A man who destroyed his multimillion dollar company in 10 seconds (2018) • Hacker News Board

Re: A man who destroyed his multimillion dollar company in 10 seconds (2018)

#421

Post by GarvielLoken » Thu, Aug 29, 2019, 8:24 AM UTC

Aeolun wrote: post #308

paulmd wrote: post #303

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Spoken like someone who can't comprehend living hand to mouth. Happiness is definitely a hockey-stick shaped curve, going from 1M to 10M is not going to make you happier, but someone who is making $100k is going to be far far happier than someone making $20k. The difference between scrabbling to pay your bills and keep the heat on, vs actually having some savings and free money for recreation, is absolutely massive.

I’m not so certain about that actually, I’ve certainly seen people making $20k that had more free money and recreation time than some people making $100k. Especially as regards recreation time. To be fair, making $20k was almost always a choice in those cases.

Happiness has the absolute strongest correlation with a strong social life and not with wealth. That's why happiness is declining in the WEIRD countries (Western, educated, industrialized, rich and democratic).

Re: A man who destroyed his multimillion dollar company in 10 seconds (2018)

#422

Post by etage3 » Thu, Aug 29, 2019, 8:33 AM UTC

clort wrote: post #408

skrebbel wrote: post #400

I've always been amazed at how important it appears to be to lie about selling crap. I find that invariably, businesses who compete on price make it iff they say it's good stuff, even if everybody knows it isn't. Eg Holland has a number of cheap shoe chains. Schoenenreus and Scapino both breathe an air of cheapness, and one went bust and the other is struggling bad. Their direct competitor Van Haren sells exactly equ…

> Their bread goes stale faster Interestingly, I wonder why this would be a metric of lower quality bread rather than higher? I mean, the obvious way to make the bread last longer would be to pump it full of preservatives, and the white stuff you buy pre-sliced in packs lasts for ages though it is not really bread and the quality is obviously low (or is it? The slices are so smooth, the bubbles so even and the crust…

Common baguette is regarded as a low quality, industrial version of "real" bread (in France). Some traditional bakeries still use ancient methods (and flour and yeast), the bread is good to eat for more than a week.

Re: A man who destroyed his multimillion dollar company in 10 seconds (2018)

#423

Post by fnord123 » Thu, Aug 29, 2019, 8:37 AM UTC

arcturus17 wrote: post #385

sharadov wrote: post #377

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nope, it was Lululemon, they were all making sporting apparel which you could wear while working out, but were nowhere close to the fabric, design, and style that Lululemon had, and they were completely clueless and neglecting the women's market. They eventually realized and have IMO caught on ( UA and Nike have great lines which have great fabrics, but am a guy, if you ask my wife she will go with Athleta, which is…

Lululemon has a weak presence in many parts of the EU and we still have people wear gym clothes in their normal lives...

Athleisure was born in Europe in the 80s (shell suits). But lululemon has like 5 shops in total in the continent (Amsterdam, Paris, Zurich, Frankfurt, Berlin).

Re: A man who destroyed his multimillion dollar company in 10 seconds (2018)

#424

Post by tigershark » Thu, Aug 29, 2019, 8:47 AM UTC

ant6n wrote: post #331

tim333 wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As an occasional Ryanair user they don't really treat you like cattle and he doesn't seem to despise his customers though if certain ones piss him off he won't necessarily cover that up. People are so snobby about it - I'd never fly a cheap service with cheap people - I'm better than that kind of vibe. Ryanair is run kind of like a bus service really - pay modest money and they ship you from A to B.

I've never had a bus service as bad as Ryanair. You get WiFi, and it's usually to & from downtown, it is cramped but reasonable, and the customer/business relationship usually dies not feel adversarial.

So are you expecting WiFi in every single airline that you fly?

Re: A man who destroyed his multimillion dollar company in 10 seconds (2018)

#425

Post by Phillipharryt » Thu, Aug 29, 2019, 8:47 AM UTC

thaumasiotes wrote: post #409

Phillipharryt wrote: post #378

So I've actually done a fair amount of research on this speech, and there a few skipped points most times people report on it. Firstly the audience loved the jokes, they laughed at them all. It wasn't like he delivered them to stunned faces and immediate shock. The only thing that brought him down was a newspaper reporter noted it down and newspapers pushed it as an artificial scandal. Everyone buying 5 pound earring…

> it wasn't even the first time he had publicly made these sorts of jokes, in fact it wasn't even the first time they had been published in the papers. > This was entirely a newspaper driven downfall That first point is good evidence that the jokes weren't very responsible for what happened. But it seems like it's just as good evidence that newspaper coverage also wasn't very responsible. Why attribute it to the news…

Fair enough question. They didn't try and cut him down before. They just reported his quotes, and had a laugh at them, it wasn't even front page news. But this time they decided it was worth cutting him down, and it was on all their front page with titles like "Ratner sells 'crap'" etc. Previously it was popular to report on him because he was shaking up the industry, and once he'd taken a large portion of it, it became time to create scandal around him. The papers used him for news on the way up, pushed him and then rode him all the way back down again.

