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I don't see how giving money to Tencent has anything to do with the ability to steer SO. The best thing would have been the status quo. SO has been running on

I don't see how giving money to Tencent has anything to do with the ability to steer SO. The best thing would have been the status quo. SO has been running on its feet for many years. This consolidation, while disputably better than Microsoft acquisition, is no worse than large companies buying out small ones usually guaranteing their demise. If anything else, Microsoft has left Github untouched so far. I am not convinced that this is "absolutely phenomenal".

teh_klev 5y ago
> The best thing would have been the status quo. SO has been running on its feet for many years You forgot that there's a bunch of VC's who now want their investment back plus interest.
- B1FF_PSUVM 5y ago
  That's it, the VC money is strictly for a limited time - when the fund time ends, there must an "exit" - either IPO or sale. (In case of success, of course; failures are just written off, the losses hopefully paid by the successful exits.)
arp242 5y ago
> If anything else, Microsoft has left Github untouched so far. Actually, I think it has gotten better. I don't like the consolidation of independents like GitHub to big corporations like Microsoft, but I can't deny that thus far, it actually worked out pretty well. Stack Overflow is a difficult company/website to manage though; it's not "just a website with a SaaS product" and really requires a good understanding of the social dynamics and such to run well, much more than e.g. GitHub.
- systemvoltage 5y ago
  That's a good point. I wonder why SO is so political? As an outsider it is just like a bunch of people asking questions and getting answers.
  - arp242 5y ago
    What do you mean with "so political"? The hard part is getting the social dynamics right. Askers want to ask any question, answerers want to answer interesting questions. Keeping both groups happy is a hard task. People complain about questions being closed (technically: "on hold") and marked as duplicated, but it serves a real purpose as no one wants to answer the same question over and over again. How you do it matters a lot though. I have a number of gripes with Stack Overflow, and there are quite a few things I would do different. But I see a lot of people complaining about it who probably don't realize just how hard of a problem it is.
    - b3morales 5y ago
      And this is complicated even more by all the "soft" topic sites, each of which has its own culture.
  - stjohnswarts 5y ago
    It's just a very rigid structure, you have to put your square block in their square hole or you will be ripped a new one and tossed when asking a question. Also mods need to be in a good mood that day.
selfhoster11 5y ago
To me, it seems that Github has become more proactive (or hair-trigger) in pulling down content via DMCA in the recent years. This could be down to companies finally figuring out that you can DMCA code repos, but I can't help thinking that the Microsoft acquisition was a factor.

teh_klev 5y ago

> The best thing would have been the status quo. SO has been running on its feet for many years You forgot that there's a bunch of VC's who now want their investment back plus interest.

B1FF_PSUVM 5y ago
That's it, the VC money is strictly for a limited time - when the fund time ends, there must an "exit" - either IPO or sale. (In case of success, of course; failures are just written off, the losses hopefully paid by the successful exits.)

arp242 5y ago

> If anything else, Microsoft has left Github untouched so far. Actually, I think it has gotten better. I don't like the consolidation of independents like GitHub to big corporations like Microsoft, but I can't deny that thus far, it actually worked out pretty well. Stack Overflow is a difficult company/website to manage though; it's not "just a website with a SaaS product" and really requires a good understanding of the social dynamics and such to run well, much more than e.g. GitHub.

systemvoltage 5y ago
That's a good point. I wonder why SO is so political? As an outsider it is just like a bunch of people asking questions and getting answers.
- arp242 5y ago
  What do you mean with "so political"? The hard part is getting the social dynamics right. Askers want to ask any question, answerers want to answer interesting questions. Keeping both groups happy is a hard task. People complain about questions being closed (technically: "on hold") and marked as duplicated, but it serves a real purpose as no one wants to answer the same question over and over again. How you do it matters a lot though. I have a number of gripes with Stack Overflow, and there are quite a few things I would do different. But I see a lot of people complaining about it who probably don't realize just how hard of a problem it is.
  - b3morales 5y ago
    And this is complicated even more by all the "soft" topic sites, each of which has its own culture.
- stjohnswarts 5y ago
  It's just a very rigid structure, you have to put your square block in their square hole or you will be ripped a new one and tossed when asking a question. Also mods need to be in a good mood that day.

selfhoster11 5y ago

To me, it seems that Github has become more proactive (or hair-trigger) in pulling down content via DMCA in the recent years. This could be down to companies finally figuring out that you can DMCA code repos, but I can't help thinking that the Microsoft acquisition was a factor.