7 ms·

It is a for profit company, the reason is always profit.

by tempfs 5y ago

globalise83 5y ago
If you simply subtract some estimate of damage to their multi-billion dollar brand, it far outweighs any conceivable revenue from this creepy feature. It is not as if buy-now-pay-later is not already widely available on most merchant checkout pages. This will just be one option among many.
Barrin92 5y ago
I'm honestly not sure how much profit a 2 trillion dollar company is supposed to generate from an interest free pay later browser bloatware feature Even if you're Scrooge McDuck that sounds not worth it
- FredPret 5y ago
  The winning play for them is to make genuinely the best browser, gain market share, and then start their shenanigans. Like Google did
  - Mikeb85 5y ago
    What shenanigans do you think Google is pulling? There's nothing equivalent in Chrome...
    - kevin_thibedeau 5y ago
      Extension manifest V3.
      - Mikeb85 5y ago
        Care to explain why you think it's a bad thing? Seems like it's mostly deprecating old JS ways of doing things and introducing new JS features and a better security policy.
        kevin_thibedeau 5y ago
        It's an underhanded way to limit blocking capabilities that they can sell as a benefit.
    - coolso 5y ago
      Most of Chrome’s shenanigans happen on the backend, like with Google in general.
      - Mikeb85 5y ago
        Nice non-answer.
    - MomoXenosaga 5y ago
      Google is an advertising company. That's what they make their money from. And they are the biggest internet advertising company. Everything they do is aimed at gathering more data for more lucrative ads.
      - Mikeb85 5y ago
        I'd rather be connected to contextual ads than have my OS vendor try to keep my entire digital life hostage for a ransom.
  - prima-facie 5y ago
    Today's Google is a saint compared to the nineties Microsoft.
    - bryanrasmussen 5y ago
      I don't know about that - 90s MS was a scumbag to any other company it could get under it but it generally didn't harm its users (other than of course being uncompetitive and limiting options) because its users were a form of customer (just not the enterprise level customers which were most important) Google harms other companies as well that it can get under its thumb, but also harms its users. In other words the only time I would have thought in the 90s how is MS going to harm me would be if I decided to start a company that would potentially compete with them, or would depend on standards they were likely to sabotage. Today if I decide to use a google service I have to to wonder - how is google going to harm me?
    - adventured 5y ago
      > Today's Google is a saint compared to the nineties Microsoft. Definitely not the case. See: rigging the advertising market in cahoots with Facebook (Jedi Blue). See: conspiring with other large tech companies to artificially limit salaries for tech workers. See: leveraging its search monopoly to gain additional monopoly or near-monopoly positions (YouTube, Chrome, Android), as well as using it to harm competitors (eg Yelp and many others). See: huge, repeat fines out of Europe for various abuses. What we already know is that they're at least as evil as 1990s Microsoft. What we don't yet know, is likely to yet put them over the top. The Feds have hardly even looked under Google's corporate hood as they did with Microsoft in the 1990s. This is merely the second or third inning of discovery of all the evil shit Google has likely done over the past two decades. Google's founders simultaneously ran away as fast as they could to get out in front of what was coming, because they know where the bodies are buried.
      - Lammy 5y ago
        > The Feds have hardly even looked under Google's corporate hood "Well of course I know him — he's me" https://qz.com/1145669/googles-true-origin-partly-lies-in-cia-and-nsa-research-grants-for-mass-surveillance/ https://qz.com/1145669/googles-true-origin-partly-lies-in-ci...
- ffhhj 5y ago
  The goal is per team, Edge team must find new ways to generate profit, how much they make doesn't really matter, but the goal is to keep increasing this profit.
  - watermelon0 5y ago
    What profit did legacy Edge bring them? Considering all the development efforts, I'd believe it was more of a money sink than anything else.
  - themitigating 5y ago
    What about WSL?
- squarefoot 5y ago
