News for hackers. Stuff that matters.
Re:Ask HN: Insider history of the demise of Kodak? by etangent on Sunday July 17, 2016 @11:42PM (#12113125)
> What many at the time didn't yet recognize was that there was no business model in digital cameras that would employ 100 thousand engineers, managers, factory workers, technicians, and staff

I believe you meant to say "that there was a business model".

Re:Ask HN: Insider history of the demise of Kodak? by intrasight on Monday July 18, 2016 @12:11AM (#12113189)
No, I really meant "there was no business model". The film and film cameras supported many of those hundred thousand employees. Let's assume that 30K of them were in the film camera areas. Kodak, as a company that markets digital cameras built in China, would support perhaps 1000 employees in that endevour. A big drop. What Kodak ended up doing mostly was just license the brand name. Probably didn't even need 1000 employees for that.
Re:Ask HN: Insider history of the demise of Kodak? by ernestbro on Monday July 18, 2016 @02:44AM (#12113540)
Kodak failed because the entire verticalized printed photo industry was demonetized. It's the same way the newspaper industry has shrunk: yes people still take pictures and read news, no there isn't an obvious way for large companies to extract value as there used to be. Printing chemicals and large printing presses are very expensive and hard to reproduce, meanwhile while digital comes along and easily replaces them. And if Instagram dies 10 others can take their place.