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Welp I think this one is deserved. Considering the rout that Tech stocks had on the market it's time to take into serious consideration where we stand. I doubt there are few who deny that a bubble has been building out in the Valley since the Great Recession. Powered by QE, a lack of safe bets in traditional american industries for investors, and the rise of China those nerds and nerdettes out west have had one hell of a time. With the collapse of the Chinese market, which is likely only just beginning, and the effects it has had today on technology stocks one has to wonder whether or not the bubble can survive the collapse of most foreign currencies and the valley's #1 provider of manufactured goods. So what do you think? Is the tech game safe? Or about to see a massive collapse? Will investors still trust the high gains that were provided to them by the Giants in Sillicon Valley or will they be forced to move to more traditional safer small growth investments like traditional retail, manufacturing, and the service sector?
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Aug 24, 2015 23:27
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sv is a bubble but had nothing to do with today's stock drop.
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Aug 24, 2015 23:32
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Are there any detailed writings by economists about it? I keep hearing it is going to happen, yet these companies continue to be held up by imaginary money.
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Aug 25, 2015 00:12
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im gay posted:Are there any detailed writings by economists about it? I keep hearing it is going to happen, yet these companies continue to be held up by imaginary money. The short version is that there's a finite amount of free money (it's not imaginary) and few to none of these companies have any hope of repaying it.
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Aug 25, 2015 00:19
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im gay posted:Are there any detailed writings by economists about it? I keep hearing it is going to happen, yet these companies continue to be held up by imaginary money. The money is certainly real. For some reason billionaires don't want to wait for their portfolios to go up 3% a year, they want to gamble millions on companies with no business plans or in some cases revenue in the hopes that they become the new Facebook. For example, let's take Robinhood. It's an app that gives commission-free stock trading in order to revolutionize retail investing or something while couching it in vaguely revolutionary terms. Well, how does it make money with no commissions and no ads? More venture capital, so it can get more users and gain more venture capital so it can get more users. They've raised $66 million in last year with no revenue other than the interest gathered on the money in their brokerage.
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Aug 25, 2015 00:45
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Luigi Thirty posted:The money is certainly real. For some reason billionaires don't want to wait for their portfolios to go up 3% a year, they want to gamble millions on companies with no business plans or in some cases revenue in the hopes that they become the new Facebook. For example, let's take Robinhood. It's an app that gives commission-free stock trading in order to revolutionize retail investing or something while couching it in vaguely revolutionary terms. Well, how does it make money with no commissions and no ads? More venture capital, so it can get more users and gain more venture capital so it can get more users. They've raised $66 million in last year with no revenue other than the interest gathered on the money in their brokerage. Reason why they wanna do it is if they manage to get bought out by Google/Facebook/Apple before the VC money runs out they get mega mega paid.
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Aug 25, 2015 00:53
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I highly recommend everyone read this talk but I'll quote the most important bit:quote:The Internet was Christmas for advertisers. Suddenly you could know exactly who was looking at your ads, and you could target them by age, sex, income, location, almost any criterion you wanted. One of the first banner ads had a click-through rate of 78%. That's mind-boggling. Do you know what two words were on that banner ad? "Shop Naked!" CLICK! But banner ads turned out to be like poison ivy. People clicked them once, and learned never to touch them again. The industry collapsed in a flurry of pop-overs, pop-unders, and shame. Until Google discovered you could serve little text ads in context, and people would click on them. The whole industry climbed on this life raft, and remains there to this day. Advertising, or the promise of advertising, is the economic foundation of the world wide web. During the dotcom bubble the investor storytime was that doing something on the internet would change everything. That user numbers were more important than revenue. That growth rates could substitute for margins. This time around there is an unhealthy obsession with big data and "disruption". Established business models with boring expensive things like actually paying employees or regulatory compliance aren't just something you don't need but are in fact something to be avoided simply because they are a part of how things used to be done. Profitability doesn't matter because if you pray to the god of disruption hard enough and collect as much data as you possibly can all the money that went into some mythical market inefficiencies will appear and shower down upon you and you'll be bajillionaires. And even if that doesn't pan out if you grow fast enough then facebook or google will buy you out and you'll be made.
