8 ms·

The popular view is that companies who write software know how to prioritise, so if a problem like this isn't fixed, it's because they've done the calculations

The popular view is that companies who write software know how to prioritise, so if a problem like this isn't fixed, it's because they've done the calculations and decided it's not worthwhile. I disagree. If there are no internal incentives for the people who know how to fix this to fix it, or if there's no path from them thinking fixing it could improve revenues to being assigned the ticket, things like this won't get fixed. I can fully believe the load times will result in fewer users and lower expenditure. I think we'll see this happen with Facebook Messenger. Both the apps and the website have become slow and painful to use and get worse every month. I think we'll start to see engagement numbers dropping because of this.

saghm 6y ago
> I think we'll see this happen with Facebook Messenger. Both the apps and the website have become slow and painful to use and get worse every month. The messenger website has been atrocious for me lately. On my high-powered desktop, it often lags a bit, and on my fairly high-end laptop, it's virtually unusable. I thought it must be something I changed in my setup, but it's oddly comforting to hear that I'm not the only one with such issues.
- baby 6y ago
  For me it’s google maps, it has gotten so freaking slow both on mobile and on desktop. Actually google docs and sheet are the same.
  - amluto 6y ago
    Gmail. Typing in gmail is painfully laggy.
- ianlevesque 6y ago
  Try https://www.messenger.com/desktop https://www.messenger.com/desktop
  - lethologica 6y ago
    [tinfoil hat] A part of me believes that this was their intention in slowing down their browser site to the extent it has (and there is absolutely zero reason as to why it should load as slow as it does) in order to drive downloads for this application. [/tinfoil hat] It's funny. That page says "A simple app that lets you text, video chat and stay close to people you care about." If it's so simple, then why does the browser version of the site take forever to load?
    - gocartStatue 6y ago
      Yeah, it used to work well in mobile browser, then only in desktop mode in mobile browser, then not at all. Now it only "kinda sorta" works in desktop browser on ridiculously overpowered PC. Gotta keep the walls tight in that private garden.
  - saghm 6y ago
    Unfortunately I'm on Linux, and they don't seem to provide a Linux client. I did try out https://github.com/sindresorhus/caprine/ https://github.com/sindresorhus/caprine/, which worked really well, but I'm one of those weirdos who prefers websites to desktop apps.
rsj_hn 6y ago
That the process breaks down in some cases doesn't mean they don't know how to prioritize. They clearly know how to prioritize well enough to make a wildly successful and enjoyable game. That doesn't mean no bad decisions were made over the last decade or so of development. Like anything else, things will be as bad as the market allows. So I'd expect monopolies to do a worse and worse job of making good decisions and companies in competitive fields to do a better and better job over time. Thus the difference between TakeTwo and Facebook, and the need for lower cost of entry and greater competition in all economic endaevors where efficiency or good decision making is important.
- AshWolfy 6y ago
  Does it? Just because something is good or successful doesnt mean it was made well. Thats why we are seeing stories of crunch, failures of management compensated by extreme overwork.
  - rsj_hn 6y ago
    Now you are moving the goalposts to a philosophical discussion as to what types of business you like or don't like, and I'm not sure any progress can be made with that approach. Some will share your values, others will find them repugnant, and in any case it doesn't have much bearing on rockstar load times.
    - AshWolfy 6y ago
      I dont think anyone likes excessive loading times or crunch. You might argue about the importance of optimization or the necessity of crunch, but i dont think anyone can argue this isnt a failure of management and communication
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
pcr910303 6y ago
> I think we'll see this happen with Facebook Messenger. Both the apps and the website have become slow and painful to use and get worse every month. I think we'll start to see engagement numbers dropping because of this. In fact, I think the iOS app for FB Messenger did get a redesign due to problems and it’s rewritten from scratch? I remember being pleasantly surprised after the big update… It became lightweight, integrates well with iOS and supports platform features. On the other hand, the desktop app or the website is a shitshow :-(
- Tsiklon 6y ago
  The iOS app is really much more performant now than it was a couple of years ago. Significantly smaller, and quicker to start up
karmasimida 6y ago
> I can fully believe the load times will result in fewer users and lower expenditure. Is GTA online still attracts new users in droves? I doubt. If the old users live with the loading time for years, they are likely to continue living with it. It would be nice if Rockstar fixes it, but I doubt it would be anything except a PR win.
- thrwyoilarticle 6y ago
  Before GTA online they entertained themselves in other ways. Eventually, they'll move on. The more friction there is to continue playing GTA online, the easier it is for there to be something to pull them away. Rockstar are now competing to be a use of someone's time, not for them to buy the game.
- ric2b 6y ago
  I rarely play it and the load time is actually the main factor. If I have an hour to play a game waiting for GTA V to load unfortunately feels like a waste of time and a chore, so I play something else.
tw04 6y ago
You have just described why I laugh anytime someone complains that government is inefficient. ANY organization of sufficient size is "inefficient" because what a large organization optimizes for (for reasons I cannot explain) cannot align with what that organization's customers want optimized.
- toyg 6y ago
  > for reasons I cannot explain Any sufficiently large institution, over time, will prioritise self-preservation over achieving their core mission. This is sociology 101. Once a company has enough users to make it hard or impossible to measure immediate performance, self-preservation is achieved with internal manoeuvering and selling to execs.
  - jack_riminton 6y ago
    Whats the remedy? apart from reducing the size of the organisation
    - ayewo 6y ago
      There was a fantastic discussion some years ago on ways to design an organization to minimize the tendency to drift towards self-preservation instead of remaining customer-focused. The HN discussion[1] was started by an article that provided numbers that seemed to suggest that Wikipedia's spending was slowly spiraling out of control. 1: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14287235 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14287235
      - jack_riminton 6y ago
        That really is a fantastic quote and a fantastic thread! What really stuck out is that Buffet said its the most important thing about Business and he didn't learn it in Business school. Same! I did an MBA and it was the biggest elephant in the room.
        6y ago
stefs 6y ago
1. people experiencing this issue have already bought the game, so there's little incentive here. 2. we can be reasonably sure people will buy newer GTA installments regardless of whether this bug is fixed or not. but: 3. if there's still money to be made from microtransactions this is a huge issue and would absolutely be worthwhile, imo.
mywittyname 6y ago
I would think this would be one of the biggest revenue / developer_time changes in company history, considering how incredibly profitable online is.
alkonaut 6y ago
> if a problem like this isn't fixed, it's because they've done the calculations and decided it's not worthwhile. If it ever reached the point where it had to be an item in a priority list, it's already a failure. Some developer should have seen the quadratic behavior and fixed it. It's not the type of thing that should ever even be part of a prioritized backlog. It's a showstopper bug and it's visible for every developer.

