A gentlemen's agreement • Hacker News Board

Re: A gentlemen's agreement

#71

Post by rz2k » Fri, Mar 22, 2013, 6:34 PM UTC

mindcrime wrote: post #41

rz2k wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Furthermore, "gentleman's agreements" like these are fundamentally anti-competitive. The sentiment is an us vs. them one, where 'us' is vendors, and 'them' is customers. While misleading statements about competitors should be unacceptable, since it hurts customers and the industry, the same cannot be said for vigorous competition. It is also worth pointing out that it's expensive to prepare for rare events, and the c…

Furthermore, "gentleman's agreements" like these are fundamentally anti-competitive. That's quite a stretch, given the usual definition of anti-competitive. A "gentleman's agreement" to not lower prices, or not to expand into a certain market, etc., would be genuinely anti-competitive. This is simply an agreement to not kick somebody when they're down. That's just good sportsmanship and integrity. Personally, I think…

Non-explicit agreements become popular when contracts are unenforceable. They also confer an advantage to groups that are more likable. Does that mean that only 'unlikeable' groups would oppose gentleman's agreements? Not really, because they also automatically favor incumbent firms over early stage firms or anyone who is disruptive.

The nod and the wink about refusing to compete, and advocating an effective blacklist of companies that evangelize on the subject of reliability can't be anything more than a nod and a wink, because it would put the signatories in legal jeopardy.

Alternately, they could build extra capacity, and sell terms on how often they would provide overflow capacity to each other, but that would cost more than simply campaigning to prohibit discussion of failures.

There really isn't any kind of stretch to call this anti-competitive. It is pretty much the archetype for using an informal agreement as an enforcement mechanism in order to avoid a mutually detrimental nash equilibrium. More companies could engage in the type of behavior advocated here, but then it wouldn't be the dynamic industry that it is.

Re: A gentlemen's agreement

#72

Post by takluyver » Fri, Mar 22, 2013, 6:42 PM UTC

nmcfarl wrote: post #60

shill wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

OP is talking about kicking someone when they are down as the result of a random catastrophe. You won't gain many customers doing this, and the ones you do gain won't be very loyal.

So perhaps what I’m saying is that at some point you have to kick when down, at least if a vendor is always down. Every marketing campaign I’ve ever been involved in ran for longer than 2 weeks. And in my example I was not joking - we were paying for a service that had roughly bi-weekly, unplanned downtime of multiple hours, for many many months. A marketing campaign would have inevitably run concurrent with a downti…

I don't think anyone's really disagreeing with this. If you can make a real case that you can offer a better service, that's fine.

As another example: say a meteorite takes out your competitor's data centre. If you are running from independent data centres with capacity to handle a sudden failure of one, feel free to highlight that. If you're running from one data centre, you should probably just count yourself lucky that it happened to them and not you.

Re: A gentlemen's agreement

#73

Post by ahoyhere » Fri, Mar 22, 2013, 6:44 PM UTC

alrs wrote: post #11

I won't be signing up for this. Having an operations team that can keep things going through adversity is a competitive advantage that doesn't come cheap. Redundancy and ops talent cost money. If your competitor made a cost/benefit decision that let them down, I say tough luck.

Her point is that DDoSing can happen to anyone. If you claim it won't happen to you, you are lying, because there is essentially nothing you can do to stop it, if Anonymous decides to attack you.

So not only is was the offending marketing not classy, it was based on a fantasy.

Re: A gentlemen's agreement

#74

Post by ahoyhere » Fri, Mar 22, 2013, 6:50 PM UTC

pseut wrote: post #67

mindcrime wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So you thought it is loable to not exploit your opponents weaknesses? There's a big difference between exploiting a weakness in general, and taking advantage of an extraordinary circumstance that harms your competitor. To me, this comes down to sportsmanship. To use a bit of an analogy... I wrestled in high-school. We trained to identify weaknesses in the game of our opponents, so I might well enter into a match with…

I like the general sentiment, and I generally act the same way, but I can't help but think, "if you ain't cheating, you ain't trying." Another analogy: I played tennis in high school and in every match I've played in my life, there are no refs and the players call balls in or out on their own. Some people cheat on that and, all else equal, they tend to win more points. If I had millions of dollars at stake on these m…

If you play for points, of course it makes sense to cheat.

