The difference between creating a pillow company and creating a tech platform is the difference between baking a cake and filming a movie. Yes one can do both, but most cannot launch companies of vastly differing industries. While most are not entrepreneurs like Mike Lindell, there is a sense that Mike Lindell’s branding is spread thin and weighed down in controversy.
In short there are a number of reasons that Mike Lindell should not set out to create a social media platform, but his capability in creating one, while dubious, is not the reason for this article. Creating a social media is doable. However, creating a social media to address current demands in the next generation of social media has already been done.
Between Gab, MeWe, Rumble, and SayScape, the solution to big tech censorship has already been created. Not enough people are on these platforms. Moreover, Mike Lindell has little to offer other than his brand, as he is well behind in the competition. In essence, Mike Lindell is being redundant. But given Mike Lindell’s previous experience on social media, the probability that big tech would attack his business is extremely high. They took down Parler for a time, and Gab had to build it’s own infrastructure while struggling to open a business checking account. Mike Lindell is likely unprepared on an infrastructural level.
Furthermore, I would argue that there is a great opportunity cost to Mike Lindell’s time spent on developing a social media platform. Mike Lindell has been a powerful faith-based investor, and this is especially the case in film. Movies like Unplanned and, the now debuting, Church People are both products of Mike Lindell’s investing, and both appear to be steps in the right direction for Christian film.
So why invest in an already crowded field that that has already created what you are trying to create. Why not seek opportunity and break new ground or build a film empire that has already experienced financial success?
This move makes no sense. While Mike Lindell is free to spend his money how he sees fit, this move comes across as an ego play, building a social media platform, that’s really a glorified fan club. A comparison to this would be Jordan Peterson’s Thinkspot.
While I think there is a pride element to this decision, I would welcome seeing more Christian “rich people” take the risks that Mike Lindell has taken. I mean this in a broad sense, not necessarily his political activism. I’ll close with a reminder of the Parable of the talents. The servant given one talent and buried it was viewed as wicked. Therefore, God does not only expect rich Christians to take financial risks for the kingdom.
5 Responses
Olde Wisdom about “Opinions” by Thee Frugal Curmudgeon
Congratulations, you are the first to receive this wisdom. I would welcome your views on the CONCEPTS separately from your disagreement with the specifics.
All opinions are valid. There are no wrong opinions.
Opinions are not facts, therefore; they cannot be true or false. You may agree or disagree with an opinion based on YOUR personal experience.
Opinions are personal, therefore; they are uniquely formed by that individual based on the information that person has and has determined to be true/false, factual, relevant, etc. to their opinion.
Therefore, your opinion that “Mike Lindell should not create a social media platform” is valid.
In my opinion your opinion is based on a significant ignorance of the social media marketplace, the world, and how business works.
I bet that you could easily name 10 social media companies. (I was going to say platforms, but we know where that would lead, and that is another debate.)
But, I bet there are easily over a 1,000 significant social media companies worldwide, some nearly as big as any of the 10 you could name. In fact, 10,000 wouldn’t surprise me. There are at least 100 in America and most countries have home brewed apps by the dozens. (I should probably search the Google Play store to test this. You can search rotten Apple if you own one of their slave built devices.
Don’t believe me? How many automotive brands are there worldwide? At least 140 and probably several times that. I’m guessing that doesn’t include motorcycle brands or specialty brands (Checker and other cab makers, Peterbilt and other truck builders, etc.)
Heck, I just looked for “pillow companies in usa” and there are several hundred including Kangaroo Pillow.
How many browsers are out there? I searched “browser” in Google Play and stopped counting at 200.
“We need fewer laws, regulations, and rules, and more people following the ones we already have.” Olde Wisdom from Thee Frugal Curmudgeon. (That’s me. C 2021) That’s a paraphrase of some quote. Maybe about books (“There are somewhere between 600,000 and 1,000,000 books published every year in the US alone” Forbes) and needing fewer new ones and more people reading each of the ones we already have.
So, if Mike Lindell feels like creating a social media platform (for whatever reason from pride to God) then, in MY opinion, he should go full steam ahead and do it.
And in MY opinion, no one else has done it right yet.
Gab was, according to their PR and ToreSays, “bulletproof”. Oops. Gab has been hacked. And don’t believe the OPINIONS expressed in the headlines you will see, Gab is not a “far-right” platform. It was A platform. Likely a “true” platform that only “censored” clearly illegal posts.
I haven’t fully researched Mike’s proposed platform, but he claims it is all the Big Tech social media functions rolled into one that will multiply media creators audiences 10-fold.
Since I’m very close to starting a blog and a podcast, I hope that claim is true so I’ll have nine followers other than my mom.
This is argumentation, not opinion. The number of social media platforms in existence, you are right to say that this is no deterrent from starting a new one. But Mike Lindell is trying to reach the same target audience to address the same demands that others are already years ahead of him on. With social media there are really only two business models. There’s the freemium model and then there’s a model that sells user information. So either the users are the customers or the users are the product. Mike Lindell is virtually blackballed from legacy advertisers, so he’ll need to employ a freemium model. But he’s no more immune to the pitfalls that Gab and Parler faced from big tech. In either case, Mike Lindell needs to attract users to his platform, but he does not have as widespread appeal as you may think.
Your comment reminded me of a story that I covered a long while ago where this political grifter, Bill Mitchell, claimed that he was on the cusp of launching a company that will take on Google. Now that company was real and publicly traded, and I uncovered their financial statements which in no capacity indicated a readiness to take on Google. Furthermore, the search engine looked at least ten years old. There are a ton of search engines out there, as I’ve observed monitoring traffic. But this venture is like creating a search engine to take on Google when multiple already exist.
