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Figma and Adobe abandon proposed merger

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Re: Figma and Adobe abandon proposed merger

#971

Post by quitit »

gibbitz wrote: post #862
quitit wrote: post #858

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree but for a slightly different reason. UX is going to get a shake up from AI. We're already seeing a bit of the new paradigm of on-demand UI/UX with Gemini (and the various me-too demos). Both Figma and Adobe are now vulnerable to disruption in this space. Adobe can use the time to ape Figma while flexing their rather good AI expertise.

I wonder about the UX created by AI when we start delegating browsing to AI. The major search engines already are looking to lean on AI and we complain about ads enough that it's clear we see browsing as a chore. It's only a matter of time before the web is written in a new bytecode that is meant for AI only. Turtles all the way down...

I think this is what the "Digital Assistant" will become. At the moment we craft some kind of prompt then scour the results which are largely book-like representations of information.

Per your suggestion, it would be logical that alongside our usual text-driven sites we have digital information repositories for AIs to query information rather than trying to glean it from the text-driven webpage. Google Knowledge and Siri Knowledge are both implementations of this idea, but I assume it will grow to something that is more general purpose, so any AI could access it. Then extend that to all manner of services, such as bookings, tickets, shopping, etc. That's where the real turtles are.

Re: Figma and Adobe abandon proposed merger

#973

Post by chefandy »

Arcanum-XIII wrote: post #953
virtualritz wrote: post #937

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Alpha channel/mask handling still sucks in Affinity and keeps sucking.[1] For me this is already yet another app I paid for that is on the way to the famous 'enshittification'. It's been years since I saw it mentioned in the Affinity forums first. And still a workflow so essential hasn't been addressed by the devs. [1] https://forum.affinity.serif.com/index.php?/topic/187070-alp...

To be honest it took a long time in Photoshop to have something as good as it is now. Masking is the bane of my existence when I have to do it (but I'm only an amateur, so, not often).

Totally true, but that doesn't change the cost/benefit ratio of actually using the product for professional work. Masking is one of those fundamentally necessary tools for efficiently making professional looking photo composites and even more so for regular graphic design type work. Doing hobby work it would definitely be less of an issue.

Re: Figma and Adobe abandon proposed merger

#974

Post by chefandy »

75th wrote: post #952
virtualritz wrote: post #937

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Alpha channel/mask handling still sucks in Affinity and keeps sucking.[1] For me this is already yet another app I paid for that is on the way to the famous 'enshittification'. It's been years since I saw it mentioned in the Affinity forums first. And still a workflow so essential hasn't been addressed by the devs. [1] https://forum.affinity.serif.com/index.php?/topic/187070-alp...

The Affinity apps being slow to adopt improvements has nothing to do with “enshittification”. They’re not actively doing user-hostile stuff for the sake of their stock price, or anything in that ballpark. The fact is that different things are “essential” to different users. Whenever they ship a new feature, some users are like “I wanted this!” while many are like “Still not shipping what we’re asking for!” I do think…

There's also a tradeoff between implementing features and controlling stability that Adobe regularly gets wrong. Show me a professional-- supposedly their target demographic-- that would prefer to have the latest whiz bang sloppy neural network feature or some cockamamie 3D bolt-on before fixing their huge list of shitty bugs.

Re: Figma and Adobe abandon proposed merger

#975

Post by throwup238 »

solatic wrote: post #760
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #497

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this is my favorite comment of the year. We've all become so inured to the idea, especially in startup land, that the purpose of building a business is just the exit (and hopefully we can get out soon enough with someone else "holding the bag"). As you point out, if Figma can build a growing, profitable business, there is no reason they can't IPO at some point. But still, this shows how even the purpose of an…

> the original intention was to get access to public market funds to grow a business. Now it's usually just a method of "exit" to let retail investors take the lion's share of the risk Founders and employees would be totally OK with staying private, if the board would ever permit issuing a dividend. That's the "normal" way to have an "exit" (i.e. return profits to shareholders) without a public offering. The purpose…

As if the employees would ever see any of that dividend. If startups paid out dividends, VCs would require them to be part of the liquidation preference clause.

