For a number of years, The Black World Today Dot Com (tbwt.com) has been the largest Black owned daily web newspaper. Early last year there was a scrambling for reader share when Microsoft and BET went into a $35 million partnership on BET's web site. That was the first major quake in the Black web world. Since then, there have been many Black web shakes.

Early this year, the Black World Today Dot Com reformatted its news services and outreached more to existing Black web sites and magazines. It offered affiliate services to others such as Gibbsmagazine.com so that they could tap into their columnists and services; it listed as many Black churches in a nationwide directory; it hyperlinked over 1,000 Black sites, and it simply expanded it services in other ways to meet the onslaught of the $35 million BET site.

BET was delayed in coming on line for many months, and when it did, it was plagued by a number of problems that they finally over came. But their audience was a different audience than tbwt.com's. They went after the young entertainment-oriented Black audience. Billionaire founder, Robert Johnson, realized that Blacks will buy entertainment even if they will purchase nothing else.

Seemingly, BET has captured their intended audience and is strong. Furthermore, BET Holdings' founder, Robert Johnson, seems to be going after bigger a fish he wants to fry--a lucrative airline route that was spun-off to him, cable TV channels with all Black movies and entertainment and talk TV, and restaurants throughout the country.

And while BET seems to be doing well, so does The Black World Today Dot Com. Their daily is expanded, full of paid advertisements, and there seems to be a strong footing on which they stand. But since the BET rise, other Black sites have arisen and cut into the supposed digital divide that exists for Black Americans.

Africana Dot Com was started by Henry Louis Gates, Jr., Kwame Anthony Appiah, and Harry M. Lasker III, on Dr. King's birthday, January 1999, to, in their own words, "[to be dedicated to] providing authoritative content about black people throughout the world and, thereby, helping bridge the digital divide."

They grew enormously within two years. Henry Louis Gates, Jr., during that time wrote a very controversial book on Blacks that may have helped their growth. If it did not help their growth among whites, it certainly helped capture the favorable attention of Time-Warner toward their site.

Approximately a month ago, the two remaining founders and current administrators of Africana.com announced that Time Warner has purchased them. Time Warner, one may remember, was bought by AOL in a major worldwide deal that is still going through the various regulatory processes of approval.

This was a major quake in the Black Web world. But before we could comprehend what this will mean, Black Voices.com announced just last week that they have worked out a very lucrative deal with General Motor. This deal runs into the multi-million dollar range. GM released a statement about why they have gone into partnership with BV.com. It is in part as follows:

"Our alliance with BlackVoices.com enables GM to establish online relationships with the African-American community and drive traffic to our web sites," said Tyrone Jordan, director of North America new business development for e-GM, GM's business-to-consumer e-commerce unit. "Part of our mission at e-GM is to enhance GM's strong relationship with various market segments. When we reviewed the options available for reaching African-Americans, BlackVoices.com clearly stood out as having the most attractive association with the African-American community."

This means that the two major content providers for Black audiences have gone white and white financed. What effect will this have on other Black web media is a question that many are asking. There is the immediate and major fear that The Black World Today Dot Com will be the next to go. Then, there are other fears such as the idea that many Black web media will start taming their voices to attract corporate take overs and Corporate capital sponsorship.

Ishmael Reed once said to Gibbs that many of us (Blacks) have not understood the power of the Internet. We can have our voices go out uncensored. In the past, many Black voices could not be heard as they should have been heard because Whites controlled the media--newspapers, publishing, TV, radio, etc. The web gives Blacks an unfiltered voice to speak the truth as Blacks see it.

But if the large web media are bought up--whether outright or partnered--the same type of restrictions of the past can be upon Black voices again. Surely, GM is not going to invest millions of dollars into a site that speaks defiantly about issues that effect Black Americans and GM.

The the changing face and the shakeout in the Black web pose some concern for Black Americans because when you have been brought to the dance, you got to, as Mollie Ivens says, dance with the ones that brong them.

These two major Black web sites should be carefully and critically studied to see exactly how their voices will change from a Black Voice to a White voice. It is also worth noting whether other strong Black web voices will mellow their tones to attract corporate sponsorships as a result of the financial shaking that is taking place in Black web-dom.[]