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>>I am glad it's over - who needs a billion bloated wordpress sites? I want everything online sold through amazon, events posted on facebook and news posted to

>>I am glad it's over - who needs a billion bloated wordpress sites? I want everything online sold through amazon, events posted on facebook and news posted to a single platform (I use an RSS reader which makes dozens of websites look exactly the same). Really? You want a few private players on the market controlling all interactions and commerce through their closed-source platforms?

pjlegato 11y ago
It's already happened. Whether we want it or not is now beside the point. Sure, there will always be a few specialist sites, but the vast majority of commerce and interaction for most people has long since moved to Amazon and Facebook.
- philovivero 11y ago
  We're more interested in your original statement, that you want it that way. I think most people educated on monopolies would probably not think that way. We're hoping you have some interesting insight here. But I'm starting to suspect what you really mean is: "Oops, I didn't meant I want it that way. I mean it is that way, and if it's going to be that way, why not take it to its logical extreme?" Which, if correct, is still an unusual sentiment. EDIT: I mis-read the comment tree and am conflating two commenters.
  - pjlegato 11y ago
    I didn't make the original statement. Someone else wrote the grandparent post.
- learc83 11y ago
  I'm not sure if you can say that most people have moved to Amazon and Facebook. The majority of their customers didn't move there because they started there. Amazon and Facebook were the first things they used on the internet. There are so many more people and companies on the internet now than there were 15 years ago. There are probably more people running custom sites and shopping at sites other than Amazon than their were back then.
- icebraining 11y ago
  Even in the US, Amazon still controls less than 40% of e-commerce spending. Outside the US, it's even less.
  - pjlegato 11y ago
    40% of ecommerce spending is a staggeringly high percentage. There are very few large industries where a single player controls 40% of the market. For comparison, Wal-Mart, the largest US brick and mortar retailer, has about 11% market share.[1] 1 - http://www.scdigest.com/assets/newsviews/13-07-26-1.php?cid=7260 http://www.scdigest.com/assets/newsviews/13-07-26-1.php?cid=...
- notahacker 11y ago
  I still can think of a lot more types of business that need websites to maintain a minimum level of apparent professionalism than need a Facebook (or Amazon) account at all. Sure, 80% of them could knock something very serviceable together with Squarespace or the right template so the designer might be a luxury, but the individual web presence still is.
  - pjlegato 11y ago
    That's true. Most businesses still need their own website. But now they build it in Squarespace, talk to their customers on Twitter, and send physical goods with Fulfillment by Amazon.
alexashka 11y ago
Who do you think makes the internet possible to begin with? Competing entities? Or people working together? I want one currency and one universal language too. That probably sounds radical to a lot of people but really, look at your life - do you want parents competing to raise you properly or do you want them working together? Why do we have the same parents our whole lives? Because it works well that way. Competition as a means of arriving at the best solution to complex problems is an unfortunate artifact that'll be looked upon as barbaric not too long from now. Working together works much better in my experience.
- pjc50 11y ago
  I think arguing for the Bolshevik abolition of the family is going to go down even less well on HN than the abolition of Wordpress. Irreconcilable differences of opinion on what the best way to do things are the reason why we can't all just join in one big cooperation; the alternative requires either total stagnation or the squashing of dissent. (See also The Tyranny of Structurelessness)

pjlegato 11y ago

It's already happened. Whether we want it or not is now beside the point. Sure, there will always be a few specialist sites, but the vast majority of commerce and interaction for most people has long since moved to Amazon and Facebook.

philovivero 11y ago
We're more interested in your original statement, that you want it that way. I think most people educated on monopolies would probably not think that way. We're hoping you have some interesting insight here. But I'm starting to suspect what you really mean is: "Oops, I didn't meant I want it that way. I mean it is that way, and if it's going to be that way, why not take it to its logical extreme?" Which, if correct, is still an unusual sentiment. EDIT: I mis-read the comment tree and am conflating two commenters.
- pjlegato 11y ago
  I didn't make the original statement. Someone else wrote the grandparent post.
learc83 11y ago
I'm not sure if you can say that most people have moved to Amazon and Facebook. The majority of their customers didn't move there because they started there. Amazon and Facebook were the first things they used on the internet. There are so many more people and companies on the internet now than there were 15 years ago. There are probably more people running custom sites and shopping at sites other than Amazon than their were back then.
icebraining 11y ago
Even in the US, Amazon still controls less than 40% of e-commerce spending. Outside the US, it's even less.
- pjlegato 11y ago
  40% of ecommerce spending is a staggeringly high percentage. There are very few large industries where a single player controls 40% of the market. For comparison, Wal-Mart, the largest US brick and mortar retailer, has about 11% market share.[1] 1 - http://www.scdigest.com/assets/newsviews/13-07-26-1.php?cid=7260 http://www.scdigest.com/assets/newsviews/13-07-26-1.php?cid=...
notahacker 11y ago
I still can think of a lot more types of business that need websites to maintain a minimum level of apparent professionalism than need a Facebook (or Amazon) account at all. Sure, 80% of them could knock something very serviceable together with Squarespace or the right template so the designer might be a luxury, but the individual web presence still is.
- pjlegato 11y ago
  That's true. Most businesses still need their own website. But now they build it in Squarespace, talk to their customers on Twitter, and send physical goods with Fulfillment by Amazon.

alexashka 11y ago

Who do you think makes the internet possible to begin with? Competing entities? Or people working together? I want one currency and one universal language too. That probably sounds radical to a lot of people but really, look at your life - do you want parents competing to raise you properly or do you want them working together? Why do we have the same parents our whole lives? Because it works well that way. Competition as a means of arriving at the best solution to complex problems is an unfortunate artifact that'll be looked upon as barbaric not too long from now. Working together works much better in my experience.

pjc50 11y ago
I think arguing for the Bolshevik abolition of the family is going to go down even less well on HN than the abolition of Wordpress. Irreconcilable differences of opinion on what the best way to do things are the reason why we can't all just join in one big cooperation; the alternative requires either total stagnation or the squashing of dissent. (See also The Tyranny of Structurelessness)