IPOs and huge sales far above the liquidation preference is the only way any of the employees would see any of that money.

Re: Figma and Adobe abandon proposed merger

#976

Post by Ericson2314 »

gunapologist99 wrote: post #645
Ericson2314 wrote: post #495

Renewed anti-trust is an interesting experiment. I don't what the consequences will be, but I am excited to find out! If a nothing else, I want people to think "we should try more policy experiments to become wiser" rather than "oh no, effect uncertain, better stick with status quo".

How is this an experiment? Don't we remember Standard Oil, AT&T, DOJ vs MS, etc?

The experiment is quickly varying the policy. Trying to compare n=1 decades apart, in the century that saw the greatest change in human history (so far), is a cool intellectual exercise but not simple-stupid enough to be empirical.

Re: Figma and Adobe abandon proposed merger

#977

Post by airstrike »

macspoofing wrote: post #964
airstrike wrote: post #720

Earlier quoted context omitted.

GitHub? But that's not the point. The point is the value of not having Figma sell to its largest competitor.

>The point is the value of not having Figma sell to its largest competitor. Adobe does not compete with Microsoft in any meaningful way. There is some overlap in some products here or there, but it's not meaningful competition.

I'm not saying Adobe competes with Microsoft.

Adobe competes with Figma. The fact that Microsoft doesn't compete with Figma is precisely why it's ok for the former to acquire the latter.

Re: Figma and Adobe abandon proposed merger

#978

Post by roncesvalles »

solatic wrote: post #760
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #497

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this is my favorite comment of the year. We've all become so inured to the idea, especially in startup land, that the purpose of building a business is just the exit (and hopefully we can get out soon enough with someone else "holding the bag"). As you point out, if Figma can build a growing, profitable business, there is no reason they can't IPO at some point. But still, this shows how even the purpose of an…

> the original intention was to get access to public market funds to grow a business. Now it's usually just a method of "exit" to let retail investors take the lion's share of the risk Founders and employees would be totally OK with staying private, if the board would ever permit issuing a dividend. That's the "normal" way to have an "exit" (i.e. return profits to shareholders) without a public offering. The purpose…

The purpose of the stock market is that a company can issue its own currency, and then print more of that currency whenever it needs to raise money, which automatically absorbs value from all outstanding investors (i.e. shareholders).

Re: Figma and Adobe abandon proposed merger

#979

Post by fzzzy »

c0nsumer wrote: post #967
Springtime wrote: post #960

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Affinity has various workflow interrupting issues and missing features, from things Adobe figured out 20 years ago. And to be clear, I'd love Affinity to succeed at being a more serious competitor. Just a handful from one notes file: - No percentage document scaling drop-down option, despite featuring some uncommonly used units for design work. Instead it's hidden as a non-discoverable feature where you enter a perce…

I really, really, really want to use the Affinity suite for more stuff, but just the other day when I was trying to knock up a basic drawing of something that exists in real life (a bicycle frame) I found that Designer couldn't draw a line of X length at N angle. It just... didn't have the option. All I wanted to do was draw a few lines of given lengths and angles and join their ends. Then overlay another set of the…

Can't you just draw a line of X length and then rotate it to N?

Re: Figma and Adobe abandon proposed merger

#980

Post by vlovich123 »

gedy wrote: post #950
vlovich123 wrote: post #775

I think this is great. Figma gets a free undiluted infusion of 1B cash. I’m surprised break-up fees aren’t negotiated as an investment instead of a pure cash transfer. Sure it may have impacted company focus, it didn’t impact their revenue that much (1.5x growth vs 2x growth in previous years although that could have also been caused by an adverse economic climate with sales slowing across many companies and industri…

Very true, but it's interesting the Figma CEO sounds disappointed, which feels like the game plan has been to be acquired and pay investors. Adobe is the biggest player in the space, so if denied, might put a damper on future acquisition price.

I mean it’s a massive exit missed for him and he has to now gamble with more fickle public markets in an adverse environment. I’d be bummed too in his shoes because it means I’d have to keep working hard with a continued risk after already taking such a massive risk.
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