...so instead of small and lean businesses (and why not employee-owned too if we're at it), that integrate well with both existing technology and economic landscape, that provide nice integration points both at the business level (partnerships etc.) and technical (APIs made for more than just consumption etc.), let's build startups that fueled by VC money evolve into monolithic monsters that ferociously guard their walled gardens and do their best to entrap customers in them, because ..."nice, polished and integrated and user-friendly experiences"?
Let's at least be frank about it: it's because... PROFIT! ...and OWN the (l)users! ...and to rule the world!
Am I the only one that instead of this, dreams of an utopical business landscape created in the image of the "UNIX philosophy": swarms of small, targeted, few-persons businesses that each solve specific problems and integrate well with one another? And of teaching the customers about the benefits of integrating the best solutions from a large number of boutique providers, all able to provide bespoke solutions for their needs, and all highly motivated to provided the best services because each small customer is really important for them?
Please, stop trying to be "full stack", do what you're best at and learn to integrate with others (yes, integration is really really hard, sometimes even harder than delivering a great product/service, but it's better than forcing the customer to accept a crappy service/product at one level of the stack just because he needs to use the "star product/service" at some other level of your stack). We don't need more Apple-like companies! A few of them are great for setting some quality and "quality of integration" and "polish" standards, but more of them are bad for all!
Let's at least be frank about it: it's because... PROFIT! ...and OWN the (l)users! ...and to rule the world!
Am I the only one that instead of this, dreams of an utopical business landscape created in the image of the "UNIX philosophy": swarms of small, targeted, few-persons businesses that each solve specific problems and integrate well with one another? And of teaching the customers about the benefits of integrating the best solutions from a large number of boutique providers, all able to provide bespoke solutions for their needs, and all highly motivated to provided the best services because each small customer is really important for them?
Please, stop trying to be "full stack", do what you're best at and learn to integrate with others (yes, integration is really really hard, sometimes even harder than delivering a great product/service, but it's better than forcing the customer to accept a crappy service/product at one level of the stack just because he needs to use the "star product/service" at some other level of your stack). We don't need more Apple-like companies! A few of them are great for setting some quality and "quality of integration" and "polish" standards, but more of them are bad for all!