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Comment by jrockway | Hacker News Reader

If I'm reading this correctly, the problem is that something that the author thinks should be free costs money, so Facebook is now "demanding that a $365 million dollar ransom gets collected from all the Mom & Pop businesses who use Facebook."

Uh huh. "Mom & Pop business" seems to be the new "won't somebody please think of the children" line designed to extinguish all rational thought. I'm getting a little tired of it.

(I'll save my rant on why I think most Mom & Pop businesses should be out of business for another day. I have to say I'm amused when I see a restaurant in my neighborhood apply a bunch of signs that say "absolutely no laptop use" and then go out of business a month later. Idealism is a bitch.)

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Especially considering his intent for them to see his posts on facebook are to drive "viewers" to his site so that he can extract advertising revenue.

Sounds like someone's bitter that their free marketing channel dried up, and they have to make actual decisions about how to fill their pipeline back, beyond just posting on facebook.

You talk about rational thought, but then go off on a tangent hoping all small business disappears? I'm curious what has made you so hateful towards both people who hold some ideal (that you don't share), and towards small businesses.

In particular, the best restaurants in the world are small, not chains. Chains are always mediocre by their very nature. Unlike in software, which can be replicated and exported perfectly, restaurants are about their chefs, something you cannot easily replicate and export. Even small finer dining chains vary hugely by location.

> In particular, the best restaurants in the world are small.

So are the worst.

Sure, and the market won't likely be kind to them.

My point is that it's illogical to "think most [small businesses] should be out of business". By their continued existence and success we can see first hand that they deserve to be in business. There are even really high end and successful places that ban cell phones and still do well. Sometimes places do well because of quirks like these. Other times not. There are many variables.

The market behaves as it does, despite what anybody thinks it should do.

Thank you, now I know there is at least one hacker news user who knows how markets work. Faith in humanity restored. Not really.

>By their continued existence and success we can see first hand that they deserve to be in business.

Or they're being given unbalanced treatment. The market is not perfectly rational; many people (whether customers, suppliers or employees) seem willing to give more to small businesses and expect less in return.

> go off on a tangent hoping all small business disappears?

No he didn't say hope all, he said most should.

I'm curious why you think they should be out of business.

You can find better selection, better prices, and better advice on the Internet. Also, Jeff bezos doesn't give me the "I hate young people" stink eye when I browse his store.

The local hardware store opens at 9:00am. Or 9:30. Or whenever pop finishes his breakfast. Because whatever I have planned for the day is not nearly as urgent as his crossword puzzle. That shit doesn't happen at Home Depot.

Home Depot (Starbucks, Applebee's, whatever) set both a floor and a ceiling for expectation of quality. For every crappy mom and pop hardware store that is poorly run, there is also an independent hardware store with kind and helpful people.

When I am traveling, I will go to Starbucks, but in my city, I know where the exceptional coffee is.

edit: s/privacy/quality

Privacy? What?

Sorry, I meant "Quality". Edited. Thanks for pointing that out.

Interesting point about this: I recently needed a tool while visiting a friend. I found the nearest hardware store's website and was irate that they didn't have hours listed. So I called. And while they technically closed 90 minutes previously, somebody was in setting up a new POS system they were switching to. He opened the shop and I got what I needed. That also doesn't happen at Home Depot.

The problem is that most celebrations of small businesses suffer from a fallacy along the lines of (exceptional service can only happen at small businesses[1]) => (all small businesses will have exceptional service).

1: And that's not even true. Amazon (the physical bit, at least) have outstanding service. Whenever a shipment doesn't show up, they refund it, no questions asked, even though it shows ask being delivered at my office address (presumably lost between the reception and me). They've sent me two new Kindles, not literally no questions asked, because they did ask, and I admitted to having broken it myself by accident - they just didn't seem to care about the answer. Pret-a-Manger (a sandwich chain in London) has consistently blazingly fast service and unwavering cheery staff.

Small businesses think they're entitled to free shit.

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