[Dropbox] has solved the “freemium” riddle, with revenue on track to hit $240 million in 2011 despite the fact that 96% of those users pay nothing. With only 70 staffers, mostly engineers, Dropbox grosses nearly three times more per employee than even the darling of business models, Google. [CEO Drew Houston] claims it’s already profitable.
I think all engineers/hackers have a certain amount of idealism in them. When they see something that is badly broken they want to fix it, and many are willing to give their time/money/talent generously.
Terrorists, in an admittedly warped sense, are idealists too. I'm an Iraqi, I think the US is a massive "bug", so I'm going to try to fix it at all costs. If I'm convinced the US is a massive bug in the software system that is the world, it makes it possible for me to want to obliterate 3,000 innocent Americans.
I'm no shrink and it sounds sacrilegious, but kernel hackers and Mohammad Atta's pals may have a lot in common. Each group is trying to make the world better, at least in their own minds.
With 71 percent of the United States search market (and 90 percent in Britain), Google’s dominance of both search and search advertising gives it overwhelming control.
So Google is a monopoly then. Won't they hear from anti-trust regulators if they abuse that position and try to gain an advantage in other markets like comparison shopping?
I have never seen any advertising on Flickr. Assuming even 5 million paid subscribers ("pro accounts") worldwide, that's only a little over $100 million/yr. Not a lot for a company of Yahoo's size.
They have other revenue streams too of course, but I can't get help get the feeling that Flickr gets Yahoo! more good PR than money.
India is one of the few countries where this is the norm. The result? Some of the cheapest phones (Basic Motorola: $35) and services ($0.02 to make local calls, $0.02 to send SMS', all incoming calls and SMS' free) in the world.
Generally speaking, businesses do best when they stick to their core business- when they stick to one thing that they know how to do.
Legendary Fidelity fund manager Peter Lynch called this "diworseification".
It is dangerous to predict a trend based on isolated, celebrity examples like Linus and Goodger.
It is true that some people who grow up playing sports will get extraordinarily rich. But the vast majority will not make a penny playing sports. Who is to the say the same pattern will not apply to open-source programmers?
Good idea, but will not work in practice. There would be too few posts, to be any meaningful discussion.
Think about it. Of the millions who visit./ everyday, probably only 10,000 or so post. That is less than 1% of visits leads in a posting. I'd reckon that an essay would be lucky to get 3-4 posts, on an average.
There is a little-known site called Allmusic which you ought to look at.
Here's how the system works. Let's say you search for Pink Floyd. Their artist page displays the following related info:
Similar Artists (in this case, Queen, The Who et al )
Influences (Beatles, Dylan)
Followers (Styx, Uriah Heep)
Formal Connections (Gillmor, Barret)
Performed Songs by..
In addition, you get to search for "other pyschedlic rock", "others in British Invasion" etc. More goodies at the site itself. Allmusic
does not show up on Google too often only because they are fiercely protective of their URLs.
What if I change something in my Word document, but later on decides it was no good and wish to discard it? Nope, sorry. My old document is already rewritten with no turning back. Or is he suggesting that everyone should always make a copy of a document before editing it, just in case? Wouldn't THAT seem terrible unintuitive?
Generally speaking, many of us in Asian countries do not have a problem with censorship, though may not be in Google'case. There are two reasons for this
1. Culturally, we are comfortable with others making decsions for us, well into adulthood. Many Indians are fine with arranged marriages, so what's wrong with arranged browsing?!:) The underlying assumption is that elders know best, and sometimes this gets extended to the state as well. Of late though, some youth have started to resent this, but the overwhelming majority remains in favor of censorship in movies, websites, books, whatever.
2. The other reason of course is there is usually a way to get around censorship. For instance, it is common knowledge that benned X-rated films are freely available. But any talk of legalizing them would be met with huge outcries. As a society, we sometimes have a need to tell ourselves that we are clean of all offensive stuff, though the reality may be something else. I mean, we sometimes willingly fool ourselves...
Slashdotters from non-Asian countries need to keep this in mind whenever issues of censorship come up.
