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It's kind of fascinating that seems like there is some kind of force that drives popular web sites to eventually self-sabotage themselves out of existence. Redd
by zmmmmm 8y ago
It's kind of fascinating that seems like there is some kind of force that drives popular web sites to eventually self-sabotage themselves out of existence. Reddit seems to be having a good go at it now.
I sort of get how it happens but I can't quite understand how the level of stupidity required by management is achieved in practice to actually do it.
- mdellavo 8y agothey need to make money
- taneq 8y agoCreate -> Monetize -> Expand -> Exploit -> Destroy It's a common commercial lifecycle for all sorts of things. You make a new thing. You find a way to make money from the thing. You expand your market for the thing by filling a need and treating your customers well. At some point you want to cash out, and start burning your userbase to make extra money. Eventually this destroys the whole thing.
- im3w1l 8y agoThat's part of it. Another cause is that companies grow and get more employees and those employees need to justify their existence by changing things up. You don't get promoted for not fixing what aint broken.
- JBReefer 8y agoThis this this. That's why there are a million fly-by-night Craigslist competitors, and then there's Craigslist. It works the same way it did in 1999, so my grandma can still sell stuff on it. That's it. Done. It's probably made way more money by not changing anything than by increasing CPMs 5% by playing a fullscreen ad every 6 seconds.
- zerostar07 8y agoit's not common. most businesses do not wait years until they capriciously decide to make money. that's because most businesses are not funded by the silicon valley, it's float or die.
- taneq 8y ago'Monetize' is the stage where they make money, and in normal companies it happens early and doesn't imply that customer service suffers. It's the 'Exploit' phase where the customer gets screwed if you let short-sighted people call the shots.
- zerostar07 8y agoIts a disease caused by the unhealthy VC-funded growth model. When major websites don't care about advertising income, the advertisers are left to become scammier and scammier as smaller websites don't have the power to wield positive change for their users.