• RedditWanderer@lemmy.world
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    20 minutes ago

    This is kinda flawed. Most businesses need to recoup their investment, and some upfront costs going away is part of the plan to profitability.

    I think this guy is confusing all “software businesses” and fortune 100 tech companies.

    Edit: there are ton of businesses that make software, don’t become unicorns or make billions, that survive on a product suiting some niche. To say “software companies” take crazy margins is stupid. Big tech is the issue, not software (see linux)

    • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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      3 hours ago

      Most businesses need to recoup their investment

      The markets jumped 30% this year alone, even in the face of a higher than recently normal interest rate.

      The problem isn’t recoupment of losses, it’s an expectation of skyrocketing future growth.

      The end result is a lending market chasing unicorns, quarter after quarter, as businesses promising increasingly ludicrous returns to lure those investors in.

      • RedditWanderer@lemmy.world
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        2 hours ago

        Youre describing the fortune 100 tech companies, as I said.

        Plenty of smaller startups survived, still develop, support and improve their software very far from everything you’re describing here. Should maintainers be paid less and less as the project ages?

        Software shouldn’t get cheaper as it ages. Big tech companies should stop milking monopolies off tax payer funds. It has nothing to do with the cost / lifecycle of software

        • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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          1 hour ago

          Plenty of smaller startups survived, still develop, support and improve their software very far from everything you’re describing here.

          The successful startups are gobbled up by the Big Tech firms. Instagram got eaten by Facebook. Nest and Fitbit were eaten by Google. Microsoft is a nesting doll of smaller game companies.

          Software shouldn’t get cheaper as it ages.

          Linux suggests otherwise. Once you have a functional feature suite, you’re just performance tuning to new hardware.

          Excel hasn’t materially changed in decades. Why does the price go up with every new edition, while it’s peer software in LibreOffice continue to be free?

          • RedditWanderer@lemmy.world
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            14 minutes ago

            There are many more successful startups than the ones who make the news and become unicorns. Again your talking about big tech and fortune 100 tech companies, not software.

            Linux doesn’t suggest otherwise, maintainers exist who need to be paid and it’s not just “performance”, thats silly.

            You say excel hasn’t fundamentally changed in decades but that’s not true. There is still a ton of tech debt in excel that affects real people, some who have left for a competitor. All these people here https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/excel/feature-request/m-p/7702 seem to disagree excel was done a long time ago. Clearly you dont work in software and are relying on what software looks like though tabloids.

            • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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              9 minutes ago

              There are many more successful startups than the ones who make the new and become unicorns.

              There are plenty of startups that don’t fail. If that’s the benchmark of success, you’re still only talking about something on the order of 10-20% of businesses. But companies that become regionally competitive, rather than simply filling a specialist IT local niche, are target rich for M&A.

              You say excel hasn’t fundamentally changed in decades but that’s not true. There is still a ton of tech debt in excel

              The existence of technical debt does not refute the claim that its hardly changed. Its evidence that much of the core architecture hasn’t changed and flashing features have just been stacked on top in an increasingly precarious manner.

              Clearly you dont work in software

              Tu quoque

              • RedditWanderer@lemmy.world
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                2 minutes ago

                Hasn’t changed?

                10-20% of businesses?

                Dude nobody has time to refute these nonsense claims. It’s not “tu quoque” if youre clearly out of touch with the industry. Software is more than what twitter says exists

    • RecluseRamble@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      3 hours ago

      Software dev is still laughably less costly than hardware dev. And when done your cost drops to zero while hardware has the whole supply chain struggle indefinitely. Big (software) tech has profit margins beyond 30% for a reason.

      • RedditWanderer@lemmy.world
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        2 hours ago

        “when done drops to zero”.

        This isn’t true at all. Software ages, you need to make it better to keep up with new shit. This isn’t a software issue, it’s a big tech/monopoly issue. Youre talking about big tech companies.

        Other software exists, it’s not just Instagram and tiktok.

        • RecluseRamble@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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          1 hour ago

          make it better to keep up with new shit

          Sure, you cannot stick to your mature piece of software but if you’re arguing new developments, then compare those to new hardware too. Far more costly and time-intensive prototyping, engineers cost pretty much the same and nowadays you get to develop firm- or software on top of it. You also cannot create low-cost income streams by implementing subscription models (well, some car vendors try but that’s big tech too).

          Software. Is. Cheap.

          • RedditWanderer@lemmy.world
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            22 minutes ago

            Thats because you define software by whatever successful startup comes a unicorn. There are millions of software companies that never make a billion dollars. Theyre still a software company making a product that doesn’t become free.

            Youre also mixing total cost versus margin. Nobody is saying software is more expensive than hardware