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37signals Earns Millions Each Year. Its CEO’s Model? His Cleaning Lady

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Re: 37signals Earns Millions Each Year. Its CEO’s Model? His Cleaning Lady

#221

Post by nameuserc »

dkrich wrote: post #219
nameuserc wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Assuming what you say were true (i.e., that I "have a problem" with 37Signals), do you "have a problem" with me "having a problem" with that? Do you also sell something people do not need? And does it make you uncomfortable when people who do not need it mentions that to an audience via HN, the same way 37Signals keeps working to make mention of itself, or have others do so, in publications with large audiences. If I…

What you are saying is akin to somebody from the revolutionary war going forward in time to the age of the cell phone and saying "People are talking through these boxes but I communicate just fine with the people in my house. I don't need these boxes. It's okay if you do." I'm not by any means suggesting that you're stupid or out of your league, but simply that you are talking about something that you are clearly com…

And your response is akin to someone being concerned about the words of a person from the 1700's reading about cell phones and asking what all the fuss is about, and maybe even stating he does not need one.

Why would you care about that? How could this person from antiquity know anything useful?

Interesting.

Re: 37signals Earns Millions Each Year. Its CEO’s Model? His Cleaning Lady

#222

Post by hackinthebochs »

anamax wrote: post #212
hackinthebochs wrote: post #196

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Profit is "evil" here because it creates incentives for all sorts of bad things. This is what necessitates a balancing force.

> Profit is "evil" here because it creates incentives for all sorts of bad things. This is what necessitates a balancing force. Even if that's true, unions aren't a balancing force to the "incentives for all sorts of bad things". The only role that unions will play here is in trying to get their cut. Actually, that's wrong. Unions will often actively help commit said "bad things" because they'll benefit. For example,…

Of course there are many dimensions here. In some dimensions unions are "evil", in some they are "good". Everyone always loves to simplify things down to their pet ideology.

Re: 37signals Earns Millions Each Year. Its CEO’s Model? His Cleaning Lady

#223

Post by anamax »

hackinthebochs wrote: post #222
anamax wrote: post #212

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Profit is "evil" here because it creates incentives for all sorts of bad things. This is what necessitates a balancing force. Even if that's true, unions aren't a balancing force to the "incentives for all sorts of bad things". The only role that unions will play here is in trying to get their cut. Actually, that's wrong. Unions will often actively help commit said "bad things" because they'll benefit. For example,…

Of course there are many dimensions here. In some dimensions unions are "evil", in some they are "good". Everyone always loves to simplify things down to their pet ideology.

> Of course there are many dimensions here. In some dimensions unions are "evil", in some they are "good".

The question isn't whether unions are good or evil, it's whether they're actually a counter to a specific evil that companies might commit.

Since that evil produces more money for the company, you need an example where a union did something to reduce a company's profit other than by trying to increase the union's cut.

Unions are not new, so if you're going to suggest that they're useful for doing something, you should have actual examples of them doing said something.

Re: 37signals Earns Millions Each Year. Its CEO’s Model? His Cleaning Lady

#224

Post by saraid216 »

davidw wrote: post #216
saraid216 wrote: post #209

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You're being needlessly pedantic. Um, no. I was being exactly as pedantic as he was. The difference was that my word choice was actually correct.

Do you understand what I am trying to communicate, or not? It does not seem like a difficult concept, so cut out the "Comic Book Guy" routine. Go ahead and actually correct my terminology if you care to - furthering everyone's knowledge is always a plus - but otherwise you are not adding anything.

No, I don't.

As far as I can tell, you were trying to use made-up words to say that Jason Fried was lying when he said he was inspired by his cleaning lady's business model because there was some particular difference between those two business models that you found significant but could not express except to vapidly define "services" as "that which cleaning ladies do" and "products" as "that which 37s is moving towards".

Re: 37signals Earns Millions Each Year. Its CEO’s Model? His Cleaning Lady

#225

Post by saraid216 »

larrys wrote: post #215
saraid216 wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> People with brains are more complex. In general if she is happy doing cleaning work we can presume she doesn't have the same brain or needs, of, say someone with higher intelligence. People are different in what their needs are. That's almost as patronizing as it is naive.

Well ok then what are you basing your thoughts on? I'm basing mine on a lifetime of meeting thousands of people from all walks of life and the story as presented by the OP. I stand behind what I have said. Would you be happy doing the simple tasks of cleaning houses everyday? Or do you prefer something more challenging like what you are doing (software development it appears). Or at least managing others doing the dr…

> From the OP it doesn't appear that we are talking about someone making their way to something greater by cleaning houses but somebody who's station in life is cleaning houses.

