I think a better comparison would be... a community art gallery opens, they invite all local artists to show their work for free. It becomes more popular then the Louvre and the owner gets fabulously rich, and sells the gallery to MOMA.
One day the new owner of the gallery realizes it's losing tons of money (and taking visitors from it's money making gallery in NYC), and it knows the artists are not going to pay (and maybe can't afford to). So it starts making prints of the artwork and selling them without giving the artists a royalty.
I disagree fundamentally with the message xkcd is saying here. Instagram, facebook, myspace etc all gained traction as basically setting up a website or wordpress site was just not practical at one time. They all give the impression that it's a practical and reasonable alternative. And that's what 99.9% of their users think.
And then of course the funding starts to dry up and the accountants start needing to see some hard $$$$ income. And that's when the ToS start to "adapt" to enable aforementioned sites to monetize "their" content. Oh didn't you know ? It's not your website after all. Sorry ! And thanks for getting your friends on board too !!
Instagram, and other social networks, are fundamentally different than wordpress sites in a number of important ways. 100 million users didn't join because it was an alternative to a blog.
Their funding didn't dry up. They raised a substantial round, and then were purchased by another company that had itself just raised billions of dollars. They didn't need money.
But they did want to make it. Because they're a business.
"Instagram, facebook, myspace etc all gained traction as basically setting up a website or wordpress site was just not practical at one time"
Really, not practical? My mother had a personal website long before Myspace. My friends in middle school had personal web pages via AOL.
I suspect that the reason Myspace became popular was the social aspect, and the reason Facebook became popular was the combination of the social aspect and the fact that you had to log in to Facebook to see anyone's Facebook pages.
Anyone who can afford a device to take photos and an internet connection has had a lot of practical alternatives for creating their own website or photo sharing site.
This is the first time XKCD has struck me as being ignorant... I'm assuming that it's for the sake of the joke.
People have a right to be annoyed by this, in fact I wish it was more common. Rights to our own creations should not be taken so lightly. So I support the sentiments of boycotters, even though Facebook is well within their rights to make this change. I don't support the attitude that it's unjust, but overreaction is better than none.
I think the punchline here is that it is a Sisyphean task to find (or expect) a "free" web service that doesn't already profit from user submitted content.
I don't think it is making light of people who are annoyed/boycotting... It is making light of the line of thought that companies we give our data to (for free) are ever going to use it for what we want them to, and not what they want to (make money).
This comic is saying that if we care about the rights to our work, don't give the work to anyone.
I think you are reading Chad's Garage as a direct analogy to Instagram, which I don't think was the intention. I think it's an over-the-top exaggeration of Instagram. The joke is about the user who expresses outrage over the free service doing something against the users' interests, but isn't even quite willing to stop using it.
>> Rights to our own creations should not be taken so lightly.
Just like possession of our belongings should not be taken lightly, which is why nobody would actually put all their stuff in Chad's garage. People have already taken the rights to their creations lightly by posting them on a free service.
"Chad's garage" seems like an appropriate generic term for a web startup whose users are not the company's customers, but it's not clear that anyone else wants to be the customer either.
As in:
"-Why did MySpace fail?
-They were basically Chad's garage."
Only Tom sold the garage for quite a lot of money in 2005 but there was no stuff in it, just a dusty list of people who had left the area never to return.
Feeble. More like "I got this note from Chad. He sold his garage to a guy who collects interesting things, and is going to let him use my stuff".
But the crux of this is the complaint is not "That's no way to run a storage business". The complaint is "that's a dick move to pull when he invited me to keep all my stuff in his garage, and got rich as a result".
The better analogy is that Chad got rich by selling the well-stocked garage to someone else. The new owner didn't get rich by hosting your stuff, in fact they have paid good money for the privilege and now want to find a way of making that money back.
Facebook is in the hole for one billion dollars on this deal and so far haven't made back a single cent.
Well, in this case Instagram invited us to use their service, and only later (as far as I know) changed the terms to allow them to sell our stuff, so the comparison between Instagram and Chad's garage isn't exactly correct.
