8 ms·

"Facebook is where you find out your highschool friend is super in to a MLM, your uncle has drastic political views you don't share, and that your historical so

"Facebook is where you find out your highschool friend is super in to a MLM, your uncle has drastic political views you don't share, and that your historical social class and network is largely irrelevant to your life a decade later." This is probably the most accurate description of Facebook I've seen.

mathattack 5y ago
Yes. There are some social groups that still use it (“no practice today”) but the novelty has gone and the youngsters have moved on. If the value of the graph increases exponentially with users, each user leaving causes a disproportionate value drop.
hoffspot 5y ago
It's really a perfect assessment. I couldn't articulate why exactly Facebook felt like I was purely wasting time each time I engaged with the experience (few times a year). This description completely crystallizes my thinking.
ubermonkey 5y ago
I'm reminded of a Twitter joke from (according to the WaPo) @KevinFarzad: "HEY IT'S ME your facebook friend from high school who never left our hometown & thinks Olive Garden is fancy. Anyway, here's a racist article."
- circa 5y ago
  lol classic
  - fooperdupes 5y ago
    lol classist
    - Jackpillar 5y ago
    - monocasa 5y ago
      Not really. A lot of my high school friends in that boat are upper class. One is the new district attorney of my hometown for instance. Another is a regulelar contributer to fox news. The stereotype is orthogonal to class.
      - fullshark 5y ago
        “Thinks Olive Garden is fancy” is clearly a pejorative class signal
        monocasa 5y ago
        In my experience it says more about if you've left your little town for a relatively significant period of time than class. I know train kids with more exposure to the world than that, and as I said above district attorneys and national news contributors who have no interest in anything outside the commercial zone of their suburb.
        shrimp_emoji 5y ago
        > train kids Is this a slur for my kind?
        monocasa 5y ago
        It's a term for teenagers and young adults that left the small town they were from by literally jumping on to a moving cargo train.
        catach 5y ago
        I suspect what may be tripping people up in this kind of discussion is that financial class and social class can be distinct from each other.
- bko 5y ago
  How is that a joke? It's just looking down on someone because of where they live, eat and their politics (assuming very lose definition of "racist"). And when did the role of journalists start including dunking on random people?
  - dgellow 5y ago
    Journalist are normal people. Normal people write shitposts on Twitter. Presidents and CEOs can shitposts on Twitter but journalists cannot? What a weird assumption.
    - bko 5y ago
      Showing contempt for huge swaths of people doesn't really bode well for objectivity. It's in poor taste for anyone to just dunk on people who stay near their homes and eat at olive garden. Sure, journalists CAN shit post, and obviously they do. I guess I assume journalists that cover news for presumably everyone wouldn't have such open contempt for so many people. But hey, that's just me.
      - browningstreet 5y ago
        They’re not dunking on people who stay near home and eat at Olive Garden.
      - ubermonkey 5y ago
        I just realized you're basing your ire here on a misread of my post. The joke is not from a journalist. The joke was copied widely when originally posted, and it wasn't clear to me who wrote it in the first place -- but if I was going to reference it here, I wanted to give proper credit. I found a story in the WaPo about online joke plagiarism, and it used this joke as an example -- and cited musician Kevin Farzad as the original author. Based on this, I credited him in my comment accordingly.
        xdavidliu 5y ago
        I misread your post in exactly the same way and thought the joke was made by a journalist.
- tamaharbor 5y ago
  What’s the matter with Olive Garden?
  - r00fus 5y ago
    Joke is thinking OG is somehow fancy digs.
    - jsnodlin 5y ago
      I wonder where that comes from. Do they pre-prepare their food and microwave it?
      - zamadatix 5y ago
        It's one of the cheapest casual dining restaurants that provide table service but avoids being fast casual dining and still tries to avoid a cheap look. Basically if eating out in general is a luxury due to cost then to you an Olive Garden or an Applebees type place is where you go to have your celebratory types of dinners because either your small town doesn't have much more to go to and/or your income doesn't really let you go spend on 1 12oz steak what could cover the entire meal for a small group at Olive Garden. Of course there is nothing wrong with thinking OG is fancy and so on. Better to avoid folks who make a big deal out of it IMO.
    - meowtimemania 5y ago
      It is fancy to a lot of people. I think the parent tweet is funny, but no need to dunk on people that don’t have a lot of money.
  - effthisis 5y ago
    It's a cheap, sly way to make an anti-White dig.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
dionidium 5y ago
This probably sounds like a real zinger to a certain kind of young person who moved to Brooklyn and thinks everybody back home is a total loser, but this is not the modal Facebook user, so I'm not sure it matters much.
- uncomputation 5y ago
  You’re trying to characterize OP as a condescending out of touch hipster, but in my opinion your characterization of the “modal” Facebook user is actually more so. The “modal” Facebook user is equally capable of being dissatisfied with the product as your 2013 hipster caricature is because FB has failed to deliver on its mission. The social side is boring and doesn’t generate as much engagement because it turns out your friends from high school truly are not relevant to your life, yes even the “modal” Facebook user is capable of change and evolution; and the content side leaves users feeling angry, divided, and exhausted after the hundredth flame war they find themselves embroiled in over the political upset of the day. It does matter.
  - jamal-kumar 5y ago
    "2013 hipster caricature" "largely irrelevant to your life a decade later." hey, 2013 was about a decade ago, you nailed it
- wegs 5y ago
  I won't argue whether it's accurate, but I think you missed the point. You can swap words around, and get the same for any demographic. The friend's perception of the poster would be "HEY IT'S ME your facebook friend from high school who went to New York and thinks is better than you. Anyway, here's a woke article."
  - nopenopenopeno 5y ago
    But that wouldn’t support their argument that FB is failing to keep up with the times. I think it matters largely because I don’t believe that most people just want content. Everyone I speak with who uses FB on a daily basis has made the decision to excuse the habit purely because they are interested in keeping in touch with people. But by excusing that habit, they end up mostly consuming content because that’s what the feed gives them. I left FB the day their “timeline” stopped supporting chronological sort.
earthboundkid 5y ago
A girl I thought was cute in college was totally convinced T***** would retain the Presidency on 1/6, so I guess it was useful as a sign something was going to happen.
- AzzieElbab 5y ago
  I haven’t seen anyone voledermord trump b4
  - earthboundkid 5y ago
    Really? I’ve been doing it continuously since mid-2016, and I don’t think I’m alone.
    - AzzieElbab 5y ago
      why?
      - synthos 5y ago
        He probably wants to avoid having a discussion with trolls and astroturfing 42 supporters who have trouble filling in blanks.
        Case81 5y ago
        And you’re saying the supporters almost all share this particular characteristic that makes them incapable of filling those blanks. Well…it makes sense.
    - tekknik 5y ago
      Do you think if you say his name 3 times he’ll appear?
  - Macha 5y ago
    Just a couple of late night US talk shows, including the most viewed one, have done this.
RC_ITR 5y ago
Well, it was always kind of doomed in this way. When everyone is still actively building their friend list (remember this started for college students) its an amazing product because it brings you closer to people in a new way and allows for curation without investing a ton into AI/ML. For people who stay in a static social bubbles for long times (e.g., your parents, your friends from HS who didn't move to a coastal city) it's also perfect, because they tend to value content related to their social group more than something new and interesting. But for the highest value users (e.g., the ones with high-paying knowledge-based jobs and a willingness to try new things) the social graph will never keep up with their lives. Bad content from the edges of the graph will slowly creep into feeds (MLMs being a prime example) and those high-value users will seek out new platforms that conform better to their interests. Instagram was a brilliant stop-gap, but Mark never saw the writing on the wall about algorithmic content (probably b/c Bytedance had the advantage of cutting its teeth in China first) and is just too far behind to ever really catch up. So now he's trying to out-future Bytedance with VR (and even got them to burn $1bn on Pico), but unless he has some hard-tech rabbit to pull out of his hat, there's just not anything there. We may very well be seeing the largest (negative) turn-around story in history since Yahoo! play out in front of our eyes.
- kwertyoowiyop 5y ago
  When do the desperate acquisitions start?
  - RC_ITR 5y ago
    https://techcrunch.com/2019/11/26/facebook-buys-the-vr-studio-behind-beat-saber/ https://techcrunch.com/2019/11/26/facebook-buys-the-vr-studi... They already have, and if the US Government would allow them to make another acquisition over $1bn, they already would have (I guarantee 5 different Biz Dev associates have made very long PowerPoints about Roblox and Rec Room only to be told the idea is DOA). It's actually kind of amazing that Mark's off-putting personality and desire to remain the face of the company is what will kill it (let's just hope Aaron Sorkin stays alive long enough for the sequel, because it might rival Citizen Kane).
stevofolife 5y ago
Actually it’s not. Your early life social group becoming irrelevant to your life a decade later is NOT representative at all. What is accurate to say is the OP is not connecting with his old friends anymore. But let’s be real here, not everyone’s like that. Facebook is just a tool to connect with people. Attributing and expecting Facebook to make your friendships more relevant and meaningful is foolish and hopeless.