However, to expect that what you do within the walls of your company is private is laughable.
That's highly culture specific. For example, most Asian companies usually do not insist that *whatever* you do on company time is teh company's. Heck, I did not even sign a contract to that effect.
Except that what marketing tells you influences what you think about the product. Shakespeare was wrong - a rose by some other name would *not* smell as good.
If anything, the sites have a better chance of collecting money from the ISPs. After all, if Yahoo/MSN etc. are not available, you are taking away one killer app (web browsing), though the other (email, provided by the ISP) would still be available. So if they are not available, why would I want an Internet connection at all?
Since the parties need each other, it is a matter of bargaining power: right now, it is about even, with a slight tilt towards the portals.
1-2 years back, Wired reported that some portals in Norway (I think) tried to bully some ISPs into a revenue-share. Wonder what came of that?!
As a guy going about to join Simputer Licensee, Picopeta, I know that the device is not aimed at just the poor. In fact, the market during the initial 2-3 years may be large companies looking for custom-built apps on powerful hand-held computers. In that sense, it may compete with iPaq et al. But finally, the hope is that the Simputer would be India's first truly world-class *product* of any type.
Not all software modules are *not* masterpieces. Nor are they meant to be.
Applying classical measures is not OK if some one is say, building an OS kernel from scratch. But if he is writing say, a "string compare" function, that's the programming equivalent of laying bricks in a kiln. Algo known, methodology known, so nothing very creative. Why shouldn't classical measures apply?
I work in Marketing, and have a perspective for you guys. The "Linux-will-rule-the-desktop" crord is falling into what we call the "better-mousetrap" trap. Just because you build a better mousetrap (in this case cheaper), does NOT mean people will come running after.
Linux adoption is a game of the mind, not product. Whatever the tech-savvy may say, Joe User will remain convinced that Linux is a tough-to-use OS, primarily meant for servers.
Bottm line: Changin perceptions is a lot harder than putting together a crack OS. Windows has got too much going for it ("better product" is not one of them) for Linux to get anywhere close.
Slashdot Mirror
.... give her a hug every single day.
From Forbes magazine's Nov 2011 edition; emphasis mine:
[Dropbox] has solved the “freemium” riddle, with revenue on track to hit $240 million in 2011 despite the fact that 96% of those users pay nothing. With only 70 staffers, mostly engineers, Dropbox grosses nearly three times more per employee than even the darling of business models, Google. [CEO Drew Houston] claims it’s already profitable.
I think all engineers/hackers have a certain amount of idealism in them. When they see something that is badly broken they want to fix it, and many are willing to give their time/money/talent generously.
Terrorists, in an admittedly warped sense, are idealists too. I'm an Iraqi, I think the US is a massive "bug", so I'm going to try to fix it at all costs. If I'm convinced the US is a massive bug in the software system that is the world, it makes it possible for me to want to obliterate 3,000 innocent Americans.
I'm no shrink and it sounds sacrilegious, but kernel hackers and Mohammad Atta's pals may have a lot in common. Each group is trying to make the world better, at least in their own minds.
So Google is a monopoly then. Won't they hear from anti-trust regulators if they abuse that position and try to gain an advantage in other markets like comparison shopping?
I don't mean to troll, but can Gordon Brown please apologize for even more serious crimes against humanity? Such as this one?
Have you used the unintuitive piece of shit called "iTunes for Windows" that makes zero sense to those unfamiliar with the OS X UI?
Apple does that so that they can say to Windows users: "If you know how to use iTunes/Windows, you already know how to use a Mac. So, switch"
Is there any other company with it's perception of viability so closely linked to a single living individual?
Berkshire Hathaway?
They have other revenue streams too of course, but I can't get help get the feeling that Flickr gets Yahoo! more good PR than money.
India is one of the few countries where this is the norm. The result? Some of the cheapest phones (Basic Motorola: $35) and services ($0.02 to make local calls, $0.02 to send SMS', all incoming calls and SMS' free) in the world.
Generally speaking, businesses do best when they stick to their core business- when they stick to one thing that they know how to do. Legendary Fidelity fund manager Peter Lynch called this "diworseification".
