4 ms·

> Snap, the company that makes the disappearing messaging app Snapchat. Although it is one of the most innovative consumer-focused internet companies Isn't thi

> Snap, the company that makes the disappearing messaging app Snapchat. Although it is one of the most innovative consumer-focused internet companies Isn't this part of the problem? Snap, albeit innovative and fast as they are in creating new paradigms should in no way be the most innovative consumer-facing company. There's an imbalance here somewhere. Maybe when it makes sense for everyone to create their own infrastructure, the hold of the five will loosen up. That might require another wave of infrastructure improvements that the huge companies will not be able to compete with the collective many.

rm_-rf_slash 9y ago
Snap wasn't a great example. They don't do anything that other Silicon Valley giants can't do. It's just messaging with a twist. Google has gchat/g+, Facebook has messenger/WhatsApp, Apple has iMessage. Snap is no Slack: it serves no niche that cannot be replicated by a company with an existing messaging service and a huge existing user base.
- xigency 9y ago
  Couldn't Slack be more easily replicated by these companies? At least SnapChat has a creative element to it.
  - bpicolo 9y ago
    They are literally all trying to be slack, and their offerings don't live up to slack. https://www.facebook.com/workplace/ https://www.facebook.com/workplace/ https://products.office.com/en-us/microsoft-teams/group-chat-software https://products.office.com/en-us/microsoft-teams/group-chat... https://www.blog.google/products/g-suite/meet-the-new-enterprise-focused-hangouts/ https://www.blog.google/products/g-suite/meet-the-new-enterp... https://chime.aws/ https://chime.aws/ That's a big theme lately. They all create copies of latest-billion-dollar business-targeted services, and release before they're fully baked. That's totally the startup approach, but it doesn't feel like an approach that works well when there's already a market leader doing the same thing but significantly better. BI is another similar area. Quicksight and Data Studio are amazingly deficient compared to Tableau. Data studio can't join SQL tables, and Quicksight leaves you hitting bugs every other page and tried too hard to support fancy charts, but entirely forgot the basic "display some tabular data" option. (Power BI by MSFT does a bit better as I understand it, but is msft-tech-focused. Haven't tried it).
    - xigency 9y ago
      Well, SnapChat is six years old and Slack is four years old. And SnapChat has only been losing steam lately, as I can tell. So give it another two years before making a judgement.
fragmede 9y ago
Err, mind explaining why shouldn't they? I say this as an 'olds' who still uses Facebook (though I've tried Snapchat, but only after they IPO'd).
- arithma 9y ago
  I meant: there must/should be more innovative companies that are targeting more fundamental problems. Of course every company should be as innovative as maximising profit allows. To reiterate I meant there ought to be lots more companies with bigger dreams than that of Snap, no matter how innovative Snap is. That Snap IS considered one of the most innovative companies is indicative of the problem.
  - adventured 9y ago
    Snap is only considered one of the more innovative companies in consumer facing social. That's it. There's no sense in expanding that to include everything in tech, they are not one of the top few most innovative consumer companies in all of technology. That Snap gets pegged as that, is a fake set-up to write articles that stick to a script that the writer wants to push. It's equivalent to asking someone's opinion when you've already entirely made up your mind, except in this case it has a particularly negative effect as it's being pushed out into the world as a form of media propaganda. Here's how it works (to use a famous example of this setup): we expected flying cars and all we got was 140 characters. That's a bullshit setup, it fails to even question whether flying cars make sense, and then sets up Twitter as an ideal example of today's level of innovation (which it never was). While Thiel was pushing that bogus premise, incredible innovation (both hardware and software) had occurred in mobile all around the world in a mere ten years from 2007 to 2017. Drastically improved communication, as one example, is far more important than flying cars. Innovation is so terrible today! Then hold up mediocre examples of innovation while ignoring the vast, extraordinary innovation going on (from quantum, to crispr, to AI).
  - Kalium 9y ago
    You're completely right! There really, really should be lots more companies with bigger dreams than those of Snap. You're so right, that thousands of people agree with you, and have created precisely those companies! They tackle issues like the cost of medicine or health insurance, provisioning clean water, or improving the basic materials we make our daily items from. They're working to get more people access to high-quality therapy or trying to reduce waste in our food supply chains. Is it perhaps possible that Snap is considered highly innovative because the people granting that honor may be less than fully informed about the wide world of startups that ought to be under consideration? Perhaps the problem here is not one of what companies exist, but of publicity? To recap: you're so completely right, you've correctly described the state of the world! Well done.

