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Seems like panic is starting to take hold. Unfortunately, neither this or the news feed update is gonna change the tide, its just too late. The transformation t

Seems like panic is starting to take hold. Unfortunately, neither this or the news feed update is gonna change the tide, its just too late. The transformation to Orkut/MySpace has already began and I am loving it. The social media experiment has failed, its become too big and caused too much psychological damage on individuals. I look forward to more and more niche communities :)

aetherson 9y ago
What evidence is there that Facebook in particular or social media in general is actually declining, rather than occasionally inspiring cranky articles?
- apocalyptic0n3 9y ago
  There is a bit of evidence in that US and Canadian daily users declined for the first time last quarter. [1] [1]: https://www.recode.net/2018/1/31/16957122/facebook-daily-active-user-decline-us-canda-q4-earnings-2018 https://www.recode.net/2018/1/31/16957122/facebook-daily-act...
- mantas 9y ago
  Regarding other social media, such functionality is longer seen as a perk by users. Interesting example may be Strava. They seem to be gravitating more towards "social" than "data crunching" kind of app. Nobody in my circles use it as "social" tool. People are not happy they're investing in bullshit functionality rather than fixing long-standing "data crunching" issues. Few mistakes here and there and people may start leaving for less "social" counterparts. There's little lockin in fitness apps anyway. Strava may be trying to steal a piece of Facebook's cake and solve lack of lockin. But IMO they're shooting themselves in a foot.
- jvagner 9y ago
  Evidence? Perhaps too early for that, but the article notes the pollster publishing the results of a survey after he left Facebook and started his own company: "Among tech companies, 32 percent of Americans said Facebook is harmful. A separate survey, which placed Facebook among other large brands including Walmart, McDonald’s, and Marlboro, found that 27 percent said it is harmful." There was an old article about which companies people could abandon first, among companies like Facebook, Google, Apple and Amazon. I believe Facebook was pretty high on that list. If you look at what happened to a company like AOL (just typing that seemed weird) or even Myspace, it's quite easy to imagine Facebook fading hard, mostly because people WANT it to fade, or they lose interest. On my own side, I only keep it around to share photos of my kid with my close friends and family. Beyond that, among the FB friends I have from years of working in tech, very few of them ever post anything at all. There's a silent percentage of the demographic who basically use FB as an RSS reader. How valuable will that be over time?
pessimizer 9y ago
Sadly, I think this is wishful thinking. What's happening is that internet and tech companies, like all state-supported monopolies eventually, are explicitly becoming primarily political organizations. Transitioning into (or starting as) a "platform", when your infrastructure is a basic CRUD app, is indistinguishable from rent-seeking, and ultimately leads to becoming a new layer of government. The real infrastructure is audience-capture through transition costs, the acquisition of potential competitors, deep relationships with and/or direct control of media outlets, and specific government subsidy through specificity in legislation, regulatory capture, government contracts and sustained quid pro quo relationships with specific government officials and institutions (revolving doors and kickbacks.) The CRUD app is just a peppercorn. None of these companies can afford to not compete on that level and expect to have the growth that their investors require. The potential that they will have a future de facto monopoly on entire forms of interaction between individuals is already priced into these companies. That's why the fight between Google and Uber over Waymo is so important (to them.) It's ultimately deciding who will have the monopoly over the only forms of transportation that they plan to allow. This is the only situation in which one could feel sorry for Uber, who is outclassed. About facebook, who is looking to take over all peer-to-peer interaction on the internet, and all consumption of news (or ideas in general, ultimately); I'd say to compare a 30% dislike poll on facebook to a poll on any other piece of government. It's really not so bad. And while Zuckerberg is repellent to a lot of people currently; if he can't pull a Bill Gates turnaround by strategically pandering through throwing cash around, he could simply fade into the background and make the face of the company somebody people liked. Depends on whether his lust for power or his lust to be loved is higher. /rant
seanalltogether 9y ago
I genuinely have no idea where people like my parents or siblings would go if Facebook vanished tomorrow. Many many people that rely on current social media platforms don't have the desire to spend time investigating and experimenting with different social tools, nor do they have a desire to fragment their communication across multiple separate platforms.
rayalez 9y ago
Do you know of any new communities that might replace it? How do you think they should look like?
bambax 9y ago
That sounds a lot like wishful thinking. As much as I would like it to be true, I don't see it happening. I have never had a Facebook account so I don't know what people find in it, but it really is unclear if people are leaving it in droves? Anyway the problem isn't Facebook per se, it's "social networks" in general; if Facebook is replaced by something similar with a different name, that's not progress, that's more of the same.

