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You underestimate the power of SaaS. Companies do SaaS precisely because it allows for this sort of capricious rent-seeking at wildly-unregulated levels of gree
by toyg 2y ago
You underestimate the power of SaaS. Companies do SaaS precisely because it allows for this sort of capricious rent-seeking at wildly-unregulated levels of greed. That's just the name of the game. If other companies don't do it yet it's just because they don't have the level of market dominance that Adobe has - once they reach it, they all behave in the same way.
- teeray 2y agoThe new goal of a company is really to just capture some percentage of your total economic output on a recurring basis.
- nijave 2y agoInfinite growth!
- interludead 2y agoSustained revenue growth
- scarface_74 2y agoNo part of the definition of “rent seeking” is selling your product directly to the end user who pays you money.
- zadokshi 2y agoAdobe doesn’t primarily sell products, Adobe primarily rents its products to consumers. Adobe is a literal actual real world example of a rent seeking company.
- sushibowl 2y agoSimply renting out products is not necessarily the same as rent-seeking. Rent-seeking is the extraction of uncompensated value from others without increasing productivity. The classic example is putting up a chain across a river and charging passing boats a toll to lift the chain. Ostensibly Adobe's customers are paying for continual improvement and support of its product and maintenance costs associated with whatever cloud features they offer. That's not rent-seeking.
- fauigerzigerk 2y agoTrue. The distinction is just not always as obvious, because rent seekers often don't start out as rent seekers. They usually gain market share based on merit. Over time, structural factors such as network effects allow them to grow the rent-seeking part of their income while the merit based part declines. Rent-seeking is a very entrenched idea though. Even the tiniest bit of merit in the distant past is enough to justify renting out inherited land for instance.
- concordDance 2y ago"Rent seeking" is an economic term where you sell access to something with a fixed supply. Classically land. The landlord does not need to do anything to gain money and it isn't possible to make any more land. It doesn't really apply to any SaaS.
- damsalor 2y agoThe landlord has to defend his claim and undermine competition
- eru 2y agoWhat is 'wildly-unregulated levels of greed' supposed to mean? > If other companies don't do it yet it's just because they don't have the level of market dominance that Adobe has - once they reach it, they all behave in the same way. Google has never charged for search, nor has Facebook charged for their social network. They arguably have bigger reach and market dominance than Adobe has. There are good reasons Google and Facebook behave in different ways, of course. They aren't stupid, nor do they lack greed. I am here just arguing that your comical assertion of mono-causality. 'If other companies don't do it yet', perhaps they have good reasons?
- forgetfreeman 2y agoGoogle doesn't charge for search because it's users are their product, same with Facebook. Apples and oranges.
- quantified 2y agoGoogle doesn't charge seekers for search. They definitely charge advertisers for search. However, I understand your point, it's the truth of many businesses that if you're not paying, you're the product not the customer.
- eru 2y ago> However, I understand your point, it's the truth of many businesses that if you're not paying, you're the product not the customer. No, that wasn't my point. My point was that the mono-causal point > If other companies don't do it yet it's just because they don't have the level of market dominance that Adobe has - once they reach it, they all behave in the same way. is wrong.
- blitzar 2y agoAdobe charges because it's users are their product, same with Google, Facebook, Apple, Microsoft etc.
- eru 2y agoThat might be true, maybe. My point was that > If other companies don't do it yet it's just because they don't have the level of market dominance that Adobe has - once they reach it, they all behave in the same way. was wrong. Clearly, there's more than one reason that determines how companies behave.
- nox101 2y agoThis is Apple's new goal. https://www.counterpointresearch.com/insights/services-revenue-grows-to-reach-highest-ever-share-as-product-revenues-decline/ https://www.counterpointresearch.com/insights/services-reven... And they will need access to all of your data to provide those services.
- threeseed 2y agoMost of their services revenue is coming from Music and AppleTV+. Which doesn’t require any of your data.
- katbyte 2y agoPlease explain why you think that’s apples new goal? The link doesn’t There is nothing I am aware of that Apple has done indicating this and plenty to show they are not (e2e cloud backups, on device llm) they continually find ways to provide services without needing access to your data or keeping your data on device
- windex 2y agoSAP has been doing this of late with wild pricing and customers are being pushed into a corner with forced upgrades.