Newspapers report on people all the time and then switch when it suits them, it's always trying to move with people. It's also worth noting the reporter, Harry Arnold, worked for The Mirror, a less than reputable rag. Arnold knew ahead of time that Ratner was to make these jokes (heard about it through his assistant I believe) and was there waiting for the moment he could quote him. The scandal was prepared before it had even happened. They didn't force him to say those things, but they sure made an enormous deal out of it.

Re: A man who destroyed his multimillion dollar company in 10 seconds (2018)

#426

Post by Spare_account » Thu, Aug 29, 2019, 9:24 AM UTC

concerned_user wrote: post #411

thaumasiotes wrote: post #409

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> it wasn't even the first time he had publicly made these sorts of jokes, in fact it wasn't even the first time they had been published in the papers. > This was entirely a newspaper driven downfall That first point is good evidence that the jokes weren't very responsible for what happened. But it seems like it's just as good evidence that newspaper coverage also wasn't very responsible. Why attribute it to the news…

Maybe different kind of newspaper? Like a tabloid compared to a respected paper, but that is just an educated guess, I don't know the actual story.

At the risk of alienating the same people that Gerald Ratner did (and in full knowledge that all generalisations are false), the people buying the stuff he sold didn't read the broadsheets.

It was the tabloid press, targeting their readers, that brought Ratners down. I don't know why they did it though apart from increasing their sales by generating buzz about a subject maybe.

Re: A man who destroyed his multimillion dollar company in 10 seconds (2018)

#427

Post by scbrg » Thu, Aug 29, 2019, 9:35 AM UTC

EGreg wrote: post #290

Traster wrote: post #286

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, let's all cheer on the guy who has open disdain for his customers. I wonder what he calls his health club customers behind closed doors.

Probably similar to what Mark Zuckerberg called people who trusted him with their data :) https://www.businessinsider.com/embarrassing-and-damaging-zu... ZUCK: yea so if you ever need info about anyone at harvard ZUCK: just ask ZUCK: i have over 4000 emails, pictures, addresses, sns FRIEND: what!? how'd you manage that one? ZUCK: people just submitted it ZUCK: i don't know why ZUCK: they "trust me" ZUCK: dumb fucks

I dislike Zuck as much as anyone, and probably more than most. But. I really don't understand why people whine about this particular quote. I think this may be one of the best things I've seen come from him. He is perfectly, one hundred percent correct.

They are dumb fucks for trusting him.

Zuck isn't a terrible person for saying that dumb fucks are dumb fucks. He's a terrible person for building a platform exploiting dumb fucks. He's a terrible person for everything except this particular conversation. Not the other way around.

Re: A man who destroyed his multimillion dollar company in 10 seconds (2018)

#428

Post by kamaal » Thu, Aug 29, 2019, 10:18 AM UTC

4ntonius8lock wrote: post #74

yummypaint wrote: post #2

All the guy did was be honest, and its not like he revealed anything people didnt know already. Seems like an emperors new clothes kind of situation.

You can't offend anybody more than by telling them a truth they don't want to hear. If you insult someone with something that is clearly not true, they will brush it off. But tell the truth they don't like and you will be hated more than anyone. This is coming from someone who was frequently hated for saying the truth, because I come from a different culture and hadn't figured out how to navigate human interactions i…

I guess the working class buyers knew they were buying cheap stuff. They just don't want to be humiliated or joked for doing so.

Often people buying these women's jewelry are men. A lot of women care more for their men who take time out and care to buy anything for mush more than the price itself.

Why humiliate them this way?

Re: A man who destroyed his multimillion dollar company in 10 seconds (2018)

#429

Post by tapland » Thu, Aug 29, 2019, 10:38 AM UTC

skrebbel wrote: post #400

I've always been amazed at how important it appears to be to lie about selling crap. I find that invariably, businesses who compete on price make it iff they say it's good stuff, even if everybody knows it isn't. Eg Holland has a number of cheap shoe chains. Schoenenreus and Scapino both breathe an air of cheapness, and one went bust and the other is struggling bad. Their direct competitor Van Haren sells exactly equ…

People don't like feeling as if they are buying cheap crap. Making your customers feel comfortable ins stores and on the web is very important.

Re: A man who destroyed his multimillion dollar company in 10 seconds (2018)

#430

Post by spuz » Thu, Aug 29, 2019, 10:45 AM UTC

skrebbel wrote: post #400

I've always been amazed at how important it appears to be to lie about selling crap. I find that invariably, businesses who compete on price make it iff they say it's good stuff, even if everybody knows it isn't. Eg Holland has a number of cheap shoe chains. Schoenenreus and Scapino both breathe an air of cheapness, and one went bust and the other is struggling bad. Their direct competitor Van Haren sells exactly equ…

For what it's worth, I think Ryanair successfully markets itself as both cheap and poor quality. Whenever for example they announce they are considering charging passengers to use the loo, or in fact charging people to carry on a bag, it negatively affects their brand which paradoxically increases their presence in the minds of customers looking to fly in Europe cheaply.