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I wonder if the outcome would have been different if Slack was incorporated outside of the US where Microsoft could use some of its non domiciled cash on the ac

I wonder if the outcome would have been different if Slack was incorporated outside of the US where Microsoft could use some of its non domiciled cash on the acquisition? http://www.ibtimes.com/microsoft-admits-keeping-92-billion-offshore-avoid-paying-29-billion-us-taxes-1665938 http://www.ibtimes.com/microsoft-admits-keeping-92-billion-o... Also interesting to think that Slack could be worth so much. Look at ICQ, Microsoft instant messenger, etc. It seems as though slack like tools get eclipsed every 5-10 years as a new generation comes along with a new favorite tool. I'd be interested in hearing from someone who would argue that slack will be a dominate communication tool in 5-8 years time and still exist in a meaningful way in 10 years time.

pmlnr 11y ago
IRC is still alive ;)
- CaptSpify 11y ago
  But it is the exception.
- bluedino 11y ago
  It's just a protocol. Like HTTP, FTP... It's not a client. It's not one companies servers. It's not anything like AOL IM, ICQ, Yahoo Messenger, PowWow...
  - pmlnr 11y ago
    And that is exactly why it's still alive.
    - lmm 11y ago
      AIM/ICQ is still alive. Yahoo! Messenger is still alive. MSN Messenger has a migration path to Skype. Doesn't seem like that distinction makes a lot of difference.
ue_ 11y ago
>get eclipsed every 5-10 years as a new generation comes along with a new favorite tool I wonder if this rule holds just as much for IRC - for most FOSS projects, IRC is the go-to choice, and it's been that way for a long time.
- yeukhon 11y ago
  IRC is my favorite, but IRC is bad for company, because you have to manage your own IRC server (you don't want to host your company stuff on freenode, do you). Also, IRC doesn't come with any integration with third party tools. Unless you have a very willing hacker willing to build the integration from scratch, IRC is bad. Not that you would never find a use case to write custom bot on Slack for your need, but I imagine tools like Jira, Jenkins are already created and are well maintained.
  - lmm 11y ago
    Established OSS tools like Jenkins already have IRC integration.
  - nrjames 11y ago
    In an enterprise environment, Slack is sometimes considered bad because all of the company data is not under the company's control. I seriously doubt that the company I work for ever would go all in on Slack, precisely for that reason.
    - yeukhon 11y ago
      A lot of enterprise claim to run their own services, but in reality, they outsource to third party to host them, for example, centurylink for active directory or some vendor for managed exchange servers. Heck, a lot of companies bought 365 and Box. People use Skype for communication, passwords are being thrown all over emails and chats. Code are on GitHub. While there is auditing in place, the reality is, a lot of enterprise data aren't really controlled and stored on-premise servers, and auditor cares mostly whether access are limited, logs are available for tractability, and whether there is enough risk assessment done prior to signing the contract.
chimeracoder 11y ago
> Look at ICQ, Microsoft instant messenger, etc. It seems as though slack like tools get eclipsed every 5-10 years as a new generation comes along with a new favorite tool. Unlike ICQ, MSN, AIM, YIM, etc., Slack is explicitly intended for companies and businesses to use as a work tool. There are some OSS communities that use it as well, but Slack very clearly discourages that use case. The "stickiness" of work tools is higher than consumer-oriented applications in general, but especially for something like Slack, which is focusing on integrating other productivity features or products[0], I don't think ICQ is a great pattern of what we should expect. [0] as we've seen by their announcement just this week
chishaku 11y ago
> ICQ, Microsoft instant messenger ... slack like tools... I think people too often overlook Slack's integrations. Yes, Slack is "just" chat or "just" a glorified IRC. Or is it? I don't know how long it would take me to integrate my Stripe, Github, Trello, and Zendesk streams into IRC to the point where I could set it and forget it. I think for business users at least, using this type of setup _effectively_ could make it hard to move away.
- baddox 11y ago
  Slack seems to have mostly eclipsed Hipchat, at least among Silicon Valley startups, but integrations probably weren't a huge factor in that. Slack does have a nicer flow for integrations, but Hipchat worked quite well (and actually had much-missed features like customizing the background color of messages; it's unfathomable how Slack could still not have this feature).
  - Klathmon 11y ago
