Crazy how so many young people are just dying of cancer these days.
She was the same age as Steve Jobs when he passed.
Susan Wojcicki has died
181–190 of 523 posts
Re: Susan Wojcicki has died
#182Was shocked to hear this news. I worked for Google years ago but I was in the NYC office, so we didn't run into the YouTube folks much. Opinions about YouTube may be mixed here on HN, but it is objectively one of the most successful businesses in tech or media to emerge in the past 15 years. If it weren't buried inside Alphabet, Youtube would be worth on the order of $400 billion, more than Disney and Comcast combine…
I think googles peering agreements are possibly the only reason YouTube is viable as a free service. Hard to compete against a company who basically doesn't have to pay for bandwidth.
Re: Susan Wojcicki has died
#183Earlier quoted context omitted.
You can’t really say it does or doesn’t. Research shows stress can be a contributor though. https://med.stanford.edu/survivingcancer/cancer-and-stress/s... .
Main factors are sleep, sunlight, diet and exercise as well as stress. You can see her schedule here: https://press.farm/susan-wojcickis-daily-routine-youtubes-ce... Sleep about 6hr, which isnt ideal. Not much chance to get sunlight which significantly reduces cancer incidence. Not much relaxing time. The question becomes, is the work worth it?
Where’s your scientific report that says sunlight significantly reduces lung cancer?
We shouldn’t have people making such claims on HN without providing references.
She was also home having dinner with her family by 6:30pm.
Re: Susan Wojcicki has died
#184Re: Susan Wojcicki has died
#185RIP. I hear that not everyone liked some of her decisions.
Personally, I wish I had any control at all over YouTube Shorts.
Re: Susan Wojcicki has died
#186Earlier quoted context omitted.
I have no dog in this game - literally no opinion on what kind of person she was. I use YouTube, even though I don't particularly like it, much like every other Google product. Not sure how much of what I dislike on YouTube is her fault or not,and it doesn't really matter anyway. It is not like I hold any hopes of YouTube becoming any better now. But I find this kind of comment curious. Someone noteworthy and controv…
Don't kill Chomsky, he is still alive
Oh lol. I thought he was dead.
The point still stands
Re: Susan Wojcicki has died
#187Earlier quoted context omitted.
>Opinions about YouTube may be mixed here on HN, but it is objectively one of the most successful businesses in tech or media to emerge in the past 15 years. I was always critical of YouTube from the sort of technical perspective than just pure UX. The core product and the core UX are great and I'm even considering getting YouTube Premium because I use YouTube so much. All in all, YouTube was and still is internet ph…
YouTube has worked well. However, I did try their YT Premium, for a while, and was incredibly disappointed in their UI. I assume that the Premium UI was designed for people that use their free tier, but is very strange, to folks like me, who come from other paid services. But I am likely not their target audience. I suppose that YT Premium does well.
I’m not sure what you mean about the UI, but I pay for YouTube Premium exclusively so I don’t have to see ads, and for that purpose alone, to me it’s worth it.
Re: Susan Wojcicki has died
#188Earlier quoted context omitted.
This saying never made sense to me as a game is only a game if there are players.
The point of the saying is that the player is not necessarily in position to change the rules, or at least not in the immediate short term. How far one wants to accept this as acceptable reasoning is a subjective matter.
Or maybe not that subjective when looked at closer. It may just as well be a saying that the entitled classes use to defend their selfish and less than good behaviour. Beacause the classes of the not-entitled buy this as somehow having reasonable meaning.
The entitled classes have no reason to change rules that are clearly stacked in their favour. But it sounds way better to say the rules cannot be changed. But it is hard to see why this should be self-evidently true.
Re: Susan Wojcicki has died
#189Earlier quoted context omitted.
> It's also not a business that rested on it's laurels. I would say it’s more a business that rests on its monopolization of the market. As a product there’s plenty I like about YouTube, but it dominated the market through the use of many highly anti-competitive strategies, and has what many would consider (and what may well be proven to be) an illegal monopoly. You can’t deny its impact, but to give such high praise…
In what way is YouTube an illegal monopoly?
Alphabet has engaged in many anti-competitive business practices to promote YouTube's monopoly.
To name a few, Alphabet is currently being sued by the DoJ for illegally monopolising digital advertising technology. That technology, which directly integrates with youtube (and which you or I could not integrate with our own competing youtube-like product), is one of the key reasons that youtube has become as successful as it is.
https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/justice-department-sues-googl...
They have also recently lost a lawsuit regarding the legality of their search monopoly, which likely also contributed to the success of youtube.
https://www.theverge.com/2024/8/5/24155520/judge-rules-on-us...
The way they leverage the OHA to ensure YouTube is shipped with every Android phone is also highly anti-competitive, and isn't too different from the IE case against Microsoft.
https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2018/07/googles-iron-grip-on...
The same concern exists in the smart TV market.
While it's not illegal (as far as I know), the practice of burning through billions of dollars until your competitors are gone and you have an unassailable market dominance is also certainly anti-competitive, and that really has been one of the other key ingredients in youtube's success.
None of these are management practices that I would consider worthy of congratulating.