I said it the other day in another thread, but just because you pay doesn't mean you've avoided this type of treatment. Remember when cable TV was ad-ree because, you know, people paid for it?
There is absolutely nothing stopping Facebook or Instagram from doing the same shit they currently do, even if they start charging their users. And the services that currently get by on user subscriptions alone will one day have to find another way to grow. And the way they'll do that is by selling ads and monetizing user data.
>Well, I'm this close to not giving him any more stuff.
>That'll teach him.
The point is, unless you're paying them money, you have nothing to threaten them with. You can't stop paying for their service (like you can with other businesses), since you weren't paying in the first place. They're a business and they're not beholden to you in any way.
Maybe it would be more clear if we had another panel explaining that Chad has no job, yet recently took a large loan from the mob. And you still decided to put your stuff in Chad's garage.
The final punchline of course is that you're not going to do anything about it.
>The point is, unless you're paying them money, you have nothing to threaten them with.
That self-righteous attitude being made fun of (i.e. That'll teach them!) is the morose self-righteousness so many of our generation feel these days when they figure out that they aren't the special flower who produces sacred works of art and are rather an id in a database who needs to be exploited for revenue somehow.
No one gives a shit if you stop using Instagram over this perfectly legitimate (in my eyes) move that was unfortunately retracted. Don't announce it over Twitter, because no one is listening but yourself.
Metaphor is a too weak -- The differences between physical storage and social photo sharing are just too numerous.
Chad would have actively promoted that you add stuff to his garage. He'd have also encouraged you to encourage others to put their stuff there -- and he'd have encouraged you to put stuff there on others' behalf.
Plus, somehow, convincing people to put stuff in his garage (greatly, greatly) increases the value of the garage.
So yeah... I know it's a joke, but it's a labored one.
SUre, but it illustrates the other side of the coin - the fact you got no rights to stuff in Chad's garage, and that should have been obvious, and you're a sucker to expect better treatment from Chad.
Yeah, how does that work? If someone uploads a photo they took of me to Instagram, can Instagram now sell that to an advertiser and use the image of me without my consent?
This is a really weak argument. It glosses over the nuances of what was originally offered from a business , and what they then tried to pivot to. Its one thing If I as an individual let you upload photos to my server, and make you a little front end to share them. It's another thing altogether If I register a business and market a product to you along with specifics about things like price and terms of service, then after I become popular and widely used I switch out the terms of service that we had originally agreed to. This is like a manufacture dumping products on the market, then once all the competitors are out of business raising prices for replacement parts.
All the "dude" has to do is take his stuff out of Chad's garage and he gets to keep it. Same with all the instagram users. If someone is storing your stuff for free, expect it to end at any point.
The issue with that argument is it was (or at least should have been) clear to everyone that Instagram didn't really offer anything "as a business" initially, it was an unsustainable land grab.
That means that the pivot was always going to come, whether it be to an advertising driven model, a merchandising model, a paying user model or whatever.
While I'm not wild about the direction they've chosen, anyone using Instagram should have known that a change was coming and accepted that risk from the outset.
I think this one has missed the point... Chad does everything he can to get people store their shit in his garage and is really proud that so many are using his garage.
But differently from Chad, instagram openly does care if you leave. So you've got leverage to negotiate with instagram, but not with Chad. I don't care if you prefer to label it as users or products or whatever. If they care to keep you, then you've got leverage to negotiate, period. The rest is just subjective semantics.
Well, I would say the difference is that when you put your stuff at your friend's place, he did not say that he may sell your stuff at some later date. If he had told that, you maybe would never have put the stuff at his place at all.
He didn't tell you he wouldn't sell your stuff thought. And you'll notice it's not "my friend Chad" implying a level of trust reserved for friends. It's just Chad. This guy Chad. His garage has nice shelves.
Chad offered me and my friends a place on his lot to store our stuff. He told us all about how safe his lot was and how easy it would be to find our stuff.
Now Chad says that to pay his bills in the future he's going to let strangers pay to wear our clothes. And he won't tell us when they do, or how often, or which clothes they wore.
Which I think is cool, because hey, free service, free market, amirite hackers?