aetherson 9y ago

What evidence is there that Facebook in particular or social media in general is actually declining, rather than occasionally inspiring cranky articles?

apocalyptic0n3 9y ago
There is a bit of evidence in that US and Canadian daily users declined for the first time last quarter. [1] [1]: https://www.recode.net/2018/1/31/16957122/facebook-daily-active-user-decline-us-canda-q4-earnings-2018 https://www.recode.net/2018/1/31/16957122/facebook-daily-act...
mantas 9y ago
Regarding other social media, such functionality is longer seen as a perk by users. Interesting example may be Strava. They seem to be gravitating more towards "social" than "data crunching" kind of app. Nobody in my circles use it as "social" tool. People are not happy they're investing in bullshit functionality rather than fixing long-standing "data crunching" issues. Few mistakes here and there and people may start leaving for less "social" counterparts. There's little lockin in fitness apps anyway. Strava may be trying to steal a piece of Facebook's cake and solve lack of lockin. But IMO they're shooting themselves in a foot.
jvagner 9y ago
Evidence? Perhaps too early for that, but the article notes the pollster publishing the results of a survey after he left Facebook and started his own company: "Among tech companies, 32 percent of Americans said Facebook is harmful. A separate survey, which placed Facebook among other large brands including Walmart, McDonald’s, and Marlboro, found that 27 percent said it is harmful." There was an old article about which companies people could abandon first, among companies like Facebook, Google, Apple and Amazon. I believe Facebook was pretty high on that list. If you look at what happened to a company like AOL (just typing that seemed weird) or even Myspace, it's quite easy to imagine Facebook fading hard, mostly because people WANT it to fade, or they lose interest. On my own side, I only keep it around to share photos of my kid with my close friends and family. Beyond that, among the FB friends I have from years of working in tech, very few of them ever post anything at all. There's a silent percentage of the demographic who basically use FB as an RSS reader. How valuable will that be over time?

pessimizer 9y ago

Sadly, I think this is wishful thinking. What's happening is that internet and tech companies, like all state-supported monopolies eventually, are explicitly becoming primarily political organizations. Transitioning into (or starting as) a "platform", when your infrastructure is a basic CRUD app, is indistinguishable from rent-seeking, and ultimately leads to becoming a new layer of government. The real infrastructure is audience-capture through transition costs, the acquisition of potential competitors, deep relationships with and/or direct control of media outlets, and specific government subsidy through specificity in legislation, regulatory capture, government contracts and sustained quid pro quo relationships with specific government officials and institutions (revolving doors and kickbacks.) The CRUD app is just a peppercorn. None of these companies can afford to not compete on that level and expect to have the growth that their investors require. The potential that they will have a future de facto monopoly on entire forms of interaction between individuals is already priced into these companies. That's why the fight between Google and Uber over Waymo is so important (to them.) It's ultimately deciding who will have the monopoly over the only forms of transportation that they plan to allow. This is the only situation in which one could feel sorry for Uber, who is outclassed. About facebook, who is looking to take over all peer-to-peer interaction on the internet, and all consumption of news (or ideas in general, ultimately); I'd say to compare a 30% dislike poll on facebook to a poll on any other piece of government. It's really not so bad. And while Zuckerberg is repellent to a lot of people currently; if he can't pull a Bill Gates turnaround by strategically pandering through throwing cash around, he could simply fade into the background and make the face of the company somebody people liked. Depends on whether his lust for power or his lust to be loved is higher. /rant

seanalltogether 9y ago

I genuinely have no idea where people like my parents or siblings would go if Facebook vanished tomorrow. Many many people that rely on current social media platforms don't have the desire to spend time investigating and experimenting with different social tools, nor do they have a desire to fragment their communication across multiple separate platforms.

rayalez 9y ago

Do you know of any new communities that might replace it? How do you think they should look like?

bambax 9y ago

That sounds a lot like wishful thinking. As much as I would like it to be true, I don't see it happening. I have never had a Facebook account so I don't know what people find in it, but it really is unclear if people are leaving it in droves? Anyway the problem isn't Facebook per se, it's "social networks" in general; if Facebook is replaced by something similar with a different name, that's not progress, that's more of the same.