10 ms·

> I always wanted Twitter to be more like a public utility Twitter is a business, how were you expecting this to work? For the USG to aqui-hire them?

by pyre 11y ago

Kalium 11y ago
Sometimes, I think it would be for the best if the USG had a way to acqui-hire companies that are best suited to be public services.
- hellbanner 11y ago
  Or if government funded open-source software research.
  - afarrell 11y ago
    DARPA does
    - hellbanner 11y ago
      Can't edit, but I meant to say *more. And DARPA, IIRC, is mostly focused around its namesake, yes? Where are the open-source softwares for supply-chain management, payment processing, calendar programs etc.. day to day needs of many citizens?
- larrys 11y ago
  Then you end up with the "postal service".
  - binxbolling 11y ago
    Which is wildly successful and doesn't cost us taxpayers a dime. If our "leaders" stopped actively sabotaging the USPS, it could be doing even better.
    - yummyfajitas 11y ago
      It was only wildly successful until our leaders "sabotaged" it by forcing it to obey standard actuarial practices. (Unlike the rest of the govt, the USPS is now required to fully fund it's pension plans.) See this comment for a more detailed explanation: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6710602 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6710602 Also, it's pretty hard not to be "wildly successful" when you get a legally enforced monopoly. Comcast is also "wildly successful", but we certainly don't want to expand that model.
      - themartorana 11y ago
        Yes and no. It's a monopoly that can't charge what it takes to stay afloat. Raising prices or changing delivery schedules requires an act of Congress! No member of Congress wants to have to answer for that, so the price of sending a letter hundreds - if not thousands - of miles, to be hand-delivered remains under one-half of one dollar $USD. THAT IS INSANE. It's been argued, deftly, that even with a decline in volume for mass mailers, raising the price from $0.49 to $1 would not only put the USPTO all the way in the black but enable them to meet obligations for years to come. But convince Congress that it's a good idea...
        refurb 11y ago
        Wait a second. I thought they would be profitable if it weren't for the pension funding? If so, then $0.49 per stamp is high enough.
        SamReidHughes 11y ago
        They can make a profit by paying their workers less. This is really about the USPS workers' union vs. Congress.
        themartorana 11y ago
        And your company could make more by paying you less. But that would be unfair, wouldn't it?
wyclif 11y ago
It's a business now. You can't go back and reinvent it now, which is clear from my comment above. But that wasn't always so. In 2006 it wasn't so. I remember those early days when only nerds were using Twitter. Now, you can't sustain a business that way, I know that. But Twitter was always supposed to be minimalist and web-enabled SMS. It's a shame, IMO, that because of "monetization" they have to make all these moves to make it more complicated and harder to surface useful information and conversations. Promoted tweets that are intrusive. Cards. Etc. I think there was a time when Twitter could have been "rolled in" to the public Internet in a way that would be more open and free of this grasping for a profit strategy. That time has passed, and it's sad.
- pyre 11y ago
  > I think there was a time when Twitter could have been "rolled in" to the public Internet in a way that would be more open and free of this grasping for a profit strategy. Hey, I remember such a time. I remember when Twitter was the "in" thing, and "everyone" (read: only techies in the Bay area) was using it. I remember how lots of conventions that are baked into the system today (@ notation for user references, "RT:" for retweeting, etc) were organically generated community standards. All of that said, Twitter as a system had major hurdles to overcome to become a utility in the way that you want. But assuming that they published a standard, and created some sort of federated system (e.g. XMPP) how would this be anything but a money-sink? Would Twitter still be in use today? Would Facebook have copied most of what the public wants out of Twitter, and that would be it? How expensive would it be for a major provided of "Twitter Protocol Service" to maintain an SMS gateway? Would anyone actually pay for this service? What about inter-node security? Would we see something akin to the joke that is TLS between SMTP servers?

> I always wanted Twitter to be more like a public utility Twitter is a business, how were you expecting this to work? For the USG to aqui-hire them?

by pyre 11y ago

> I always wanted Twitter to be more like a public utility Twitter is a business, how were you expecting this to work? For the USG to aqui-hire them?

Kalium 11y ago

Sometimes, I think it would be for the best if the USG had a way to acqui-hire companies that are best suited to be public services.

hellbanner 11y ago
Or if government funded open-source software research.
- afarrell 11y ago
  DARPA does
  - hellbanner 11y ago
    Can't edit, but I meant to say *more. And DARPA, IIRC, is mostly focused around its namesake, yes? Where are the open-source softwares for supply-chain management, payment processing, calendar programs etc.. day to day needs of many citizens?
larrys 11y ago
Then you end up with the "postal service".
- binxbolling 11y ago
  Which is wildly successful and doesn't cost us taxpayers a dime. If our "leaders" stopped actively sabotaging the USPS, it could be doing even better.
  - yummyfajitas 11y ago
    It was only wildly successful until our leaders "sabotaged" it by forcing it to obey standard actuarial practices. (Unlike the rest of the govt, the USPS is now required to fully fund it's pension plans.) See this comment for a more detailed explanation: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6710602 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6710602 Also, it's pretty hard not to be "wildly successful" when you get a legally enforced monopoly. Comcast is also "wildly successful", but we certainly don't want to expand that model.
    - themartorana 11y ago
      Yes and no. It's a monopoly that can't charge what it takes to stay afloat. Raising prices or changing delivery schedules requires an act of Congress! No member of Congress wants to have to answer for that, so the price of sending a letter hundreds - if not thousands - of miles, to be hand-delivered remains under one-half of one dollar $USD. THAT IS INSANE. It's been argued, deftly, that even with a decline in volume for mass mailers, raising the price from $0.49 to $1 would not only put the USPTO all the way in the black but enable them to meet obligations for years to come. But convince Congress that it's a good idea...
      - refurb 11y ago
        Wait a second. I thought they would be profitable if it weren't for the pension funding? If so, then $0.49 per stamp is high enough.
      - SamReidHughes 11y ago
        They can make a profit by paying their workers less. This is really about the USPS workers' union vs. Congress.
        themartorana 11y ago
        And your company could make more by paying you less. But that would be unfair, wouldn't it?

wyclif 11y ago

It's a business now. You can't go back and reinvent it now, which is clear from my comment above. But that wasn't always so. In 2006 it wasn't so. I remember those early days when only nerds were using Twitter. Now, you can't sustain a business that way, I know that. But Twitter was always supposed to be minimalist and web-enabled SMS. It's a shame, IMO, that because of "monetization" they have to make all these moves to make it more complicated and harder to surface useful information and conversations. Promoted tweets that are intrusive. Cards. Etc. I think there was a time when Twitter could have been "rolled in" to the public Internet in a way that would be more open and free of this grasping for a profit strategy. That time has passed, and it's sad.

pyre 11y ago
> I think there was a time when Twitter could have been "rolled in" to the public Internet in a way that would be more open and free of this grasping for a profit strategy. Hey, I remember such a time. I remember when Twitter was the "in" thing, and "everyone" (read: only techies in the Bay area) was using it. I remember how lots of conventions that are baked into the system today (@ notation for user references, "RT:" for retweeting, etc) were organically generated community standards. All of that said, Twitter as a system had major hurdles to overcome to become a utility in the way that you want. But assuming that they published a standard, and created some sort of federated system (e.g. XMPP) how would this be anything but a money-sink? Would Twitter still be in use today? Would Facebook have copied most of what the public wants out of Twitter, and that would be it? How expensive would it be for a major provided of "Twitter Protocol Service" to maintain an SMS gateway? Would anyone actually pay for this service? What about inter-node security? Would we see something akin to the joke that is TLS between SMTP servers?