Betting on things that never change (2017) • Hacker News Board

Re: Betting on things that never change (2017)

#21

Post by bhewes » Tue, Nov 23, 2021, 1:13 AM UTC

danielmarkbruce wrote: post #19

groby_b wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If Kodak was in the "business of capturing memories", they wouldn't have dropped the technology for digital cameras. They wouldn't have been afraid of their own new tech (Kodak had digital camera technology in the early 70s) cannibalizing old tech (film), and instead invested in that segment. They wasted something like 25 years dragging their heels because they didn't realize that people don't use film because film i…

So they would have invested a lot in digital cameras, executed well(?) and gone bankrupt. Mobile phones ended up eating cameras for all but very niche uses.

The sensors in the mobile are still made by camera companies. It would have been easy for Kodak to dominate CMOS sensors.

Re: Betting on things that never change (2017)

#22

Post by danielmarkbruce » Tue, Nov 23, 2021, 1:16 AM UTC

wizzwizz4 wrote: post #13

danielmarkbruce wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then I've done a bad job communicating what I meant. My point is, (virtually) every single product can make the claim they are making a bet on something that doesn't change. Both good and bad products. Failed and successful. The entire article says nothing of practical value. Everyone is betting on something that doesn't change and something which does.

It's not about products (business tactics). It's about business philosophy and business strategy.

And every business creating a new product or service can claim they are following this business philosophy and/or business strategy. They just have to talk at the right level of abstraction.

Re: Betting on things that never change (2017)

#23

Post by roti » Tue, Nov 23, 2021, 1:22 AM UTC

kqr wrote: post #6

Or as Deming put it: long-term successful organisations need to find their constancy of purpose . Kodak didn't find it: they were in the business of analogue film; they could have been in the business of capturing memories, and survived the digitalisation of photography. Manufacturers of carburetors generally didn't find it; they were in the business of carburetors, and not stochiometric mixtures of air and fuel, and…

https://petapixel.com/2018/10/19/why-kodak-died-and-fujifilm...

Meanwhile, Fujifilm thrived post-film by recognizing they're really in the chemical business, and pivoted well (to pharmaceuticals, cosmetics, and highly functional materials).

Re: Betting on things that never change (2017)

#24

Post by danielmarkbruce » Tue, Nov 23, 2021, 1:54 AM UTC

bhewes wrote: post #21

danielmarkbruce wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So they would have invested a lot in digital cameras, executed well(?) and gone bankrupt. Mobile phones ended up eating cameras for all but very niche uses.

The sensors in the mobile are still made by camera companies. It would have been easy for Kodak to dominate CMOS sensors.

So, at that point they'd be in the camera business, sort of. Right? Funnily enough the real long term, not changing thing is: people want to be able to 'capture' light....

Re: Betting on things that never change (2017)

#25

Post by perl4ever » Tue, Nov 23, 2021, 2:06 AM UTC

paulpauper wrote: post #9

>Take three companies in the 1990s: Sears, Beenz, and Amazon. >Sears bet the Internet changed nothing, to its detriment. Beenz bet the Internet changed everything – creating a points-based currency valid only at online merchants – to its detriment. Amazon bet the Internet changed distribution, but rooted its strategy in things that have never, and will never, change. It nailed the center of the Venn diagram of change…

Then there was Radio Shack who bet everybody would want to go around scanning bar codes to get to web pages.

It seemed incredibly dumb, and they're gone, but here we are with QR codes all over the place.

Re: Betting on things that never change (2017)

#26

Post by Mikeb85 » Tue, Nov 23, 2021, 2:27 AM UTC

roti wrote: post #23

kqr wrote: post #6

Or as Deming put it: long-term successful organisations need to find their constancy of purpose . Kodak didn't find it: they were in the business of analogue film; they could have been in the business of capturing memories, and survived the digitalisation of photography. Manufacturers of carburetors generally didn't find it; they were in the business of carburetors, and not stochiometric mixtures of air and fuel, and…

https://petapixel.com/2018/10/19/why-kodak-died-and-fujifilm... Meanwhile, Fujifilm thrived post-film by recognizing they're really in the chemical business, and pivoted well (to pharmaceuticals, cosmetics, and highly functional materials).