If you play to be a better human being, and better at tennis, you are just fucking yourself in the ear if you cheat.

When you cheat, you know you can't win in a fair fight. You may win -- but you know you don't "deserve" it. You can tell yourself you "deserve" it because you were smart enough to take advantage, but some part of you will know you're a liar, and you couldn't hack it in a fair fight.

This is also why lying to people is a waste of time, because it creates a layer between you and the rest of the world. Chronic liars often find themselves facing depression because "nobody knows the real me." And cheats, when in a position where cheating won't help them, lack confidence.

Re: A gentlemen's agreement

#75

Post by ahoyhere » Fri, Mar 22, 2013, 6:59 PM UTC

Sad to see the discussion is more about "what'll get you customers" instead of "what does it mean to do business ethically."

Capitalism, fine. Competitiveness, fine. Postmark is not a company afraid of customers or competition. But they believe in competing in a classy, ethical way. Most importantly, their competitive advantages are based on facts, things they can control, things their competitors could control but don't.

How can anyone disagree with that?

But sure, let's look at it from a ruthless, ethics-free standpoint:

What if you do run attack ads, what if you do kick the competitor when they have a freak event that they did not cause and could not have prevented -- an enormous DDoSing campaign by an organized group -- and which could happen to you, too?

What if you lure customers away with these attack ads?

What will those customers do when you have a freak event?

No service has perfect uptime. DDoSing can happen to anyone.

So even if you have the ethics of a rutabaga, all you get for your efforts are customers which do not tolerate the occasional freak event. What do you think they're going to do when you have something you have no control over?

Your marketing will have created the results that you deserve.

Business doesn't exist in a vacuum. You do not "win customers for life." Customers are not all equal (far from it). This is a long game. Being classy, being honest, is the best way to create a business you -- and your customers -- can live with for a long time.

Re: A gentlemen's agreement

#76

Post by mindcrime » Fri, Mar 22, 2013, 7:02 PM UTC

rz2k wrote: post #71

mindcrime wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Furthermore, "gentleman's agreements" like these are fundamentally anti-competitive. That's quite a stretch, given the usual definition of anti-competitive. A "gentleman's agreement" to not lower prices, or not to expand into a certain market, etc., would be genuinely anti-competitive. This is simply an agreement to not kick somebody when they're down. That's just good sportsmanship and integrity. Personally, I think…

Non-explicit agreements become popular when contracts are unenforceable. They also confer an advantage to groups that are more likable. Does that mean that only 'unlikeable' groups would oppose gentleman's agreements? Not really, because they also automatically favor incumbent firms over early stage firms or anyone who is disruptive. The nod and the wink about refusing to compete, and advocating an effective blacklis…

and advocating an effective blacklist of companies that evangelize on the subject of reliability

Who did that, and what does it have to do with this discussion?

There really isn't any kind of stretch to call this anti-competitive.

I think you're seeing something that isn't there. We'll probably just have to "agree to disagree" on this point.

Re: A gentlemen's agreement

#77

Post by scott_meade » Fri, Mar 22, 2013, 7:14 PM UTC

ahoyhere wrote: post #75

Sad to see the discussion is more about "what'll get you customers" instead of "what does it mean to do business ethically." Capitalism, fine. Competitiveness, fine. Postmark is not a company afraid of customers or competition. But they believe in competing in a classy, ethical way. Most importantly, their competitive advantages are based on facts , things they can control, things their competitors could control but…

"all you get for your efforts are customers which do not tolerate the occasional freak event" Said another way: companies' customers are a reflection how the company behaves. If you want customers who are a pain to deal with, who threaten to switch at any unmet whim, and who will step all over you as a vendor, then by all means go ahead and step all over your competition to get those customers. A company that acts like a jerk is going to have customers who are jerks and who wants to deal with that.