saghm 6y ago

> I think we'll see this happen with Facebook Messenger. Both the apps and the website have become slow and painful to use and get worse every month. The messenger website has been atrocious for me lately. On my high-powered desktop, it often lags a bit, and on my fairly high-end laptop, it's virtually unusable. I thought it must be something I changed in my setup, but it's oddly comforting to hear that I'm not the only one with such issues.

baby 6y ago
For me it’s google maps, it has gotten so freaking slow both on mobile and on desktop. Actually google docs and sheet are the same.
- amluto 6y ago
  Gmail. Typing in gmail is painfully laggy.
ianlevesque 6y ago
Try https://www.messenger.com/desktop https://www.messenger.com/desktop
- lethologica 6y ago
  [tinfoil hat] A part of me believes that this was their intention in slowing down their browser site to the extent it has (and there is absolutely zero reason as to why it should load as slow as it does) in order to drive downloads for this application. [/tinfoil hat] It's funny. That page says "A simple app that lets you text, video chat and stay close to people you care about." If it's so simple, then why does the browser version of the site take forever to load?
  - gocartStatue 6y ago
    Yeah, it used to work well in mobile browser, then only in desktop mode in mobile browser, then not at all. Now it only "kinda sorta" works in desktop browser on ridiculously overpowered PC. Gotta keep the walls tight in that private garden.
- saghm 6y ago
  Unfortunately I'm on Linux, and they don't seem to provide a Linux client. I did try out https://github.com/sindresorhus/caprine/ https://github.com/sindresorhus/caprine/, which worked really well, but I'm one of those weirdos who prefers websites to desktop apps.

rsj_hn 6y ago

That the process breaks down in some cases doesn't mean they don't know how to prioritize. They clearly know how to prioritize well enough to make a wildly successful and enjoyable game. That doesn't mean no bad decisions were made over the last decade or so of development. Like anything else, things will be as bad as the market allows. So I'd expect monopolies to do a worse and worse job of making good decisions and companies in competitive fields to do a better and better job over time. Thus the difference between TakeTwo and Facebook, and the need for lower cost of entry and greater competition in all economic endaevors where efficiency or good decision making is important.