Ironically Fuji expanded back to cameras and is also making some of the best digital cameras and lenses today.

Re: Betting on things that never change (2017)

#27

Post by sudosysgen » Tue, Nov 23, 2021, 2:37 AM UTC

danielmarkbruce wrote: post #19

groby_b wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If Kodak was in the "business of capturing memories", they wouldn't have dropped the technology for digital cameras. They wouldn't have been afraid of their own new tech (Kodak had digital camera technology in the early 70s) cannibalizing old tech (film), and instead invested in that segment. They wasted something like 25 years dragging their heels because they didn't realize that people don't use film because film i…

So they would have invested a lot in digital cameras, executed well(?) and gone bankrupt. Mobile phones ended up eating cameras for all but very niche uses.

They'd probably become a pretty big fab outside of just making smartphone sensors. The business of memory would abstract into the business of information in general.

Re: Betting on things that never change (2017)

#28

Post by thom » Tue, Nov 23, 2021, 3:01 AM UTC

Slightly tangential, but I definitely would prefer Amazon to offer less choice. Sure, give me every book in existence, but don’t give me 1000 options for a new cable or whatever, most of which are of questionable quality and have dozens of fake reviews. I’d much prefer fewer, more reliable options.

Re: Betting on things that never change (2017)

#29

Post by groby_b » Tue, Nov 23, 2021, 3:26 AM UTC

danielmarkbruce wrote: post #19

groby_b wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If Kodak was in the "business of capturing memories", they wouldn't have dropped the technology for digital cameras. They wouldn't have been afraid of their own new tech (Kodak had digital camera technology in the early 70s) cannibalizing old tech (film), and instead invested in that segment. They wasted something like 25 years dragging their heels because they didn't realize that people don't use film because film i…

So they would have invested a lot in digital cameras, executed well(?) and gone bankrupt. Mobile phones ended up eating cameras for all but very niche uses.

You do realize that the long-term success of a company requires more than one decision, right?

SD cards are currently a $8bn market. Phone image sensors are a $15bn market. Digital camera market is $8bn (and growing, fwiw)

There's also the fact that memories need displaying. I hear OLEDs are popular these days. Kodak did groundbreaking research there too.

There were plenty of ways forward for Kodak that still would've fundamentally kept them in the "capturing images & memories" business without majorly contorting themselves. Instead, they were afraid of cannibalizing their own business. (Their really a canonical example in this area). It's Christensen's "Innovators dilemma".

Yes, the real story is more complex than that one decision, or even a handful decisions. There are other splendidly boneheaded decisions that have nothing todo with "capturing memories", but still a lot with "capturing images" - my favorite is that Kodak, shortly before the Boomer retirement wave, decided "eh, who needs medical imaging" and sold that unit off - but the motivation was the same. They didn't want to move from analog to digital.

And yes, getting these decisions alone wouldn't have been an automatic success - but it would have made further success possible. (One of the major things they would've needed to tackle is that analog is chemical engineers, and digital mostly isn't)

But with all these caveats, the root cause for Kodak's demise is still staying strong to a specific product instead of a bigger mission.

Re: Betting on things that never change (2017)

#30

Post by toast0 » Tue, Nov 23, 2021, 3:31 AM UTC

danielmarkbruce wrote: post #20

not2b wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But people in Kodak got that, which is why they invented the digital camera. They didn't execute well. Transitions are tough.

Even if they executed well they would have been toast, it just would have taken another 10(?) years.

I'm posting this from an OS designed for cameras, which I think would have been terrible for cameras, but still ... at the very least, phones could hype their Kodak sensors instead of Sony sensors.