    >it's unfathomable how Slack could still not have this feature I hear this saying a lot, and every time I just can't take it seriously. This is the first time I've ever heard of someone wanting customizable background colors for messages on a messaging platform. It's just not something I or anyone I know about cares about. I just can't see how that would be considered a high importance feature by anyone.
    - kcorbitt 11y ago
      HipChat's colored messages made it easy to see the error messages in a stream of mostly unimportant notifications. Slack kinda lets you do the same thing with a vertical colored bar to the left of the message, but important/error messages are much less visually distinct.
    - Jordrok 11y ago
      I seem to remember AIM allowing customized fonts and background colors around 15 years ago... Just sayin'
hyperliner 11y ago
This is a very interesting point. Is there any IP in Slack? Or can Microsoft build it in Office / Skype / etc etc and basically block Slack off of the enterprise? Building the ecosystem would be tough, but the capability seems doable by Microsoft or any other company with resources (Google?).
gshulegaard 11y ago
> It seems as though slack like tools get eclipsed every 5-10 years as a new generation comes along with a new favorite tool. You've definitely got a point there. Although I do want to mention that part of the reason Slack eclipsed other tools was, in part, its Websocket based protocol. They have created a fairly complete unified messaging application because of it (IMO). They were the first movers in the area. I don't know if I would provide much of a meaningful discussion regarding the longer term viability of Slack, but I think they have a chance to be meaningful, maybe even dominate in 10 years time. They are already Websocket based and they are moving towards WebRTC support...if they take that direction and add P2P support to provide truly secure encrypted communications where certificates are negotiated P2P, then I think they will explode to even greater heights than they have already achieved. Of course, this is not a simple task, but the business implications of truly secure communications channels would be compelling for most corporate enterprises. Now this is not the same as 100% secure endpoints, but it would be a massive step in the right direction. Edit: Forgot to add P2P link... https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/Guide/API/WebRTC/Peer-to-peer_communications_with_WebRTC https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/Guide/API/WebRT...
- JustSomeNobody 11y ago
  10 Years? Hmmm... That is a <i>very<i> long time.
  - gshulegaard 11y ago
    Network externalities are powerful things. Especially when it comes to enterprise level applications.
- cpeterso 11y ago
  IRC Cloud's web client uses WebSockets.
  - gshulegaard 11y ago
    I don't think that IRC Cloud was originally based on websocket...I think it used 'keep-alive' but I could be wrong. Although it still has documentation on how to use HTTPS for stream end-points (https://github.com/irccloud/irccloud-tools/wiki/API-Overview https://github.com/irccloud/irccloud-tools/wiki/API-Overview). Also can't find much information about WebRTC support for IRC Cloud.
lmm 11y ago
Frankly Slack's success is the utter failure of every alternative on the UX side. MSN messenger was perhaps wrong-footed by the shift to multi-device, but none of the other tools have such an excuse. It's not a generational thing, it's an incredible level of, there's no other word, incompetence on the part of the makers of major messaging software (Skype in particular).
- chubot 11y ago
  Yeah I agree, I think people routinely underestimate the level of quality and amount of time you have to put into a consumer product. A good example is Yahoo Mail... this product is used by so many people, and was supposedly overhauled a few years ago, yet it is mediocre in so many ways.
  - rokhayakebe 11y ago
    What email product isn't mediocre? This entire vertical needs an upgrade. Perhaps Email is Hard.
    - chubot 11y ago
      Gmail is good, but it got that good about 10 years ago, and hasn't gotten much better since. (Arguably it's worse in some respects.) When Gmail came out it was a breath of fresh air... now it's just the bar you need to meet. It's sad that Yahoo hasn't been able to meet that bar in 10 years.
    - jhasse 11y ago
      Fastmail!
- petergatsby 11y ago
  100%
- dave2000 11y ago
  MSN had big flashing ads. When I first saw that I assumed I was dealing with another windows install with malware on it. I've paid for the OS, why have I got this freemium crap? Slack has no way of letting me know who's read the messages. Come on, it's 2016. I asked them about this and they told me the only solution is it get each contact to add a sunglasses icon as they read each message! What a joke.

