I've seen the news that Hostway and Affinity merged and the revenu of the new company is more than $100 million. Do you think that smaller web hosts will be hit from the big players and most of them will need to sell their businesses for less.

The "big players" have been around for quite a while now and there are plenty of smaller hosts doing just nicely. Sure the big boys will continue to eat each other up and grow into faceless giants but there will always be room for small hosts - just because a company is corporate/global doesn't make them any better.

Often when a company grows too big it starts to become more and more distant from it's customers. This is where smaller companies who run a more personal service always fare better. I don't think smaller hosts will have to start cheapening themselves at all, savvy customers go for important issues like service and support before price.

blue-dreamer is right. There will always be room for a small company who can offer a decent service at a fair price.

I say let the Verios and Hostways and Interland of the world do what they want. I'll keep rockin' the Sectorlink server as long as I possibly can.