Comment by CWuestefeld

12 days ago

...which I suppose is why IBM is still the industry leader in computing, while Ford, GM, and Chrysler can't be competed with. Photographers always use Kodak film, and we all talk on our Nokia cell phones. We all shop at Sears, and fly on Pan Am.

4 comments

CWuestefeld

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mrguyorama  11 days ago

>IBM is still the industry leader in computing

IBM's stock price is 10 times what it was in 1991. What the hell have they even done in that time?

They don't have to be whatever you think is "industry leading in computing", because apparently just once being worth something was enough to enrich an entire generation of management while the rest of us struggle.

>Ford

Despite decades of failure that led to their struggles in 2008 and an increase in energy costs, they didn't die, and despite then selling several lines of cars that had serious defects that should no longer happen, they abandoned selling anything other than overpriced trucks and are STILL doing just fine.

>Sears

Sears was murdered to enrich a few already wealthy people. At no point did it do worse business.

Do you know which companies you didn't even mention that do not support your claim? All the gigantic conglomerates that own you.

From Disney owning a giant chunk of all media and setting national IP policy, to Sysco being one of the only food service companies because they ate all the other ones so now every restaurant is stuck selling the same food as most prisons, to Nestle owning most of the grocery store so they can sell you water that they pumped out of your aquifer for crazy rates while complaining they couldn't be profitable without slave labor, to Dupont poisoning the entire earth, to fossil fuel companies that set national energy policy, to most farming in the US being beholden to a single legal entity, to the vast majority of "Brands" in the US just being a label change of a product they did not design.

You seem to be under this absurd notion that as long as the brand name on a couple consumer items changes occasionally (due to the kinds of technological innovations that we will never see again and cannot be predicted or relied upon), everything is fine?

autoexec  12 days ago

I never claimed that companies can't fail or change, only that bloat and inefficiencies aren't a death sentence. Even several of your examples are still alive and well and it's telling that their major declines took place in the 1980s and 1990s. Companies have gotten a lot better at abusing government and law to protect their profits over the last 40 years.

  • CWuestefeld  9 days ago

    Companies have gotten a lot better at abusing government and law

    Comments like this always seem to lead to calls to give the government greater power to rein in those companies.

    I'm not claiming these abuses don't exist. But there's no reason not to also look at them as the government getting a lot better at taking advantage of companies, to protect their offices. If you look at it in this context, it should be clear that increasing regulatory authority is far from a solution: it's actually counter-productive, creating tools to facilitate ever-greater abuses.