Will Communities be one of the few long term survivors of AI software market disruption?
Even Wordpress could suffer in the long run? Are websites becoming obsolete? Google - CoWork plugins wipe billions off global market in 'SaaSpocalypse' in case you are not aware of what AI did last week.
I think this is largely speculation rather than a proven trend. To be honest, it comes across as a bit fear-driven — and I say that respectfully.
- Websites are not obsolete.
- WordPress is not disappearing.
- SaaS is not collapsing.
AI is definitely reshaping the landscape, but disruption doesn’t automatically mean extinction. These platforms have adapted before — and they will again.
Fit Lehrer my intention was not to drive fear, but rather to recognize the fear that is happening right now in the marketplace, and what that means for software devs like me, attempting to plan for long term survival. Salesforce, all the legal software companies, etc lost billions this week.
Jeff I totally understand your point, that market swings are real.
I just don’t think “stocks dropping” equals “SaaS/websites are dying.” AI is forcing products to adapt (often re-bundling features), not go extinct. The winners will be the ones that integrate AI into real workflows and keep strong distribution/community.
Appreciate the discussion with you 🙌
Fit Lehrer One additional thought from my perspective is this was more of a market correction that has been a long time coming. SaaS has been pretty dang proud of their per seat licensing prices for quite some time. Anthropic didn't cause it, just helped trigger the correction. Kind of reminds me of the 2008 housing bubble crash. Prices were getting too out of control.
Fit Lehrer real WEB3 will probably change the situation too... interesting time
I don't think the sorts of people who would find themselves in this community have much to worry about. Massive companies will absolutely need to reshape as the landscape shifts. But no matter what happens up at the top, there are billions of internet users and millions of websites that will soldier on.
Looking more micro than macro, and specifically within this area, the big trend I think is going to be all around self-hosting and managing your own data. The appeal of SaaS to the end user will diminish as ownership of data becomes more important. There will be a pushback on the general "cloud" philosophy that we've all become used to.
That's why I think FluentCommunity is so great and why I'm backing it going forward. The whole Fluent suite is all about self-hosting and management of your systems and data. The closest competitor is the SureSuite and they have taken the managed platform approach and the number one reason I barely scratched the surface when looking at SureDash. Their latest CRM-like offering is the same, you have to hand over all your contacts and data to them.
I don't think that will be unique to this particular niche either. It used to be if Option A was self-hosted and Option B was managed, you'd just go with Option B to avoid the headaches and get yourself there quicker. Now it's Option A - a little extra effort for long term data retention and huge cost savings.
Ross FCA since my other business is called Cloudless Smart Home, I am betting you are correct sir. I have just pivoted to cloudless business now.
I agree big business SaaS will adapt, but smaller websites are being impacted by AI with a reduction in traffic as people read the search AI Overview without clicking through, or bypass search altogether and go straight to ChatGPT. The old website model of building SEO optimised content on a website, fed by search traffic, funded by ads, affiliates etc, is dead.
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