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I've actually spent quite a bit of time working on a design document for an open source version of the Facebook platform. I got a fair bit of the architecture a

I've actually spent quite a bit of time working on a design document for an open source version of the Facebook platform. I got a fair bit of the architecture and requirements down for what I believed would make the project successful. Then I came to the slow realization that the world had categorically no use for a Facebook alternative. The features of Facebook are largely meaningless. What matters is the absolute stranglehold Facebook has and will maintain via acquisitions of users. It's not a question of simply getting the user to register for another site. Many Facebook users will have as many as five or more Facebook products on their mobile. They'll also be logged into a half dozen other properties on the internet with Facebook's OAuth scheme. Icing on the cake? Tinder. Every college aged person I've spoken to has little interest in Facebook. But they've all reinstalled it in order to use Tinder. You cannot get a mass migration to occur unless their is an absolute PR Apocalypse at Facebook or if you can offer absolute parity to the slow dopamine drip provided by constant notifications and social validations coming from all their products. At once.

Bahamut 9y ago
I think there is space for an alternative - keep in mind that that doesn't mean that they have to be hugely popular. For example, some online communities I am a part of subsist mainly in chat rooms, or forums. Those communities are so tightly knit in many ways. While a lot of us are also friends on FB, our ties in these communities are still very strong.
- anigbrowl 9y ago
  I'm in some such communities too, but efforts to get anything going on other sites outside fb come to nothing because you just end up with more social media to keep track of for no real benefit - you can't do anything sufficiently interesting that you can't already do on FB, and you've lost all the network effects for content discovery, rapid dissemination of news or sufficiently entertaining content etc. OK you gain privacy but that's really a negative freedom. I assume everything I do online is visible to spies and corporations anyway unless I go to the bother of running Tor (and probably even then), so moving some of my social activity off FB isn't much more effective than virtually waving a fist in Mark Zuckerberg's direction. Let's be realistic here, small specialist forums are simply not going to overcome large-scale network effects absent massive functional advantages.
  - type0 9y ago
    > I assume everything I do online is visible to spies and corporations anyway unless I go to the bother of running Tor Not quite sure what's your point here but most subject specific forums on the web have a huge bunch of users with nicknames and not their real names. With the same reasoning you could also say: no need to close the door to WC when you go there to do your needs since people outside know what you're doing there anyway! If you use VPN and a lot less of your personal information will be sold to advertisers.
siquick 9y ago
You can sign up to Tinder with your mobile number now.

Bahamut 9y ago

I think there is space for an alternative - keep in mind that that doesn't mean that they have to be hugely popular. For example, some online communities I am a part of subsist mainly in chat rooms, or forums. Those communities are so tightly knit in many ways. While a lot of us are also friends on FB, our ties in these communities are still very strong.

anigbrowl 9y ago
I'm in some such communities too, but efforts to get anything going on other sites outside fb come to nothing because you just end up with more social media to keep track of for no real benefit - you can't do anything sufficiently interesting that you can't already do on FB, and you've lost all the network effects for content discovery, rapid dissemination of news or sufficiently entertaining content etc. OK you gain privacy but that's really a negative freedom. I assume everything I do online is visible to spies and corporations anyway unless I go to the bother of running Tor (and probably even then), so moving some of my social activity off FB isn't much more effective than virtually waving a fist in Mark Zuckerberg's direction. Let's be realistic here, small specialist forums are simply not going to overcome large-scale network effects absent massive functional advantages.
- type0 9y ago
  > I assume everything I do online is visible to spies and corporations anyway unless I go to the bother of running Tor Not quite sure what's your point here but most subject specific forums on the web have a huge bunch of users with nicknames and not their real names. With the same reasoning you could also say: no need to close the door to WC when you go there to do your needs since people outside know what you're doing there anyway! If you use VPN and a lot less of your personal information will be sold to advertisers.

siquick 9y ago

You can sign up to Tinder with your mobile number now.