5 ms·

Ask HN: Future of Facebook?

6 points by rblion 16y ago

Will Facebook continue to go unchallenged and dominate the web? Or will a bold startup disrupt their plans? Or a different scenario? What do you all think?

david927 16y ago
I give FB about two, maybe three, years. It's hard to imagine tectonic shifts, but they happen in technology pretty often. And we have all the ingredients for a shift. The only thing left that's needed is a well-played challenger, and we'll get several by year's end.
- rblion 16y ago
  I fully agree. Facebook is tied to Microsoft and Yahoo, two sinking ships in the consumer psyche, birds of a feather flock together. I wonder if Apple will ever see the need to parter with a social platform...
  - kimfuh 16y ago
    I've always wondered if apple would ever do that. How they'd stay exist post-jobs.
vital101 16y ago
I don't think that Facebook will sink. However, since it's spread itself so thin over so many different areas I think that some startups might come in a become bigger players. It's kind of like Myspace. Facebook did a good job destroying their > 18 demographic, but it still has a strong following amongst teenagers (source: many younger cousins)
samratjp 16y ago
Diaspora's an interesting contender, though I doubt it can beat facebook's mom/grandma-friendly ease of use. Facebook is pretty smart, mind you, but they do need to pick up the pace on mobile (maybe, they'll buy Loopt as they should anyways). It would be very funny to see the next big startup beating facebook using facebook's Open Source tools. I mean, to scale that high, you would be silly not to. After all, Diaspora's betting on MongoDB (wonder why they didn't go with Cassandra, hmm? :-p) As about the future, facebook will continue to make the web facebookable, the "Like" is only the beginning. I wouldn't be surprised if facebook integrated loopt to make real places "Like"able and have check in's as a core feature. facebook sign-in will continue to have more impact and it's likely that facebook may even dominate commenting using a Disqus like approach.

6 points by rblion 16y ago

Will Facebook continue to go unchallenged and dominate the web? Or will a bold startup disrupt their plans? Or a different scenario? What do you all think?

david927 16y ago

I give FB about two, maybe three, years. It's hard to imagine tectonic shifts, but they happen in technology pretty often. And we have all the ingredients for a shift. The only thing left that's needed is a well-played challenger, and we'll get several by year's end.

rblion 16y ago
I fully agree. Facebook is tied to Microsoft and Yahoo, two sinking ships in the consumer psyche, birds of a feather flock together. I wonder if Apple will ever see the need to parter with a social platform...
- kimfuh 16y ago
  I've always wondered if apple would ever do that. How they'd stay exist post-jobs.

vital101 16y ago

I don't think that Facebook will sink. However, since it's spread itself so thin over so many different areas I think that some startups might come in a become bigger players. It's kind of like Myspace. Facebook did a good job destroying their > 18 demographic, but it still has a strong following amongst teenagers (source: many younger cousins)

samratjp 16y ago

Diaspora's an interesting contender, though I doubt it can beat facebook's mom/grandma-friendly ease of use. Facebook is pretty smart, mind you, but they do need to pick up the pace on mobile (maybe, they'll buy Loopt as they should anyways). It would be very funny to see the next big startup beating facebook using facebook's Open Source tools. I mean, to scale that high, you would be silly not to. After all, Diaspora's betting on MongoDB (wonder why they didn't go with Cassandra, hmm? :-p) As about the future, facebook will continue to make the web facebookable, the "Like" is only the beginning. I wouldn't be surprised if facebook integrated loopt to make real places "Like"able and have check in's as a core feature. facebook sign-in will continue to have more impact and it's likely that facebook may even dominate commenting using a Disqus like approach.