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This behavior is explained by the fact that these departments within Google are looking at their “rivals” for inspiration, rather than the fundamental problems

by gen220 7y ago

This behavior is explained by the fact that these departments within Google are looking at their “rivals” for inspiration, rather than the fundamental problems Google is rewarded for solving (Search, targeted advertising, IT infrastructure). Nobody will remember it, but in eBay’s early days of success, Amazon spent a nontrivial amount of engineering effort into building an auction style marketplace. They actually built something that was better than eBay’s model by many accounts. Nobody cared and it was shut down, because Amazon is not where people go to sell things at auction. Just like google search is not where people go to do their shopping. From the outside, it seems like Amazon doesn’t spend much time worrying about what Google and Facebook are doing. Not sure if that’s changed recently (Alexa, certain AWS products, Amazon original series). In general, as companies balloon in size, it’s very hard to draw ROI out of the core product, and these companies tend to bloom into conglomerates (like amazon is, arguably). The biggest mistake you can make, IMO, is when you sacrifice the UX of your core product to benefit these “subsidiaries”, like google has done with shopping infecting search, as others have alluded to.

ximeng 7y ago
Story of Amazon vs eBay told by Steve Yegge here: https://medium.com/s/story/jeff-bezos-jack-ma-and-the-quest-to-kill-ebay-bb4992dc5020 https://medium.com/s/story/jeff-bezos-jack-ma-and-the-quest-...
alephnan 7y ago
> within Google are looking at their “rivals” for inspiration, rather than the fundamental problems Google is rewarded for solving (Search, targeted advertising, IT infrastructure). Most of my cloud experience has been with GCP, but I tried Azure this weekend. I'm not sure how good specific cloud services / products are, but Azure has a much better story on a cloud-first development. In Azure, I used Visual Studio Online (VScode in the browser). This ran in a VM with command line access. It's integrated with Github, and I imagine other Azure web services will come next, such as a one click deploy button. Microsoft's acquisitions and open-sourcing (Monaco editor, TypeScript) has been so strategic and well-integrated. Amazon acquired Cloud9 but not sure where that went. GCP had a lead with a more feature filled web console which has all the right pieces (SSH emulator/shell), but it seems they squandered the opportunity to make it fully integrated development solution with a Web IDE.
Scoundreller 7y ago
I don’t remember anything about Amazon auctions, but Yahoo had a pretty good auction system, but it never took off.
- rangibaby 7y ago
  Japan is in an alternate universe where Yahoo Auctions is the top dog and EBay is unknown
  - redis_mlc 7y ago
    eBay had issues with i18n and entered Japan 28 days after Yahoo auctions. Oops!
alasdair_ 7y ago
>This behavior is explained by the fact that these departments within Google are looking at their “rivals” for inspiration, rather than the fundamental problems Google is rewarded for solving (Search, targeted advertising, IT infrastructure). In Steve Yegge's post on why he left google: "You can look at Google’s entire portfolio of launches over the past decade, and trace nearly all of them to copying a competitor: Google+ (Facebook), Google Cloud (AWS), Google Home (Amazon Echo), Allo (WhatsApp), Android Instant Apps (Facebook, WeChat), Google Assistant (Apple/Siri), and on and on and on. They are stuck in me-too mode and have been for years. They simply don’t have innovation in their DNA any more. And it’s because their eyes are fixed on their competitors, not their customers." https://medium.com/@steve.yegge/why-i-left-google-to-join-grab-86dfffc0be84 https://medium.com/@steve.yegge/why-i-left-google-to-join-gr... >Nobody will remember it, but in eBay’s early days of success, Amazon spent a nontrivial amount of engineering effort into building an auction style marketplace. They actually built something that was better than eBay’s model by many accounts. Nobody cared and it was shut down, because Amazon is not where people go to sell things at auction. Just like google search is not where people go to do their shopping. For more info on "Mr Tooth" and Amazon's quest to compete with eBay, see another Steve Yegge post here: https://medium.com/s/story/jeff-bezos-jack-ma-and-the-quest-to-kill-ebay-bb4992dc5020 https://medium.com/s/story/jeff-bezos-jack-ma-and-the-quest-... "So, Life Lesson #2 (and this one is pretty goddamn important) is: Don’t try to beat a network by making a clone with improvements. It ain’t gonna work. There is too much gravitational inertia in the original network; nobody is incentivized to leave it."
- grogenaut 7y ago
  whats going on with facebook marketplace vs craigslist then?
  - joshAg 7y ago
    at least for cars, craigslist started charging $5 for private parties to make a post, but facebook is free.
lowdose 7y ago
Could the biggest difference between Alphabet & Amazon come down to if the actual founder is still commanding the army? Bezos is probably a god within Amazon this could be a serious competitive advantage. I believe Zuckerberg and Musk also enjoy the force of good they have created themselves. I don't really understand why you would quit in such a position.
- biolurker1 7y ago
  Because some people find other things in life after securing financial freedom. Ceo work is extremely stressful