Discovered this week when tweeting a link to an old xkcd comic that @xkcd has been registered and has more than 14,000 followers ... and only 1 tweet. (Confirming it was officially Randall.)
Seems to be an opportunity for some simple automation to add some reasonable distribution into the 'Twittersphere', so I was surprised to note it.
Maybe he doesn't want to pass out flyers for his band practice in Chad's Garage.
By publishing on Twitter, he is essentially handing some control over his output to Twitter. Not a lot, but some. By registering @xkcd, he's just protecting his online identity.
There are waaay too many comments in here stating one way or another "this is a terrible comparison! it's nothing like this!"
A.) it's a webcomic, not a lawyers overview of the situation.
B.) I think yall are missing out on the joke, which is not the metaphor with Instagram, it's the users reaction that is the punch line.
C.) The take from the comic is, if you're not paying for it, don't call it a business, at least not a business where you are the customer.
I'm getting very tired of hearing this. It's like we make up excuses for startups being dicks. There has to be a way to find business model that involves showing respect for your users and the content they're creating, while still making money on ads, offers, etc.
It also completely ignores the fact that paying customers get ripped off all the time, by the companies they pay money to. In the wider perspective, being a dick doesn't seem to correlate to receiving money from your user-base.
[+] [-] ry0ohki|13 years ago|reply
One day the new owner of the gallery realizes it's losing tons of money (and taking visitors from it's money making gallery in NYC), and it knows the artists are not going to pay (and maybe can't afford to). So it starts making prints of the artwork and selling them without giving the artists a royalty.
[+] [-] ragmondo|13 years ago|reply
And then of course the funding starts to dry up and the accountants start needing to see some hard $$$$ income. And that's when the ToS start to "adapt" to enable aforementioned sites to monetize "their" content. Oh didn't you know ? It's not your website after all. Sorry ! And thanks for getting your friends on board too !!
[+] [-] bbaker|13 years ago|reply
Their funding didn't dry up. They raised a substantial round, and then were purchased by another company that had itself just raised billions of dollars. They didn't need money.
But they did want to make it. Because they're a business.
[+] [-] betterunix|13 years ago|reply
Really, not practical? My mother had a personal website long before Myspace. My friends in middle school had personal web pages via AOL.
I suspect that the reason Myspace became popular was the social aspect, and the reason Facebook became popular was the combination of the social aspect and the fact that you had to log in to Facebook to see anyone's Facebook pages.
[+] [-] panacea|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] adaml_623|13 years ago|reply
Anyone who can afford a device to take photos and an internet connection has had a lot of practical alternatives for creating their own website or photo sharing site.
[+] [-] smosher|13 years ago|reply
People have a right to be annoyed by this, in fact I wish it was more common. Rights to our own creations should not be taken so lightly. So I support the sentiments of boycotters, even though Facebook is well within their rights to make this change. I don't support the attitude that it's unjust, but overreaction is better than none.
[+] [-] dfxm12|13 years ago|reply
I don't think it is making light of people who are annoyed/boycotting... It is making light of the line of thought that companies we give our data to (for free) are ever going to use it for what we want them to, and not what they want to (make money).
This comic is saying that if we care about the rights to our work, don't give the work to anyone.
[+] [-] furyofantares|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] sanderjd|13 years ago|reply
Just like possession of our belongings should not be taken lightly, which is why nobody would actually put all their stuff in Chad's garage. People have already taken the rights to their creations lightly by posting them on a free service.
[+] [-] smspence|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] pavlov|13 years ago|reply
As in: "-Why did MySpace fail? -They were basically Chad's garage."
[+] [-] ojr|13 years ago|reply
As in: Im moving to Marks Garage because the shelves in Chad's Garage keeps rearranging
[+] [-] jpswade|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] marbletiles|13 years ago|reply
But the crux of this is the complaint is not "That's no way to run a storage business". The complaint is "that's a dick move to pull when he invited me to keep all my stuff in his garage, and got rich as a result".
[+] [-] simonh|13 years ago|reply
Facebook is in the hole for one billion dollars on this deal and so far haven't made back a single cent.
