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It's possible to migrate software without driving off all your users. It's soft, after all. When the 8-bit wave crested, that didn't mean Apple was done as a

by ken 7y ago

It's possible to migrate software without driving off all your users. It's soft, after all. When the 8-bit wave crested, that didn't mean Apple was done as a company. Why do we accept that such a short-lived company (less than one human generation) is "a good run", just because it's software? If Tesla turned into a "classic pump and dump scheme", nobody would say "Well, Tesla is 16 years old. They've had a good run."

TheAdamAndChe 7y ago
It makes sense to think of Reddit as an application rather than a company. Reddit the application depends on network effects to grow, and without growth, decay will be inevitable. Facebook the company has been able to create other applications that grow, even while Facebook the application is starting a network effect-triggered death spiral. Reddit Inc. has not created any other growth applications like the Reddit app, so will die.
- kordlessagain 7y ago
  > It makes sense to think of Reddit as an application rather than a company. Saying something makes sense doesn't make it make sense. Reddit is not just an application. Reddit is millions of like-minded users exchanging thoughts on a wide variety of subjects. The software or application may affect how those users interact with the other users, but it is the users at the end of the day that define what Reddit (or this site) is.
  - OnlineGladiator 7y ago
    This ignores astroturfing, abusive mods, user hostile tactics (forcing v.reddit on users and disallowing converting it to gifs - even banning a bot that did it at the website level), and a lot of other serious systemic problems with reddit's "community." Reddit was once a community, but now it's an attempt to monetize its users - nothing more, nothing less. It's clearly already dying to anybody that isn't inside the echo chamber. It moved away from value creation years ago and is clearly in the death grip of value extraction. I suspect it actually has a lot to do with their latest investment round 5 years ago, but this is purely speculation on my part. https://venturebeat.com/2014/09/30/y-combinator-backers-upvote-reddit-with-50m-investment/ https://venturebeat.com/2014/09/30/y-combinator-backers-upvo...
    - Deimorz 7y ago
      You've missed two more investment rounds. They raised $500M more after that one: $200M in July 2017: https://www.vox.com/2017/7/31/16037126/reddit-funding-200-million-valuation-steve-huffman-alexis-ohanian https://www.vox.com/2017/7/31/16037126/reddit-funding-200-mi... $300M in February 2019: https://techcrunch.com/2019/02/11/reddit-300-million/ https://techcrunch.com/2019/02/11/reddit-300-million/
- matheusmoreira 7y ago
  Perpetual growth is good only in a business sense. Social software has an optimal amount of users. Too few and there isn't enough signal, too many and there's too much noise. Both make people lose interest and leave.

by ken 7y ago

TheAdamAndChe 7y ago

It makes sense to think of Reddit as an application rather than a company. Reddit the application depends on network effects to grow, and without growth, decay will be inevitable. Facebook the company has been able to create other applications that grow, even while Facebook the application is starting a network effect-triggered death spiral. Reddit Inc. has not created any other growth applications like the Reddit app, so will die.

kordlessagain 7y ago
> It makes sense to think of Reddit as an application rather than a company. Saying something makes sense doesn't make it make sense. Reddit is not just an application. Reddit is millions of like-minded users exchanging thoughts on a wide variety of subjects. The software or application may affect how those users interact with the other users, but it is the users at the end of the day that define what Reddit (or this site) is.
- OnlineGladiator 7y ago
  This ignores astroturfing, abusive mods, user hostile tactics (forcing v.reddit on users and disallowing converting it to gifs - even banning a bot that did it at the website level), and a lot of other serious systemic problems with reddit's "community." Reddit was once a community, but now it's an attempt to monetize its users - nothing more, nothing less. It's clearly already dying to anybody that isn't inside the echo chamber. It moved away from value creation years ago and is clearly in the death grip of value extraction. I suspect it actually has a lot to do with their latest investment round 5 years ago, but this is purely speculation on my part. https://venturebeat.com/2014/09/30/y-combinator-backers-upvote-reddit-with-50m-investment/ https://venturebeat.com/2014/09/30/y-combinator-backers-upvo...
  - Deimorz 7y ago
    You've missed two more investment rounds. They raised $500M more after that one: $200M in July 2017: https://www.vox.com/2017/7/31/16037126/reddit-funding-200-million-valuation-steve-huffman-alexis-ohanian https://www.vox.com/2017/7/31/16037126/reddit-funding-200-mi... $300M in February 2019: https://techcrunch.com/2019/02/11/reddit-300-million/ https://techcrunch.com/2019/02/11/reddit-300-million/
matheusmoreira 7y ago
Perpetual growth is good only in a business sense. Social software has an optimal amount of users. Too few and there isn't enough signal, too many and there's too much noise. Both make people lose interest and leave.