The Financial Times reports that investors may be engaging in another Internet "bubble."

As is usually the case in these situations, a few of the investors will make big profits, but most will lose money. The FT reports:

The $1.65bn sale of YouTube to Google last year, along with an expected wave of advertising tied to online video, have prompted a stampede that some Silicon Valley financiers are already comparing to the dotcom bubble, though at this stage at least it remains on a far smaller scale.

Video has become the hottest corner of a broader financing boom tied to so-called "Web 2.0" internet companies. The amount of US venture capital flowing into video-related start-ups of all types jumped by 95 per cent last year to $682m, according to figures compiled by Dow Jones/Venture One. . . .

Some 30 start-ups have already raised venture capital money to create consumer video sites, according to Todd Dagres, a partner at Spark Capital, whose investments include video site Veoh Networks.

Most are in their early stages and have raised only an average of $10m each, but eventual investments in these companies as they try to expand are set to top $1bn, he estimated.

In addition, the article reports, numerous proposals for additional startups are pouring in. Dagres predicts that most investors in this will eventually lose money, but that they should be safe this year.

Some investors are taking the seemingly less risky approach of backing companies that create the software and other necessaries to run these sites:

Part of this involves software, networking and other "infrastructure" companies deemed less risky than websites trying to attract a consumer audience.

But of course, when their customers go belly-up, most of these won’t have any revenue stream, either.

I knew of a few people, as we all do, who invested in the Google/Yahoo!/etc. boom a few years back and got out just days before the bubble burst. They made a fortune, and their money—and that of the big losers—made the current Web possible.

But that’s little comfort if you lost your fortune on it. 

The moral is just as it always has been in the investment world:

Guess right.