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How long do you think they have left? OR Do you foresee them surviving beyond 2027?

by rblion 9y ago

devscreen 9y ago
I'm usually quite bullish on Snap. They seem to be doing some things right. From the outside, they seem overstaffed so it's good to see them reducing headcount. The fact that they're rebuilding the android app completely sounds like a bad idea that will be a bit of a timesink.
- Ganz7 9y ago
  Nope. Snapchat is almost unusable on Android right now. Compared to instagram's stories, which loads up in an instant, Snapchat takes its own sweet time. They made the mistake of not paying enough attention to android in the beginning. And now they are trying to fix their mistake. It is a timesink; but they brought it upon themselves.
  - spurcell93 9y ago
    Ditto. They did a big upgrade a few months (years?) back and yet my Nexus 6P takes literally 10+ seconds before Snapchat responds to touches. It's horrendous
  - richardknop 9y ago
    Agreed. They need to up their Android game. This is a time sink for sure but it is absolutely necessary.
- afuchs 9y ago
  The Android app crashes frequently and freezes up even more often. Have you tried using the app for an extended period of time? Instead of fixing each individual problem, they appear to have declared bankruptcy and are throwing out their old code.
jondubois 9y ago
- They lost $3 Billion in 9 months. - For every $6 they spent, they got back $1 in revenue. - The product is an app which is free to use. - A large chunk of their system runs on Google App Engine; which is probably the most expensive and highest lock-in infrastructure solution that you could possibly use. - The CEO, who was basically fresh out of university, turned down a $4 Billion offer buy the company. So basically; they're a company which loses money at an incredible rate on a product which is nearly impossible to monetise and with an inexperienced and irrational person as a CEO. I'm surprised it still exists tbh. No sane rational person can look at those numbers and think that it's a good investment.
- spyspy 9y ago
  > most expensive Not really. Like any hosting platform, if you know how to tune it properly costs can be kept low. We cut our infra costs in half moving to GAE. YMMV.
  - scurvy 9y ago
    They're already in Google Cloud. One could argue that's preventing them from keeping costs low. Google Cloud is tremendously expensive in op-ex at Snap's scale. You're paying Google instead of having a good ops team(s). Dropbox did the math and found they could do better on their own. Only time will tell who is right.
    - speedplane 9y ago
      I use Google Cloud. Love it's simplicity and design. It's definitely cheaper on the lower to even medium end. But once you're spending six figures per month, it's probably only ~10% cheaper than buying the equipment and hiring three people to manage it. Not sure why anyone would be on Google Cloud (or any cloud really) and spend 7 figures a month, unless you got a sweet deal from them.
      - drchickensalad 9y ago
        Not for a very bandwidth-focused business like snap.

How long do you think they have left? OR Do you foresee them surviving beyond 2027?

by rblion 9y ago

How long do you think they have left? OR Do you foresee them surviving beyond 2027?

I'm usually quite bullish on Snap. They seem to be doing some things right. From the outside, they seem overstaffed so it's good to see them reducing headcount. The fact that they're rebuilding the android app completely sounds like a bad idea that will be a bit of a timesink.

Ganz7 9y ago
Nope. Snapchat is almost unusable on Android right now. Compared to instagram's stories, which loads up in an instant, Snapchat takes its own sweet time. They made the mistake of not paying enough attention to android in the beginning. And now they are trying to fix their mistake. It is a timesink; but they brought it upon themselves.
- spurcell93 9y ago
  Ditto. They did a big upgrade a few months (years?) back and yet my Nexus 6P takes literally 10+ seconds before Snapchat responds to touches. It's horrendous
- richardknop 9y ago
  Agreed. They need to up their Android game. This is a time sink for sure but it is absolutely necessary.
afuchs 9y ago
The Android app crashes frequently and freezes up even more often. Have you tried using the app for an extended period of time? Instead of fixing each individual problem, they appear to have declared bankruptcy and are throwing out their old code.

jondubois 9y ago

- They lost $3 Billion in 9 months. - For every $6 they spent, they got back $1 in revenue. - The product is an app which is free to use. - A large chunk of their system runs on Google App Engine; which is probably the most expensive and highest lock-in infrastructure solution that you could possibly use. - The CEO, who was basically fresh out of university, turned down a $4 Billion offer buy the company. So basically; they're a company which loses money at an incredible rate on a product which is nearly impossible to monetise and with an inexperienced and irrational person as a CEO. I'm surprised it still exists tbh. No sane rational person can look at those numbers and think that it's a good investment.

spyspy 9y ago
> most expensive Not really. Like any hosting platform, if you know how to tune it properly costs can be kept low. We cut our infra costs in half moving to GAE. YMMV.
- scurvy 9y ago
  They're already in Google Cloud. One could argue that's preventing them from keeping costs low. Google Cloud is tremendously expensive in op-ex at Snap's scale. You're paying Google instead of having a good ops team(s). Dropbox did the math and found they could do better on their own. Only time will tell who is right.
  - speedplane 9y ago
    I use Google Cloud. Love it's simplicity and design. It's definitely cheaper on the lower to even medium end. But once you're spending six figures per month, it's probably only ~10% cheaper than buying the equipment and hiring three people to manage it. Not sure why anyone would be on Google Cloud (or any cloud really) and spend 7 figures a month, unless you got a sweet deal from them.
    - drchickensalad 9y ago
      Not for a very bandwidth-focused business like snap.