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by dizzystar 4633 days ago
My main issue with that number is the assumption that Twitter will still be around or significant by 2023. If the past 10 years are any indication, the internet user-base is fickle and moves around a lot. There really isn't enough data-points from the past 10 years to reliably predict trends for the next 10 years, unless you want to say that there will be tons of carcasses and has-beens.
2 comments
_pmf_ 4633 days ago
> If the past 10 years are any indication, the internet user-base is fickle and moves around a lot.

No, you don't get it. Exponential growth is real. Ponzi schemes are the future.

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technotony 4633 days ago
You could have said the same thing about Google during their IPO, and they are doing just fine.

Not to say you don't have a point, but I think the point you are making is less to be reflected in the revenue number but in the probability of the company surviving, which he put's at 100% in his assumptions... that does sound rich to me!

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devx 4633 days ago
They are not really the same thing. We'll always need search, and unless Google falls behind, we'll keep using Google if their search results are the best. Or unless everyone decides en mass that they can live with less good results, if the new ones offers 10x more privacy, and in a world where NSA/governments run rampant with the data collection and abuse it. Right now that's pretty much the only thing I could see Google dying from. That and laziness, but that's less likely to happen.

Communications and social platform, while they can have some pretty strong network effects, are not as important, even if they keep improving them,. A new generation of users might switch from Facebook to Snapchat, and it's irrelevant if Facebook adds the same kind of features. A new generation of users won't switch from Google to Bing, or something else, unless, as I said, Google stops providing the best results.

Whatsapp is used by more than 300 million users right now, more than Twitter. Do you think Whatsapp will still be as relevant 10 years down the road? The chances are pretty small, I think.

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eru 4633 days ago
> [..] we'll keep using Google if their search results are the best.

People just need good enough search, not the best.

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gbadman 4633 days ago
Google has proven itself as a company capable of, and prepared to move into new markets and to diversify its portfolio of services. Twitter, on the other hand, has only diversified around the 140 character concept.

In my mind, it is diversification that allows a tech company to stay afloat when new entrants can have such a rapid impact on the market.

It is in no way conceivable to me that the 'trendy' means to communicate will still be in 140 character morsels 10 years from now.

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