  There is zero proof that it will remain interest free forever; also their main goal here is to engage as much people as possible, so that each purchase click will generate profits indirectly through users profiling etc.
- greyhat 5y ago
  > While the service is being promoted as ‘interest-free’, some were quick to point out that all transactions are subject to a “$4 flat fee”.
- slimsag 5y ago
  As another said, the goal to increase revenue is per team. The Edge team must likely find proof for how they will drive revenue in the future. Suddenly you've got a full browser engineering team trying to figure out how to monetize a browser - tough sell. So they can't come up with anything, that's fine because a product manager is the owner of this task anyway. They propose a myriad of different ways to monetize Edge in the future: * A "Edge Pro" subscription $10/mo where you get ad-blocking and no tracking (we'll need to block third-parties from offering this) * A built in way to pay people online, we take a cut. Hey maybe we finance big purchases and that's a unique selling point? * Premium apps/websites, web page authors can give access only to users with an Edge subscription and in return they get a cut of the profits. They discuss these options as a team, and decide which one is least likely to cause backlash and is least difficult to "try out" and they land on what we're seeing here.
  - scj 5y ago
    "The peripheral drivers team needs to increase it's revenue."
    - chocolatkey 5y ago
      That team doesn't need to, device manufacturers already do that by only making drivers for Windows for certain devices, increasing lock-in
    - noisy_boy 5y ago
      "View this ad to continue using your mouse"
  - meesterdude 5y ago
    This is a pretty good breakdown of how it likely came to be, but leaves out the satanic rituals and incantations that also (seemingly) play a big part in how microsoft makes decisions.
  - adrr 5y ago
    Sell the default search provider to bing for a few billion dollars. Same way Firefox makes money.
- BbzzbB 5y ago
  Of all the FAAMG out there, Microsoft arguably has the most diverse revenue streams, I don't see what's surprising with them going after another market (let alone payments). It's just another layer for monetization and doesn't prevent them pursuing their other business lines (it's arguably different teams anyway). Nothing's ever worth it if you take the approach of "It's already worth/earning 100x, adding 1x isn't worth the effort". P.s.: I don't mean to defend BNPL, IMO it is shark loaning disguised behind late fees. I forgot the exact number but when I did the (ballpark) math for Afterpay you were capping at like 30% in late fees within 3/4 months.
  - slimsag 5y ago
    > Of all the FAAMG out there Of all the MANGA* out there FTFY
    - jaredsohn 5y ago
      MAMAA
    - Shared404 5y ago
      Not the commenter above, but I don't really want to support Facebook's attempt to dodge bad press with a name change. I'll stick with FAAMG.
      - BbzzbB 5y ago
        I'm not too political/ideological about it, but Alphabet kept it's G in the acronym, Meta will keep it's F. I may revisit once they don't get >90% of their revenue from Google Services and Facebook + IG. But I do think if we're gonna be pedantic about Meta, we should be the same with Alphabet.
- scrollaway 5y ago
  The Scrooge McDuck from the Ducktales remake (which I heartily recommend watching; it's a wonderfully funny cartoon for adults that pokes fun at plenty of adult things including silicon valley and mark zuckerberg) actually talks a bit about making money the smart way rather than being a penny-pincher. Which is a nice departure from the old persona.
FredPret 5y ago
But their thinking is flawed. The reason is of course profit, but the result will not be profit.
- derekjdanserl 5y ago
  The ultimate result is never profit. https://wikipedia.org/wiki/Tendency_of_the_rate_of_profit_to_fall https://wikipedia.org/wiki/Tendency_of_the_rate_of_profit_to...
hvgk 5y ago
It’s not profit. It’s monumentally stupid dick sucking promo hunting product managers. I’ve watched several products ruined by these people over the years. The engineers walk and they become the majority of opinion. Next thing you know your sleek well engineered product looks like a Mumbai train at rush hour. It’s imperative you stop using a product when this happens so that the higher up stakeholders see the damage they do.
siproprio 5y ago
Chrome doesn't do this.

