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the solution is re thinking the business model, we already have a successful model its called Discord. No ads, just premium services for users.

the_fire_friar 5y ago
I will be pleasantly surprised if Discord could reach a $1 trillion dollar market cap on that business model.
- wintermutestwin 5y ago
  Oh yes, an IRC service and a blog really need that kind of $ to thrive. /s
  - nabaraz 5y ago
    I think OP is making the case that all ultra-successful companies eventually gives up on ethics and their founding principles.
- ipaddr 5y ago
  Discord has reached a phase where many users would like to replace them and other startups are looking for a way to replace them.
turminal 5y ago
Selling user data to third parties is no better than showering them with ads.
ineedasername 5y ago
Discord doesn't appear to be profitable yet. Or, at least they don't appear to have ever said they were, and have taken about $500m in funding w/ about $220m in revenue since 2016. They seem to be on a solid path, but I think it's too soon to hold them up as an archetype of a social networking service that can be massively successful on a freemium/subscription revenue model. I also can't think of any company close to the size of facebook that is free for "users" rather than charging for their software/services. That doesn't mean it's impossible, but we're looking for a black swan event to change that, and it's unclear if Discord is going to have the hockey stick growth to make that happen, or if its recent increase in revenue is even sustainable as Covid becomes less disruptive.
- btown 5y ago
  If Discord ever did need to become ad-supported (not that I ever want it to!!), it could actually strike an interesting middle ground. Facebook's problem is not that it controls which ads a person sees based on their content and communities, but rather quite the reverse: it controls what content and communities a person sees in order to increase their engagement with ads! Discord, if it were to maintain a strong commitment to a "one way flow" of information towards ad targeting (without leaking that information to advertisers, of course, which is easier said than done) and not towards content promotion, could find a sweet spot where it is not possible for them to ever enter the business of being incentivized to promote misinformation - except insofar as paid ads are the misinformation, which is still a problem but at least a more traceable and manageable one. People would still discover and choose their communities organically, and the mods and participants of communities would control their outbound edges of the discovery graph. Of course, not being able to optimize the bulk of a user experience for engagement is somewhat anathema to both the data scientist and product management instincts in me... but I honestly would much rather work on any B2B recommender system, or even an ad system like the aforementioned one, than blindly write code that has now been proven to do harm.

the_fire_friar 5y ago

I will be pleasantly surprised if Discord could reach a $1 trillion dollar market cap on that business model.

wintermutestwin 5y ago
Oh yes, an IRC service and a blog really need that kind of $ to thrive. /s
- nabaraz 5y ago
  I think OP is making the case that all ultra-successful companies eventually gives up on ethics and their founding principles.
ipaddr 5y ago
Discord has reached a phase where many users would like to replace them and other startups are looking for a way to replace them.

turminal 5y ago

Selling user data to third parties is no better than showering them with ads.

ineedasername 5y ago

Discord doesn't appear to be profitable yet. Or, at least they don't appear to have ever said they were, and have taken about $500m in funding w/ about $220m in revenue since 2016. They seem to be on a solid path, but I think it's too soon to hold them up as an archetype of a social networking service that can be massively successful on a freemium/subscription revenue model. I also can't think of any company close to the size of facebook that is free for "users" rather than charging for their software/services. That doesn't mean it's impossible, but we're looking for a black swan event to change that, and it's unclear if Discord is going to have the hockey stick growth to make that happen, or if its recent increase in revenue is even sustainable as Covid becomes less disruptive.

btown 5y ago
If Discord ever did need to become ad-supported (not that I ever want it to!!), it could actually strike an interesting middle ground. Facebook's problem is not that it controls which ads a person sees based on their content and communities, but rather quite the reverse: it controls what content and communities a person sees in order to increase their engagement with ads! Discord, if it were to maintain a strong commitment to a "one way flow" of information towards ad targeting (without leaking that information to advertisers, of course, which is easier said than done) and not towards content promotion, could find a sweet spot where it is not possible for them to ever enter the business of being incentivized to promote misinformation - except insofar as paid ads are the misinformation, which is still a problem but at least a more traceable and manageable one. People would still discover and choose their communities organically, and the mods and participants of communities would control their outbound edges of the discovery graph. Of course, not being able to optimize the bulk of a user experience for engagement is somewhat anathema to both the data scientist and product management instincts in me... but I honestly would much rather work on any B2B recommender system, or even an ad system like the aforementioned one, than blindly write code that has now been proven to do harm.