@johnhamelink I agree it's a pile of crap, but I'm a bit confused about the 'shuts down competition' - - given there's Zoom/Google's stuff/Webex etc where does the competition thing come from?
@penguin42 there’s no interoperability with other networks, so as marketshare is captured, network effects dictate that the value of other systems diminishes because they can’t compete. It’s also the reason why building “markets” on top of train lines and other closed loop systems fundamentally doesn’t work
I absolutely agree with your point about network effects - Teams has been bundled with Office which is the defacto standard in enterprises.
However - which other systems have interoperability? WebEx, Zoom, Facetime, WhatsApp, FB Messenger etc all offer video chats, but does any of these interoperate? I think not.
Which are the competitors I am missing in this space?
@penguin42@airwhale I mean you are right - the other proprietary systems are no better on that front. I want to advocate for open, distributed systems that have interoperability built into their design. Organisations are spoiled for choice in this front: Rocket Chat, Mattermost, and Matrix to name just a few. Many of them have slack API compatibility (like this https://developers.mattermost.com/integrate/slash-commands/slack/). For personal messaging I like to recommend signal, but interop is a problem with its design. At least it’s open source though.
@penguin42@airwhale it’s also just easier to build a centralised system, but we have the tools and frameworks now to build sustainable distributed and federated systems at scale now. When I add up all the above the conclusion I’m left with is that the short term interests of businesses who are selling said communication systems are not compatible with the long term interests of the communities that rely on them.
@penguin42 in our case at least through the "company already pays for M365 and it's included in subscription type <x>". Which is how the objectively worst tool became at least number 2 in the market (possibly behind zoom, idk).
It's the old bundling shenanigans again that already got them before courts in the 90s but they'll do it again since it's so profitable. @johnhamelink
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