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There is nothing to "get". It's all the same. Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat. People want a free way to broadcast to their friends. Someone invents a se

There is nothing to "get". It's all the same. Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat. People want a free way to broadcast to their friends. Someone invents a service that does that. Slowly ads take over. Now the stream needs to be "curated". It's no longer a timeline. It's no longer sensible. Now you can no longer reliably broadcast to your friends. People search for a new service that did what the old service used to do. They don't even realize that's what they are doing, but that's what they are doing. I've done this myself now what, a half dozen times? Every 2 years you have to do it again. It's the same damn model. It's all the same thing. Sometimes I feel like I'm taking crazy pills. Does no one see this? Snapchat will rule until he ads take over. Your stories will slowly be interrupted by ads. Then your stories will fall out of time sync and you'll only get some updates or a "Featured Updates" or some other features that's really just a way to prioritize and guarantee ad delivery. And while this is happening someone will put out something new, that essentially does what Snapchat originally did in a slightly different format. Maybe square instead of portrait or GIF or Live Photo or whatever. But it's all the same thing. This game will continue forever. All people want is a way to broadcast into a stream of content, and view other people's content in a timeline. That's it. It works for a while until you get too big. Then you can't pay for it and you have to start inject ads and resorting the timeline until it's no longer a timeline or it's a timeline full of all this stuff no one ever wanted or asked for. When I was 15 I'd get home from school and run to my computer to check my favorite message board. I'd hit "New Posts" and see all the content from my friends. Cool new video game discussion, new video card benchmarks, some photos someone uploaded, some rant. Honestly, nothing has really changed in 15 years except the format of the content has been continuously updated to be technically (and culturally) relevant. But a post is still a post.

