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Manifestos and Monopolies

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Re: Manifestos and Monopolies

#31

Post by [deleted] »

TimJYoung wrote: post #26
abannin wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thompson's point here isn't about the content itself, but rather the supply chain for the content. Because the internet effectively provides 'infinite' distribution, the traditional models of controlling distribution are worthless. This is a very consistent theme in his writings. Consider that both the worthless and valuable content that you've defined use the same methods for distribution; Facebook, Twitter, Google,…

Yes, but production distribution. It still costs money to produce something of value, whether it's an article in a magazine or an album. The fact that it costs virtually nothing to reproduce an album or distribute it digitally does not negate the investment it took to produce it. And the fact remains that Facebook and Google, among many others, profited handsomely from this confusion.

[deleted]

Re: Manifestos and Monopolies

#32

Post by confounded »

TimJYoung wrote: post #29
confounded wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It still costs money to produce something of value It costs rapidly decreasing amounts to produce something of value. If you want a few stabs from a violin in your song, you rarely need to hire a concert violinist these days, thanks to recordings and software-synthesizers based on infinitely reproducible code and data.

Absolutely, but that doesn't mean that it's still easy to produce the final work. If anyone can do it, then it's obviously not valuable. Take "Stranger Things" on Netflix, for example. I normally hate sci-fi, but this was one heck of a great season 1 for a series. Did it take a lot less in terms of technical know-how/costs to produce than it would have taken in the 80's ? Sure, no doubt. But, it still is a very uniqu…

> But, it still is a very unique cultural work that is definitely more valuable than something created by another group of people with access to the exact same technology, but producing something of lesser value

Human cultural value != market-value. This is what I'm getting at.

What was the incremental cost to you to watch each episode?

How much did you pay to watch ET? Buy a Twin Peaks box-set?

> The secret sauce is the people involved and their life experiences, knowledge, and expertise, none of which are "free".

You can find free life-experiences (Medium, Twitter), knowledge and expertise (Github, Wikipedia, Quora) all over the internet.

I'm not saying that people don't need money to exist, or that as we're able to produce more, cultural exhanges are worth subjectively less to other humans (quite the opposite).

I'm saying that the costs of people producing things is decreasing rapidly. What is increasing is the net share of value which is captured by distribution platforms.

It's relevant that you can only watch Stranger Things on Netflix --- you can't 'buy it', you need to pay a rent in perpetuity to watch your favorite shows at your own discretion. This is only possible due to the power which the distribution platform (Netflix) has accumulated.

Re: Manifestos and Monopolies

#33

Post by skewart »

TimJYoung wrote: post #26
abannin wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thompson's point here isn't about the content itself, but rather the supply chain for the content. Because the internet effectively provides 'infinite' distribution, the traditional models of controlling distribution are worthless. This is a very consistent theme in his writings. Consider that both the worthless and valuable content that you've defined use the same methods for distribution; Facebook, Twitter, Google,…

Yes, but production distribution. It still costs money to produce something of value, whether it's an article in a magazine or an album. The fact that it costs virtually nothing to reproduce an album or distribute it digitally does not negate the investment it took to produce it. And the fact remains that Facebook and Google, among many others, profited handsomely from this confusion.

True. I think the author was a bit hasty in how he phrased things here. Given the context of the rest of his writing it's pretty clear that he's talking about the overall supply chain of content as opposed to the demand side.

Basically the insight is that, for a lot of industries, the internet has caused a general shift in the center of power from the supply side to the demand side. Fifty years ago you could maintain a strong and powerful position by controlling the supply chain for media content. Largely this was because supplying media was pretty hard - you had to find and organize the writers/artists, physically manufacture it, and distribute it across a given geographic area. Because it was challenging to supply media, there were relatively few options that consumers had access to, so if you managed to bring something to market it was relatively easy to find people who would be interested in buying it.

The internet turned that dynamic on its head. Now all those challenges with getting media into peoples' hands have evaporated. Of course it's still really hard to produce great content - and individual creators can still do fantastically well - but there is much less money to be made by bringing the content that creators create to the market. Instead, the more powerful position is to control the consumer relationship and let the content creators come to you. In a marketplace where there is a massive supply of different things for consumers to consume it's hard for any one creator/supplier to stand out and get the attention of consumers. So a company that does hold a lot of consumer mind-share and can act as a kind of entry-point to the market for consumers, like Netflix or Facebook, has a ton of leverage over suppliers.

And these companies do add value for consumers. It's overwhelming to have so many different options to chose from. It's nice to have someone help me navigate the choices, or even just present me a steady feed of content I might like.

We're seeing this dynamic not just in markets for media but also in markets for things like furniture and even consumer financial products - Houzz and Credit Karma, respectively, are both trying to be consumer gatekeepers, which will give them tremendous power in their markets.

Re: Manifestos and Monopolies

#34

Post by L_Rahman »

TimJYoung wrote: post #12

The author lost me here: "it is a reflection of the fundamental reality that the supply of content (and increasingly goods) is infinite, and thus worthless" No, the supply of worthless content is infinite. The supply of interesting content provided by professionals with the backgrounds necessary to provide such content is not. This is why you still see the majority of journalistic content provided by a small number o…

Thompson would be the first to agree with you. He would in fact point to his very own business as an example that he believes in well-researched, expensive to produce content. He would then go on to argue that similar content sources will have to find ways of making money that don't involve putting display ads next to their content.

https://stratechery.com/2015/grantland-and-the-surprising-fu...

