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Why Microsoft Wants Discord
11–20 of 75 posts
Re: Why Microsoft Wants Discord
#12Is seems to me the top five software companies are on a never-ending quest to buy up every other promising software company. GitHub, Twitch, Mojang, Instagram, WhatsApp... I'd love to see a few smaller software companies refuse to get bought up and instead cultivate an independent mindset. Otherwise, we end up with a world completely dominated by Microsoft, Google, Apple, Amazon, and Facebook.
What's in it for the smaller software companies in "refusing" to get bought up?
Obviously, they have the opportunity to get even bigger and either IPO or get purchased for a higher price... but they also have a risk of losing market share (and value) to competitors... or being acquired by a larger company might give them the funding, marketing power, business alignment, etc. to accelerate their growth.
(Not talking specifically about Discord - I know almost nothing about their service.)
Re: Why Microsoft Wants Discord
#13Is seems to me the top five software companies are on a never-ending quest to buy up every other promising software company. GitHub, Twitch, Mojang, Instagram, WhatsApp... I'd love to see a few smaller software companies refuse to get bought up and instead cultivate an independent mindset. Otherwise, we end up with a world completely dominated by Microsoft, Google, Apple, Amazon, and Facebook.
Yeah.... but also a good way to get paid for a lot of people who then go on to start up new and interesting things that may or may not get dominated by the big 6.
Re: Why Microsoft Wants Discord
#14Discord is capable of organic growth. Teams isn't.
They are not very related categories.
People use slack because they liked it and convinced their managers.
MSFT has direct access to every single CTO/CIO in the world. They have a sales pipe into most of them along with a bunch of other products. 'Teams' is on paper, the Slack equivalent that rolls in along with the other products and will likely be preferred by Managers.
I believe that Discord has 1) more resonance with XBox than Teams, and 2) it gives MSFT access to a true, consumer, content oriented setting. Like FB, TikTok etc. which is a cultural access point they don't have.
Re: Why Microsoft Wants Discord
#15Is seems to me the top five software companies are on a never-ending quest to buy up every other promising software company. GitHub, Twitch, Mojang, Instagram, WhatsApp... I'd love to see a few smaller software companies refuse to get bought up and instead cultivate an independent mindset. Otherwise, we end up with a world completely dominated by Microsoft, Google, Apple, Amazon, and Facebook.
Unfortunately the smaller companies don't have a choice. Many acquisitions from Big Tech come with a threat - sell your company or we will move into your space and tank your valuation.
Sometimes they simply don't have a viable path to staying independent and profitable. Discord has tried a few things to earn more money (premium subscriptions, a game store) that didn't work out. I don't think they have a lot of options other than selling.
Re: Why Microsoft Wants Discord
#16Is seems to me the top five software companies are on a never-ending quest to buy up every other promising software company. GitHub, Twitch, Mojang, Instagram, WhatsApp... I'd love to see a few smaller software companies refuse to get bought up and instead cultivate an independent mindset. Otherwise, we end up with a world completely dominated by Microsoft, Google, Apple, Amazon, and Facebook.
That's impossible.Tech is currently unregulated anarchy.
Big Tech is allowed to do whatever it wants despite obviously using predatory pricing.
Re: Why Microsoft Wants Discord
#17Is seems to me the top five software companies are on a never-ending quest to buy up every other promising software company. GitHub, Twitch, Mojang, Instagram, WhatsApp... I'd love to see a few smaller software companies refuse to get bought up and instead cultivate an independent mindset. Otherwise, we end up with a world completely dominated by Microsoft, Google, Apple, Amazon, and Facebook.
There are at least a couple out there. Snapchat turned down a $3B offer from Facebook to stay independent, and I believe Twitter have turned down similar offers through the years.
Re: Why Microsoft Wants Discord
#18Sometimes I wonder if the world would be better or worse if there was a max size for companies. It’s also interesting how many chat apps are acquired and exist. Just how large is that market?
From what I've seen the big companies just stink at chat period, so they go in buy a chat company, ruin the product and someone else moves into the space and starts taking market share again.
Examples include
AIM
Skype
Slack
and now Discord
Re: Why Microsoft Wants Discord
#19Sometimes I wonder if the world would be better or worse if there was a max size for companies. It’s also interesting how many chat apps are acquired and exist. Just how large is that market?
I don't think it's necessarily that bad when there's a single large company that dominates a space. from a user's perspective, google search is probably better than any alternative involving four or five competitors on equal footing. some things scale really well.
more of a problem is when one company is a big player in several horizontal markets, creating an opportunity to take over new markets with a mediocre offering.
Re: Why Microsoft Wants Discord
#20They shouldn't be allowed to have it