They have firmly situated themselves as the dominant social network, and I don't see this changing for a long time. But even now, Facebook's influence on our l

They have firmly situated themselves as the dominant social network, and I don't see this changing for a long time. But even now, Facebook's influence on our lives is fading away. As nearly everyone starts using it, and as everyone starts forming connections with anyone they have briefly met, it's power becomes greatly diluted. In many ways, it is becoming LinkedIn - a sterile place where everyone only puts forth their public persona. It's certainly more complex than that, to do a real analysis you need to go feature by feature. Some become more useful as everyone connects (market place, events, causes, messaging, chat) but other things clearly suffer. Facebook used to be a place to share the kind of personal photos only your good friends see, but no longer. Your status used to be a very personal microblog, now you have to be much more careful. Facebook used to be about your personal life, and more and more it's about your public life. Most teenagers will probably reject using Facebook in meaningful ways because of this. And that's the beginning of the end for Facebook as we know it. Soon it will be nothing but infrastructure for our public net existence. Sure they will continue to make money, but I do expect the people who used to spend hours a day on it to start channeling their attention elsewhere. If you want to compete with Facebook, become the tool that lets people follow each others' personal lives again. Let Facebook continue on it's trajectory to become a digital address book.