4 ms·

Your description of 1997 Apple sounds uncomfortably close to modern Google. I miss working for startups.

chubot 4y ago
That was also echoing through my brain while reading through the comment (worked there awhile ago) It would be crazy if someone just shook up the whole company top to bottom, but google is still making money and apple wasn’t So I think it will never happen
- mooreds 4y ago
  Nothing is forever.
- hot_gril 4y ago
  Good point, it's not a good comparison. > it will never happen I can see it happening. They have just one cash cow in advertising, and it's not terribly secure. TikTok is already a serious threat to YouTube. If this became a crisis, it wouldn't sink the company, but it'd certainly shake it up.
  - kypro 4y ago
    The "TikTok threat" is so overblown. It's not activity competing with any existing social or video platform. It's competing for time, but that's about it. No one is using TikTok to stay in touch with their Grandmother or watching 2 hour Podcasts on it. They invented a new type of video entertainment which has a social element, that's it - it's neither a YouTube or a social network competitor. I'd argue Snapchat is probably their most direct competitor, but Snapchat's DAU is still growing fine, because even in Snapchat's case I think you can argue they're used differently. Snapchat seems to be used primarily to stay in touch with friends where as TikTok seems to be used to find/share short-form video content with strangers.
    - hot_gril 4y ago
      It directly competes for some use cases, for time, and for ads. One person's total time spent watching videos doesn't grow just because there's a new platform on the block. Kids even use TikTok as an alternative to Google searches for knowledge. I'm not saying TikTok alone can wreck Google, but YouTube at least felt threatened enough to make something similar called Shorts. IDK about the social network side. Google doesn't really have one, so it's whatever.
      - deleted 4y ago
        [deleted]
      - cma 4y ago
        > Kids even use TikTok as an alternative to Google searches for knowledge Is that why Google search heavily forces tons of Youtube results to the top now even when it is barely relevant?
        hot_gril 4y ago
        Maybe not cause of TikTok directly but because subtitled videos in general are an easier format on a phone compared to scrolling around search results and dealing with 2-5 popups (including the cookies agreement) on every site. Web browsing is much easier on a PC, but that's the minority use case.
        cma 4y ago
        > compared to scrolling around search results and dealing with 2-5 popups Queue the four minute youtube ad.
        hot_gril 4y ago
        Yeah there's that too. I think TikTok simply has fewer ads. One of my friends described tech platforms as following a cycle where they're popular while they're loss-leading, but eventually they try to reel in profits that are actually proportional to their valuation, and everyone switches to the next thing. This implies that later investors are duped into holding the bag for something that's not worth the investment. Idk if he's right, but given the tendency for tech to ride bubbles, he could be.
pvg 4y ago
It's very much apples to goggles - google is gigantic, mature company with some problems and one that makes occasional missteps. It still makes many things people like, including truckfuls of money. 1997 Apple had a very enthusiastic userbase, small and dwindling market share, mostly terrible products and was teetering on the edge of extinction.
- hot_gril 4y ago
  It's more how I feel about the SWE culture, not the company's fate. You're right that they're very different scenarios, including the fact that it's not 1997 anymore.
  - pvg 4y ago
    It's just a fundamentally different thing to be working for a company that is not a burning shipwreck. It influences culture and everything else much more strongly than some of the organizational parallels (although I think these are pretty weak as well). Imagine what working at Google would be like if Google was a losing search engine company.
    - hot_gril 4y ago
      Depends how it's losing. Could be like Yahoo! who just accepted its fate and sank as gracefully as possible, or could be like Apple who fought back.
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
hk1337 4y ago
Maybe even modern Apple, as if Apple just sort of reverted after Steve Jobs passed away.
hot_gril 4y ago
Hmm, doesn't feel good having such a negative comment rise up this much.

That was also echoing through my brain while reading through the comment (worked there awhile ago) It would be crazy if someone just shook up the whole company top to bottom, but google is still making money and apple wasn’t So I think it will never happen

mooreds 4y ago
Nothing is forever.
hot_gril 4y ago
Good point, it's not a good comparison. > it will never happen I can see it happening. They have just one cash cow in advertising, and it's not terribly secure. TikTok is already a serious threat to YouTube. If this became a crisis, it wouldn't sink the company, but it'd certainly shake it up.
- kypro 4y ago
  The "TikTok threat" is so overblown. It's not activity competing with any existing social or video platform. It's competing for time, but that's about it. No one is using TikTok to stay in touch with their Grandmother or watching 2 hour Podcasts on it. They invented a new type of video entertainment which has a social element, that's it - it's neither a YouTube or a social network competitor. I'd argue Snapchat is probably their most direct competitor, but Snapchat's DAU is still growing fine, because even in Snapchat's case I think you can argue they're used differently. Snapchat seems to be used primarily to stay in touch with friends where as TikTok seems to be used to find/share short-form video content with strangers.
  - hot_gril 4y ago
    It directly competes for some use cases, for time, and for ads. One person's total time spent watching videos doesn't grow just because there's a new platform on the block. Kids even use TikTok as an alternative to Google searches for knowledge. I'm not saying TikTok alone can wreck Google, but YouTube at least felt threatened enough to make something similar called Shorts. IDK about the social network side. Google doesn't really have one, so it's whatever.
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
    - cma 4y ago
      > Kids even use TikTok as an alternative to Google searches for knowledge Is that why Google search heavily forces tons of Youtube results to the top now even when it is barely relevant?
      - hot_gril 4y ago
        Maybe not cause of TikTok directly but because subtitled videos in general are an easier format on a phone compared to scrolling around search results and dealing with 2-5 popups (including the cookies agreement) on every site. Web browsing is much easier on a PC, but that's the minority use case.
        cma 4y ago
        > compared to scrolling around search results and dealing with 2-5 popups Queue the four minute youtube ad.
        hot_gril 4y ago
        Yeah there's that too. I think TikTok simply has fewer ads. One of my friends described tech platforms as following a cycle where they're popular while they're loss-leading, but eventually they try to reel in profits that are actually proportional to their valuation, and everyone switches to the next thing. This implies that later investors are duped into holding the bag for something that's not worth the investment. Idk if he's right, but given the tendency for tech to ride bubbles, he could be.

pvg 4y ago

It's very much apples to goggles - google is gigantic, mature company with some problems and one that makes occasional missteps. It still makes many things people like, including truckfuls of money. 1997 Apple had a very enthusiastic userbase, small and dwindling market share, mostly terrible products and was teetering on the edge of extinction.

hot_gril 4y ago
It's more how I feel about the SWE culture, not the company's fate. You're right that they're very different scenarios, including the fact that it's not 1997 anymore.
- pvg 4y ago
  It's just a fundamentally different thing to be working for a company that is not a burning shipwreck. It influences culture and everything else much more strongly than some of the organizational parallels (although I think these are pretty weak as well). Imagine what working at Google would be like if Google was a losing search engine company.
  - hot_gril 4y ago
    Depends how it's losing. Could be like Yahoo! who just accepted its fate and sank as gracefully as possible, or could be like Apple who fought back.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

hk1337 4y ago

Maybe even modern Apple, as if Apple just sort of reverted after Steve Jobs passed away.

hot_gril 4y ago

Hmm, doesn't feel good having such a negative comment rise up this much.