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Aug 25, 2015 01:16
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LionYeti posted:Reason why they wanna do it is if they manage to get bought out by Google/Facebook/Apple before the VC money runs out they get mega mega paid. And the real gag is that Google/Facebook/Apple have all this economic clout because they are underwritten by the MIC and the American Tax Payer. Because the revenue model isn't just click-through advertising or premium accounts.
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Aug 25, 2015 01:17
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How is Apple underwritten by MIC? I get that Google/Facebook, with all the data, would be of interest to the National Security sector, but why Apple?
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Aug 25, 2015 01:44
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McDowell posted:And the real gag is that Google/Facebook/Apple have all this economic clout because they are underwritten by the MIC and the American Tax Payer. Google makes plenty of money from advertisement. http://www.statista.com/statistics/266249/advertising-revenue-of-google/ When it comes to the viability of ads Google is really the last company that should be cited. It's really all the other companies which relies on ad revenue that's the issue precisely because google dominates it so much already.
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Aug 25, 2015 01:51
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Shifty Pony posted:
Or it could be that companies like amazon and uber provides better services for the costumer than existing alternatives
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Aug 25, 2015 01:52
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Typo posted:Or it could be that companies like amazon and uber provides better services for the costumer than existing alternatives Could be, but no.
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Aug 25, 2015 02:00
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lol people think Uber provide better services for the customer. Even AIRBNB doesn't provide better services. AirBNB isn't very much like Uber mind you, it's service is something completely different a hotel service which it competes which. Uber are still just the exact same thing as taxi's literally no difference.
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Aug 25, 2015 02:03
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If I could pay 5-10 dollars more for an uber like app that instead gets me a regulated taxi I'd be all over that. I don't like Ubers business practices but when drunk as hell me needs to get home its way easy to just hit two buttons.
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Aug 25, 2015 02:08
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It's also worth noting that Amazon has been operating at thin margins in exchange for complete dominance of market share
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Aug 25, 2015 02:14
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coma posted:It's also worth noting that Amazon has been operating at thin margins in exchange for complete dominance of market share
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Aug 25, 2015 02:15
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PerpetualSelf posted:lol people think Uber provide better services for the customer.
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Aug 25, 2015 02:19
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*shaking pom poms* BURST! BURST! BURST!
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Aug 25, 2015 02:21
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PerpetualSelf posted:Uber are still just the exact same thing as taxi's literally no difference. It's cheaper and more convenient.
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Aug 25, 2015 02:23
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PerpetualSelf posted:AirBNB isn't very much like Uber mind you, it's service is something completely different a hotel service which it competes which. Uber are still just the exact same thing as taxi's literally no difference. Like I can understand if you're upset about how they're classifying workers or ignoring local rules or not providing enough insurance, those are sensible concerns. But if you think the quality of service is the same, you're insane(ly blinded by ideology). Kim Jong Il posted:It's cheaper and more convenient. * being on phone, pretending credit card machine doesn't work, ditching scheduled fare to pick up a more lucrative one on the way, etc. Cicero fucked around with this message at 02:26 on Aug 25, 2015 |
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Aug 25, 2015 02:24
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It's like insisting that Amazon is "exact same thing as store catalog literally no difference".
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Aug 25, 2015 02:29
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Ghost of Reagan Past posted:Aren't they making a lot of money from Amazon Web Services now? A cool billion after operating expenses which is pretty nice, but their bread and butter is still the online retailing I believe
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Aug 25, 2015 02:31
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Ghost of Reagan Past posted:Aren't they making a lot of money from Amazon Web Services now? yeah
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Aug 25, 2015 02:31
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hypnorotic posted:How is Apple underwritten by MIC? I get that Google/Facebook, with all the data, would be of interest to the National Security sector, but why Apple? Any business with enough staying power/consumer trust gets that Federal $$$. Microsoft charges the government per email account mined. Silicon Valley Libertarianism is very mercenary. Doesn't the latest iOS have features so law enforcement can limit functionality in 'sensitive' areas? Backdoors have a dollar value.
