Goodreads was the future of book reviews, then Amazon bought it • Hacker News Board

Re: Goodreads was the future of book reviews, then Amazon bought it

#411

Post by perryizgr8 » Tue, Jul 04, 2023, 6:00 AM UTC

fsckboy wrote: post #85

teamspirit wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately that's exactly why so many startups get bought. Not to become part of the parent company's business, no, just not to become a competitor later. Would stronger (and enforced) anti trust laws be a solution? I believe businesses would just lie and say they are going to be part of the business but then just bury them anyway.

> I believe businesses would just lie and say they are going to be part of the business but then just bury them anyway. That's where my pet antitrust solution succeeds where others fail: ban all M&A. Companies only engage in mergers to consolidate market share, but their market share consolidation (i.e. monopolization) not only decreases competition, but also comes at the expense of employees and customers of the acq…

> ban all M&A

Let's think through this. Company A wants to buy Company B. M&A is banned.

1. A pays B's owners $X for all IP and other properties of B.

2. B fires everyone.

3. A hires whoever they want out of B's former employees.

A "ban" will simply not work as long as your country has a concept of property rights and ownership.

Re: Goodreads was the future of book reviews, then Amazon bought it

#412

Post by grujicd » Tue, Jul 04, 2023, 6:10 AM UTC

CamperBob2 wrote: post #286

cratermoon wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The insiders say never to rent from AirBnB if the property isn't at least 4.8 stars. These days those ranking systems don't truly start from 0 or 1. The statistically significant range is much smaller. I don't personally know have the stats chops to do it, but I'm sure determining that range can be done.

The important thing is to actually read the reviews. A five-star place that's located 2 blocks away from a railroad crossing that's active all night won't yield a five-star experience, but the host can hardly be expected to mention that. The last AirBnB I rented was a five-star house where the host had installed one of those Nest smoke detectors with the motion-sensing night light directly above the bed. He still got…

Why 5 if your sleep was miserable (I assume)? Host has full control over that and should be held responsible if made a poor choice which affects guests. You're polite to host, but not polite to future guests.

Re: Goodreads was the future of book reviews, then Amazon bought it

#413

Post by traviscj » Tue, Jul 04, 2023, 6:13 AM UTC

bstpierre wrote: post #205

Curvature5868 wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it possible for private companies to pay dividends? Let's say you retire and you own a portion of a small but thriving company. Could that company potentially provide you with dividends as a form of income?

Yes, a private company can pay dividends. Or you could loan it the money to buy out your shares and collect interest as it pays back the loan. Or a mixture of the two, with a thousand little variations on terms. I believe I ran into an employee-owned company once that had gone through some version of the loan scenario.

Possible, yes, and frequently used I’m sure, but entangles the retirees financial future with the business’s future — the retiree loses if the new owners make bad decisions, overleverage, and end up defaulting / bankrupting themselves. I don’t think it’s reasonable to force all businesspeople to retain this risk after disposing of the business concern.

Re: Goodreads was the future of book reviews, then Amazon bought it

#414

Post by autoexec » Tue, Jul 04, 2023, 6:14 AM UTC

unreal37 wrote: post #126

fsckboy wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I believe businesses would just lie and say they are going to be part of the business but then just bury them anyway. That's where my pet antitrust solution succeeds where others fail: ban all M&A. Companies only engage in mergers to consolidate market share, but their market share consolidation (i.e. monopolization) not only decreases competition, but also comes at the expense of employees and customers of the acq…

Company A is 6 days away from going out of business. They will shut their doors. All employees will lose their jobs. All customers will lose access to whatever Company A does that they find helpful. But then Company B agrees to buy them for $1 so that they continue running. Pays the employees, and continues running the service for customers. Ban it?

> Company A is 6 days away from going out of business. They will shut their doors. All employees will lose their jobs. All customers will lose access to whatever Company A does that they find helpful.

If Company A was providing a service that people found helpful, someone else who is more competent at running a business will step in to fill that need. Employees will flock to the new better run business or move to some other better run business.

When new companies have to step up to provide popular goods and services that were previously being provided by failing, poorly run companies, it results in innovations and new ways of doing things instead of just letting bloated industry giants continue to be propped up artificially by restricting consumer choice.

Having more players in a market also increases resiliency and improves stability. If one company runs into problems, the others in that space can pick up the slack. No more "Too Big to Fail".

Re: Goodreads was the future of book reviews, then Amazon bought it

#415

Post by ZhadruOmjar » Tue, Jul 04, 2023, 6:26 AM UTC

dudul wrote: post #371

Leires wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sorry you went through that. I had an interview recently that asked no technical questions, only logic puzzles like "princess is behind door number 1, monster is behind door number 2" scenario shit. I mentioned I'm extremely bad at these, but I have ten years of experience that I can speak to. I went ahead and did the quiz and got ghosted anyways. The silver lining is we get to watch companies like this become la…

Next time just refuse to dance and end the interview on the spot. I do that and it feels great to see the light dying in their eyes when they realize you're the one "dumping" them.

Feels good for 15 minutes while you burn a bridge and don't proceed at the interview. Presumably they have other candidates, they probably don't even remember you a couple of days later.