Why do you have this mindless obsession with ranking things in some arbitrary manner and then requiring that people climb your ladder?

Re: 37signals Earns Millions Each Year. Its CEO’s Model? His Cleaning Lady

#226

Post by davidw »

saraid216 wrote: post #224
davidw wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you understand what I am trying to communicate, or not? It does not seem like a difficult concept, so cut out the "Comic Book Guy" routine. Go ahead and actually correct my terminology if you care to - furthering everyone's knowledge is always a plus - but otherwise you are not adding anything.

No, I don't. As far as I can tell, you were trying to use made-up words to say that Jason Fried was lying when he said he was inspired by his cleaning lady's business model because there was some particular difference between those two business models that you found significant but could not express except to vapidly define "services" as "that which cleaning ladies do" and "products" as "that which 37s is moving towa…

Woah: I never called anyone a liar.

Product business and service business are fairly common labels.

http://swombat.com/2011/4/26/services-products

http://techcrunch.com/2011/04/24/what-should-you-do-with-you...

So I don't think they're made up at all, seeing as how they're in common use. It's probably true that there is not a black or white line between the two, and both can be good businesses, but I did think it fair to point out that cleaning is very much a "service" whereas 37 signals started out doing services (sites and so on) and moved towards products, which tend to scale up more.

Re: 37signals Earns Millions Each Year. Its CEO’s Model? His Cleaning Lady

#227

Post by hackinthebochs »

anamax wrote: post #223
hackinthebochs wrote: post #222

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course there are many dimensions here. In some dimensions unions are "evil", in some they are "good". Everyone always loves to simplify things down to their pet ideology.

> Of course there are many dimensions here. In some dimensions unions are "evil", in some they are "good". The question isn't whether unions are good or evil, it's whether they're actually a counter to a specific evil that companies might commit. Since that evil produces more money for the company, you need an example where a union did something to reduce a company's profit other than by trying to increase the union'…

Decreasing the company's profit doesn't necessarily equate to a union taking its "cut" (of the profits). Think reduced hours, more vacation, sick leave, less hazardous environment. Here the union is a check against a corporation's motive to sacrifice work environment for profit.

Re: 37signals Earns Millions Each Year. Its CEO’s Model? His Cleaning Lady

#228

Post by fakeer »

danmaz74 wrote: post #197
dlss wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

first "What makes a company newsworthy (unless it's as a case study) is its size, or potential size." then "But articles of that type are case studies, not news" first "Do you really want to read articles about all of them? I don't." then "I've been running one for the past 7 years. And I'm interested in reading about others." I think what you want is for Jason to have said "I wish the technical community were focuse…

News is, by definition, about current events. Case studies are about past events. So, in general, they can't be the same thing (even if, of course, the publication of an interesting case study can be interesting - and current - news). "Why can't there be news stories about how awesome the customer experience at X has gotten?": If you really want to know, I advise you to read "Storytelling: Branding in practice".

News is, by definition, about current events. Case studies are about past events.

You are logically incorrect. Well, by your own logic. How can you publish news about a current event? To be written as news it has to be happened in the past.

Re: 37signals Earns Millions Each Year. Its CEO’s Model? His Cleaning Lady

#229

Post by danmaz74 »

fakeer wrote: post #228
danmaz74 wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

News is, by definition, about current events. Case studies are about past events. So, in general, they can't be the same thing (even if, of course, the publication of an interesting case study can be interesting - and current - news). "Why can't there be news stories about how awesome the customer experience at X has gotten?": If you really want to know, I advise you to read "Storytelling: Branding in practice".

News is, by definition, about current events. Case studies are about past events. You are logically incorrect. Well, by your own logic. How can you publish news about a current event? To be written as news it has to be happened in the past.

It all depends how you define "current".

Re: 37signals Earns Millions Each Year. Its CEO’s Model? His Cleaning Lady

#230

Post by mratzloff »

aik wrote: post #129
Acne_Researcher wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree with what you. His style of running a business as likely maximized his personal happiness, and possibly his employees. But I would have liked to see him say "we could have been far more profitable, but we didn't care about that, so we limited hours and didn't hire salespeople." Instead what I hear him saying is "we are the best business we could be, because we limit hours."

>> His style of running a business as likely maximized his personal happiness, and possibly his employees. Rather than the main focus being happiness, I think the main focus is: Are you building something great? And he believes maximizing happiness and job satisfaction is a core component of achieving something great.

You have it reversed. Building something great is a component of happiness.
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