pmlnr 11y ago

IRC is still alive ;)

CaptSpify 11y ago
But it is the exception.
bluedino 11y ago
It's just a protocol. Like HTTP, FTP... It's not a client. It's not one companies servers. It's not anything like AOL IM, ICQ, Yahoo Messenger, PowWow...
- pmlnr 11y ago
  And that is exactly why it's still alive.
  - lmm 11y ago
    AIM/ICQ is still alive. Yahoo! Messenger is still alive. MSN Messenger has a migration path to Skype. Doesn't seem like that distinction makes a lot of difference.

ue_ 11y ago

>get eclipsed every 5-10 years as a new generation comes along with a new favorite tool I wonder if this rule holds just as much for IRC - for most FOSS projects, IRC is the go-to choice, and it's been that way for a long time.

yeukhon 11y ago
IRC is my favorite, but IRC is bad for company, because you have to manage your own IRC server (you don't want to host your company stuff on freenode, do you). Also, IRC doesn't come with any integration with third party tools. Unless you have a very willing hacker willing to build the integration from scratch, IRC is bad. Not that you would never find a use case to write custom bot on Slack for your need, but I imagine tools like Jira, Jenkins are already created and are well maintained.
- lmm 11y ago
  Established OSS tools like Jenkins already have IRC integration.
- nrjames 11y ago
  In an enterprise environment, Slack is sometimes considered bad because all of the company data is not under the company's control. I seriously doubt that the company I work for ever would go all in on Slack, precisely for that reason.
  - yeukhon 11y ago
    A lot of enterprise claim to run their own services, but in reality, they outsource to third party to host them, for example, centurylink for active directory or some vendor for managed exchange servers. Heck, a lot of companies bought 365 and Box. People use Skype for communication, passwords are being thrown all over emails and chats. Code are on GitHub. While there is auditing in place, the reality is, a lot of enterprise data aren't really controlled and stored on-premise servers, and auditor cares mostly whether access are limited, logs are available for tractability, and whether there is enough risk assessment done prior to signing the contract.

chimeracoder 11y ago

> Look at ICQ, Microsoft instant messenger, etc. It seems as though slack like tools get eclipsed every 5-10 years as a new generation comes along with a new favorite tool. Unlike ICQ, MSN, AIM, YIM, etc., Slack is explicitly intended for companies and businesses to use as a work tool. There are some OSS communities that use it as well, but Slack very clearly discourages that use case. The "stickiness" of work tools is higher than consumer-oriented applications in general, but especially for something like Slack, which is focusing on integrating other productivity features or products[0], I don't think ICQ is a great pattern of what we should expect. [0] as we've seen by their announcement just this week

chishaku 11y ago

> ICQ, Microsoft instant messenger ... slack like tools... I think people too often overlook Slack's integrations. Yes, Slack is "just" chat or "just" a glorified IRC. Or is it? I don't know how long it would take me to integrate my Stripe, Github, Trello, and Zendesk streams into IRC to the point where I could set it and forget it. I think for business users at least, using this type of setup _effectively_ could make it hard to move away.