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Aug 25, 2015 02:37
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McDowell posted:Any business with enough staying power/consumer trust gets that Federal $$$. Microsoft charges the government per email account mined. Silicon Valley Libertarianism is very mercenary. Doesn't the latest iOS have features so law enforcement can limit functionality in 'sensitive' areas? Backdoors have a dollar value. And blackberry is used by the president. That's why they're doing so well.
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Aug 25, 2015 02:40
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I think there's going to be a market correction and you're going to see the era of infinite free VC money fade away, but lol if you're cheering for the tech industry to die. The tech giants ain't going anywhere.
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Aug 25, 2015 02:46
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McDowell posted:Any business with enough staying power/consumer trust gets that Federal $$$. Microsoft charges the government per email account mined. Silicon Valley Libertarianism is very mercenary. Doesn't the latest iOS have features so law enforcement can limit functionality in 'sensitive' areas? Backdoors have a dollar value. That's because Microsoft was the first to come up with a legitimately good OS usable by the average person, to the point where most software is written for windows and everyone bandwagons onto it to avoid the issue of incompatibility. Microsoft have plenty of customers who aren't the government. The Iphone is a worldwide sold hot item and status symbol of the middle class from China to Mexico, backdoor or not. Also Office 365 is not bad as an email service compare to the atlernatives. Typo fucked around with this message at 02:50 on Aug 25, 2015 |
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Aug 25, 2015 02:47
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computer parts posted:Could be, but no. Amazon's existing competitor is...Walmart? You might not like capitalist tech giants, but it's not like the alternatives are any better Cicero posted:Uber is taxis but managed much better (from the consumer perspective, that is). I can't even fathom the amount of cognitive dissonance going on in the head of the average anti-Uber leftist. "People keep on raving about this new service that's exactly the same as the old one!!" "Oh sorry there's a traffic jam let's just take this giant circle around the city also oops the credit card machine is broken and I don't have change so I guess you are gonna have to pay me $60 for the $41 ride." Typo fucked around with this message at 02:51 on Aug 25, 2015 |
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Aug 25, 2015 02:49
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LionYeti posted:If I could pay 5-10 dollars more for an uber like app that instead gets me a regulated taxi I'd be all over that. I don't like Ubers business practices but when drunk as hell me needs to get home its way easy to just hit two buttons. Where do you live and what phone do you have? In order of "the ones I've heard about the most" to "I googled this one and it seems to be using regulated taxis": http://flywheel.com/ http://yellowcabsf.com/ http://gocurb.com/ http://www.nextaxi.com/ http://hailacabapp.com/ This is assuming you for some reason can't call the cab company directly (though admittedly the wait for these can be kind of poo poo).
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Aug 25, 2015 02:50
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asdf32 posted:And blackberry is used by the president. That's why they're doing so well. Yup. There is security available (at a premium for very private individuals - including keeping the server physically in your house) - but the average person lives in the panopticon and that is okay. We need to create new political, social, and economic mechanisms where individuals can work and learn and their own pace and are accountable for their actions. If you make the US secure and prosperous under such a model other nations will follow. A true meritocracy demands political revolution. Edit: Really I'm just saying it's funny that at the end of the day the entire tech sector has always needed federal subsidies - from the first transistor on a lab bench. It's just in a new dimension with the Snowden leaks and a company like twitter - which has been developing political utility more than profit, particularly starting with the Iranian Green Revolution. Mc Do Well fucked around with this message at 02:56 on Aug 25, 2015 |
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Aug 25, 2015 02:51
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McDowell posted:Yup. There is security available (at a premium for very private individuals - including keeping the server physically in your house) - but the average person lives in the panopticon and that is okay. We need to create new political, social, and economic mechanisms where individuals can work and learn and their own pace and are accountable for their actions. If you make the US secure and prosperous under such a model other nations will follow. A true meritocracy demands political revolution. The government is good at doing basic research and big tech projects like the space program or the atomic bomb, the private sector is better at turning the fruits of those research into consumer goods.
