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> acreom is VC backed, and doesn’t implement any of the mentioned practices ...yet. In typical VC fashion it will totally respect the user forever (wink, wink

by kaoD 3y ago

> acreom is VC backed, and doesn’t implement any of the mentioned practices ...yet. In typical VC fashion it will totally respect the user forever (wink, wink) until they want to actually cash out. PS: would've been a nice touch if you disclosed acreom is yours.

inferense 3y ago
you’re right, disclaimer: I am the founder not unless these values are provided by technical decisions over policies or promises. in acreom’s case, you own the software as well as your data and there’s not much we can do about it since we built it that way (local-first, offline with optional sync, e2ee, markdown without any acreom specific formatting)
- lmeyerov 3y ago
  Until the founder gets tired, replacement CEO gets hired, and with VC board encouragement, sells to PE or BigCo who switches the defaults 18mo later. Users get the choice of dead, CVE-riddled software or following the company's structure. Conversely, with a less misaligned board & company structure, a friendly hire (e.g., internal) can take over and the board stays aligned. Ex: Mozilla. Protecting this is super hard... OpenAI has been quite a lesson in how fast things can change even with supposed governance structures: 100% reversal to closed code/weights/algorithms/data, $-first, & pro-military
borski 3y ago
Being bootstrapped doesn’t somehow absolve founders of that. It’s a false sense of security. VC-backed companies eventually exit, yes, but bootstrapped companies often just… die. And, plenty of VC-backed companies do not commit the cardinal sins described in this article; lock-in, anti-user practices, and so on. I ran a VC-backed cybersecurity company for nearly 10 years, and we never engaged in any bad-for-the-user chicanery, and our VCs never pushed us to. This is an article to promote Obsidian (which is fine, and I have on my list to try) but on very shaky ground. Being bootstrapped, in and of itself, does not somehow imply Obsidian will be around longer or less crappy to their users. It’s entirely about the founders and what they prioritize; not how they got their funding.
- ghufran_syed 3y ago
  but I think the point is that by being "100% user supported”, the way to get rich is by getting more paying users by “making things people want” vs optimising a metric like “growth” in order to temporarily fool the next investor into overpaying at IPO or acquisition.
  - wmf 3y ago
    Sadly it's common to make things (not enough) people want and still run out of money.
  - borski 3y ago
    The way to get rich if you’re VC-funded is also to make things people want by getting more paying users. You don’t become Dropbox or Stripe by having a terrible product. The fools optimizing for “growth” without anything sustainable aren’t going to get rich (on average), and are focused on the wrong customer - the VC. VCs don’t force you to do bad things. Bad founders do bad things, and they sometimes raise money. That’s all.

by kaoD 3y ago

inferense 3y ago

you’re right, disclaimer: I am the founder not unless these values are provided by technical decisions over policies or promises. in acreom’s case, you own the software as well as your data and there’s not much we can do about it since we built it that way (local-first, offline with optional sync, e2ee, markdown without any acreom specific formatting)

lmeyerov 3y ago
Until the founder gets tired, replacement CEO gets hired, and with VC board encouragement, sells to PE or BigCo who switches the defaults 18mo later. Users get the choice of dead, CVE-riddled software or following the company's structure. Conversely, with a less misaligned board & company structure, a friendly hire (e.g., internal) can take over and the board stays aligned. Ex: Mozilla. Protecting this is super hard... OpenAI has been quite a lesson in how fast things can change even with supposed governance structures: 100% reversal to closed code/weights/algorithms/data, $-first, & pro-military

borski 3y ago

Being bootstrapped doesn’t somehow absolve founders of that. It’s a false sense of security. VC-backed companies eventually exit, yes, but bootstrapped companies often just… die. And, plenty of VC-backed companies do not commit the cardinal sins described in this article; lock-in, anti-user practices, and so on. I ran a VC-backed cybersecurity company for nearly 10 years, and we never engaged in any bad-for-the-user chicanery, and our VCs never pushed us to. This is an article to promote Obsidian (which is fine, and I have on my list to try) but on very shaky ground. Being bootstrapped, in and of itself, does not somehow imply Obsidian will be around longer or less crappy to their users. It’s entirely about the founders and what they prioritize; not how they got their funding.

ghufran_syed 3y ago
but I think the point is that by being "100% user supported”, the way to get rich is by getting more paying users by “making things people want” vs optimising a metric like “growth” in order to temporarily fool the next investor into overpaying at IPO or acquisition.
- wmf 3y ago
  Sadly it's common to make things (not enough) people want and still run out of money.
- borski 3y ago
  The way to get rich if you’re VC-funded is also to make things people want by getting more paying users. You don’t become Dropbox or Stripe by having a terrible product. The fools optimizing for “growth” without anything sustainable aren’t going to get rich (on average), and are focused on the wrong customer - the VC. VCs don’t force you to do bad things. Bad founders do bad things, and they sometimes raise money. That’s all.