by gen220 7y ago

ximeng 7y ago

Story of Amazon vs eBay told by Steve Yegge here: https://medium.com/s/story/jeff-bezos-jack-ma-and-the-quest-to-kill-ebay-bb4992dc5020 https://medium.com/s/story/jeff-bezos-jack-ma-and-the-quest-...

alephnan 7y ago

> within Google are looking at their “rivals” for inspiration, rather than the fundamental problems Google is rewarded for solving (Search, targeted advertising, IT infrastructure). Most of my cloud experience has been with GCP, but I tried Azure this weekend. I'm not sure how good specific cloud services / products are, but Azure has a much better story on a cloud-first development. In Azure, I used Visual Studio Online (VScode in the browser). This ran in a VM with command line access. It's integrated with Github, and I imagine other Azure web services will come next, such as a one click deploy button. Microsoft's acquisitions and open-sourcing (Monaco editor, TypeScript) has been so strategic and well-integrated. Amazon acquired Cloud9 but not sure where that went. GCP had a lead with a more feature filled web console which has all the right pieces (SSH emulator/shell), but it seems they squandered the opportunity to make it fully integrated development solution with a Web IDE.

Scoundreller 7y ago

I don’t remember anything about Amazon auctions, but Yahoo had a pretty good auction system, but it never took off.

rangibaby 7y ago
Japan is in an alternate universe where Yahoo Auctions is the top dog and EBay is unknown
- redis_mlc 7y ago
  eBay had issues with i18n and entered Japan 28 days after Yahoo auctions. Oops!

alasdair_ 7y ago

>This behavior is explained by the fact that these departments within Google are looking at their “rivals” for inspiration, rather than the fundamental problems Google is rewarded for solving (Search, targeted advertising, IT infrastructure). In Steve Yegge's post on why he left google: "You can look at Google’s entire portfolio of launches over the past decade, and trace nearly all of them to copying a competitor: Google+ (Facebook), Google Cloud (AWS), Google Home (Amazon Echo), Allo (WhatsApp), Android Instant Apps (Facebook, WeChat), Google Assistant (Apple/Siri), and on and on and on. They are stuck in me-too mode and have been for years. They simply don’t have innovation in their DNA any more. And it’s because their eyes are fixed on their competitors, not their customers." https://medium.com/@steve.yegge/why-i-left-google-to-join-grab-86dfffc0be84 https://medium.com/@steve.yegge/why-i-left-google-to-join-gr... >Nobody will remember it, but in eBay’s early days of success, Amazon spent a nontrivial amount of engineering effort into building an auction style marketplace. They actually built something that was better than eBay’s model by many accounts. Nobody cared and it was shut down, because Amazon is not where people go to sell things at auction. Just like google search is not where people go to do their shopping. For more info on "Mr Tooth" and Amazon's quest to compete with eBay, see another Steve Yegge post here: https://medium.com/s/story/jeff-bezos-jack-ma-and-the-quest-to-kill-ebay-bb4992dc5020 https://medium.com/s/story/jeff-bezos-jack-ma-and-the-quest-... "So, Life Lesson #2 (and this one is pretty goddamn important) is: Don’t try to beat a network by making a clone with improvements. It ain’t gonna work. There is too much gravitational inertia in the original network; nobody is incentivized to leave it."

grogenaut 7y ago
whats going on with facebook marketplace vs craigslist then?
- joshAg 7y ago
  at least for cars, craigslist started charging $5 for private parties to make a post, but facebook is free.

lowdose 7y ago

Could the biggest difference between Alphabet & Amazon come down to if the actual founder is still commanding the army? Bezos is probably a god within Amazon this could be a serious competitive advantage. I believe Zuckerberg and Musk also enjoy the force of good they have created themselves. I don't really understand why you would quit in such a position.

biolurker1 7y ago
Because some people find other things in life after securing financial freedom. Ceo work is extremely stressful