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Aug 25, 2015 02:57
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Typo posted:The government is good at doing basic research and big tech projects, the private sector is better at turning the fruits of those research into consumer goods. And now the consumer goods have a strange new utility through personal instant communication anywhere anytime https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QKqHZcXvUAs Now is the time for imagination and action. The State leads and the manufacturers follow in an endless dance.
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Aug 25, 2015 02:59
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The point is to develop your idea until it can be sold to Yahoo I think..
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Aug 25, 2015 03:08
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Cicero posted:Uber is taxis but managed much better (from the consumer perspective, that is). I can't even fathom the amount of cognitive dissonance going on in the head of the average anti-Uber leftist. "People keep on raving about this new service that's exactly the same as the old one!!" Here they didn't even take credit cards at all until the city council forced them to just a couple years back, and they would always ask for you to give them turn-by-turn directions to even the most basic and common locations. I can't think of another service out there that is half as bad as the average taxi service is. MaxxBot fucked around with this message at 03:56 on Aug 25, 2015 |
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Aug 25, 2015 03:16
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MaxxBot posted:Here they didn't even take credit cards at all until the city council forced them too just a couple years back, and they would always ask for you to give them turn-by-turn directions to even the most basic and common locations. I can't think of another service out there that is half as bad as the average taxi service is.
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Aug 25, 2015 03:47
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Typo posted:Or it could be that companies like amazon and uber provides better services for the costumer than existing alternatives I loathe Uber and I'll be the first to admit that from the customer side of things Uber is better than taxis. The trouble is that it isn't sustainable. Uber is the poster child for the current crop of SV startup mania which promises VCs that they will be finding "inefficiencies" or have magical pie in the sky solutions to solve the problem of basic economics which is clearly menacing on the horizon. In the case of Uber they claim that their surge algorithm somehow makes transit more efficient and that self-driving cars will solve the "people can't live on this amount of money" problem. IMO everyone should use the hell out of Uber right now because at present it is little more than Silicon Valley Venture Capitalists subsidizing the transportation of the rest of the world and is the closest thing we'll get to taxing the rich to fund public transit. Additionally the target audience of many of the startups is such a small slice of the public that promises of efficiencies of scale can't materialize. Even in the ideal of "people with too much money and too little time" environment of San Francisco they still hemorrhage money. The simple fact is that for the vast majority of these "Uber for X" services you can't maintain that level of service they promise for the price they charge. It would be like paying McDonalds fry cook wages and while demanding Morton's level service. It might work for a little while but eventually the gig will be up and you'll have to either raise prices or cut service. And customers really HATE price hikes which leaves you wide open to other competitors who offer lower levels of service but lower prices.
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Aug 25, 2015 03:59
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Typo posted:Amazon's existing competitor is...Walmart? Mostly about Uber. Shifty Pony posted:I loathe Uber and I'll be the first to admit that from the customer side of things Uber is better than taxis. Unless you have a wheelchair anyway.
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Aug 25, 2015 04:02
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computer parts posted:Unless you have a wheelchair anyway. Well yeah.
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Aug 25, 2015 04:06
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Uber's main 'innovation' has been exploiting workers more effectively by offloading capital costs onto them as well, all the while convincing them that this makes them 'empowered' individuals. This race-to-the-bottom in real wages hurts workers and their living standards. That this is often called innovation by gullible morons is probably itself Silicon Valley's greatest innovation to date. So if the bubble bursts, you're probably going to see a doubling down on this kind of rhetoric. Workers will be blamed, and down their wages will go, even while labor productivity has gone up. Real envelope-pushing stuff, can't wait to see when Wired starts praising slavery as the new normal or whatever.
rudatron fucked around with this message at 04:28 on Aug 25, 2015 |
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Aug 25, 2015 04:12
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Or until they finally get sued enough to the point where the lawsuits can't be constantly dragged out in court or the lady that was taking all the contractor cases drives them off. The question is does the spigot turn off before cabs are really screwed.
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Aug 25, 2015 04:25
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