4 ms·
While I think this is in general interesting, a couple things stand out to me: > And there's a reason why: these are mostly companies that win by having better
by hospadar 6y ago
While I think this is in general interesting, a couple things stand out to me:
> And there's a reason why: these are mostly companies that win by having better technology, rather than just a CEO who's really driven and good at making deals.
Really? Always? Are we sure that some companies [which are funded by giants like softbank and have names that rhyme with schmuber] don't [at least] sometimes win because of massive capital injections which allow them to subsidize consumer-facing pricing and stomp all over the competition? Having "better technology" wouldn't allow you to beat uber, you'd also need to subsidize rides for years to choke out uber on pricing. This is true for a lot of big modern companies - they can leverage their capital to crush early competition and wait till they're the only game in town to raise prices and cover their costs (or hope that economies of scale will catch up). I realize that PG isn't saying this _doesn't_ happen, just seems like he's painting a glossy "it's because meritocracy and innovation" picture over things that often have a lot more to do with simply having access to insane amounts of capital (i.e. being good at making deals)
> Of course the Gini coefficient is increasing. With more people starting more valuable companies, how could it not be?
I think this is a really deceptive statement - it kinda sounds like "more people are getting rich" when in fact fewer people are getting [even] richer. The details of _who_ is getting richer are interesting and I think well covered by this post (and I'm not arguing that), I just have a personal beef with the presentation that maybe it's somehow OK (or good?) that income inequality is getting worse because... tech?
A reframing of this story about how the combination of tech & the modern world of VC enables the ultra-wealthy to more effectively concentrate and grow their wealth (even if sometimes a startup founder gets to win the lottery and join the club) could be just as factually correct and a little less rosy.
- lanstin 6y agoMaybe things have shifted, but the Jobs bio and the Gates bio makes one think that in the technology land rush, "better technology" looses to "driven and good at making deals." Perhaps the "worse is better" feature of technological culture explains it, but the Woz and Unix did not win; Jobs and Microsoft won. (Perhaps free software will win in the end, but no guarantees in history.) In fact, if I had to explain the change in technology over my lifetime it is that the people who understand technology and love elegance and efficiency are being pushed out by the people that want to be wealthy and get in on good deals.