8 ms·

Problem is the tech world is changing very fast. If you're going to sit idle hoping to make the same amount of cash every year, you're going to disappear within

Problem is the tech world is changing very fast. If you're going to sit idle hoping to make the same amount of cash every year, you're going to disappear within 5-6 years. Not liking where Discord is headed either, just saying some change is necessary not only for growing, but for staying relevant.

themacguffinman 5y ago
This is exactly what happened to Teamspeak, they sat on their arses for ages without changing much of anything. Now it's hard to imagine them getting back any major market share in popular communities ever again. That seems like a death sentence for a social application.
- Shacklz 5y ago
  There's a difference between "sitting on their arses" and "trying to grab every single customer possible". TeamSpeak didn't bother to acknowledge that a lot of people often just want to write some messages to others without actually hopping into a channel/server, let alone a VoIP-channel. Their synchronous-only communication philosophy via community-maintained servers just didn't pan out.
  - themacguffinman 5y ago
    Let's not rewrite history and pretend that Teamspeak was always terrible. Their "philosophy" panned out for a long time and made them kings of the space, but to reiterate the GP's comment: things change. Now users want more convenience. Now they want better mobile support. Now they want GIFs and reactions. You can point out what Teamspeak didn't acknowledge as much as you like, anything is obvious in hindsight. To see what you're missing, you need to explore more and more possibilities and constantly innovate. You can bet that your current or future competition is. Prescience is not a business strategy.
konschubert 5y ago
Maybe that's okay. Be THE product for half a decade, make your money, close up, next venture.
- WitCanStain 5y ago
  That sounds horrible. We should focus on making good products that last a long time. What is the point of making something new and almost identical every 5 years?
  - jsilence 5y ago
    Yeah exactly! Maybe that's why users should focus on protocols and not on Platforms. Like Matrix.org
    - petre 5y ago
      And like XMPP before it.
    - Nbox9 5y ago
      How long did it take to upgrade from IPV4 to IPV6? IPV6 is a massively popular protocol in which virtually every technical person admitted we will need to move off of IPV4. IPV6 is 25 years old and we’re still not done with the migration. Protocols have a massive problem with updating their feature sets and security features.
  - perryizgr8 5y ago
    > almost identical If that were so, you would still be in business. The whole thing is products try to continuously evolve, which is what the parent is against. He/she says don't evolve so much that you become a new product. Instead shut shop when it becomes unprofitable and make a new product.
  - herbst 5y ago
    Discord was horrible bloated software to begin with, and bloat only got worse. Nothing of value will be lost, chatting is no rocket science.
sadness3 5y ago
It takes significant evolution to just keep doing what you set out to do well. Running a successful mechanics business to repair cars means continuously updating your skills and tools. Eventually you become a flying car repair shop. It doesn't mean you have to grow to encompass every aspect of the automobile industry and compete with Repco and Mobil.
- amelius 5y ago
  Except by then cars are rented to you by big advertising companies (in exchange for data), and they also do repairs (or outsource them to the lowest bidder). Skills don't matter if your business case has disappeared.
zelphirkalt 5y ago
I would not confuse the need for further developing ones tech, with the need for growing (in employees, customers, and whatever else). A product can stay relevant, if it keeps up with the tech, but does not necessarily need to capture every possible customer on the planet, not even as a goal.
lmm 5y ago
I'm not convinced - in my friend group Discord would never have got a chance if Skype had left well enough alone and not tried to fix what wasn't broken. Instead they added more and more bloat, which created the opportunity that Discord then stepped into.
- jeltz 5y ago
  Agreed, Skype used to have much of the Swedish market until they fucked up their clients and pushed people to Facebook Messenger. Now it is irrelevant.
- relativ575 5y ago
  It's impossible to tell if Skype becoming irrelevant was due to new bloated features, new features that were badly implemented, or just that their users wanted to play with a new shinny tool that happened to be good and gradually moved there. They could have stayed put without adding any new features and would still be beaten by Discord.
michaelt 5y ago
The difference between 'keeping up in a fast-changing market' and 'failing to focus on your core market' is often only obvious with hindsight. Google's launch of Google+ to keep up with Facebook was a huge waste of time, resources and goodwill. It had nothing to do with their core search and e-mail products, except for sharing ads/tracking. On the other hand, Google's acquisition of Youtube was a genius move that's massively paid back, even though it had nothing to do with their core search and e-mail products, except for sharing ads/tracking. So you don't just need to change to keep up - you need a specific type of change and it's not always easy to know what that is :)
- sumedh 5y ago
  > Google's launch of Google+ to keep up with Facebook was a huge waste of time They had Orkut, they could have used it to compete with Facebook instead of creating a new service. Its the same thing with Googles multiple chat apps.

themacguffinman 5y ago

This is exactly what happened to Teamspeak, they sat on their arses for ages without changing much of anything. Now it's hard to imagine them getting back any major market share in popular communities ever again. That seems like a death sentence for a social application.

