bickster Posted February 20, 2023 Moderator Share Posted February 20, 2023 1 minute ago, Tegis said: I find it to be a reincarnation of IRC but with emoticons and voice/video Yeah thats what Whatsapp is too Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MakemineVanilla Posted February 20, 2023 Share Posted February 20, 2023 1 hour ago, KentVillan said: No, it just dominates that specific niche because of network effects, first mover advantage, etc. If network capacity is a prerequisite, then a company like Amazon could do it, maybe? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bickster Posted February 20, 2023 Moderator Share Posted February 20, 2023 Just now, MakemineVanilla said: If network capacity is a prerequisite, then a company like Amazon could do it, maybe? I think he meant network as in the sheer volume of accounts interacting with each other rather than computing capacity 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MakemineVanilla Posted February 20, 2023 Share Posted February 20, 2023 2 hours ago, bickster said: I think he meant network as in the sheer volume of accounts interacting with each other rather than computing capacity Okay! I have to say that there seems to be a serious lack of real competition in whatever market Twitter operate in. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bickster Posted February 20, 2023 Moderator Share Posted February 20, 2023 2 minutes ago, MakemineVanilla said: Okay! I have to say that there seems to be a serious lack of real competition in whatever market Twitter operate in. Most have socials are fairly unique. There are alternatives to Twitter though but they just don't have the userbase to make them competitive yet Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chrisp65 Posted February 20, 2023 Share Posted February 20, 2023 The widely touted jump was from twitter to mastodon. Once people were there, they found it too much like hard work. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MakemineVanilla Posted February 21, 2023 Share Posted February 21, 2023 10 hours ago, chrisp65 said: The widely touted jump was from twitter to mastodon. Once people were there, they found it too much like hard work. One thing I couldn't help but notice was that all the rival platforms all have names which fail to suggest their function. Pow-wow or Palava might actually suggest what it's about. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StefanAVFC Posted February 21, 2023 VT Supporter Share Posted February 21, 2023 13 hours ago, bickster said: Yeah thats what Whatsapp is too Discord and Whatsapp are about as similar as Twitter and Facebook Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bickster Posted February 21, 2023 Moderator Share Posted February 21, 2023 24 minutes ago, StefanAVFC said: Discord and Whatsapp are about as similar as Twitter and Facebook I did say I didn't use it, so it was always take it with a pinch of salt Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KentVillan Posted February 21, 2023 Author Share Posted February 21, 2023 16 hours ago, MakemineVanilla said: If network capacity is a prerequisite, then a company like Amazon could do it, maybe? 16 hours ago, bickster said: I think he meant network as in the sheer volume of accounts interacting with each other rather than computing capacity Yep as Bicks says. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Network_effect Quote In economics, a network effect (also called network externality or demand-side economies of scale) is the phenomenon by which the value or utility a user derives from a good or service depends on the number of users of compatible products. Network effects are typically positive, resulting in a given user deriving more value from a product as more users join the same network. The adoption of a product by an additional user can be broken into two effects: an increase in the value to all other users ( "total effect") and also the enhancement of other non-users' motivation for using the product ("marginal effect"). It’s the reason why platforms like Twitter, Spotify, Netflix, etc all attract enormous investment to run unprofitable for several years in a quest to have the most users. The idea being that you reach a critical mass of users which makes your platform an insurmountable market leader. Doesn’t always work, of course! But Twitter has a pretty solid market leader status in its niche that is hard to shift, no matter how hard Musk tries. However when the balance shifts things can change very quickly. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MakemineVanilla Posted February 21, 2023 Share Posted February 21, 2023 21 minutes ago, KentVillan said: It’s the reason why platforms like Twitter, Spotify, Netflix, etc all attract enormous investment to run unprofitable for several years in a quest to have the most users. Thanks! It does seem wrong though to me. If I start a company with a huge amount of capital which allows me to run at a loss for several years and lowers my prices below my competitors, which ultimately puts them out of business (Uber or Standard Oil, say), that would risk reducing competition and ultimately creating a monopoly. Capitalism can't function correctly without competition, and so shouldn't Twitter be broken up to allow other companies to enter the market? