A tool to map your network - for fundraising, sales, partnerships, etc - to get intros to people. Cold email is dying as it gets so much cheaper and easier to send emails with AI and automation, so human connection is going to skyrocket in importance.
You're talking about the most documented genocide in human history. The whole world is watching; Israel's crimes against humanity will never be forgotten.
He knows exactly what he is doing. That’s what makes this disgusting. He knows that 50.000 women and children dead is most likely a lower bound as there are likely hundred thousand plus buried under the rubble.
He also knows that his government is starving a million people to try to eliminate the 10.000 fighters that are surviving.
There are other genocides happening in Myanmar and Sudan that nobody talks about.
And as far as US, you had a distinct movement that was against Kamala specifically because she was pro Israel.
I really don't understand the obsession with this particular conflict to the point where you feel like you are in the moral right by essentially punishing US people and making it worse for the people you care about (in terms of Republicans being way more pro Israel), specifically because the democratic party, didn't offer up a candidate that is EXPLICITLY against Israel.
You don’t get why people would be upset that their politicians are green lighting a genocide? The Americans have blood on their hands when it comes to Gaza and the same cannot be said about other conflicts.
In voting, you had 3 choices, vote Dem, vote Rep, or abstain.
When it comes to Palestine, you had 2 choices, vote Dem, which is arguably the better choice as Dems overall are more humanitarian minded, or the other 2, which both increase chances of Trump winning, which is way worse for Palestine.
I don't get what mental gymnastics one has to do to find that abstaining is the morally justified position. Its not like if enough people abstain, nobody becomes president.
>The Americans have blood on their hands when it comes to Gaza and the same cannot be said about other conflicts.
Uh.....lol?
The other big thing is that I dunno how one can support people that actively murder people for being gay, but thats just me.
>There are other genocides happening in Myanmar and Sudan that nobody talks about.
Sounds a lot like whataboutism. I heard a lot of that term going around whenever anyone dared mention any non-mainstream talking point about the Russian invasion of Ukraine, but funnily enough, no one seems to talk about now.
Lol its not whataboutism. You can't do this thing where you just throw in fallacies at something randomly do discredit.
Whataboutism is when you justify the wrongdoing of X by pointing out that Y is also wrong and nothing is being done about it.
Im simply pointing out that if your outrage about Palestine is genocide, then you should be outraged about the other genocides. You can either agree, or you can further narrow down your position on why specifically Palestine conflict is the one you chose to place your outrage on, and not others.
It absolutely is about whataboutism insofar as people here (not you specifically) use it as a pseudo-argument that automatically wins a discussion, but applying it only when convenient for their political preferences or worldview.
"I can think of one very powerful country doing exactly that for over half a century. Hope we're all collectively raging against anything coming from that country."
and
"There are other genocides happening in Myanmar and Sudan that nobody talks about."
Please be honest and fair. Don't you agree both of these arguments are more or less in the same vein? We're both pointing out that Bad Shit is happening elsewhere in time or space, and for some reason we think that public attention/outrage is unfairly shifted towards a specific conflict. We both imply that there is a deliberate political reason leading to that specific conflict being in the limelight and not any other conflict.
Given our little discussion here, I probably strongly disagree with you on the specifics of this specific conflict (Gaza). But we both have made the same argument, coming from diametrically opposed points of view: we both think (correct me if I'm wrong) that people/media/society etc have pet conflicts to be outraged with in detriment of all other ongoing conflicts. Or in short -- hypocrisy. Although I disagree with you, I very much think this specific argument is absolutely valid.
My point is that media and online people (HN) were very eager to scream Whataboutism when the exact same comment was made in another context (Ukraine), but everyone seems to have forgotten about Whataboutism in this conflict when people like yourself make comments in the same vein.
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The judge actually complimented Schiller for wanting to follow the spirit of the ruling based on discussions that were had inside Apple and he was overruled by the CFO and Cook.
Loans get issued based on profit generation (or asset value), so no, it is not “to keep them afloat”. You can’t get a loan if your company is not doing well or too risky (that’s why startups raise equity - because they are still too risky for someone to lend them money).
