GitHub lost $66M in nine months of 2016 • Hacker News Board

Re: GitHub lost $66M in nine months of 2016

#61

Post by sctb » Thu, Dec 15, 2016, 10:22 PM UTC

dijit wrote: post #4

Part of me is glad the "inclusive" practices of only hiring women and minorities isn't being rewarded. At the same time, GitHub really is at the centre of opensource- how can they be losing money when they are literally the defacto code hosting site? And if they go under, who could replace them?

Please don't introduce generic controversy like this with such a tenuous connection to the discussion at hand, especially with an unsubstantiated causal implication. We're just so unlikely to learn something in the inevitable flamewar that follows.

Re: GitHub lost $66M in nine months of 2016

#62

Post by ProAm » Thu, Dec 15, 2016, 10:22 PM UTC

AceJohnny2 wrote: post #40

ZenoArrow wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the other hand, as Git is a DVCS even if GitHub went down the repos still live on local developer machines, so it'd be easy enough to move to a different Git hosting provider.

People keep bringing that up, but that's missing the bigger picture: GitHub is more than just a git host, it's also a "social hub" where people can fork repos and offer changes back (pull requests), a passable bugtracker (issues), even wiki, and even web host (github.io). Many people have warned that using these added-value features makes you dependent on GitHub (Linus Torvalds has a kernel mirror on GitHub, but for…

The problem is social hubs add very little real value and are easily replaceable, especially among technically astute people.

Re: GitHub lost $66M in nine months of 2016

#63

Post by cperciva » Thu, Dec 15, 2016, 10:23 PM UTC

drchiu wrote: post #19

I can't find the blog post, but some blog wrote a while ago why VCs invest in companies like Github. TL;DR -- basically it provides infrastructure for other startups. The business itself may not be a great business due to the amount of cost it takes to run it -- but it's necessary for the running of other ventures. Sort of like highways and non-toll bridges.

Are you saying that VCs are investing because they see companies like GitHub as being public goods? That's contrary to normal investing principles, unless there's some reason to think that a VC investing will result in their portfolio companies having superior access.

Re: GitHub lost $66M in nine months of 2016

#64

Post by badminton1 » Thu, Dec 15, 2016, 10:24 PM UTC

If you are an investor, you want to invest $1 to get $2 back (aka shareholder value). If your dividends are not growing, you divest and invest somewhere else.

Now, the thing is very competitive, and many companies offer "exponential growth". If your growth slows down, if the perspective is not good, divestment starts and that is a downwards spiral.

To stay competitive and to prevent an investor run, companies are forced to take massive risks. And risks materialize into huge disasters... like this one apparently.

Re: GitHub lost $66M in nine months of 2016

#65

Post by knownothing » Thu, Dec 15, 2016, 10:24 PM UTC

kobeya wrote: post #17

lalos wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's what happens with centralized systems it is inevitable, from the Roman Empire to Google Code nothing is permanent.

The laws of physics are.

Right. That's why we never find out we were wrong about anything in science.

Re: GitHub lost $66M in nine months of 2016

#66

Post by cperciva » Thu, Dec 15, 2016, 10:24 PM UTC

Fiahil wrote: post #60

mmastrac wrote: post #3

The thought of losing Github to the startup graveyard is kind of scary. It was bad enough to lose Google Code and when SourceForge had their "great purge" of inactive projects.

We'll just move the code to gitlab. Git allow us to do it almost painlessly (well, with a missing issue backlog). It's not a big deal.

99% of the value of github is the user interface, not the mere fact that it's a hosted git repository.

Re: GitHub lost $66M in nine months of 2016

#67

Post by wjossey » Thu, Dec 15, 2016, 10:24 PM UTC

was_boring wrote: post #32

wjossey wrote: post #6

I hope this is a temporary blip on the radar for Github, and that they return to profitability very quickly. Github should be a pillar platform in our community for the next decade, and the only way for them to become that is via profitability.

Why should it? They weren't responsive to user demands for years, routinely break features (checkbox saving is broken right now), and have terrible discovery and search. If anything we should be cheering for gitlab. Atleast we can modify it locally.

Because we should be cheering for Gitlab, and Github, and any other major competitor in the space to perform well and be stable (and independent, ideally).

Competition & long term stability means that they can focus on the features that are most meaningful for their user base. If their revenue stream continues to be poor, they may begin making short-term decisions to prop up revenue, which ultimately will lead to a much poorer product over the long term.

Re: GitHub lost $66M in nine months of 2016

#68

Post by beachy » Thu, Dec 15, 2016, 10:24 PM UTC

Asparagirl wrote: post #23

kumarski wrote: post #9

I always freak about some other country attacking github. The world would crumble/ it's probably some sort of weird national security scenario.

An attack on StackOverflow would be as bad or worse. These sites should probably be protected as areas of national strategic importance, like how the US protected the NYC docks during WWII.

Perhaps the federal government should take over IT security for github and SO? )

Re: GitHub lost $66M in nine months of 2016

#69

Post by tootie » Thu, Dec 15, 2016, 10:25 PM UTC

drchiu wrote: post #19

I can't find the blog post, but some blog wrote a while ago why VCs invest in companies like Github. TL;DR -- basically it provides infrastructure for other startups. The business itself may not be a great business due to the amount of cost it takes to run it -- but it's necessary for the running of other ventures. Sort of like highways and non-toll bridges.

I don't get it. They're taking one for the team? Seems more like dumping to stymie competition.

Re: GitHub lost $66M in nine months of 2016

#70

Post by dom0 » Thu, Dec 15, 2016, 10:25 PM UTC

was_boring wrote: post #32

wjossey wrote: post #6

I hope this is a temporary blip on the radar for Github, and that they return to profitability very quickly. Github should be a pillar platform in our community for the next decade, and the only way for them to become that is via profitability.

Why should it? They weren't responsive to user demands for years, routinely break features (checkbox saving is broken right now), and have terrible discovery and search. If anything we should be cheering for gitlab. Atleast we can modify it locally.

Just anecdotal evidence: I contacted support twice, the latest incident just a couple days ago, and they fixed it in both instances in one or two days.