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stevo985 Posted February 21, 2023 VT Supporter Share Posted February 21, 2023 14 hours ago, chrisp65 said: The widely touted jump was from twitter to mastodon. Once people were there, they found it too much like hard work. I couldn’t even figure out how to join mastodon so gave up 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KentVillan Posted February 21, 2023 Author Share Posted February 21, 2023 2 hours ago, MakemineVanilla said: Thanks! It does seem wrong though to me. If I start a company with a huge amount of capital which allows me to run at a loss for several years and lowers my prices below my competitors, which ultimately puts them out of business (Uber or Standard Oil, say), that would risk reducing competition and ultimately creating a monopoly. Capitalism can't function correctly without competition, and so shouldn't Twitter be broken up to allow other companies to enter the market? It depends. I think with taxis you're right. Uber was just VC-funded cheap taxis with minimal value add - and now Uber is having to charge market rates and pay taxes, it's losing its dominance. With something like Twitter, I think it's harder to argue that you want lots of competition in that specific niche, because users themselves benefit from a single platform. It also only looks like a monopoly from one angle (microblogging on any subject)... if you take specific subject areas like politics or finance or sport, Twitter has plenty of competition. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MakemineVanilla Posted February 21, 2023 Share Posted February 21, 2023 1 hour ago, KentVillan said: It depends. I think with taxis you're right. Uber was just VC-funded cheap taxis with minimal value add - and now Uber is having to charge market rates and pay taxes, it's losing its dominance. With something like Twitter, I think it's harder to argue that you want lots of competition in that specific niche, because users themselves benefit from a single platform. It also only looks like a monopoly from one angle (microblogging on any subject)... if you take specific subject areas like politics or finance or sport, Twitter has plenty of competition. As we know, too many competing companies in a sector (railways say), means that they all lose money. Most sectors seem to have reduced competition to a very few brands: Coke and Pepsi, Ford and General Motors, Intel and AMD, etc... I think it would be better for consumers if Twitter had a bit more competition, but as you pointed out there are huge barriers to entry. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
limpid Posted February 21, 2023 Administrator Share Posted February 21, 2023 2 minutes ago, MakemineVanilla said: I think it would be better for consumers if Twitter had a bit more competition, but as you pointed out there are huge barriers to entry. The consumers of twitter are the advertisers. The users are product. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MakemineVanilla Posted February 21, 2023 Share Posted February 21, 2023 1 hour ago, limpid said: The consumers of twitter are the advertisers. The users are product. Good point! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KentVillan Posted February 21, 2023 Author Share Posted February 21, 2023 1 hour ago, limpid said: The consumers of twitter are the advertisers. The users are product. That’s a simplification, though. I think more helpful to think of it as several categories of customer. Ordinary users are “buying” access to the platform with their data, content, etc and getting a product in return. So Twitter can be thought of a bit like a classic middleman business (estate agents, recruiters, auction platforms, etc). Plus Musk has introduced monetisation for ordinary users now in the form of paid verification etc. And it doesn’t really affect the competition argument that much, since either way it’s about who attracts monetisable eyeballs in a particular market. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LondonLax Posted February 21, 2023 Share Posted February 21, 2023 You also don’t have to log on to Twitter to use it. You can just read it like a newspaper, whereby advertisers get very little from you. Facebook was a little different where you voluntarily uploaded so much detail about yourself in the course of using the site. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
limpid Posted February 21, 2023 Administrator Share Posted February 21, 2023 6 minutes ago, LondonLax said: You also don’t have to log on to Twitter to use it. You can just read it like a newspaper, whereby advertisers get very little from you. Facebook was a little different where you voluntarily uploaded so much detail about yourself in the course of using the site. They get your eyeballs. It's just a little less targeted so they get less for their money. I suspect that Musk is already exploring blocking the use of the APIs that allow sites like VillaTalk to embed tweets unless they pay. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
magnkarl Posted February 22, 2023 Share Posted February 22, 2023 If anyone needed any more reason to leave the hellhole that is Twitter, they've now started censoring anyone trying to report on Russia abducting Ukrainian children, as per the German ZDF journalist above. I guess Musk is trying to whitewash his viewpoints. Meanwhile people like George Galloway, Vance, Blumethal et. al. are continuing to spew out disinformation and litteral lies about their paymasters. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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