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I don't understand why people don't just email photos to their friends without involving middlemen like facebook? Don't you have your friends in a private cont

I don't understand why people don't just email photos to their friends without involving middlemen like facebook? Don't you have your friends in a private contacts list/address book? Isn't it trivial to send a photo attached to an email? What is the problem? Note: I do not and never have used facebook, genuinely don't understand what the deal is here.

saagarjha 9y ago
Convenience, I’d expect. Not everyone has the email addresses of all their friends, and email has limits on file sizes, etc.
jen729w 9y ago
People are strange. My family all have iPhones, we all use iMessage, yet for some reason we have a group chat on WhatsApp which is where my sister and mam share photos of my nieces. The functionality is no different to iMessage. I don’t know why this happens. It just does.
Transfinity 9y ago
I think the main difference between the two mediums is that email is push-based, while Facebook is pull-based. With email, you have to explicitly select recipients. You're essentially saying "here are my photos, I think they are relevant to you specifically". The onus is on the sender to figure out what's good for the receiver, and it's considered rude to send many frivolous or irrelevant messages. Think of how you grumble when you unsubscribe from some company's mailing list - this is an example of this social norm. With Facebook, you say "my photos are here, anyone may look at them if they want". Figuring out whether the content is relevant is now the job of the receiver, not the sender. Facebook's UI is well aligned with this role: unlike email, where you must explicitly download attachments and mark messages as read, on Fb image previews are displayed inline and to never see a message again you must only scroll past it. Advertisements aren't considered intrusive, it's just content from another source that is (in theory) just as easy to ignore. The social dynamic is very different, and so it's used to send a different sort of message than email.
- 4ad 9y ago
  Related, but sadly unavailable: http://cr.yp.to/im2000.html http://cr.yp.to/im2000.html
rahoulb 9y ago
I have 75 relatives on Facebook who live around 3000 miles away from me. If I want to share a photo do I send a mass email to all 75 annoying those who aren’t interested, do I BCC everyone so I get repeated responses (and those responses aren’t shared with anyone else who is interested). Or do I post it on my Facebook feed where those who aren’t interested can ignore it (and it will be gone soon) and those who are can have a conversation around it without getting in everyone else’s way? Edit: ok maybe around 40, not 75. But point still stands, it’s indirect communication rather than remembering about that cousin of an auntie’s grandparent’s nephew’s sister-in-law that I met ten years ago.

saagarjha 9y ago

Convenience, I’d expect. Not everyone has the email addresses of all their friends, and email has limits on file sizes, etc.

jen729w 9y ago

People are strange. My family all have iPhones, we all use iMessage, yet for some reason we have a group chat on WhatsApp which is where my sister and mam share photos of my nieces. The functionality is no different to iMessage. I don’t know why this happens. It just does.

Transfinity 9y ago

I think the main difference between the two mediums is that email is push-based, while Facebook is pull-based. With email, you have to explicitly select recipients. You're essentially saying "here are my photos, I think they are relevant to you specifically". The onus is on the sender to figure out what's good for the receiver, and it's considered rude to send many frivolous or irrelevant messages. Think of how you grumble when you unsubscribe from some company's mailing list - this is an example of this social norm. With Facebook, you say "my photos are here, anyone may look at them if they want". Figuring out whether the content is relevant is now the job of the receiver, not the sender. Facebook's UI is well aligned with this role: unlike email, where you must explicitly download attachments and mark messages as read, on Fb image previews are displayed inline and to never see a message again you must only scroll past it. Advertisements aren't considered intrusive, it's just content from another source that is (in theory) just as easy to ignore. The social dynamic is very different, and so it's used to send a different sort of message than email.

4ad 9y ago
Related, but sadly unavailable: http://cr.yp.to/im2000.html http://cr.yp.to/im2000.html

rahoulb 9y ago

I have 75 relatives on Facebook who live around 3000 miles away from me. If I want to share a photo do I send a mass email to all 75 annoying those who aren’t interested, do I BCC everyone so I get repeated responses (and those responses aren’t shared with anyone else who is interested). Or do I post it on my Facebook feed where those who aren’t interested can ignore it (and it will be gone soon) and those who are can have a conversation around it without getting in everyone else’s way? Edit: ok maybe around 40, not 75. But point still stands, it’s indirect communication rather than remembering about that cousin of an auntie’s grandparent’s nephew’s sister-in-law that I met ten years ago.