It is a for profit company, the reason is always profit.

by tempfs 5y ago

It is a for profit company, the reason is always profit.

If you simply subtract some estimate of damage to their multi-billion dollar brand, it far outweighs any conceivable revenue from this creepy feature. It is not as if buy-now-pay-later is not already widely available on most merchant checkout pages. This will just be one option among many.

Barrin92 5y ago

I'm honestly not sure how much profit a 2 trillion dollar company is supposed to generate from an interest free pay later browser bloatware feature Even if you're Scrooge McDuck that sounds not worth it

FredPret 5y ago
The winning play for them is to make genuinely the best browser, gain market share, and then start their shenanigans. Like Google did
- Mikeb85 5y ago
  What shenanigans do you think Google is pulling? There's nothing equivalent in Chrome...
  - kevin_thibedeau 5y ago
    Extension manifest V3.
    - Mikeb85 5y ago
      Care to explain why you think it's a bad thing? Seems like it's mostly deprecating old JS ways of doing things and introducing new JS features and a better security policy.
      - kevin_thibedeau 5y ago
        It's an underhanded way to limit blocking capabilities that they can sell as a benefit.
  - coolso 5y ago
    Most of Chrome’s shenanigans happen on the backend, like with Google in general.
    - Mikeb85 5y ago
      Nice non-answer.
  - MomoXenosaga 5y ago
    Google is an advertising company. That's what they make their money from. And they are the biggest internet advertising company. Everything they do is aimed at gathering more data for more lucrative ads.
    - Mikeb85 5y ago
      I'd rather be connected to contextual ads than have my OS vendor try to keep my entire digital life hostage for a ransom.
- prima-facie 5y ago
  Today's Google is a saint compared to the nineties Microsoft.
  - bryanrasmussen 5y ago
    I don't know about that - 90s MS was a scumbag to any other company it could get under it but it generally didn't harm its users (other than of course being uncompetitive and limiting options) because its users were a form of customer (just not the enterprise level customers which were most important) Google harms other companies as well that it can get under its thumb, but also harms its users. In other words the only time I would have thought in the 90s how is MS going to harm me would be if I decided to start a company that would potentially compete with them, or would depend on standards they were likely to sabotage. Today if I decide to use a google service I have to to wonder - how is google going to harm me?
  - adventured 5y ago
    > Today's Google is a saint compared to the nineties Microsoft. Definitely not the case. See: rigging the advertising market in cahoots with Facebook (Jedi Blue). See: conspiring with other large tech companies to artificially limit salaries for tech workers. See: leveraging its search monopoly to gain additional monopoly or near-monopoly positions (YouTube, Chrome, Android), as well as using it to harm competitors (eg Yelp and many others). See: huge, repeat fines out of Europe for various abuses. What we already know is that they're at least as evil as 1990s Microsoft. What we don't yet know, is likely to yet put them over the top. The Feds have hardly even looked under Google's corporate hood as they did with Microsoft in the 1990s. This is merely the second or third inning of discovery of all the evil shit Google has likely done over the past two decades. Google's founders simultaneously ran away as fast as they could to get out in front of what was coming, because they know where the bodies are buried.
    - Lammy 5y ago
      > The Feds have hardly even looked under Google's corporate hood "Well of course I know him — he's me" https://qz.com/1145669/googles-true-origin-partly-lies-in-cia-and-nsa-research-grants-for-mass-surveillance/ https://qz.com/1145669/googles-true-origin-partly-lies-in-ci...
ffhhj 5y ago
The goal is per team, Edge team must find new ways to generate profit, how much they make doesn't really matter, but the goal is to keep increasing this profit.
- watermelon0 5y ago
  What profit did legacy Edge bring them? Considering all the development efforts, I'd believe it was more of a money sink than anything else.
- themitigating 5y ago
  What about WSL?
squarefoot 5y ago