Re: Goodreads was the future of book reviews, then Amazon bought it

#416

Post by abenga » Tue, Jul 04, 2023, 6:31 AM UTC

ClumsyPilot wrote: post #326

hcal wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not advocating for banning M&As, but I think that could be addressed by only allowing acquisitions under specific bankruptcy conditions. Again, though, I'm not advocating for that position. I'd hate to spend part of my life building a business and not be able to cash out when the time comes for me to retire.

> not be able to cash out when the time comes for me to retire You can perfectly cash out by selling your business to private equity, or to anyone really. Ban on M&A just means you cant sell a social network to Facebook, but you could sell it to Microsoft, to Autodesk, to Berkshire capital, etc.

Coul Berkshire Capital buy two social networks and merge them? Could Facebook form a capital holding company and buy a social network anyway?

Re: Goodreads was the future of book reviews, then Amazon bought it

#417

Post by abenga » Tue, Jul 04, 2023, 6:33 AM UTC

alex028502 wrote: post #409

freddie_mercury wrote: post #403

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What M&A are you familiar with that they can typically happen in a 6 day timeframe? Virtually every single bank failure that happens results in an M&A that is negotiated over a weekend. Most recently Credit Suisse collapsed in March. UBS bought it on Monday, March 19, after negotiations began on Friday, March 16. UBS offered a price that was 60% lower than the Friday closing price. The deal was accepted.

Interestingly in this case an "approval" similar to the one we are talking about did happen over that weekend didn't it? I think the approvers brokered the deal.

Regulators were concerned about a collapse causing contagion that results in a financial crisis. Would they care to do that for a little startup with a few dozen employees?

Re: Goodreads was the future of book reviews, then Amazon bought it

#418

Post by ClumsyPilot » Tue, Jul 04, 2023, 6:34 AM UTC

rtbathula wrote: post #253

crazygringo wrote: post #6

Goodreads wasn't "the future of book reviews", it was a good review site that might have innovated great new things or might not have at all. But regardless, Amazon should never have been allowed to acquire it -- it was incredibly anti-competitive. Amazon never wanted to do anything with Goodreads at all -- as demonstrated by the fact that it hasn't done anything. It was a purely defensive move to prevent anyone else…

"should never have been allowed to acquire it?" It's very funny the way you put it. Already government has too much power and you want further they take over the economy and do pulls and pushes. Free market means, freely allowing people to trade using persuasions — not government using its coercion. People also often forget other side of the picture. 1. Why don't they attack smaller companies who are ready to sell th…

> Free market means, freely allowing people to trade using persuasions

Have you ever heard of market manipulation, wash trading, self dealing, and other kinds of fraud in the 'free market'?

Re: Goodreads was the future of book reviews, then Amazon bought it

#419

Post by Qwertious » Tue, Jul 04, 2023, 6:40 AM UTC

smcin wrote: post #343

dexterdog wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which is why founders should have a network where one creates good reads and sells to Amazon and then one of the others starts a better good reads right away. Then when founder A's handcuffs come off he goes and makes a new version of the most recent thing that sold to one of the FAANGs.

Not really because any acquisition is going to have a non-compete to prevent that obvious scenario. Goodreads' Otis Chandler in 2021 invested [0] in BookClub [1] ("building actionable learning cultures through books, for teams") . And Elizabeth Khuri [2] and Chandler both also invested in Looped [3] (a more engaged and interactive livestreaming event service for concerts, comedy and other entertainment) [0]: https://…

>Not really because any acquisition is going to have a non-compete to prevent that obvious scenario.

This applies even without the non-competes - it takes time to set up a new company and gain marketshare, so even without non-competes the monopoly is successfully kicking the can down the road. And every extra year of monopoly is another years' worth of price-gouging profits, so repeatedly buying out competitors can be worthwhile.

Re: Goodreads was the future of book reviews, then Amazon bought it

#420

Post by autoexec » Tue, Jul 04, 2023, 6:40 AM UTC

idopmstuff wrote: post #207

thomasahle wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So what happens to the mom and pop hardware store that's been running for 30 years when mom and pop want to retire? They just have to shut their doors? They could sell it to another mom and pop? It's only an M&A if the shop is bought by / becomes part of another business. If nobody wants to continue running the independent shop, it doesn't make much difference to consumers if a chain buys it, or if it closes down a…

If the only people who can buy businesses are individuals, you've cut the potential acquirer pool, and thus the value, by an enormous amount. > If nobody wants to continue running the independent shop, it doesn't make much difference to consumers if a chain buys it, or if it closes down and the chain just opens a new shop there. You're pointing out exactly why banning M&A would be good for big businesses. Now instead…

> You're pointing out exactly why banning M&A would be good for big businesses. Now instead of having to buy out the little guy, they just wait for it close

Assuming that they close. If it continues to be successful and they can find someone else to run the business when they retire than Big Business never gets a chance to move in. If they don't, Big Business can buy their assets and try to open a new store there just like anyone else could.

Either way, everyone is happy. The owners of the store still retire, and the Big Business gets a chance to outbid everyone else who wants to move into a market that's already proven itself to be a success. That happens enough right now and it's not caused the collapse of society.

> Now the mom and pop lost a bunch of money and the big company got a new location at a big savings.

Why would Big Business acquire the store by paying Mom & Pop more money than M&P would have made letting it close and putting the assets up for sale to the highest bidder? Seems like the smart move for Big Business in that case is to wait it out anyway. If Big Business can convince Mom & Pop to let them be absorbed for less money than Big Business would have had to pay them at auction then M&P still loses money.