It’s that time of year again: when experts (*) opine on the year that has been and the year that will be. Other than the pontification excesses attendant on the changeover from the 20th to the 21st century, this year’s bloviation about watershed events, never-anticipated black swans, etc., should reach new heights.

Yankee Group is contributing in its own way, of course: On Thursday this week we’ll hold our annual Predictions webinar, in which we share a few of our expectations for 2009 in the move to Anywhere. Based on pre-registrations to date, it looks as if it will be our best-attended webinar in all of 2008. (Click here for details.)

Today, I helped drop a few more nuggets into the digital drama at a Boston-based discussion for Internet marketing organized by the MITX association. Our panel of experts considered the lessons of the Internet from the last downturn, the new consumer, and where marketing will adapt. Lots of Anywhere-based insights, including these:

•  This recession isn’t the fault of the Internet marketing people — so this time around those in that sector can be the solution, rather than the problem
• This recession will drive advertisers to what’s measurable. One participant pointed out, though, that the bar should be even higher: not only should I be able to measure it, I should be able to say I’ve already tried it once and I know it works.
• The Anywhere consumer, already eager to be more portable with his or her digital experiences, will also be readier to engage in value exchange, a quid-pro-quo trade of information and consideration in return for something they value.
• That same consumer, bewildered or angry about the collapse of the economy around them, will be more cynical of corporate speak and slower to trust. Instead, he’s more likely to seek confirmation of critical information from multiple sources, or to take matters into his own hands.

We wrapped the discussion this morning by trying to fill in this phrase: “2009 will be the Year of (blank)”. Answers proffered included “Accountability” — meaning consumers call all their digital experiences to account for themselves, and brands call marketing to account for its value as well. Also “Survival” — another double-entendre referring both to the need for digital marketing to hunker down while the consumer hunkers down. My word to fill in the blank for 2009 was “Cash” — as in, if you have it, you’ll make it, and if you don’t, you won’t.

Join us Thursday for some real Anywhere insight!

(*) Old joke: If X is an unknown quantity, and ’spurt’ is a drip under pressure, then an expert is ‘an unknown drip under pressure’. Sound about right?