cloudjacker 10y ago
yeah no, snapchat was never a timeline and thats what was good about it you want to be connected with someone because you are friends but don't like the random shit they post but don't want to unfriend them? thats a problem for a different social network but not snapchat
- themagician 10y ago
  It is a timeline though. I open Snapchat and I see all the messages and stories, in order—sorted by time. It's not jumbled, there's no features. There's no "Featured" or "Top Stories" or "Retweets". It's just a timeline of content. From people I follow or people I know who have sent things to me. My Snapchat looks just like my Twitter did in 2008, except with a few more boobs.
  - cloudjacker 10y ago
    ok by definition of timeline correct, by UX of timeline no. it doesn't show you what it is without you explicitly diving into that story
    - themagician 10y ago
      What are you talking about? I open Snapchat and it's literally two timelines, a private one and a public one. They are in order and timestamped. By definition and by UX. It is perhaps a quintessential example of a timeline of content.
      - cloudjacker 10y ago
        nah when people think timeline they think the UX of Facebook, Twitter and tertiary networks that show you cards of data, everything about the post they don't think some pedantic shit about it being "in order and timestamped so that fulfills all the criteria!"
      - themagician 10y ago
        You are the one being pedantic in this case. Sorry a list of content sorted by time is a timeline. I don't know what else you call that.
mrweasel 10y ago
>Someone invents a service that does that. Slowly ads take over. The problem really is that no one wants to pay for services, or no one is willing to try charging for their services. Ads are the "safe" option, but it will also make your users leave in the long run. I was pretty baffled when a publisher wrote that they would rather make money from ads on their site, than make money from people buying a subscription. Service like Twitter, Snapchat and what not seems to be the same way, there's no desire to try anything but ads. It is still my belief that at some point some large seller of physical goods will announce that they're pull their online ads due to lack of profitability. After that the entire online media business will be forced to charge their users, and we'll all be better off. Maybe it's just wishful thinking.
- raimue 10y ago
  > or no one is willing to try charging for their services app.net tried, but it was not successful.
  - majewsky 10y ago
    In Germany, especially since Snowden, there is a healthy niche for paid mail providers, such as posteo.de or mailbox.org. I pay 1€ per month for my mailbox because it allows me to be certain that I'm the customer, not the product.
    - mrweasel 10y ago
      I pay a little more for KolabNow, but I'm happy to do it.
- weavie 10y ago
  So what is the alternative? We don't want to pay, we don't want ads.. how else can these things make money?
  - mrweasel 10y ago
    My alternative isn't one that most people would accept, but I'd be fine with money losing companies ceasing to exist. I'm fairly confident that Snapchat could make money charging their users, if the fee is sufficiently small. Say $10 per year, perhaps as an in-app purchase, with the first 6 month being free. We also may have to accept that some of these companies, Twitter seems the most obvious, isn't actually providing anything of tangible value to the average user and therefore can't exist. Of cause if some investors wants to keep throwing money at Twitter to keep the lights on, they're more than welcome. I know I'm not exactly being friendly towards Twitter, but it's a great example of a company that needs to fail. The only reason they don't is because investors have already wasted so much money that they're desperately trying so save it in hope of making the money back, by some miracle. Part of it might also be that investors, journalists and bankers are so heavy users of Twitter that they fail to see that the business isn't sustainable. In the end the user will always be the one to pay the bill. Either by directly paying, or indirectly via advertising.
Kiro 10y ago
I honestly don't think you get it. I've lived through all major social networks and the only one I've shared stuff on is Snapchat. It's a major breakthrough for me.
- themagician 10y ago
  Sounds like the one who doesn't get it is you.
  - Kiro 10y ago
    Nope, you are definintely the one who doesn't get it considering you're completely missing why Snapchat is a different beast.
    - Teeboo 10y ago
      Elaborate please. Why is it different?
majewsky 10y ago
> It's all the same. Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat. People want a free way to broadcast to their friends. That's only one use-case. I don't use Twitter at all to broadcast to my friends. I broadcast political opinion and tech humor to whomever it may concern, and receive condensed insights from public figures whom I find relevant for me.
- aethos 10y ago
  I would argue that "purposeful" users like yourself are in the minority.
TeMPOraL 10y ago
I agree. I just deleted Instagram from my phone (for unrelated reasons), but one thing I've noticed recently in my somewhat irregular usage of that service is that it started to inject ads and "promoted content" in between the posts of people I follow. Frankly, it's fucking annoying. But the point is, Instagram seems to be entering the "ad phase" you're describing.
Teeboo 10y ago
This. This. This. This. This. This. I believe the value of the social networking platform to a user is inverse to the maturity of the company. Facebook has already become choked with it's own content and advertisements so the next generation migrate to a "cleaner" platform. The centre of gravity shifts. New platform monetises and the choking cycle begins anew... The stages - Stage 1: Platform Exclusivity Platform Coveted Platform Expanded Stage 2: Platform Opened Platform Developed (upon) Platform Expanded Stage 3 Platform Monetised PLatform Curated Platform Locked (to previous developers to protect revenue streams) Stage 4 Platfrom Alternatives Platform Decline Platform Obsolescence You could, quite easily Venn Diagram where the current social media services are and how they are eating the older's market share. As platforms lock developers out, other pre-revenue companies are opening up to those developers stealing previously allegiant demographics.
- dave2000 10y ago
  Perhaps I'm missing something but I don't see or don't recognize any ads. Is this just because you're using the app whereas I'm using a browser with an ad blocker? Or do you see ads more when you poke around looking at groups and games and whatever (I just spend a few minutes a week looking at friends posts and rarely comment or post any of my own content;i really only joined for Messenger)
  - Teeboo 10y ago
    You don't see ads on Facebook? It must be the ad blocker. 70% of the real estate via browser is ad based. Those ads don't include promoted posts from pages you elected to follow. The majority of content on FB is promotional.
    - dhimes 10y ago
      Holy crap! I had no idea.
      - Teeboo 10y ago
        What? Not sure what has inspired your sarcasm. I and another poster are discussing the UX experience which differs between browser with ad-blocker and other versions. Thy kind of sarcasm is not really meant for HN. Do you have an opinion of substance?
kristiandupont 10y ago
I think you are taking the abstraction too far. True, there are some very significant similarities but there are also differences and although they may be subtle, such differences can lead to vastly different uses. Facebook and Twitter were never "officially" about posting short-lived, single-view posts the way Snapchat is and I for one never used them like that (and I've been on both for many years). You might be right about ads eventually ruining it, but that doesn't mean that it's otherwise identical.
leonroy 10y ago
>...it works for a while until you get too big. Then you can't pay for it and you have to start inject ads... In a rather serendipitious stroke Snapchat don't have to maintain armies of servers to hold years of user data (unlike Facebook or Twitter). I think this will help them a lot in the long run in keeping their costs low and advertising to a minimum. This topic actually reminds me of that great Gavin Belson rant in Silicon Valley: Gavin Belson: "Data creation is exploding. With all the selfies and useless files people refuse to delete on the Cloud - 92% of the world's data was created in the last two years alone. At the current rate, the world's data storage capacity will be overtaken by next Spring. It will be nothing short of a catastrophe: data shortages, data rationing, data black markets... Datageddon!"
- toyg 10y ago
  I don't think so. I'm sure anything older than a year on FB goes on some sort of extra-slow storage, which is likely why their search is crap and will forever be crap. The real expense for FB is likely to be in guaranteeing realtime sync between dozens of platforms and gazillions of clients. All that JS and PHP has to be coded up and served somehow... Same for Twitter -- everyone remembers the "whale" when they were struggling with infrastructure pains, then they massively invested to sort that out... and ended up chasing profits to pay for it all, of course. Snapchat will soon get there as well.
NathanKP 10y ago
The thing that people tend to miss about Snapchat is that it has a really creative monetization strategy. I actually like Snapchat ads, while I hate ads everywhere else and install ad blockers on all my devices. The sponsored filters tend to be really fun, and I end up sending and receiving multiple pictures over the course of the day that used the sponsored filter. And the ads in Vice, Buzzfeed, and other stories are well crafted to fit in with the content. The ads feel like snaps from friends, rather than the spammy, low quality crap that you see in other places on the internet. Platforms like Facebook and Twitter have awkward, disruptive ad systems, but Snapchat already has a successful ad system that people actually enjoy interacting with, and that is amazing.
dlsx 10y ago
And then the next era may be independence. Remember all of the geocities websites in the 1990s? There was a certain charm to all of that.
RodericDay 10y ago
You're not taking crazy pills. You're spot on.

