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Billionaires Build

paulgraham.com

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Re: Billionaires Build

#71

Post by [deleted] »

Loughla wrote: post #36
AlwaysRock wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Die a hero or live long enough to become the villain right?

I've never fully understood that saying. Failure to stay relevant and understand the world as it is without your blinders on doesn't make you the victim of time. That's a choice you've made. It's simple to lose touch. You did what the youth are doing a decade ago; hell, you're still in the game, albeit in a much different role. The world shifts around you, but you are so rich and powerful that people in your personal…

[deleted]

Re: Billionaires Build

#72

Post by thorough »

bob33212 wrote: post #31
Traster wrote: post #28

For a clearly smart guy it's so frustrating to see PG bring in a topic like the Billionaires being exploitative, and then taking such a thoroughly blinkered view. It's a massive blind spot that PG fails to address is that it's the exact same sense of mission that he sees in start ups that creates the permission structure to exploit people. It's not that people set out to exploit people and as a result they become bil…

Right, Bezos didn't set out to bankrupt as many small businesses as he could. He started with providing a wider range of books to people over the internet. For the person who wanted a specific book and was only able to get it on Amazon this is a "good" thing. For the local bookstore who is now bankrupt that is a "bad" thing. I've come to the conclusion that to be a CEO you have to wear these blinders and have faith t…

I’m working at my job doing just fine. My employer is pretty happy and so am I. Then a new guy comes along and says, “I can do thorough’s job better than he can.” My boss hires him and she agrees. At length, she decides to keep the new guy and fire me because he’s meeting her needs better than I am. She doesn’t need to pay me anymore.

There are two happy people in this story and one unhappy one. But the fact that there is an unhappy one doesn’t seem like nearly enough to me to decide it shouldn’t have played out like it did.

Does it seem like enough to you? If not, what other common element would this story have to have to decide it shouldn’t have happened?

Re: Billionaires Build

#73

Post by ghufran_syed »

detaro wrote: post #61
MattGaiser wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Small businesses are dying because of small business refusal to use technology. They would rather grumble about how "millennials won't pick up the phone anymore" to order things. In the case of small bookstores, they think it is enough to toss books on the shelf and wait for people to come browsing. Well, I can now browse from bed.

That's very simplified, many small book stores take online or email orders. That doesn't magically put them in the same position as Amazon & co.

Would you also argue that these small bookstores “delight their users”? If so, why aren’t they making money? If not, do you think that maybe that might be the problem?

Re: Billionaires Build

#74

Post by postingpals »

troughway wrote: post #45

Can someone pin point what is objectively wrong or out of touch with this article? Genuinely asking because the past three+ posts from pg have been met with negativity saying pg is a wealthy Londoner who doesn’t understand the prole struggle.

He starts his entire essay with a faulty premise, that in order to be a billionaire you have to be exploitative, and then goes on to argue why Y Combinator doesn't look for exploitative people so therefore this must not be true.

Look, not even 'prole defenders' agree with this. You don't have to be exploitative to be a billionaire, it's simply a byproduct. There are only several thousand billionaires on earth and you'd be hard pressed to find any one of them without some sort of scandal involving their workers or consumers.

Pinpointing what is 'objectively' wrong with a subjective essay is hard, which is why most people are attacking the subjectivity itself, and I think that's healthy to do.

Re: Billionaires Build

#75

Post by yetanothermonk »

It’s so strange the YC comments and some Twitter comments are so focused on the billionaire part. The real part is to deeply understand your users, no? And the focus on YC interviews is reminiscent of media is the massage—-the hubbub places YC as a thing to pass but if you understand your users deeply, you won’t even need YC.

In a way all the YC interview prep stuff is written for the wrong people (for YC, and this is obviously a little wrong) but also the right people (who will chase prestige to read the article about interviewing at YC).

Re: Billionaires Build

#76

Post by Meekro »

Traster wrote: post #28

For a clearly smart guy it's so frustrating to see PG bring in a topic like the Billionaires being exploitative, and then taking such a thoroughly blinkered view. It's a massive blind spot that PG fails to address is that it's the exact same sense of mission that he sees in start ups that creates the permission structure to exploit people. It's not that people set out to exploit people and as a result they become bil…

California legislators made this kind of argument earlier this year as they tried to force Uber to reclassify their drivers as employees. California voters rejected that. Uber drivers themselves overwhelmingly wanted to keep their contractor status. Maybe they don't consider themselves exploited?

Re: Billionaires Build

#77

Post by ghufran_syed »

jariel wrote: post #47
MattGaiser wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Small businesses are dying because of small business refusal to use technology. They would rather grumble about how "millennials won't pick up the phone anymore" to order things. In the case of small bookstores, they think it is enough to toss books on the shelf and wait for people to come browsing. Well, I can now browse from bed.