But if you want customers that are fans and proponents and evangelists for your company - then act in those positive ways yourself.

Re: A gentlemen's agreement

#78

Post by mfenniak » Fri, Mar 22, 2013, 7:15 PM UTC

ahoyhere wrote: post #75

Sad to see the discussion is more about "what'll get you customers" instead of "what does it mean to do business ethically." Capitalism, fine. Competitiveness, fine. Postmark is not a company afraid of customers or competition. But they believe in competing in a classy, ethical way. Most importantly, their competitive advantages are based on facts , things they can control, things their competitors could control but…

I love this point of view. If every business person thought like this, and could visualize far enough down the road to see the effects their actions have, capitalism wouldn't have a bad reputation. :-)

Re: A gentlemen's agreement

#79

Post by rz2k » Fri, Mar 22, 2013, 8:29 PM UTC

mindcrime wrote: post #76

rz2k wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Non-explicit agreements become popular when contracts are unenforceable. They also confer an advantage to groups that are more likable. Does that mean that only 'unlikeable' groups would oppose gentleman's agreements? Not really, because they also automatically favor incumbent firms over early stage firms or anyone who is disruptive. The nod and the wink about refusing to compete, and advocating an effective blacklis…

and advocating an effective blacklist of companies that evangelize on the subject of reliability Who did that, and what does it have to do with this discussion? There really isn't any kind of stretch to call this anti-competitive. I think you're seeing something that isn't there. We'll probably just have to "agree to disagree" on this point.

This resembles a statement to the effect of not considering an economic phenomenon because it was not immediately obvious.

Professional courtesy occurs in many professions including law, medicine and finance, and it causes real economic harm even though the harm is so spread out that it frequently goes unnoticed. The very nature of this type of collusion is that it is not obvious on the surface, and though the harm is real it is often well-intentioned and understood as courteous by the people responsible for it.

Only marginally more obvious is if you even hear people describing whether they raise the hourly rate for their gardener as a courtesy issue in regard to a friend who employs the same person. There the harm is almost blatantly obvious, but I assure you it is a common sentiment.

Here's an actual quote:

>When someone you compete against is suffering, especially as a result of any kind of infrastructure issues, shut up and keep your head down.

and, later:

>Not to mention, do you really want those customers who were so quick to leave? What do you think they’ll do when you go down next time?

which sounds like the argument about trying to hire A, B or C people—it's actually a pretty good idea to target really demanding customers. There is a random component to infrastructure failures, but it is nonsense to pretend that preparation, capacity, and redundancy have no effect, and that they are not only effective marketing topics, but features that are ultimately very important to users.

Re: A gentlemen's agreement

#80

Post by rz2k » Fri, Mar 22, 2013, 8:52 PM UTC

ahoyhere wrote: post #75

Sad to see the discussion is more about "what'll get you customers" instead of "what does it mean to do business ethically." Capitalism, fine. Competitiveness, fine. Postmark is not a company afraid of customers or competition. But they believe in competing in a classy, ethical way. Most importantly, their competitive advantages are based on facts , things they can control, things their competitors could control but…

Their is a long time debate between the ideals of communitarism and the ideals of cosmopolitanism, but another term for courteous noncompete agreements with your competitors is cronyism.

When does being nice to your competitors undermine your users' best interests? When does generosity toward people within your industry community benefit your industry at the expense of other communities, and how old does your company have to be before you can call that behavior cronyism? Do you have to smoke cigars in a poorly lit room? What if you just like being more generous to people who smoke cigars in dark rooms more than people who occasionally go outside, and are active? Does that make you a crony?

Reading these comments I get the impression that people want to be nice to others in companies like their own, more than they are describing any type of universal ethical guidelines.