cloudjacker 10y ago

yeah no, snapchat was never a timeline and thats what was good about it you want to be connected with someone because you are friends but don't like the random shit they post but don't want to unfriend them? thats a problem for a different social network but not snapchat

themagician 10y ago
It is a timeline though. I open Snapchat and I see all the messages and stories, in order—sorted by time. It's not jumbled, there's no features. There's no "Featured" or "Top Stories" or "Retweets". It's just a timeline of content. From people I follow or people I know who have sent things to me. My Snapchat looks just like my Twitter did in 2008, except with a few more boobs.
- cloudjacker 10y ago
  ok by definition of timeline correct, by UX of timeline no. it doesn't show you what it is without you explicitly diving into that story
  - themagician 10y ago
    What are you talking about? I open Snapchat and it's literally two timelines, a private one and a public one. They are in order and timestamped. By definition and by UX. It is perhaps a quintessential example of a timeline of content.
    - cloudjacker 10y ago
      nah when people think timeline they think the UX of Facebook, Twitter and tertiary networks that show you cards of data, everything about the post they don't think some pedantic shit about it being "in order and timestamped so that fulfills all the criteria!"
    - themagician 10y ago
      You are the one being pedantic in this case. Sorry a list of content sorted by time is a timeline. I don't know what else you call that.

mrweasel 10y ago

>Someone invents a service that does that. Slowly ads take over. The problem really is that no one wants to pay for services, or no one is willing to try charging for their services. Ads are the "safe" option, but it will also make your users leave in the long run. I was pretty baffled when a publisher wrote that they would rather make money from ads on their site, than make money from people buying a subscription. Service like Twitter, Snapchat and what not seems to be the same way, there's no desire to try anything but ads. It is still my belief that at some point some large seller of physical goods will announce that they're pull their online ads due to lack of profitability. After that the entire online media business will be forced to charge their users, and we'll all be better off. Maybe it's just wishful thinking.

raimue 10y ago
> or no one is willing to try charging for their services app.net tried, but it was not successful.
- majewsky 10y ago
  In Germany, especially since Snowden, there is a healthy niche for paid mail providers, such as posteo.de or mailbox.org. I pay 1€ per month for my mailbox because it allows me to be certain that I'm the customer, not the product.
  - mrweasel 10y ago
    I pay a little more for KolabNow, but I'm happy to do it.
weavie 10y ago
So what is the alternative? We don't want to pay, we don't want ads.. how else can these things make money?
- mrweasel 10y ago
  My alternative isn't one that most people would accept, but I'd be fine with money losing companies ceasing to exist. I'm fairly confident that Snapchat could make money charging their users, if the fee is sufficiently small. Say $10 per year, perhaps as an in-app purchase, with the first 6 month being free. We also may have to accept that some of these companies, Twitter seems the most obvious, isn't actually providing anything of tangible value to the average user and therefore can't exist. Of cause if some investors wants to keep throwing money at Twitter to keep the lights on, they're more than welcome. I know I'm not exactly being friendly towards Twitter, but it's a great example of a company that needs to fail. The only reason they don't is because investors have already wasted so much money that they're desperately trying so save it in hope of making the money back, by some miracle. Part of it might also be that investors, journalists and bankers are so heavy users of Twitter that they fail to see that the business isn't sustainable. In the end the user will always be the one to pay the bill. Either by directly paying, or indirectly via advertising.

Kiro 10y ago

I honestly don't think you get it. I've lived through all major social networks and the only one I've shared stuff on is Snapchat. It's a major breakthrough for me.

themagician 10y ago
Sounds like the one who doesn't get it is you.
- Kiro 10y ago
  Nope, you are definintely the one who doesn't get it considering you're completely missing why Snapchat is a different beast.
  - Teeboo 10y ago
    Elaborate please. Why is it different?

majewsky 10y ago

> It's all the same. Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat. People want a free way to broadcast to their friends. That's only one use-case. I don't use Twitter at all to broadcast to my friends. I broadcast political opinion and tech humor to whomever it may concern, and receive condensed insights from public figures whom I find relevant for me.

aethos 10y ago
I would argue that "purposeful" users like yourself are in the minority.

