[whynotmaybe]

Because long term companies in tech are seen as "not innovating" or "evil".

Ex : Microsoft (evil), Oracle (not innovating and evil), IBM (not innovating), Apple (evil)

Being a startup is seen as "good" by many people because you're seen as "trying", if you stay long and raise your prices, you're seen as "milking".

Microsoft is creating a lot of innovation by trying and failing (Windows phone) or succeeding (Office 365) but many people here see them as evil because they ask for money.

[feoren]

Ehh ... is Wikipedia seen as "not innovating" or "evil"? Craigslist? They haven't really changed their core model (except for Wikipedia's recent more minimal look, I guess, but that's a pretty small change in the last decade). Wikipedia went the direction that once they had more money than they needed to run it, they started to do other stuff. I think that's great. Once your killer app is hugely successful, stop messing with it. Focus on running it efficiently and reliably with a small crew, and take the ongoing income from that to try other things.

Yes, the companies you listed are viewed negatively, but that's not because they have a sustainable business model. Don't underestimate the many perfectly valid reasons those companies earned their reputations.

[gottorf]

> Craigslist? They haven't really changed their core model

For what it's worth, in my local (smaller city, not a tech hub) market, Craigslist is basically dead, killed by Facebook Marketplace; and I'm assuming my market isn't the only such one. So it's possible that they will need to change their model, or at least how they execute upon it.

Funny: Craigslist isn't even loading for me at the moment, and DownDetector shows it's not just me.