Re: Manifestos and Monopolies

#35

Post by L_Rahman »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #4
RodericDay wrote: post #2

> I have probably written more positive pieces about Facebook than just about any other company, and frankly, still will. > My deep-rooted suspicion of Zuckerberg’s manifesto has nothing to do with Facebook or Zuckerberg; I suspect that we agree on more political goals than not. > I don’t necessarily begrudge Facebook this dominance; > Moreover, my proposals are in line with Zuckerberg’s proclaimed goals: I don't hon…

He's saying: 1. Facebook is executing a cunning strategy brilliantly; and 2. The power this centralizes in Zuckerberg is concerning; although 3. I'm not as worried as I might otherwise be because I trust him with that power. It's less hedging than expressing a nuanced point.

Thompson specifically says that he doesn't trust Zuckerberg with that power. Even though Thompson suspects that he and Zuckerberg probably want the same global outcomes, he is inherently suspicious of any centrally controlled entity.

> my discomfort arises from my strong belief that centralized power is both inefficient and dangerous: no one person, or company, can figure out optimal solutions for everyone on their own, and history is riddled with examples of central planners ostensibly acting with the best of intentions — at least in their own minds — resulting in the most horrific of consequences; those consequences sometimes take the form of overt costs, both economic and humanitarian, and sometimes those costs are foregone opportunities and innovations. Usually it’s both.

Re: Manifestos and Monopolies

#36

Post by L_Rahman »

monkbent wrote: post #11
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's an articulation of the general versus the specific. He's saying the general idea underpinning Zuckerberg's manifesto is concerning. He's just personally okay given it's specifically Zuckerberg manning the helm. (Separately, he says Facebook is in a good economic position. That's a separate train of thought from the manifesto discussion.)

I have no idea how you guys are getting the impression I'm ok with Zuckerberg's stated goals here. I think I was pretty clear on that point at least!

I thought so too, especially given that you devoted a considerable chunk of "The Cost of Monopoly" section to explain why you're actually concerned.

Re: Manifestos and Monopolies

#37

Post by L_Rahman »

RodericDay wrote: post #21
monkbent wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have no idea how you guys are getting the impression I'm ok with Zuckerberg's stated goals here. I think I was pretty clear on that point at least!

Are you the author? I'm not saying you're ok with his goals. I'm saying that you seem to be very concerned with not coming off as "one of those anti-FB people", to the degree that it weakens the momentum of your writing a lot. I'm sure other people really like it.

Yes, monkbent is Ben's handle on HN.

Re: Manifestos and Monopolies

#38

Post by wtbob »

jondubois wrote: post #7
coldcode wrote: post #3

I use FB to keep in touch with friends who mostly live far from me. That's all I really want, but that makes FB no money. What I wish I could do was build exactly that because in the end that's what most people really care about; however there is exactly zero money to do this sort of thing since FB has basically cornered the market in connecting people. The basic question is: would you pay $1 a month to keep in touch…

I think that the reason why people wouldn't pay $1 per month is mostly because of inconvenience. If people had to pay for Facebook as part of their income tax (which amounted to about $12 per year), then I think a lot of people would be OK with that and everyone would be better off overall. The problem is that the force of marketing is invisible. Even people who are resistant to targeted advertising are at least susc…

> If people had to pay for Facebook as part of their income tax (which amounted to about $12 per year), then I think a lot of people would be OK with that and everyone would be better off overall.

But which Facebook would that be? Would it be the personal-page Facebook or the News Feed Facebook or the Facebook of Tomorrow? It's obvious that a State could build a Facebook clone, but is there any evidence that it could innovate well?

Granted, Facebook itself is imperfect, but it at least has to provide someone some value: Statebook would only need to give some grandees a sense of self-importance.

Re: Manifestos and Monopolies

#39

Post by type0 »

wtbob wrote: post #38
jondubois wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that the reason why people wouldn't pay $1 per month is mostly because of inconvenience. If people had to pay for Facebook as part of their income tax (which amounted to about $12 per year), then I think a lot of people would be OK with that and everyone would be better off overall. The problem is that the force of marketing is invisible. Even people who are resistant to targeted advertising are at least susc…

> If people had to pay for Facebook as part of their income tax (which amounted to about $12 per year), then I think a lot of people would be OK with that and everyone would be better off overall. But which Facebook would that be? Would it be the personal-page Facebook or the News Feed Facebook or the Facebook of Tomorrow? It's obvious that a State could build a Facebook clone, but is there any evidence that it could…

> Granted, Facebook itself is imperfect, but it at least has to provide someone some value: Statebook would only need to give some grandees a sense of self-importance.

Imagine the future where Statebook would provide this invaluable service to vote online and do your taxes when Zuck becomes a successful politician.

Re: Manifestos and Monopolies

#40

Post by dilemma »

TimJYoung wrote: post #12

The author lost me here: "it is a reflection of the fundamental reality that the supply of content (and increasingly goods) is infinite, and thus worthless" No, the supply of worthless content is infinite. The supply of interesting content provided by professionals with the backgrounds necessary to provide such content is not. This is why you still see the majority of journalistic content provided by a small number o…

Indeed. The author charges for access to his premium content (and value added services) so obviously it is not worthless.
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