There is zero proof that it will remain interest free forever; also their main goal here is to engage as much people as possible, so that each purchase click will generate profits indirectly through users profiling etc.
greyhat 5y ago
> While the service is being promoted as ‘interest-free’, some were quick to point out that all transactions are subject to a “$4 flat fee”.
slimsag 5y ago
As another said, the goal to increase revenue is per team. The Edge team must likely find proof for how they will drive revenue in the future. Suddenly you've got a full browser engineering team trying to figure out how to monetize a browser - tough sell. So they can't come up with anything, that's fine because a product manager is the owner of this task anyway. They propose a myriad of different ways to monetize Edge in the future: * A "Edge Pro" subscription $10/mo where you get ad-blocking and no tracking (we'll need to block third-parties from offering this) * A built in way to pay people online, we take a cut. Hey maybe we finance big purchases and that's a unique selling point? * Premium apps/websites, web page authors can give access only to users with an Edge subscription and in return they get a cut of the profits. They discuss these options as a team, and decide which one is least likely to cause backlash and is least difficult to "try out" and they land on what we're seeing here.
- scj 5y ago
  "The peripheral drivers team needs to increase it's revenue."
  - chocolatkey 5y ago
    That team doesn't need to, device manufacturers already do that by only making drivers for Windows for certain devices, increasing lock-in
  - noisy_boy 5y ago
    "View this ad to continue using your mouse"
- meesterdude 5y ago
  This is a pretty good breakdown of how it likely came to be, but leaves out the satanic rituals and incantations that also (seemingly) play a big part in how microsoft makes decisions.
- adrr 5y ago
  Sell the default search provider to bing for a few billion dollars. Same way Firefox makes money.
BbzzbB 5y ago
Of all the FAAMG out there, Microsoft arguably has the most diverse revenue streams, I don't see what's surprising with them going after another market (let alone payments). It's just another layer for monetization and doesn't prevent them pursuing their other business lines (it's arguably different teams anyway). Nothing's ever worth it if you take the approach of "It's already worth/earning 100x, adding 1x isn't worth the effort". P.s.: I don't mean to defend BNPL, IMO it is shark loaning disguised behind late fees. I forgot the exact number but when I did the (ballpark) math for Afterpay you were capping at like 30% in late fees within 3/4 months.
- slimsag 5y ago
  > Of all the FAAMG out there Of all the MANGA* out there FTFY
  - jaredsohn 5y ago
    MAMAA
  - Shared404 5y ago
    Not the commenter above, but I don't really want to support Facebook's attempt to dodge bad press with a name change. I'll stick with FAAMG.
    - BbzzbB 5y ago
      I'm not too political/ideological about it, but Alphabet kept it's G in the acronym, Meta will keep it's F. I may revisit once they don't get >90% of their revenue from Google Services and Facebook + IG. But I do think if we're gonna be pedantic about Meta, we should be the same with Alphabet.
scrollaway 5y ago
The Scrooge McDuck from the Ducktales remake (which I heartily recommend watching; it's a wonderfully funny cartoon for adults that pokes fun at plenty of adult things including silicon valley and mark zuckerberg) actually talks a bit about making money the smart way rather than being a penny-pincher. Which is a nice departure from the old persona.

FredPret 5y ago

But their thinking is flawed. The reason is of course profit, but the result will not be profit.

derekjdanserl 5y ago
The ultimate result is never profit. https://wikipedia.org/wiki/Tendency_of_the_rate_of_profit_to_fall https://wikipedia.org/wiki/Tendency_of_the_rate_of_profit_to...

hvgk 5y ago

It’s not profit. It’s monumentally stupid dick sucking promo hunting product managers. I’ve watched several products ruined by these people over the years. The engineers walk and they become the majority of opinion. Next thing you know your sleek well engineered product looks like a Mumbai train at rush hour. It’s imperative you stop using a product when this happens so that the higher up stakeholders see the damage they do.

siproprio 5y ago

Chrome doesn't do this.