It is dangerous to predict a trend based on isolated, celebrity examples like Linus and Goodger.
It is true that some people who grow up playing sports will get extraordinarily rich. But the vast majority will not make a penny playing sports. Who is to the say the same pattern will not apply to open-source programmers?
Good idea, but will not work in practice. There would be too few posts, to be any meaningful discussion. ./ everyday, probably only 10,000 or so post. That is less than 1% of visits leads in a posting. I'd reckon that an essay would be lucky to get 3-4 posts, on an average.
Think about it. Of the millions who visit
Anyone have any links to a really funny Windows lambasting? I'd enjoy being proven wrong.
Yeah, plenty on Satirewire
There is a little-known site called Allmusic which you ought to look at.
Here's how the system works. Let's say you search for Pink Floyd. Their artist page displays the following related info:
In addition, you get to search for "other pyschedlic rock", "others in British Invasion" etc. More goodies at the site itself. Allmusic does not show up on Google too often only because they are fiercely protective of their URLs.
Ever heard of UNDO, mate?
Generally speaking, many of us in Asian countries do not have a problem with censorship, though may not be in Google'case. There are two reasons for this
:) The underlying assumption is that elders know best, and sometimes this gets extended to the state as well. Of late though, some youth have started to resent this, but the overwhelming majority remains in favor of censorship in movies, websites, books, whatever.
1. Culturally, we are comfortable with others making decsions for us, well into adulthood. Many Indians are fine with arranged marriages, so what's wrong with arranged browsing?!
2. The other reason of course is there is usually a way to get around censorship. For instance, it is common knowledge that benned X-rated films are freely available. But any talk of legalizing them would be met with huge outcries. As a society, we sometimes have a need to tell ourselves that we are clean of all offensive stuff, though the reality may be something else. I mean, we sometimes willingly fool ourselves...
Slashdotters from non-Asian countries need to keep this in mind whenever issues of censorship come up.
However, to expect that what you do within the walls of your company is private is laughable.
That's highly culture specific. For example, most Asian companies usually do not insist that *whatever* you do on company time is teh company's. Heck, I did not even sign a contract to that effect.
Except that what marketing tells you influences what you think about the product. Shakespeare was wrong - a rose by some other name would *not* smell as good.
Just noticed that slashdotsucks.com has a Google topic:= Topics
http://slashdotsucks.com/modules.php?name
Traditional bricks and mortar producers have to sweeten the distribution channels, so why not MSN?
Traditional media (TV, radio) pay the content people (record labels/musicians, sitcom producers). So why not the ISPs pay the sites?
If anything, the sites have a better chance of collecting money from the ISPs. After all, if Yahoo/MSN etc. are not available, you are taking away one killer app (web browsing), though the other (email, provided by the ISP) would still be available. So if they are not available, why would I want an Internet connection at all?
Since the parties need each other, it is a matter of bargaining power: right now, it is about even, with a slight tilt towards the portals.
1-2 years back, Wired reported that some portals in Norway (I think) tried to bully some ISPs into a revenue-share. Wonder what came of that?!
As a guy going about to join Simputer Licensee, Picopeta, I know that the device is not aimed at just the poor. In fact, the market during the initial 2-3 years may be large companies looking for custom-built apps on powerful hand-held computers. In that sense, it may compete with iPaq et al. But finally, the hope is that the Simputer would be India's first truly world-class *product* of any type.
Not all software modules are *not* masterpieces. Nor are they meant to be.
Applying classical measures is not OK if some one is say, building an OS kernel from scratch. But if he is writing say, a "string compare" function, that's the programming equivalent of laying bricks in a kiln. Algo known, methodology known, so nothing very creative. Why shouldn't classical measures apply?
Linux adoption is a game of the mind, not product. Whatever the tech-savvy may say, Joe User will remain convinced that Linux is a tough-to-use OS, primarily meant for servers.
Bottm line: Changin perceptions is a lot harder than putting together a crack OS. Windows has got too much going for it ("better product" is not one of them) for Linux to get anywhere close.