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this post was submitted on 27 Oct 2023
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He’s recreating Venmo. 😂
FWIW his white whale or inspiration is more like the Chinese “we do everything” apps / platforms https://wise.com/us/blog/chinese-payment-app
Without getting official government institutions on board or making the app mandatory in some way, I don't see how this would work outside of authoritarian countries
They're bleeding users and advertisers as it is
The Chinese super apps didn't really have government institutions on board, aside from the chat censorship aspect which was the main thing the government was originally paying attention to. In other aspects, the Chinese government and its regulators didn't initially get involved, and the rapid dominance of Alibaba and Tencent took them by surprise.
The super apps benefitted from a mix of rapid smartphone adoption, first mover advantages, weak consumer protections, and fierce competition with each other. It's probably that combination of circumstances that's hard to replicate, not the authoritarian country bit (there are lots of authoritarian countries that haven't fostered super apps).
The Chinese government was not entirely happy about the result; for example, the dominance of WeChat Pay and AliPay poses a threat to the state-owned banks, which are a major channel of government control over the economy. That is why the Chinese government has spent the last few years cracking down on the super app companies in various ways.
That explains him supporting the alt-right.
The thing about these everything apps is that they filled a niche in the markets they've succeeded in. As far as I know, and I could be wrong, Google doesn't operate their Play services or Google Pay in China, meaning there was a vacuum for something else to fill it. WeChat and AliPay has done that.
It'd take a LOT of effort to build a platform like Paytm for the U.S., nevermind other markets. You can't just buy a microblogging platform and magically redevelop it into something like Paytm. He'd need to partner with other businesses and whatnot, and I just don't see there being any sort of interest in that kind of partnership.
There's been attempts to build these sorts of "everything apps" before. Facebook has tried and failed. I think Snapchat has tried it. Apps here in the west tend to focus on doing a single or a handful of tasks really well. If an app ends up doing too much, it's often split into several apps.
Yeah, I have trouble imagining this working in the US, even if Musk hadn't spent a year flushing his cash and credibility down the drain.
I don't see it working in Sweden either.
Amazon launched here a couple of years ago, and I think they've clawed out a niche in the market shockingly, but they're not the "go to marketplace" for everything. If I want to buy electronics there's like at least half a dozen online (that often have physical locations) stores I'd go to first. Same thing for larger appliances, clothes, make-up/beauty/skin-hair-care, shoes, sporting goods, furniture. Amazon is mostly for like weird niche stuff, like it's the only place I could find a detergent that's designed for robot mops that doesn't contain tea-tree oil. Amazon is also a decent place to find mass-produced cheap garbage tat, like LED string lights and what have you.
They also make use of the same delivery services that all other stores do, so there's no point in using them if you want speedy deliveries. I also don't feel safe as a buyer when using Amazon because while I'm sure they have to be compliant with Swedish consumer laws, I'm also positive they'll make the experience as tricky to navigate as possible. If I buy a motherboard from say Inet, and it breaks, I can just send an email to Jonas at Inet and they'll sort it out. Nothing will be that straight-forward with Amazon.
Anyway, the point of that massive segue is; if a MASSIVE specialised company like Amazon has failed to fully establish themselves in their own niche here in Sweden, how on earth would a broken microblogging platform manage to "out-compete" other, trusted, and established services?
Musk is aiming to use twitter for a niche that doesn't exist. Literally the only demand for this dream platform of his, is himself.
Speaking of buying weird niche items from Amazon: I’ve ordered spare parts and other weird and obscure electronics from Amazon so many times that now they think I’m a company and that I should have a company account.
How did this happen? If I want to buy normal stuff, I’ll walk to a normal store and buy it there. If I need something a bit more special, I’ll probably find it somewhere within a 2000 km radius. If nobody sells what I need, I’ll try Amazon. That’s why my shopping history looks like I’m running some special company.
He was involved with PayPal so it’s not a huge stretch but I wouldn’t trust anything with that clown.
He was ousted from PayPal before it become PayPal. Actually his name for the service was X, so this might be long awaited dream.
He really wasn’t that involved. He was trying to build an everything app. Peter Theil went with PayPal and booted Elon.
Which are basically operating systems, and therefore not needed and against the rules of the iOS and Android app stores.
Yeh was going to say this sounds more like wechat.
And let's remind everyone because people seem to forget.
PayPal is NOT FDIC insured!
I pretty much run everything through paypal for the extra layer of security.
It saved my ass when I was doxxed and hacked. I had my logins and financial information stolen.
I can totally see not putting more than a few thousand into the balance if you're going to use it like a secured credit card.
Otherwise, keeping $0 in it and using it as a middle man between your bank and the outside world is a fantastic solution to protecting yourself.
Was forced out of after he almost tanked the company trying to do this exact thing.
What's the definition of insanity again?
Yeah, it’s not an original idea. He’s recycling his ideas.
ExTwitter
That is too simplistic of a name and un-original.
If this product moves forward, it's likely to be on a small scale. For example, like when a person needs to send a friend reimbursement for a coffee. So, initially, if it needs a simple name for paying back friends, or other pals, why not just call it Pay-A-Pal, or PayPal for short.
No bank account, no actual cash and everything happens in the system. It's revolutionary! It's like digital transactions that happen through pure accounting for a small fee. Like credit cards, but those are old.