I understand that you do not think the execution of social media alternatives have been done right, but Mike Lindell is overpromising on what his platform will actually be capable of doing. His claims of being able to combine a microblogging platform with a video sharing/hosting platform in such a short period of time is not very credible. It indicates that he’s bought code that he plans on turning into a social media platform. Moreover, his claim on building an audience is not how social media works. If it can grow a content creator’s audience 10x, they had no audience in the first place. Generally speaking, the pattern has been influencers bringing their audience over to an alternative platform (in many cases being paid to do so), not influencers cultivating an audience on these platforms that they could not otherwise do on the legacy social media. Despite heavy YouTube censorship, that is where the eyeballs are and it dwarfs the others. If I cannot attract an audience on YouTube, I will not suddenly be able to on Rumble or Bitchute.
I would argue that Mike Lindell is acting far more like Bill Mitchell than Elon Musk here. Mike Lindell’s social media platform will rely too heavily on his brand which does not have widespread appeal, especially among young conservatives who he will need in order to succeed. In addition to “alternative platform fatigue” and being late to the game, the financial drain of creating a platform is massive. Video hosting is expensive even in the unlikely event he can get AWS to do business with him. Thus, the ROI would be better on a number of other ventures that could fight big tech or the woke influence on the culture.
“Mike Lindell is trying to reach the same target audience to address the same demands that others are already years ahead of him on.”
So, let’s just all give up and wait to be cancelled or ghosted into oblivion while providing Big Tech with all of our personal information for them to profit from.
“others are already years ahead of him” but apparently all have failed. His proposed Vocl (“Victory of Christ’s Love.”) platform sounds like it is targeting Christians not a general audience. According to the interview I heard (oh, this is clever if planned) he plans to launch in a couple of weeks. That would be Easter Sunday?
“With social media there are really only two business models.”
Ah, the classic False Dichotomy. Number three is to fund it out of your own pocket without hope for profit. Number four is to get other people to fund it with the hope for them that they can “go public” and make money off of suckers.
“But this venture is like creating a search engine to take on Google when multiple already exist.”
So why bother to take on any established thing? I said you “don’t understand the social media marketplace” and I stand by that claim. While Big Tech currently dominates, will they always? There is nothing new under the sun, and that includes something “new” (as in different) coming along that will displace Big Tech. I could name a lot of “new” things that have displaced the dominant company in even your short lifetime.
“I understand that you do not think the execution of social media alternatives have been done right”
Ah, don’t assume anything. You are 100% wrong in this case. I use virtually ZERO social media for anything. I may in the near future, depending on how you wish to define “social media”, but my “argument” has nothing to do with whether or not I think any social media has “been done right”. I would be perfectly happy with using MacWrite as my word processor. I’ve owned a Samsung Galaxy Note 8 for nearly four years and never use the button on the S Pen. 99% of people don’t use much more than half of the features of anything. Heck, my toaster has buttons on it that I don’t even know what they do.
Being the next big thing isn’t about features, it is all about marketing and persuading people that you are exactly what they need. (Did I mention my brother still loves and uses HyperCard?)
“I would argue that Mike Lindell is acting far more like Bill Mitchell than Elon Musk here. Mike Lindell’s social media platform will rely too heavily on his brand”
Really? The only Bill Mitchell I know is Gen. Billy Mitchell the “father of the US Air Force. On the other hand, Elon Musk relies “heavily on his brand”. Elon has produced some successful products, but are they really successful? Is Musk really only “rich” on paper? How fast will his empire collapse if people find out he is a snake-oil salesman?
“a combination of Twitter and YouTube, nothing like Gab or Parler, and meant for “print radio, and TV.””
You probably have more information about what Lindell plans to do and more educated guesses at how he plans to do it, I’m simply repeating the claims he made in the interview I heard. I doubt he can fulfill those claims, but if you start out with “I know I’m going to fail.” why bother?
“print radio, and TV” sounds somewhat unique to me. Sounds like he is targeting “creators” like yourself who want to produce content for all three in one place. Also sounds like the FoxNews website where I can go to one place and get the same story three ways.
Mike does show his age with that phrase. Like Trump’s “wiretapping”, Lindell is referring to “old” media. I would have said, “meant for” “blogging, podcasting, and video.” and that is probably still old skool. (Is there a “fancy” word for video hits? One that encompasses TikTok to reporting on events to documentaries? Vlogging seems repetitive.)
Why are you wasting your talent on a blog that will have nearly zero effect on the woke church? I’m sure there are others out there that do a better job, and you are fighting against firmly entrenched beliefs. You have no hope of success.
That is essentially what you are saying about Lindell.
I don’t for a minute think you are wasting your talent with this blog. You have persuaded at least one person, me. Keep up the fight.
PS – “This is argumentation, not opinion.” that is so Common Core. But thanks, I wasted an hour researching the difference. Shows how things have changed in just my lifetime. I’m sure I was taught the difference, but the words used to describe that were different.
PPS – I figured out how to keep that “blank” line between thoughts and paragraphs. I replaced Word’s paragraph mark with a manual line break.
Totally disagree my friend. He’s not doing it alone BTW.
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He gets kicked off of Twitter in January/February and in March he says he’ll be ready to roll out a new platform. It’s not impossible, but certainly makes it more likely that he’s purchased code that will not differentiate himself from existing alternatives.