Shacklz 5y ago
There's a difference between "sitting on their arses" and "trying to grab every single customer possible". TeamSpeak didn't bother to acknowledge that a lot of people often just want to write some messages to others without actually hopping into a channel/server, let alone a VoIP-channel. Their synchronous-only communication philosophy via community-maintained servers just didn't pan out.
- themacguffinman 5y ago
  Let's not rewrite history and pretend that Teamspeak was always terrible. Their "philosophy" panned out for a long time and made them kings of the space, but to reiterate the GP's comment: things change. Now users want more convenience. Now they want better mobile support. Now they want GIFs and reactions. You can point out what Teamspeak didn't acknowledge as much as you like, anything is obvious in hindsight. To see what you're missing, you need to explore more and more possibilities and constantly innovate. You can bet that your current or future competition is. Prescience is not a business strategy.

konschubert 5y ago

Maybe that's okay. Be THE product for half a decade, make your money, close up, next venture.

WitCanStain 5y ago
That sounds horrible. We should focus on making good products that last a long time. What is the point of making something new and almost identical every 5 years?
- jsilence 5y ago
  Yeah exactly! Maybe that's why users should focus on protocols and not on Platforms. Like Matrix.org
  - petre 5y ago
    And like XMPP before it.
  - Nbox9 5y ago
    How long did it take to upgrade from IPV4 to IPV6? IPV6 is a massively popular protocol in which virtually every technical person admitted we will need to move off of IPV4. IPV6 is 25 years old and we’re still not done with the migration. Protocols have a massive problem with updating their feature sets and security features.
- perryizgr8 5y ago
  > almost identical If that were so, you would still be in business. The whole thing is products try to continuously evolve, which is what the parent is against. He/she says don't evolve so much that you become a new product. Instead shut shop when it becomes unprofitable and make a new product.
- herbst 5y ago
  Discord was horrible bloated software to begin with, and bloat only got worse. Nothing of value will be lost, chatting is no rocket science.

sadness3 5y ago

It takes significant evolution to just keep doing what you set out to do well. Running a successful mechanics business to repair cars means continuously updating your skills and tools. Eventually you become a flying car repair shop. It doesn't mean you have to grow to encompass every aspect of the automobile industry and compete with Repco and Mobil.

amelius 5y ago
Except by then cars are rented to you by big advertising companies (in exchange for data), and they also do repairs (or outsource them to the lowest bidder). Skills don't matter if your business case has disappeared.

zelphirkalt 5y ago

I would not confuse the need for further developing ones tech, with the need for growing (in employees, customers, and whatever else). A product can stay relevant, if it keeps up with the tech, but does not necessarily need to capture every possible customer on the planet, not even as a goal.

lmm 5y ago

I'm not convinced - in my friend group Discord would never have got a chance if Skype had left well enough alone and not tried to fix what wasn't broken. Instead they added more and more bloat, which created the opportunity that Discord then stepped into.

jeltz 5y ago
Agreed, Skype used to have much of the Swedish market until they fucked up their clients and pushed people to Facebook Messenger. Now it is irrelevant.
relativ575 5y ago
It's impossible to tell if Skype becoming irrelevant was due to new bloated features, new features that were badly implemented, or just that their users wanted to play with a new shinny tool that happened to be good and gradually moved there. They could have stayed put without adding any new features and would still be beaten by Discord.

michaelt 5y ago

The difference between 'keeping up in a fast-changing market' and 'failing to focus on your core market' is often only obvious with hindsight. Google's launch of Google+ to keep up with Facebook was a huge waste of time, resources and goodwill. It had nothing to do with their core search and e-mail products, except for sharing ads/tracking. On the other hand, Google's acquisition of Youtube was a genius move that's massively paid back, even though it had nothing to do with their core search and e-mail products, except for sharing ads/tracking. So you don't just need to change to keep up - you need a specific type of change and it's not always easy to know what that is :)

sumedh 5y ago
> Google's launch of Google+ to keep up with Facebook was a huge waste of time They had Orkut, they could have used it to compete with Facebook instead of creating a new service. Its the same thing with Googles multiple chat apps.