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Comment by mmffrrss | Hacker News Reader

Although Zuck is easy to mock about this move proves courage for a company as big as Fb. In the end, zuck understands that the risk of not changing is much greater than the risk of staying the same. Technology is unstoppable

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It proves he thinks everyone will follow along anyway

It proves Apple’s data labels and growing awareness digital ads drive little business, which proved Facebook is a non-contributor to the economy in a real way

Zuck is just looking to keep his good times rolling as interest fades. This isn’t courage, this is “the writing is on the wall, let’s try something sooner than later.”

That’s how I read the situation. I think FB is cool for Gen-X and above and they are trying desperately to appeal to a younger audience. They have no where to go but down if they don’t figure that out.

Much like Microsoft's misstep in not taking the internet seriously in the 90's, and not taking smartphones seriously in the 2000's.

I think Microsoft did take them seriously. They just screwed up the execution.

Like here's a "Microsoft’s Windows Mobile 2003 for Pocket PC Phone Edition" phone out a couple of years before the iPhone https://www.zdnet.com/product/anextek-sp230/

Their problem with execution was the plan of vertical integration that Apple is known for. In particular, there's little that the first iPhone could do that Blackberry didn't already do at the time - except for one thing. Cost. Blackberry was a victim of their success in the business market segment, and Microsoft wanted to join them there. The iPhones initial launch included a deal with AT&T to make it a relatively affordable, consumer facing device, thus expanding the market as a whole, to the success we see today.

As I recall, the iPhone originally had little to none integration with enterprise infrastructure, as Blackberry and Windows Phone had . In my view, The iphone was just too cool not to be in the hands of CEOs and CTOs , which most likely managed to bend companies rules to start allowing usage of iphones and basically making blackberry superfluous

Perhaps they thought they could deal with it in their own time. Instead, the world marched on.

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