" dying because of small business refusal to use technology" This is a little glib. There's nothing most of these small business can do.

Really? That sounds like a self-fulfilling prophecy. If the only thing they do is provide book ordering services, but amazon does it better, should amazon really feel bad about that? When you successfully pass an interview and get a job offer, do you feel bad enough for those who didn’t do as well that you turn down the job offer?

EDIT: forgot to add, I suspect there are many things small bookstores could do in terms of building a local community (in-person and online) of people who love books, improving discovery options for new books from that community, that kind of thing. So maybe they should be doing that i.e. “do things that don’t scale” to try and delight their users more than amazon does, in a way where their lack of scale is an advantage?

Re: Billionaires Build

#78

Post by staunch »

bob33212 wrote: post #31
Traster wrote: post #28

For a clearly smart guy it's so frustrating to see PG bring in a topic like the Billionaires being exploitative, and then taking such a thoroughly blinkered view. It's a massive blind spot that PG fails to address is that it's the exact same sense of mission that he sees in start ups that creates the permission structure to exploit people. It's not that people set out to exploit people and as a result they become bil…

Right, Bezos didn't set out to bankrupt as many small businesses as he could. He started with providing a wider range of books to people over the internet. For the person who wanted a specific book and was only able to get it on Amazon this is a "good" thing. For the local bookstore who is now bankrupt that is a "bad" thing. I've come to the conclusion that to be a CEO you have to wear these blinders and have faith t…

Amazon didn't kill small businesses. We killed them by using Amazon. And I'm glad to have participated. I much prefer Amazon passing the savings of time and money to me rather than some small business owner. The small businesses I was forced to use previously were inefficient, slow, overcharging, had terrible customer service, exploited employees, etc.

As an example: we killed tons of movie rental businesses by switching to Netflix. Life is much better now for everyone who isn't a movie rental store owner, which is almost everyone.

Small business doesn't mean good business and big business doesn't mean bad business. What matters to me is the net effect, and in most cases with Amazon, the net effect is very positive.

The same is true for Google, Uber, and Facebook and most big tech successes. The ratio of bad:good is just worse for some of them than for others, making it harder to judge.

Re: Billionaires Build

#79

Post by an_opabinia »

mellavora wrote: post #39
an_opabinia wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Airbnb feels like a very bad example. It’s rich people renting out their homes to other rich people. You’re saying that’s more exploitative than rich people renting out those same homes to poor people? How do you think that really pans out?

My brother works for HUD. They have many examples of people (ab)using Airbnb to operate as slumlords; a type of exploitation which is outlawed. The corporation Airbnb has historically not been cooperative in assisting the HUD in this process. So no, it is not just rich people renting to rich people. In many cases it is rich people using the platform to avoid regulations which prohibit exploitative renting to poor peo…

But for people that poor, isn’t the alternative not living there at all? Or a different slumlord?

I have nothing but empathy for someone who can’t drive and cannot afford normal housing in the same place they receive services. I totally understand how some of those people would choose to have fewer services and leave, or god forbid be homeless.

But do those people you’re describing, who actively login into AirBnb - if they didn’t get something they paid for in-platform, or if the listing is lying, are you saying Airbnb doesn’t come through? It almost certainly does. A giant corporation is honestly better equipped to go to bat for a wronged customer simply because it has the money to provide a remedy and a case manager does not - the case manager must get all remedies from the richest institution of them all, the government.

Personally I believe Airbnb should just design a high minimum rental cost and ban all transactions that are too cheap. But I wouldn’t describe Airbnb as exploiting these people, they are obviously victims of landlords?

Re: Billionaires Build

#80

Post by bambax »

thorough wrote: post #72
bob33212 wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right, Bezos didn't set out to bankrupt as many small businesses as he could. He started with providing a wider range of books to people over the internet. For the person who wanted a specific book and was only able to get it on Amazon this is a "good" thing. For the local bookstore who is now bankrupt that is a "bad" thing. I've come to the conclusion that to be a CEO you have to wear these blinders and have faith t…

I’m working at my job doing just fine. My employer is pretty happy and so am I. Then a new guy comes along and says, “I can do thorough’s job better than he can.” My boss hires him and she agrees. At length, she decides to keep the new guy and fire me because he’s meeting her needs better than I am. She doesn’t need to pay me anymore. There are two happy people in this story and one unhappy one. But the fact that the…

If the new guy doesn't follow regulations or doesn't pay taxes like you do (Airbnb, Uber) or if he somehow provides drugs to the boss and as a result she needs him day in and day out (Facebook), then this shouldn't have happened.
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