31–40 of 188 posts
Steve Yegge's writing, whether on technology or business (or both), is always delightful to read. If he can start to write more now that he's no longer at Google, then I'm happy not just for him and his new job, but also for the rest of us, who can (hopefully) hear his voice much more often.
It's a delightful read. I am no fan of Google but people do realize that once a company becomes big innovation has huge costs involved, more people means lesser room for growth and hence the politics, as well as some arrogance of being a large company. That said I kind of disagree with this: Restaurants and food trucks are both about to be obliterated by Peach and Uber Eats. The biggest cost to a restaurant was their…
Right now, what we have are the first generation of delivery restaurants which is basically "restaurants, only it's delivery". We won't start seeing the real revolution until we start seeing formats built natively around the assumptions of delivery. The second generation of "delivery, only it happens to be restaurants" format is going to look radically different from what we have today. For example, right now, restau…
Currently staying in indonesia for vacation, i can verify, a lot of green go-jek jackets, not so many grab ones. Personally i use go-jek. Got an sms just like whatsapp, and i was setup. Grab wants me to create an account, meh, so i stopped there. I like the live tracking, so i can see, where the driver is. Helped me a lot to get out and find the driver, as the navigation route is most likely wrong in all these small…
From what I understand Go-Jek is kicking Grab's ass in Indonesia. Go-Jek is presently only in Indonesia, and Grab is probably larger in SEA as a whole , but nothing prevents GoJek from expanding to other countries, so yes major war going on. May the best company win! I think Steve just wrote a great recruiting piece for Grab and Gojek ;-). Both are incredible companies, so all for the good. $Diety knows we need some…
So, working for an Uber clone that underpays its workers and exists to further enrich its billionaire shareholders is the most exciting thing this guy could find to do with his life? After already making millions off of his past career? This is why people hate tech workers.
Having a popular blog is that much appreciated nowadays that he'd have significantly more income than his peers (without blogs)?
I'm getting super excited!
... a little bit later...
> "So what is Grab? Well, the simple and unsatisfying answer is: They’re the Uber of Southeast Asia."
Lost me at this point!
I think Google's strategy is far deeper than short term profit.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Right now, what we have are the first generation of delivery restaurants which is basically "restaurants, only it's delivery". We won't start seeing the real revolution until we start seeing formats built natively around the assumptions of delivery. The second generation of "delivery, only it happens to be restaurants" format is going to look radically different from what we have today. For example, right now, restau…
I completely agree on how it will lead to innovations on the restaurant side. Sharing infrastructure and bringing down costs. The question really is on the app side - today they might be in making say $X from 3-4 places serving steamed rice. But tomorrow as you pointed out this might reduce down to $x/3 because all 3-4 can band together to pay for the same delivery. It will affect the food delivery app's bottom line.…
What we've seen across a range of creative industries is a transformation of incentives from those who are able to run the best business into those who are able to make the best product.
Take Youtube for example. Prior to Youtube, creatives had to figure out how to create compelling videos, where to market them to attract the most eyeballs and then how to monetize the ensuing attention. Those are three disparate skillsets that are rarely found in the same person.
Now with YouTube, while possessing the skills to market and monetize are beneficial, they're no longer essential. Instead, what you can do is purely focus on producing the best damn videos possible (where "best" is defined by whatever Youtube algorithm of the week is optimizing for) and Youtube will put your videos in front of the right eyeballs, grow your audience for you and monetize that audience (in exchange for taking a hefty cut and locking you into the platform).
We're seeing the same thing happen with Medium in blogging, AirBNB in accommodation, Facebook with news etc.
Right now, most restaurants fail, not because the food is bad, but because restauranteurs rarely make good businesspeople.
There's a compelling value add to chefs to offering them a platform where all they need to focus on is making the best possible dish for a given price point and customers naturally are delivered to them. At the same time, there's a compelling value to consumers where an app can look at my past purchase history, use machine learning, and add a free sample sized portion of a dish it think I will like to any delivery I order in order to expose me to new restaurants.
Any app that manages to insert itself into the middle of that transaction is going to redefine the food industry. That's why everyone is so hot for delivery right now. Even though the short term game has horrible unit economics, delivery is a natural choke point by which you can own the customer relationship.
In reality, in the US, this is really Yelp's game to lose. Yelp's stranglehold on reviews gives it a natural leverage point to pivot into this space. It's only Yelp's horrible executional ability that has opened up the space to so many well funded competitors.
This guy's report is biased, he is simply apostate from Google.
So, working for an Uber clone that underpays its workers and exists to further enrich its billionaire shareholders is the most exciting thing this guy could find to do with his life? After already making millions off of his past career? This is why people hate tech workers.