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This was an acquisition, not a merger, but if we misquote your mother a bit to fit this situation: YouTube?

by isykt 3y ago

Forgeties79 3y ago
YouTube’s algorithm routinely drives people to more and more extreme content and is designed to be as addictive as possible so that users don’t leave. A lot of this is the result of Google’s acquiring them. I’m curious how you think it’s better. Let me also be clear that it’s not like it was squeaky clean and friendly prior. But to say it has improved since the acquisition…I’m having a hard time seeing that.
- HWR_14 3y ago
  The acquisition by Google happened 18 months into YouTubes existence. It's been 18 years since then. I don't know if you really recall what a site was like 18 years ago. Besides that, what Google provided was hosting infrastructure and legal protection. Otherwise they would have been sued into nothing and couldn't have afforded to serve video.
  - ghaff 3y ago
    Early on YouTube was basically a repository of commercial copyrighted material. Widespread home video was not really a big thing at the time.
  - Forgeties79 3y ago
    Honestly I did not realize that acquisition happened so early in YT’s existence. That’s on me I suppose.
    - HWR_14 3y ago
      It's understandable. It was originally allowed to be its own thing. There were several iterations of it being brought into the Google fold, and it would be easy to mistake any of those for the acquisition event.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
alkibiades 3y ago
youtube is significantly worse other than maybe in stability/uptime. remember google tried to force that weird google plus login instead? and now it’s so corporatized/ad filled
- gruez 3y ago
  When you consider the alternative is no youtube at all (remember, they were hemorrhaging money), everything you described doesn't seem so bad.
- mochomocha 3y ago
  In no world would Youtube be even remotely profitable without advertising. Google ran it as a $B+/year loss for years before managing to making it profitable. Tell me now a believable alternative growth story for Youtube where Google didn't buy it and the service isn't "corporatized" and not losing money. You can't compare an unprofitable small-scale startup product to what the same product needs to be to make it 1) planet-scale and 2) profitable.
  - tempestn 3y ago
    Yeah, without an acquisition, YouTube doesn't exist today. And most acquisitions would have turned out far worse than the Google one did. (See Evernote...)
29athrowaway 3y ago
It's full of residential trash burning videos. They film themselves burning residential trash and teach others "how to save money at the dump" doing it. Each one of them pollutes more than an entire city. I've reported them, because those activities are illegal, and YouTube keeps the videos up.
- tempestn 3y ago
  Sounds like the algorithm has learned that you get really fired up about residential trash videos.
- isykt 3y ago
  The comment I'm responding to asked if either the customer or the company were better after the merger. Google's (and YouTube's) customers are advertisers. Advertisers are certainly better off with the scale and reach that Google juiced YouTube with, and Google earns about $15B annually in revenue from it. So, I'd say both conditions are met.

This was an acquisition, not a merger, but if we misquote your mother a bit to fit this situation: YouTube?

by isykt 3y ago

This was an acquisition, not a merger, but if we misquote your mother a bit to fit this situation: YouTube?

YouTube’s algorithm routinely drives people to more and more extreme content and is designed to be as addictive as possible so that users don’t leave. A lot of this is the result of Google’s acquiring them. I’m curious how you think it’s better. Let me also be clear that it’s not like it was squeaky clean and friendly prior. But to say it has improved since the acquisition…I’m having a hard time seeing that.

HWR_14 3y ago
The acquisition by Google happened 18 months into YouTubes existence. It's been 18 years since then. I don't know if you really recall what a site was like 18 years ago. Besides that, what Google provided was hosting infrastructure and legal protection. Otherwise they would have been sued into nothing and couldn't have afforded to serve video.
- ghaff 3y ago
  Early on YouTube was basically a repository of commercial copyrighted material. Widespread home video was not really a big thing at the time.
- Forgeties79 3y ago
  Honestly I did not realize that acquisition happened so early in YT’s existence. That’s on me I suppose.
  - HWR_14 3y ago
    It's understandable. It was originally allowed to be its own thing. There were several iterations of it being brought into the Google fold, and it would be easy to mistake any of those for the acquisition event.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]

alkibiades 3y ago

youtube is significantly worse other than maybe in stability/uptime. remember google tried to force that weird google plus login instead? and now it’s so corporatized/ad filled

gruez 3y ago
When you consider the alternative is no youtube at all (remember, they were hemorrhaging money), everything you described doesn't seem so bad.
mochomocha 3y ago
In no world would Youtube be even remotely profitable without advertising. Google ran it as a $B+/year loss for years before managing to making it profitable. Tell me now a believable alternative growth story for Youtube where Google didn't buy it and the service isn't "corporatized" and not losing money. You can't compare an unprofitable small-scale startup product to what the same product needs to be to make it 1) planet-scale and 2) profitable.
- tempestn 3y ago
  Yeah, without an acquisition, YouTube doesn't exist today. And most acquisitions would have turned out far worse than the Google one did. (See Evernote...)

29athrowaway 3y ago

It's full of residential trash burning videos. They film themselves burning residential trash and teach others "how to save money at the dump" doing it. Each one of them pollutes more than an entire city. I've reported them, because those activities are illegal, and YouTube keeps the videos up.

tempestn 3y ago
Sounds like the algorithm has learned that you get really fired up about residential trash videos.
isykt 3y ago
The comment I'm responding to asked if either the customer or the company were better after the merger. Google's (and YouTube's) customers are advertisers. Advertisers are certainly better off with the scale and reach that Google juiced YouTube with, and Google earns about $15B annually in revenue from it. So, I'd say both conditions are met.