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The question isn't "can Facebook be replaced" as much as it is "why haven't alternatives already succeeded?" I'm thinking of Diaspora* in particular.

jph 9y ago
For Diaspora in particular, this archived article goes in depth. "What happened to the Facebook killer? It's complicated." (2012-10-02) https://web.archive.org/web/20121009223506/https://motherboard.vice.com/2012/10/2/what-happened-to-the-facebook-killer-it-s-complicated https://web.archive.org/web/20121009223506/https://motherboa... Excerpts: * The team of four young kids had little real-world programming experience. * The team found themselves crushed under the weight of expectation. * The first release, on September 15, 2010 was a public disaster, mainly for its bugs and security holes. * Google+ imitated Diaspora core features such as circles, and invested lots of money, but still failed. * The team ran low on money, and VC interested waned. * Sadly one of team members suicided.
- WheelsAtLarge 9y ago
  here's a direct link: https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/pggg3z/what-happened-to-the-facebook-killer-it-s-complicated https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/pggg3z/what-happe...
petercooper 9y ago
Working backwards from social networks that have succeeded back to their origins, I think a common factor is that they really caught an entire community/subset of society and then spread from there. Facebook took over Harvard, MIT, and then spread uni to uni until people were clamoring to get on. I still remember when I wasn't able to get onto FB. Pinterest's growth was really weak early on when they tried to be all things to all people, but then they doubled down on women, fashion, and crafters. Hacker News started oriented around the Valley and Valley-leaning/Web 2.0 entrepreneurs. Reddit's initial userbase is a bit more complicated to define but was not anywhere as diverse as it is now. If you look at less successful, but still succeeding, social networks you see a little of this occurring. Orkut was general but quickly became a Brazilian social network. Ello was general but doubled down on designers and is still going. Sticking to your niche works fine if you lack the escape velocity to go general. Diaspora's problem, to me, is that "people sick of Twitter" is not really a cohesive community. Similarly for app.net and Mastodon. "People sick of Facebook" is likely to be a similarly pointless target market.

jph 9y ago

For Diaspora in particular, this archived article goes in depth. "What happened to the Facebook killer? It's complicated." (2012-10-02) https://web.archive.org/web/20121009223506/https://motherboard.vice.com/2012/10/2/what-happened-to-the-facebook-killer-it-s-complicated https://web.archive.org/web/20121009223506/https://motherboa... Excerpts: * The team of four young kids had little real-world programming experience. * The team found themselves crushed under the weight of expectation. * The first release, on September 15, 2010 was a public disaster, mainly for its bugs and security holes. * Google+ imitated Diaspora core features such as circles, and invested lots of money, but still failed. * The team ran low on money, and VC interested waned. * Sadly one of team members suicided.

WheelsAtLarge 9y ago
here's a direct link: https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/pggg3z/what-happened-to-the-facebook-killer-it-s-complicated https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/pggg3z/what-happe...

petercooper 9y ago

Working backwards from social networks that have succeeded back to their origins, I think a common factor is that they really caught an entire community/subset of society and then spread from there. Facebook took over Harvard, MIT, and then spread uni to uni until people were clamoring to get on. I still remember when I wasn't able to get onto FB. Pinterest's growth was really weak early on when they tried to be all things to all people, but then they doubled down on women, fashion, and crafters. Hacker News started oriented around the Valley and Valley-leaning/Web 2.0 entrepreneurs. Reddit's initial userbase is a bit more complicated to define but was not anywhere as diverse as it is now. If you look at less successful, but still succeeding, social networks you see a little of this occurring. Orkut was general but quickly became a Brazilian social network. Ello was general but doubled down on designers and is still going. Sticking to your niche works fine if you lack the escape velocity to go general. Diaspora's problem, to me, is that "people sick of Twitter" is not really a cohesive community. Similarly for app.net and Mastodon. "People sick of Facebook" is likely to be a similarly pointless target market.