3 ms·

Slack is a really interesting company IMO. They were very late to the space - I was using Flowdock when they became a thing, and felt like Slack's lack of threa

Slack is a really interesting company IMO. They were very late to the space - I was using Flowdock when they became a thing, and felt like Slack's lack of threads was a deal breaker. But Slack raised a boat load more money than their competitors, offered a free product and spent a huge amount of money on marketing and now they are the top dog. They're still losing money, and both Microsoft and Google have competitors rolled into their productivity suites, but I think they've largely crushed the smaller competition. I'm still not very bullish on Slack since I don't see how they build a defensible moat against competitors for what is a fairly simple product, particularly when Google/Microsoft have basically free versions for their enterprise customers, but all I know is that I have no idea how to evaluate anything even remotely like a consumer company!

tonyarkles 7y ago
Unfortunately for me, Slack’s moat seems to be its network effects. We have tech community groups setting up Slack instances, and other alternatives are rejected because “everyone already has Slack at work and it’s easy to add another one”. Between my handful of clients and the communities I participate in, I am currently signed into 9 Slack instances. It’d be fine (I’m also on about 9 IRC channels), but the RAM... and the slowness of switching around between them. X-Chat is my baseline, and it makes Slack feel really bloated and clunky.
- Eridrus 7y ago
  But I feel like this doesn't make them any money. If Slack started charging money, people would jump to something else pretty quick.
  - tonyarkles 7y ago
    If Slack started charging money for community groups, then sure, some of them would definitely jump ship. But... looking at my Slack here, I've got 4 clients and 6 community groups that I'm connected to. If a new client asks me what I'd prefer for a group chat, I'm probably going to say Slack. Not because I love it, but because I've already been sucked into the ecosystem. The free tier is definitely a marketing tool. Get people into the ecosystem and make it easier for someone to choose Slack rather than something else.

tonyarkles 7y ago

Unfortunately for me, Slack’s moat seems to be its network effects. We have tech community groups setting up Slack instances, and other alternatives are rejected because “everyone already has Slack at work and it’s easy to add another one”. Between my handful of clients and the communities I participate in, I am currently signed into 9 Slack instances. It’d be fine (I’m also on about 9 IRC channels), but the RAM... and the slowness of switching around between them. X-Chat is my baseline, and it makes Slack feel really bloated and clunky.

Eridrus 7y ago
But I feel like this doesn't make them any money. If Slack started charging money, people would jump to something else pretty quick.
- tonyarkles 7y ago
  If Slack started charging money for community groups, then sure, some of them would definitely jump ship. But... looking at my Slack here, I've got 4 clients and 6 community groups that I'm connected to. If a new client asks me what I'd prefer for a group chat, I'm probably going to say Slack. Not because I love it, but because I've already been sucked into the ecosystem. The free tier is definitely a marketing tool. Get people into the ecosystem and make it easier for someone to choose Slack rather than something else.