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Did Twitter need to be more than keep the lights on? I thought HN's refrain 2 years ago was how ridiculous it was that a simple product that didn't need to add

by ethbr0 4y ago

Did Twitter need to be more than keep the lights on? I thought HN's refrain 2 years ago was how ridiculous it was that a simple product that didn't need to add features had a large headcount + how many businesses would be better off running stable instead of for growth. Well, here we go.

nawgz 4y ago
I think it would be a pretty disingenuous argument that Musk's leadership is closer to "stable" than what was happening before, which is probably why you're the only one even alluding to it.
- ethbr0 4y ago
  In terms of headcount. No need to argue against a person, instead of the objective scenario I proposed.
- ipaddr 4y ago
  They are finally not losing money. Things are better at twitter and stable. And they are not as funded by advertising which is a win for many
  - wpietri 4y ago
    Twitter was basically break-even before: https://www.businessofapps.com/data/twitter-statistics/ https://www.businessofapps.com/data/twitter-statistics/ > And they are not as funded by advertising which is a win for many That is "pony in there somewhere" levels of optimism about Musk wrecking relationships with Twitter's major source of revenue: https://www.techdirt.com/2023/04/17/advertisers-see-elon-musk-as-a-liability-as-they-avoid-twitter/ https://www.techdirt.com/2023/04/17/advertisers-see-elon-mus...
criddell 4y ago
Or maybe, there’s a spot somewhere between bloated and skeletal that makes more sense.
- geodel 4y ago
  Well, there are thousand spots based on thousand opinions.
wpietri 4y ago
> Did Twitter need to be more than keep the lights on? In my view (early Twitter user, briefly worked at Twitter years ago), definitely yes. Twitter spent years bumping along and riding on their network effect. But that can't last forever. Twitter should have been energetically using their strengths to expand beyond their core product. For basically the same reasons that Google needed to be more than a search company. And toward the end of Jack's reign, they were finally showing signs of progress toward a decent level of product experimentation, so I had real hope for them.
rvba 4y ago
Well, if twitter was bloated by a very big team it needs to be shrank first to become a smaller product. All this bloated legacy code is still there and would have to be rewritten. The teams that over-complicated the simple app wanted to show that they do something. When they are gone, their bloated code will not magically become small. And no I dont think that Twitter layoffs were performed well. Just observing that those two things are not a contradiction. On a side note: after upgrades of many apps or programs or websites that do them worse I often think that a lot of people complicate things or change things for the sake of showing that they are doing something.

by ethbr0 4y ago

nawgz 4y ago

I think it would be a pretty disingenuous argument that Musk's leadership is closer to "stable" than what was happening before, which is probably why you're the only one even alluding to it.

ethbr0 4y ago
In terms of headcount. No need to argue against a person, instead of the objective scenario I proposed.
ipaddr 4y ago
They are finally not losing money. Things are better at twitter and stable. And they are not as funded by advertising which is a win for many
- wpietri 4y ago
  Twitter was basically break-even before: https://www.businessofapps.com/data/twitter-statistics/ https://www.businessofapps.com/data/twitter-statistics/ > And they are not as funded by advertising which is a win for many That is "pony in there somewhere" levels of optimism about Musk wrecking relationships with Twitter's major source of revenue: https://www.techdirt.com/2023/04/17/advertisers-see-elon-musk-as-a-liability-as-they-avoid-twitter/ https://www.techdirt.com/2023/04/17/advertisers-see-elon-mus...

criddell 4y ago

Or maybe, there’s a spot somewhere between bloated and skeletal that makes more sense.

geodel 4y ago
Well, there are thousand spots based on thousand opinions.

wpietri 4y ago

> Did Twitter need to be more than keep the lights on? In my view (early Twitter user, briefly worked at Twitter years ago), definitely yes. Twitter spent years bumping along and riding on their network effect. But that can't last forever. Twitter should have been energetically using their strengths to expand beyond their core product. For basically the same reasons that Google needed to be more than a search company. And toward the end of Jack's reign, they were finally showing signs of progress toward a decent level of product experimentation, so I had real hope for them.

rvba 4y ago

Well, if twitter was bloated by a very big team it needs to be shrank first to become a smaller product. All this bloated legacy code is still there and would have to be rewritten. The teams that over-complicated the simple app wanted to show that they do something. When they are gone, their bloated code will not magically become small. And no I dont think that Twitter layoffs were performed well. Just observing that those two things are not a contradiction. On a side note: after upgrades of many apps or programs or websites that do them worse I often think that a lot of people complicate things or change things for the sake of showing that they are doing something.