A loan is a form of debt, which is one of the two main forms of capital - the other main one being equity. Debt is less expensive than equity, so companies prefer to issue to raise capital via debt than equity.
Its not just profit that is considered for a loan. Anything related to states is more stable and thus less risky. Or how would you evaluate state bonds by profit only? Elon knows what i am talking about.
It’s funny that Molly (a VC) ascribes so much power to VCs that they can literally create bank runs on their own.
No.
VCs don’t make decisions on where a company keeps its cash; the founder/CEO does. And founders freaked the f-ck out. Let’s make sure to remember that founders had 100% agency in the decisions they made about their cash.
Here’s a selection of comments in the Whatsapp founders group Im in - all founders, no VCs:
Thursday 3/8 (36 hours before FDIC takeover):
“I'd consider moving to one of the too big to fail banks..”
“I agree the risk is higher then we thought before, I'm in SVB, with 4% - and looking to understand where to go now.”
“It's a numbers game - if a lot of people do what I do at the moment - it will fall.....”
“Does someone have a contact at Chase for B2B SaaS customers? I'm thinking it's wise to already have an account open there in case it will seem like we need to move off SVB.”
“Let's say we want to open a Chase account and move company funds?”
“for those that have their money in SVB and do not have another company bank account - what are the immediate options?”
“If there is a risk of a bank run, why not take the money out”
“Basically our whatsapp group creates bank runs now... power to the founders?”
“we just moved 85% of our money out”
“I just pulled ours”
It’s not surprising a VC would think she has more power than she actually has, but she also clearly has no idea about the wildfire that was spreading among founders themselves. Founders don’t give a sh-t about what their investors think (generally) - founders make the decisions they think are best because they have the most to lose (or win) from being wrong (or right). And they are much, much, much more likely to trust their fellow founders than their VCs.
When a bank runs, you run. Trying to pin the blame on depositors is misguided. There are real villains to the SVB story. Regulators. Senior management. Goldman Sachs.
I don’t think the depositors should be blamed for attempting to get their money out of the bank once it became insolvent, but they certainly weren’t blameless in their own risk management prior to that.
Roku keeping half a billion dollars at svb without doing capitalization audits, or venture firms steering portfolio companies there without recommending backup banks is a business failure plain and simple. Those actions deserve scrutiny and the decision makers deserve blame.
> Roku keeping half a billion dollars at svb without doing capitalization audits, or venture firms steering portfolio companies there without recommending backup banks is a business failure plain and simple
One hundred percent. I was more attacking this conspiratorial line around so and so's tweets prompting the run.
They bought SVB’s loans at a $2bn loss to SVB [1] and then advised them to go to market with non-binding capital commitments [2][3][4] all while billing SVB $100mm for the trouble [5]. In short, they gave terrible advice, tanked the bank and then made bank, all while West Coast punditry began blaming depositors.
Well what else are you supposed to do? Fly your private jet to Bali and then not have a megayacht sitting there waiting for you? There's no way I'm waiting a full week for them to sail over from the Maldives so I need to have at least two.
I’ve had this business idea for years but I would be torn apart in todays world if I tried to launch it:
Build an ML model trained on actual images of women’s breasts and bras that are verified to fit them well. Once the core model is built a separate, a smaller size on-device model is built to be the model users actually interact with. A user submits an image of breasts and is told right away which bras in which sizes would be the best for them. Photos containing faces would be blocked from being uploaded. No photos would leave the device unless a user opted in to do so in order to help improve the model.
Monetization is straightforward: affiliate fees for directing users to buy bras at retailers, plus sponsored placements in search results at some point.
Biggest concern is how to come up with the initial data set, but I’m fairly certain there’s a solution there.
Am I crazy or is this as obvious as it seems to me? ThirdLove sucks, as do calculators like this.
I'm not a woman, but do have over a decade of experience looking at pictures of breasts.
To be honest with you, I don't think it would be possible to properly parameterise a boob based on nothing but still images. They all have different centres of mass, different elasticities, different shapes and different textures. Not to mention that different women engage in different activities that require different levels of support.
You might be able to get a fit using 3D scanners plus some sort of standardised jiggle generator, but by that stage you might as well just have a skilled consultant hand you a few different pairs to try on.