[+] [-] vetler|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] AndrewDucker|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] adhipg|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] drcube|13 years ago|reply
There is absolutely nothing stopping Facebook or Instagram from doing the same shit they currently do, even if they start charging their users. And the services that currently get by on user subscriptions alone will one day have to find another way to grow. And the way they'll do that is by selling ads and monetizing user data.
[+] [-] brown9-2|13 years ago|reply
No, I don't. Do you recall how far back this was?
[+] [-] jere|13 years ago|reply
>Well, I'm this close to not giving him any more stuff.
>That'll teach him.
The point is, unless you're paying them money, you have nothing to threaten them with. You can't stop paying for their service (like you can with other businesses), since you weren't paying in the first place. They're a business and they're not beholden to you in any way.
Maybe it would be more clear if we had another panel explaining that Chad has no job, yet recently took a large loan from the mob. And you still decided to put your stuff in Chad's garage.
The final punchline of course is that you're not going to do anything about it.
[+] [-] Dirlewanger|13 years ago|reply
That self-righteous attitude being made fun of (i.e. That'll teach them!) is the morose self-righteousness so many of our generation feel these days when they figure out that they aren't the special flower who produces sacred works of art and are rather an id in a database who needs to be exploited for revenue somehow.
No one gives a shit if you stop using Instagram over this perfectly legitimate (in my eyes) move that was unfortunately retracted. Don't announce it over Twitter, because no one is listening but yourself.
[+] [-] jwilliams|13 years ago|reply
Chad would have actively promoted that you add stuff to his garage. He'd have also encouraged you to encourage others to put their stuff there -- and he'd have encouraged you to put stuff there on others' behalf.
Plus, somehow, convincing people to put stuff in his garage (greatly, greatly) increases the value of the garage.
So yeah... I know it's a joke, but it's a labored one.
[+] [-] sp332|13 years ago|reply
That would be true if Chad were running a storage service, which he isn't!
[+] [-] JoeAltmaier|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] elemenohpee|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dkhenry|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] aidenn0|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Tyrannosaurs|13 years ago|reply
That means that the pivot was always going to come, whether it be to an advertising driven model, a merchandising model, a paying user model or whatever.
While I'm not wild about the direction they've chosen, anyone using Instagram should have known that a change was coming and accepted that risk from the outset.
[+] [-] error|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] vibrunazo|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nutanc|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] kennywinker|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] fallenhitokiri|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mjhagen|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jerrya|13 years ago|reply
Now Chad says that to pay his bills in the future he's going to let strangers pay to wear our clothes. And he won't tell us when they do, or how often, or which clothes they wore.
Which I think is cool, because hey, free service, free market, amirite hackers?
[+] [-] smspence|13 years ago|reply
How does this match up with Instagram's TOS in any way? I still do not understand what Instagram is doing that is getting everyone so riled up.
[+] [-] JacobAldridge|13 years ago|reply
Seems to be an opportunity for some simple automation to add some reasonable distribution into the 'Twittersphere', so I was surprised to note it.
[+] [-] kennywinker|13 years ago|reply
By publishing on Twitter, he is essentially handing some control over his output to Twitter. Not a lot, but some. By registering @xkcd, he's just protecting his online identity.
[+] [-] unknown|13 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] ImprovedSilence|13 years ago|reply
A.) it's a webcomic, not a lawyers overview of the situation. B.) I think yall are missing out on the joke, which is not the metaphor with Instagram, it's the users reaction that is the punch line. C.) The take from the comic is, if you're not paying for it, don't call it a business, at least not a business where you are the customer.
[+] [-] smackfu|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] DoubleMalt|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] karl_nerd|13 years ago|reply
It also completely ignores the fact that paying customers get ripped off all the time, by the companies they pay money to. In the wider perspective, being a dick doesn't seem to correlate to receiving money from your user-base.
Here's an excellent text about it: http://powazek.com/posts/3229
[+] [-] MikeTaylor|13 years ago|reply
(That's "implies" in the English language sense, not the mathematical sense. Substitute "suggests" if you prefer.)
[+] [-] DanEdge|13 years ago|reply