AshWolfy 6y ago
Does it? Just because something is good or successful doesnt mean it was made well. Thats why we are seeing stories of crunch, failures of management compensated by extreme overwork.
- rsj_hn 6y ago
  Now you are moving the goalposts to a philosophical discussion as to what types of business you like or don't like, and I'm not sure any progress can be made with that approach. Some will share your values, others will find them repugnant, and in any case it doesn't have much bearing on rockstar load times.
  - AshWolfy 6y ago
    I dont think anyone likes excessive loading times or crunch. You might argue about the importance of optimization or the necessity of crunch, but i dont think anyone can argue this isnt a failure of management and communication

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

pcr910303 6y ago

> I think we'll see this happen with Facebook Messenger. Both the apps and the website have become slow and painful to use and get worse every month. I think we'll start to see engagement numbers dropping because of this. In fact, I think the iOS app for FB Messenger did get a redesign due to problems and it’s rewritten from scratch? I remember being pleasantly surprised after the big update… It became lightweight, integrates well with iOS and supports platform features. On the other hand, the desktop app or the website is a shitshow :-(

Tsiklon 6y ago
The iOS app is really much more performant now than it was a couple of years ago. Significantly smaller, and quicker to start up

karmasimida 6y ago

> I can fully believe the load times will result in fewer users and lower expenditure. Is GTA online still attracts new users in droves? I doubt. If the old users live with the loading time for years, they are likely to continue living with it. It would be nice if Rockstar fixes it, but I doubt it would be anything except a PR win.

thrwyoilarticle 6y ago
Before GTA online they entertained themselves in other ways. Eventually, they'll move on. The more friction there is to continue playing GTA online, the easier it is for there to be something to pull them away. Rockstar are now competing to be a use of someone's time, not for them to buy the game.
ric2b 6y ago
I rarely play it and the load time is actually the main factor. If I have an hour to play a game waiting for GTA V to load unfortunately feels like a waste of time and a chore, so I play something else.

tw04 6y ago

You have just described why I laugh anytime someone complains that government is inefficient. ANY organization of sufficient size is "inefficient" because what a large organization optimizes for (for reasons I cannot explain) cannot align with what that organization's customers want optimized.

toyg 6y ago
> for reasons I cannot explain Any sufficiently large institution, over time, will prioritise self-preservation over achieving their core mission. This is sociology 101. Once a company has enough users to make it hard or impossible to measure immediate performance, self-preservation is achieved with internal manoeuvering and selling to execs.
- jack_riminton 6y ago
  Whats the remedy? apart from reducing the size of the organisation
  - ayewo 6y ago
    There was a fantastic discussion some years ago on ways to design an organization to minimize the tendency to drift towards self-preservation instead of remaining customer-focused. The HN discussion[1] was started by an article that provided numbers that seemed to suggest that Wikipedia's spending was slowly spiraling out of control. 1: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14287235 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14287235
    - jack_riminton 6y ago
      That really is a fantastic quote and a fantastic thread! What really stuck out is that Buffet said its the most important thing about Business and he didn't learn it in Business school. Same! I did an MBA and it was the biggest elephant in the room.
      - 6y ago

stefs 6y ago

1. people experiencing this issue have already bought the game, so there's little incentive here. 2. we can be reasonably sure people will buy newer GTA installments regardless of whether this bug is fixed or not. but: 3. if there's still money to be made from microtransactions this is a huge issue and would absolutely be worthwhile, imo.

mywittyname 6y ago

I would think this would be one of the biggest revenue / developer_time changes in company history, considering how incredibly profitable online is.

alkonaut 6y ago

> if a problem like this isn't fixed, it's because they've done the calculations and decided it's not worthwhile. If it ever reached the point where it had to be an item in a priority list, it's already a failure. Some developer should have seen the quadratic behavior and fixed it. It's not the type of thing that should ever even be part of a prioritized backlog. It's a showstopper bug and it's visible for every developer.