This is going to be a disaster - Bending Spoons is not a good actor:
“let’s talk about Bending Spoons’ business model. The basic concept is very simple:
- Find a solid app that someone else built and buy it from them (see Splice (acquired from GoPro) and 30 Day Fitness)
- Optimize the monetization of said app (by implementing from scratch or fine-tuning existing subscriptions), thereby driving higher lifetime value (LTV)
- Take that higher LTV and use it to bid on expensive ad inventory (on Google, Facebook, Apple Search) where you can acquire more users (aka drive more downloads) - i.e. leverage performance marketing for growth
- Convert those new downloads to paying users
- Massively ramp revenues and cash flow by combining the new users + the better monetization
- Use the new cash flow - plus the debt from those lovely Italian banks - to fund the next acquisition
- Lather, rinse, repeat
There is absolutely nothing wrong with this business model. What differentiates Bending Spoons, though, is how they do it.
Remini - Bending Spoons’ new app that the press is gushing over - is $10 a WEEK. And Splice, the app that started it all? That’ll set you back a cool $5/week.
Does anyone really think it’s appropriate to pay $10 a week for a photo editing app?”
None of what you wrote makes them sound like a "bad actor". All of these are good things for a failing business. Why shouldn't a photo editing app be $10/week? If you don't think you are getting that much value out of it then don't subscribe. Yet there is probably a group of power users who will gladly pay that amount. Evernote needs to be catering to them, not the millions of users who will endlessly complain but never spend an actual dollar on their services.
This is a common response. unfortunately it doesn’t hold water: the average lifetime of a paid user of Splice is somewhere in the 7-10 week range (source is confidential).
What super users of editing products do you know that only stay 10 weeks?
None. What’s actually happening is Bending Spoons is exploiting the App Store’s ease of payment and dark patterns to trick unsuspecting users into enrolling in a super high priced subscription without their knowledge.
I've never had an iPhone so I'm not familiar with these dark patterns. Are you saying it's actually possible to get an Apple user to subscribe without clearly displaying the payment amount or frequency?
> Are you saying it's actually possible to get an Apple user to subscribe without clearly displaying the payment amount or frequency?
Both are displayed by a system-controlled modal but even with that there are many stories of people not realizing/noticing the frequency. Apple has forced developers to place the frequency more prominently on their info screens but it's only helped so much. I have a hard time seeing a legitimate use for a weekly subscription other than to trick users. I almost think that Apple shouldn't allow that frequency or they should have extra vetting/restrictions/alerts for users. I know Apple sends out an email before they charge a recurring subscription (or at least I've gotten them for my yearly subscriptions) but maybe a push notification on the phone/tablet (that you could disable per-app) would be a another way to help prevent this type of fraud/scam.
They are the abuser that benefits from the lock-in. Evernote has gradually made it harder and harder to export (50 notes per try, not everything makes it out) and now they exit to these guys.
It’s the worst of the post-VC models. Seems like they have been positioning for this for a while.
Ahh, good to know. I jumped ship with a full ENEX export to Joplin about 4 years ago. Haven't looked back since then, although my needs are simple, not power user-like.
I see this complaint a lot and it never really made any sense to me. If something is a scam it has to do with the delivery or the advertisement of the product. But the pricing? No. It is not possible for the price of something by itself to render something a scam. If it costs too much it costs too much, this does not imply malfeasance on the part of the seller.
I agree - it’s about how the developer communicates (or in this case obfuscates) the price to the user. Check out the substack link and you’ll see screenshots of how Bending Spoons does it (it’s highly misleading).
Generally I’m of the opinion that consumers are responsible for their own choices; but Apple has allowed bad actors to exploit the availability of weekly subscriptions and prey on suspecting users.
I disagree that "$9.99/week" below a continue button leading to a purchase dialog is in any way misleading.
I looked at the screenshot before reading the surrounding justification, and the understanding I got was that continuing would charge me $9.99 on a weekly basis until canceled (which would also show up in the purchase confirmation). It turns out that is exactly what happens.