TeMPOraL 10y ago

I agree. I just deleted Instagram from my phone (for unrelated reasons), but one thing I've noticed recently in my somewhat irregular usage of that service is that it started to inject ads and "promoted content" in between the posts of people I follow. Frankly, it's fucking annoying. But the point is, Instagram seems to be entering the "ad phase" you're describing.

Teeboo 10y ago

This. This. This. This. This. This. I believe the value of the social networking platform to a user is inverse to the maturity of the company. Facebook has already become choked with it's own content and advertisements so the next generation migrate to a "cleaner" platform. The centre of gravity shifts. New platform monetises and the choking cycle begins anew... The stages - Stage 1: Platform Exclusivity Platform Coveted Platform Expanded Stage 2: Platform Opened Platform Developed (upon) Platform Expanded Stage 3 Platform Monetised PLatform Curated Platform Locked (to previous developers to protect revenue streams) Stage 4 Platfrom Alternatives Platform Decline Platform Obsolescence You could, quite easily Venn Diagram where the current social media services are and how they are eating the older's market share. As platforms lock developers out, other pre-revenue companies are opening up to those developers stealing previously allegiant demographics.

dave2000 10y ago
Perhaps I'm missing something but I don't see or don't recognize any ads. Is this just because you're using the app whereas I'm using a browser with an ad blocker? Or do you see ads more when you poke around looking at groups and games and whatever (I just spend a few minutes a week looking at friends posts and rarely comment or post any of my own content;i really only joined for Messenger)
- Teeboo 10y ago
  You don't see ads on Facebook? It must be the ad blocker. 70% of the real estate via browser is ad based. Those ads don't include promoted posts from pages you elected to follow. The majority of content on FB is promotional.
  - dhimes 10y ago
    Holy crap! I had no idea.
    - Teeboo 10y ago
      What? Not sure what has inspired your sarcasm. I and another poster are discussing the UX experience which differs between browser with ad-blocker and other versions. Thy kind of sarcasm is not really meant for HN. Do you have an opinion of substance?

kristiandupont 10y ago

I think you are taking the abstraction too far. True, there are some very significant similarities but there are also differences and although they may be subtle, such differences can lead to vastly different uses. Facebook and Twitter were never "officially" about posting short-lived, single-view posts the way Snapchat is and I for one never used them like that (and I've been on both for many years). You might be right about ads eventually ruining it, but that doesn't mean that it's otherwise identical.

leonroy 10y ago

>...it works for a while until you get too big. Then you can't pay for it and you have to start inject ads... In a rather serendipitious stroke Snapchat don't have to maintain armies of servers to hold years of user data (unlike Facebook or Twitter). I think this will help them a lot in the long run in keeping their costs low and advertising to a minimum. This topic actually reminds me of that great Gavin Belson rant in Silicon Valley: Gavin Belson: "Data creation is exploding. With all the selfies and useless files people refuse to delete on the Cloud - 92% of the world's data was created in the last two years alone. At the current rate, the world's data storage capacity will be overtaken by next Spring. It will be nothing short of a catastrophe: data shortages, data rationing, data black markets... Datageddon!"

toyg 10y ago
I don't think so. I'm sure anything older than a year on FB goes on some sort of extra-slow storage, which is likely why their search is crap and will forever be crap. The real expense for FB is likely to be in guaranteeing realtime sync between dozens of platforms and gazillions of clients. All that JS and PHP has to be coded up and served somehow... Same for Twitter -- everyone remembers the "whale" when they were struggling with infrastructure pains, then they massively invested to sort that out... and ended up chasing profits to pay for it all, of course. Snapchat will soon get there as well.

NathanKP 10y ago

The thing that people tend to miss about Snapchat is that it has a really creative monetization strategy. I actually like Snapchat ads, while I hate ads everywhere else and install ad blockers on all my devices. The sponsored filters tend to be really fun, and I end up sending and receiving multiple pictures over the course of the day that used the sponsored filter. And the ads in Vice, Buzzfeed, and other stories are well crafted to fit in with the content. The ads feel like snaps from friends, rather than the spammy, low quality crap that you see in other places on the internet. Platforms like Facebook and Twitter have awkward, disruptive ad systems, but Snapchat already has a successful ad system that people actually enjoy interacting with, and that is amazing.

dlsx 10y ago

And then the next era may be independence. Remember all of the geocities websites in the 1990s? There was a certain charm to all of that.

RodericDay 10y ago

You're not taking crazy pills. You're spot on.