from Russia will invest bonker dineros. That’s just how shit will go down in the next decade of the web.

It’s not just economic progress. It’s global, thermonuclear economic progress. Who will be there with me? Krugman, will you?

Howard Lindzon is a hedge fund manager since 1998. He is also the creator of Wallstrip.com (purchased by CBS in 2007) and now the cofounder of Stocktwits.com. Howard is also a partner in Knight’s Bridge Capital Partners a Private Equity Firm in Toronto, Canada. He blogs at www.howardlindzon.com and tweets at www.twitter.com/howardlindzon

Does it make any sense for 5,000 teachers around the country to teach the same college algebra or macroeconomics course every semester? Of course not. Obviously, if you could take a class from Greg Mankiw or Tyler Cowen why would you resort to taking a class from some mid-level hack (assuming prices were similar)? The only reason 5,000 teachers are regurgitating the same subject in 5,000 separate classrooms around the country is because as little as a few years ago we didn’t have the technology for thousands of students around the country to learn from the same professor.

To wit: here’s a lecture by MIT’s Walter Lewin on torques and oscillating bodies, courtesy of Academic Earth:

The problem, right now, is that the API for the Lists feature isn’t quite done. Marcel Molina, an engineer on the Twitter API team, told Mediaite via e-mail that API will be ready for developers to use sometime next week. At that point, look for an explosion of browser-based tools which will allow you to quickly and easily build lists in a more intuitive way.

Unfortunately, though, Molina also indicates that having the ability to batch update a list (that is, to add a number of users at a time) is under consideration, but not currently supported. This means that creating or editing a large list will continue to be a little pokey – though resourceful developers may find a way around this limitation.

So why launch this now? Twitter knows that the early beta testing group will happily plug away at making their new feature pop — because it’s COOL to be one of the Twitter chosen, like Ashton — and then that everyone else will follow suit, not only because they’ve heard the buzz but because it’s essential to not falling behind (let’s inflate those follower counts, everyone!). I have no problem with rolling out a new feature and I have no problem with changing the way the game is played, but I DO have a problem with doing so in a way that creates a time-consuming, burdensome process for your users. It’s antithetical to everything that made Twitter work so well in the first place.

Or maybe not. I remember looking through the Twitter “Suggested Users” and seeing things like “Whole Foods” and “Britney Spears.” Hardly a list curated on based on quality. And there’s no application process so, say, a new charity can apply for that status (I spent a lot of time back in May helping to launch Elie Wiesel’s Twitter feed — a worthy one if ever there was — and it would have been great to be able to submit that feed for consideration). But no. I just went to check out the “Suggested Users” again and I kid you not, this was the very first one: Dell Outlet – “Refurbished Dell™ computers, electronics.” Don’t forget that TM sign! Somewhere, Jeff Jarvis is bonking his head against a wall.

I also remember Howard Lindzon of StockTwits complaining that Twitter didn’t promote the offshoot sites that used it in innovative, successful ways (like, ahem, Stocktwits) — instead cleaving to the celeb-tweeter crowd. Now, with these Twitter Lists, the usual suspects again got the first nod — and a critical jump of time which turns out to actually matter sort of a lot, since it takes about half an hour to make any list worth reading. I have been a huge Twitter booster and proselytizer since I signed on but part of that was the simplicity and ease of using it, and before it exploded. This is the first time I’ve been turned off by something Twitter has done. It reminds me of the awful Facebook redesign which basically drove me off that platform, except to post the occasional Mediaite link.

I know what you’re thinking, “Wah, wah, why does Twitter need you and your puny 9K following? The top 168 Twitter accounts have over 1 million and the top-thousandth person has 54,886. You’re bupkes.” Well yes, yes, I am. But an empire is built on bupkes, and Twitter’s whole enterprise has relied on people generating content for free. If it wants Lists to take off, it needs everyone to make them — which means incentivizing users to spend their (free) time to create their (free) lists which amount to (free) infrastructure. All of which Internerds have historically shown they’re happy to do, but only if it’s (a) useful and (b) easy. Tagging, organizing, curating — it takes time. If it takes too much of it, why bother? (BTW this is one of the reasons I switched from YouTube to Vimeo).

I’m still a Twitter fan and have said before that I would gladly pay for it — Lord knows I use it! — but even the most loyal users can get turned off by a bad user experience. This is the Internet — there’s always something else waiting in the wings. (For God’s sake, even Stocktwits decided they didn’t need Twitter anymore, and it’s part of their name.) So don’t get too cocky, Twitter. It’s early yet – and your users have to LIKE using you. Next time, think of them when you roll out a new product — not just yourself.