rm_-rf_slash 9y ago

Snap wasn't a great example. They don't do anything that other Silicon Valley giants can't do. It's just messaging with a twist. Google has gchat/g+, Facebook has messenger/WhatsApp, Apple has iMessage. Snap is no Slack: it serves no niche that cannot be replicated by a company with an existing messaging service and a huge existing user base.

xigency 9y ago
Couldn't Slack be more easily replicated by these companies? At least SnapChat has a creative element to it.
- bpicolo 9y ago
  They are literally all trying to be slack, and their offerings don't live up to slack. https://www.facebook.com/workplace/ https://www.facebook.com/workplace/ https://products.office.com/en-us/microsoft-teams/group-chat-software https://products.office.com/en-us/microsoft-teams/group-chat... https://www.blog.google/products/g-suite/meet-the-new-enterprise-focused-hangouts/ https://www.blog.google/products/g-suite/meet-the-new-enterp... https://chime.aws/ https://chime.aws/ That's a big theme lately. They all create copies of latest-billion-dollar business-targeted services, and release before they're fully baked. That's totally the startup approach, but it doesn't feel like an approach that works well when there's already a market leader doing the same thing but significantly better. BI is another similar area. Quicksight and Data Studio are amazingly deficient compared to Tableau. Data studio can't join SQL tables, and Quicksight leaves you hitting bugs every other page and tried too hard to support fancy charts, but entirely forgot the basic "display some tabular data" option. (Power BI by MSFT does a bit better as I understand it, but is msft-tech-focused. Haven't tried it).
  - xigency 9y ago
    Well, SnapChat is six years old and Slack is four years old. And SnapChat has only been losing steam lately, as I can tell. So give it another two years before making a judgement.

fragmede 9y ago

Err, mind explaining why shouldn't they? I say this as an 'olds' who still uses Facebook (though I've tried Snapchat, but only after they IPO'd).

arithma 9y ago
I meant: there must/should be more innovative companies that are targeting more fundamental problems. Of course every company should be as innovative as maximising profit allows. To reiterate I meant there ought to be lots more companies with bigger dreams than that of Snap, no matter how innovative Snap is. That Snap IS considered one of the most innovative companies is indicative of the problem.
- adventured 9y ago
  Snap is only considered one of the more innovative companies in consumer facing social. That's it. There's no sense in expanding that to include everything in tech, they are not one of the top few most innovative consumer companies in all of technology. That Snap gets pegged as that, is a fake set-up to write articles that stick to a script that the writer wants to push. It's equivalent to asking someone's opinion when you've already entirely made up your mind, except in this case it has a particularly negative effect as it's being pushed out into the world as a form of media propaganda. Here's how it works (to use a famous example of this setup): we expected flying cars and all we got was 140 characters. That's a bullshit setup, it fails to even question whether flying cars make sense, and then sets up Twitter as an ideal example of today's level of innovation (which it never was). While Thiel was pushing that bogus premise, incredible innovation (both hardware and software) had occurred in mobile all around the world in a mere ten years from 2007 to 2017. Drastically improved communication, as one example, is far more important than flying cars. Innovation is so terrible today! Then hold up mediocre examples of innovation while ignoring the vast, extraordinary innovation going on (from quantum, to crispr, to AI).
- Kalium 9y ago
  You're completely right! There really, really should be lots more companies with bigger dreams than those of Snap. You're so right, that thousands of people agree with you, and have created precisely those companies! They tackle issues like the cost of medicine or health insurance, provisioning clean water, or improving the basic materials we make our daily items from. They're working to get more people access to high-quality therapy or trying to reduce waste in our food supply chains. Is it perhaps possible that Snap is considered highly innovative because the people granting that honor may be less than fully informed about the wide world of startups that ought to be under consideration? Perhaps the problem here is not one of what companies exist, but of publicity? To recap: you're so completely right, you've correctly described the state of the world! Well done.