3 ms·

and one-punch KO Facebook Wha? A bunch of geeks living in the echo chamber are pissed about a privacy issue, so they all cruise over to a geeky website, and t

and one-punch KO Facebook Wha? A bunch of geeks living in the echo chamber are pissed about a privacy issue, so they all cruise over to a geeky website, and toss in $20 of their geek-inflated disposable income, to a vaporware project whose popularity is mostly due to politics. Meanwhile, in the time it took me to write this, ten million people logged in to Facebook. Methinks a little perspective is in order here.

jacquesm 17y ago
Exactly. All this amounts to at this stage is a signal to facebook. A powerful signal, absolutely. But not by any stretch of the imagination a threat. If they deliver somewhere in the fall and if it starts to draw significant traffic and if they don't have a big security breach themselves, and if there is no falling out between the four founders then they might be a contender. But that's a lot of ifs.
- rick_2047 17y ago
  I was just wondering is the 100k worth the powerful signal.
  - jacquesm 17y ago
    > I was just wondering is the 100k worth the powerful signal. Don't you mean the opposite?
    - rick_2047 17y ago
      No I don't. Not many people care about there privacy (otherwise facebook would have been bust). And even if they had pledged 200% or 300% that would have been enough to send a strong signal but 1088% of pledging is just not right. There could have been so much more done with the other 80k. So many other things need money.
      - jacquesm 17y ago
        Ah, I get you now, sorry. I don't know if it is not 'right', the signal function would have been just as strong if they would have set their original goal at $100K and people would have sent them that much $. In some ways the $amount is a value that collapses a number of underlying elements to a single number, the amount of frustration around facebook privacy, the people that simply wish these kids luck and there are a number of people that hate facebook enough to put up a substantial amount of $. Which portion of that $100K ($109K already, $4500 per hour right now) comes from the 'signal' portion is hard to tell.

jacquesm 17y ago

Exactly. All this amounts to at this stage is a signal to facebook. A powerful signal, absolutely. But not by any stretch of the imagination a threat. If they deliver somewhere in the fall and if it starts to draw significant traffic and if they don't have a big security breach themselves, and if there is no falling out between the four founders then they might be a contender. But that's a lot of ifs.

rick_2047 17y ago
I was just wondering is the 100k worth the powerful signal.
- jacquesm 17y ago
  > I was just wondering is the 100k worth the powerful signal. Don't you mean the opposite?
  - rick_2047 17y ago
    No I don't. Not many people care about there privacy (otherwise facebook would have been bust). And even if they had pledged 200% or 300% that would have been enough to send a strong signal but 1088% of pledging is just not right. There could have been so much more done with the other 80k. So many other things need money.
    - jacquesm 17y ago
      Ah, I get you now, sorry. I don't know if it is not 'right', the signal function would have been just as strong if they would have set their original goal at $100K and people would have sent them that much $. In some ways the $amount is a value that collapses a number of underlying elements to a single number, the amount of frustration around facebook privacy, the people that simply wish these kids luck and there are a number of people that hate facebook enough to put up a substantial amount of $. Which portion of that $100K ($109K already, $4500 per hour right now) comes from the 'signal' portion is hard to tell.