So who exactly is being misled here? People who are functionally literate enough to use a smart phone and download an app but illiterate enough to not know what $9.99 a week means? I don't think that person exists. Maybe children but they shouldn't be allowed to sign up for subscriptions without parental oversight anyways.
Completely different type of applications, I remember an old thread on twitter about one useless wallpapers app being sold for that kind of money. And it was not the only one. It's a business model.
Not sure what "useless wallpaper" app you are talking about but I just took a look at https://bendingspoons.com/products and everything there seems pretty useful and well designed.
That minuscule subset is well designed, yes, the rest decent BUT some of them with in my opinion predatory pricing in many cases, $9/wk to download some wallpaper or some sleep noises app. But yes, they are not the only ones doing it.
If you are interested search on the appstore among the boatload of apps they have.
Tricking users into these high priced subscriptions is a tried and true strategy in the app store. The press caught on late (2018) but it was happening from the moment apple opened up subscriptions to all developers in June 2016. Started with crappy coloring book apps and then spread like wildfire from there. Bending Spoons is simply the evolution of that.
I wouldn't say "fraudolent", no laws are being broken here.
And I'm not trying to be snarky with this, but I'm not doing your research for you on a well known issue of the App Store. I'm ok if you keep being not aware of it.
This specific company has a decade long history of being in the grey zone in regard to App Store rules. Like many others, yes, but let's not normalize it.
if you browse Bending Spoons' site on archive.org you'll see that a few years ago they indeed sold wallpaper apps and keyboard apps for debatable prices.
They had even more apps, but most of them were removed entirely from their portfolio, and some ended up in the account of Easy Tiger Apps, LLC [1], including a 4,99€/week step counting app that is a blatant rip off of a more famous one
“There is absolutely nothing wrong with this business model… What differentiates Bending Spoons, though, is how they do it.
Remini - Bending Spoons’ new app that the press is gushing over - is $10 a WEEK. And Splice, the app that started it all? That’ll set you back a cool $5/week.”
In short, they buy apps, add aggressive and practically exploitative monetization, and ride the revenue stream until it dries up.
> Italian app developer Bending Spoons has raised more than 340 million euros ($327 million) from investors including Hollywood actor Ryan Reynolds and Kerry Trainor, the former CEO of video streaming platform Vimeo.
> Bending Spoons, whose apps include popular video editing tool Splice and Remini, an image editor based on artificial intelligence technology, said the money could be used for acquisitions.
> A source close to the company said former Google Executive Chairman and CEO Eric Schmidt was among the investors. Other backers included Italian banks Intesa Sanpaolo and Banco BPM.
The issue is that people are at least somewhat "locked in" to whatever apps they're already using, so sudden major price increases are a bit extortionate: Either you pay us a bunch of money, or lose access to your data/workflow.
Prior to acquisition, one could reasonably expect Evernote not to announce sudden, shocking price changes, because they were trying to build a long-term brand. Now, suddenly, that's not the case.
This is made worse when the app doesn't do a good job of letting you export your data in the first place.
Came here to write something similar, you did it better.
I will never accept that selling wallpaper apps or something with the same level of complexity for hundred of dollars every year is an acceptable business model.
> Does anyone really think it’s appropriate to pay $10 a week for a photo editing app?
Apparently yes, otherwise it would have just been a failed experiment and revert back to $X/month
Even if they charged $100/week I don't see how it makes them a bad actor. If the pricing/cancellation policies are deceptive then sure, but that is irrelevant to the price.
When I say cancel in one tap, what I mean is I have a list of every subscription I am holding, and I pick that one and it goes.
I do not want any kind of retention, I do not want to be messaged in any way, just stop renewal. I do not want to call in, live chat, give a reason, etc.
This is a very odd comparison. You’re comparing a past workflow for one service against an existing workflow for an entirely separate service, but only speculating on whether it is actually less.
It’s currently 6 taps to cancel a single subscription in Apple and 2 taps extra for each service you want to cancel right after. I love knowing that I don’t have to figure out what magical incantation I have to do to cancel any/every service I sign up for.
Last I checked, it's also incredibly difficult to cancel an Apple subscription if you've switched away from the ecosystem and all you have on hand is Linux and Android.
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