Machine intelligence dissolves network effects: Uber→Waymo, Stack Overflow→ChatGPT
pzakin · x · 2026-10-29
Responding to a16z's Guy Wuollet on where all the network-effect businesses went, pzakin argues the great original internet companies (Google, Facebook, Uber) won by solving human coordination problems — and machine intelligence obviates the need for those.
His mappings: Uber→Waymo (no driver network needed), Facebook→algorithmic feeds (no social graph needed), Stack Overflow→ChatGPT (no Q&A community needed). Modern AI winners are built on scale economies and cornered resources like compute and talent rather than network effects.
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