baddox 11y ago
Slack seems to have mostly eclipsed Hipchat, at least among Silicon Valley startups, but integrations probably weren't a huge factor in that. Slack does have a nicer flow for integrations, but Hipchat worked quite well (and actually had much-missed features like customizing the background color of messages; it's unfathomable how Slack could still not have this feature).
- Klathmon 11y ago
  >it's unfathomable how Slack could still not have this feature I hear this saying a lot, and every time I just can't take it seriously. This is the first time I've ever heard of someone wanting customizable background colors for messages on a messaging platform. It's just not something I or anyone I know about cares about. I just can't see how that would be considered a high importance feature by anyone.
  - kcorbitt 11y ago
    HipChat's colored messages made it easy to see the error messages in a stream of mostly unimportant notifications. Slack kinda lets you do the same thing with a vertical colored bar to the left of the message, but important/error messages are much less visually distinct.
  - Jordrok 11y ago
    I seem to remember AIM allowing customized fonts and background colors around 15 years ago... Just sayin'

hyperliner 11y ago

This is a very interesting point. Is there any IP in Slack? Or can Microsoft build it in Office / Skype / etc etc and basically block Slack off of the enterprise? Building the ecosystem would be tough, but the capability seems doable by Microsoft or any other company with resources (Google?).

gshulegaard 11y ago

> It seems as though slack like tools get eclipsed every 5-10 years as a new generation comes along with a new favorite tool. You've definitely got a point there. Although I do want to mention that part of the reason Slack eclipsed other tools was, in part, its Websocket based protocol. They have created a fairly complete unified messaging application because of it (IMO). They were the first movers in the area. I don't know if I would provide much of a meaningful discussion regarding the longer term viability of Slack, but I think they have a chance to be meaningful, maybe even dominate in 10 years time. They are already Websocket based and they are moving towards WebRTC support...if they take that direction and add P2P support to provide truly secure encrypted communications where certificates are negotiated P2P, then I think they will explode to even greater heights than they have already achieved. Of course, this is not a simple task, but the business implications of truly secure communications channels would be compelling for most corporate enterprises. Now this is not the same as 100% secure endpoints, but it would be a massive step in the right direction. Edit: Forgot to add P2P link... https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/Guide/API/WebRTC/Peer-to-peer_communications_with_WebRTC https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/Guide/API/WebRT...

JustSomeNobody 11y ago
10 Years? Hmmm... That is a <i>very<i> long time.
- gshulegaard 11y ago
  Network externalities are powerful things. Especially when it comes to enterprise level applications.
cpeterso 11y ago
IRC Cloud's web client uses WebSockets.
- gshulegaard 11y ago
  I don't think that IRC Cloud was originally based on websocket...I think it used 'keep-alive' but I could be wrong. Although it still has documentation on how to use HTTPS for stream end-points (https://github.com/irccloud/irccloud-tools/wiki/API-Overview https://github.com/irccloud/irccloud-tools/wiki/API-Overview). Also can't find much information about WebRTC support for IRC Cloud.

lmm 11y ago

Frankly Slack's success is the utter failure of every alternative on the UX side. MSN messenger was perhaps wrong-footed by the shift to multi-device, but none of the other tools have such an excuse. It's not a generational thing, it's an incredible level of, there's no other word, incompetence on the part of the makers of major messaging software (Skype in particular).

chubot 11y ago
Yeah I agree, I think people routinely underestimate the level of quality and amount of time you have to put into a consumer product. A good example is Yahoo Mail... this product is used by so many people, and was supposedly overhauled a few years ago, yet it is mediocre in so many ways.
- rokhayakebe 11y ago
  What email product isn't mediocre? This entire vertical needs an upgrade. Perhaps Email is Hard.
  - chubot 11y ago
    Gmail is good, but it got that good about 10 years ago, and hasn't gotten much better since. (Arguably it's worse in some respects.) When Gmail came out it was a breath of fresh air... now it's just the bar you need to meet. It's sad that Yahoo hasn't been able to meet that bar in 10 years.
  - jhasse 11y ago
    Fastmail!
petergatsby 11y ago
100%
dave2000 11y ago
MSN had big flashing ads. When I first saw that I assumed I was dealing with another windows install with malware on it. I've paid for the OS, why have I got this freemium crap? Slack has no way of letting me know who's read the messages. Come on, it's 2016. I asked them about this and they told me the only solution is it get each contact to add a sunglasses icon as they read each message! What a joke.