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--- | ||
layout: post | ||
title: 'SaaS and competition issues' | ||
date: 2024-09-10 22:55:57 +0200 | ||
lang: en | ||
lang-ref: saas-and-competition-issues | ||
--- | ||
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The hype must stop. | ||
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Calm down, tech-preneurs. | ||
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Something funny is that many entrepreneurs believe that "competition is good". | ||
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In fact, it's only good for those who already have money and are protected from the risks of collapse. | ||
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As a result, hundreds of 'SaaS' or other tools are created, and I haven't seen this many 'new products' in the last 3 or 4 years (since the beginning of LLMs hype, in fact). | ||
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However, most of these tools are 'dormant', a bit active at the beginning (the hype, as always) and their growth quickly slows and then fades away. | ||
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What all these tech-bros don't tell you (and yes, I'm using the masculine form for a reason, it's not a lack of inclusion) is when their projects fail. Some will have a bit of honesty and talk about it, then move on to the next project. | ||
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Open Source tools already made it possible to make a lot of paid tools based on free tools (for example, all the Laravel company's apps are based on this: a huge pile of free tools plugged together to make a super-paying tool), but now with the various LLMs plugged into an IDE, or online code/image generators, you can create a SaaS in a day, with all the branding and design behind it, it doesn't cost much, it runs for a while, and then you let it go to sleep because there's not much to do - well, a bit of support maybe, but LLMs actually help with that - but it's not enough to make enough money to spend full-time on it, so you attempt to make another project. | ||
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For a few years now, online tools have been popping up all the time, some of them identical, most of them similar, and they're all going to be there, all together, like thousands of poorly maintained self-service bicycles. Each one will produce its own service, hoping that it works, but others are already there anyway. | ||
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In the end, the products that will work the best will do it based on a single criterion: will the tech-bro behind the SaaS have been a good enough manipulator... er, sorry, a good enough 'salesman', to sell his product. And to do that, will our child prodigy have enough money to hire a good marketing department to do the job for him? | ||
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We're back to the beginning of this article: those whose projects work well are those who already have the money to make it work. As a result, there's a lot of competition, but the winners are always the richest. There's no point in having a good idea. You have to sell hype, you have to sell, you always have to find a way to sell. | ||
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It's like the proliferation of streaming platforms: when it was just Netflix, everyone had it, pretty much everything was on it, it was pretty much fine. Now there's a dozen of them, the customer doesn't know which self-service bicycle to choose, and in any case most of them have slightly degraded quality, or differences too significant, that they will have to take pieces of each to have a correct tool. | ||
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Most of these SaaS are brand new tools, they are babies, and so just like babies, they are not finished. | ||
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Competition creates thousands of small average (or rotten) projects in the world. | ||
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So what do we do? | ||
What is the solution? | ||
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Here it is: very often, it is enough to take a single large project that has already existed for ages, improve it with our needs, and there you have it. | ||
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That's Open Source. | ||
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Collaboration for the common good. | ||
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As opposed to competition for personal and individual profit. |
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--- | ||
layout: post | ||
title: 'SaaS et problèmes de compétition' | ||
date: 2024-09-10 22:55:57 +0200 | ||
lang: fr | ||
lang-ref: saas-and-competition-issues | ||
--- | ||
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Il faut arrêter avec la hype. | ||
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Calmez-vous, les tech-preneurs. | ||
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Un truc fun, c'est que beaucoup d'entrepreneurs estiment que "la compétition a du bon". | ||
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En fait, ça n'a du bon que pour ceux qui ont déjà de la thune et qui sont protégés des risques de chute. | ||
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Du coup, on voit des centaines de "SaaS" ou autres outils apparaître, j'ai jamais vu autant de "nouveautés" depuis genre 3 ou 4 ans (depuis les débuts de la popularité des LLMs, en fait). | ||
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Pour autant, la plupart de ces outils sont "dormants", un peu actifs au début (la hype, toujours) et leur croissance stagne rapidement puis s'étiole. | ||
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Ce que ne vous disent pas tous ces tech-bros (et oui, pour la 2e fois je mets ça sciemment au masculin, ce n'est pas un manque d'inclusion) c'est quand leurs projets capotent. Certains vont avoir un peu d'humilité et en parler puis passer au prochain projet. | ||
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Les outils Open Source permettaient déjà de faire pas mal d'outils payants à partir d'outils gratuits (par exemple, toutes les applis de l'entreprise Laravel sont basées là-dessus : une gigantesque masse d'outils gratuits branchés ensembles pour faire un outil super-payant), mais maintenant avec les différents LLMs branchés à un IDE ou carrément à des générateurs de code et d'images en ligne, on peut créer un SaaS en une journée, avec tout le branding et le design derrière, ça ne coûte pas cher, ça tourne pendant quelques temps, et on le laisse dormir ensuite parce qu'il n'y a pas grand chose à faire, enfin un peu de support peut-être mais en vrai les LLMs aident à ça, mais ça fait pas assez de chiffre pour faire du temps-plein dessus donc on tente un autre projet. | ||
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Du coup, depuis quelques années, des outils en ligne popent tout le temps, certains sont identiques, la plupart sont similaires, et ils vont tous être là, tous ensembles, comme des milliers de Vélib mal entretenus. Chacun va mettre en prod son service, en espérant qu'il marche, mais d'autres sont déjà là. | ||
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Au final, les produits qui vont fonctionner le mieux le feront sur un seul critère : est-ce que le tech-bro derrière le SaaS aura été un assez bon manipulateur... euh, pardon, un assez bon "commercial", pour vendre son tapis. Et pour ça, est-ce que notre Enguerrand-Théophile de Sulpice-Trébourg aura assez de thune pour embaucher le service marketing qui fera le taff à sa place. | ||
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On en revient au début de cet article : ceux pour qui ça marche, c'est ceux qui ont déjà la thune pour que ça marche. La conséquence de ça, c'est qu'il y a une compétition de malade, mais les gagnants sont toujours les plus riches. La bonne idée n'a aucun intérêt. Il faut vendre de la hype, il faut vendre, toujours trouver un moyen de vendre. | ||
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C'est comme la multiplication des plateformes de streaming : quand c'était juste Netflix, tout le monde était dessus, y'avait quasiment tout dessus, ça allait à peu près. Maintenant y'en a treize à la douzaine, le client ne sait plus quel Vélib choisir, et de toute façon la plupart ont une qualité suffisamment dégradée, ou des différences trop peu négligeable, qu'ils vont devoir prendre des morceaux de chacun pour avoir un outil correct. | ||
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La plupart de ces SaaS sont des outils tout neufs, ce sont des bébés, et donc comme tous les bébés, ils ne sont pas finis. | ||
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La compétition crée des milliers de petits projets moyens (ou pourris) dans le monde. | ||
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Alors, que faire ? | ||
C'est quoi, la solution ? | ||
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La voici : très souvent il suffit de prendre un seul et unique gros projet qui existe déjà depuis des lustres, l'améliorer avec nos besoins, et voilà. | ||
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L'Open Source, c'est ça. | ||
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La collaboration pour le bien commun. | ||
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En opposition avec la compétition pour le profit personnel. |
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