SideCar feels that Uber was unfair, but the truth is the company didn’t understand that product matters more than technical expertise. Plus, why Twitter doesn’t have an natural acquirers, and several other tidbits from this week.
The FANG Playbook
The FANG companies — Facebook, Amazon, Netflix, and Google — are far more similar than you might think. Their rise in value is no accident, and it is connected to Aggregation Theory.
WhatsApp Drops Subscription Fee, Messaging’s Monetization Potential, GM Acquires Sidecar Remnants
WhatsApp unsurprisingly dropped their subscription fee and, paradoxically, increased the services value. There are much better ways to monetize messaging. Plus, why it doesn’t matter what car makers do.
The Big 5 Year in Review: Apple, Google, Microsoft, Amazon, and Facebook
A year-end review of tech’s five most important companies.
Slack Follow-up, The WeChat Platform, Uber and Facebook Messenger
More on Slack’s platform opportunity, which can be compared to what WeChat has already accomplished in China. That said, the fact way that China is truly mobile-first means that it’s likely that no one — including Facebook Messenger — will fully imitate WeChat’s model.
Slack and the State of Technology at the End of 2015
Slack has announced the Slack Platform. It’s an obvious move, but it’s the obviousness that indicates what a huge opportunity it is
Atlassian’s IPO and the Evolution of Dev Tools, Facebook Open-Sources Machine-Learning Hardware, Microsoft Open-Sources Chakra
More open-source news warrants a discussion about why exactly open-source matters for strategy.
Dropbox Kills Carousel and Mailbox, Facebook Kills Creative Labs
Dropbox finally focuses on business, while Facebook realizes it’s a big company now.
TensorFlow and Monetizing Intellectual Property
Google has said repeatedly that machine learning is key to their future. Why, then, did they open source the secret sauce? Is it a mistake, or are there lessons to be learned for IP creators everywhere.
A New Publishing Model…Maybe; Facebook Earnings, Facebook Sharing
Follow-up on yesterday’s article on potential new publishing models, and then a discussion of Facebook earnings. Plus, a new reason skeptics have found to doubt the company.