mathattack 5y ago

Yes. There are some social groups that still use it (“no practice today”) but the novelty has gone and the youngsters have moved on. If the value of the graph increases exponentially with users, each user leaving causes a disproportionate value drop.

hoffspot 5y ago

It's really a perfect assessment. I couldn't articulate why exactly Facebook felt like I was purely wasting time each time I engaged with the experience (few times a year). This description completely crystallizes my thinking.

ubermonkey 5y ago

I'm reminded of a Twitter joke from (according to the WaPo) @KevinFarzad: "HEY IT'S ME your facebook friend from high school who never left our hometown & thinks Olive Garden is fancy. Anyway, here's a racist article."

circa 5y ago
lol classic
- fooperdupes 5y ago
  lol classist
  - Jackpillar 5y ago
  - monocasa 5y ago
    Not really. A lot of my high school friends in that boat are upper class. One is the new district attorney of my hometown for instance. Another is a regulelar contributer to fox news. The stereotype is orthogonal to class.
    - fullshark 5y ago
      “Thinks Olive Garden is fancy” is clearly a pejorative class signal
      - monocasa 5y ago
        In my experience it says more about if you've left your little town for a relatively significant period of time than class. I know train kids with more exposure to the world than that, and as I said above district attorneys and national news contributors who have no interest in anything outside the commercial zone of their suburb.
        shrimp_emoji 5y ago
        > train kids Is this a slur for my kind?
        monocasa 5y ago
        It's a term for teenagers and young adults that left the small town they were from by literally jumping on to a moving cargo train.
      - catach 5y ago
        I suspect what may be tripping people up in this kind of discussion is that financial class and social class can be distinct from each other.
bko 5y ago
How is that a joke? It's just looking down on someone because of where they live, eat and their politics (assuming very lose definition of "racist"). And when did the role of journalists start including dunking on random people?
- dgellow 5y ago
  Journalist are normal people. Normal people write shitposts on Twitter. Presidents and CEOs can shitposts on Twitter but journalists cannot? What a weird assumption.
  - bko 5y ago
    Showing contempt for huge swaths of people doesn't really bode well for objectivity. It's in poor taste for anyone to just dunk on people who stay near their homes and eat at olive garden. Sure, journalists CAN shit post, and obviously they do. I guess I assume journalists that cover news for presumably everyone wouldn't have such open contempt for so many people. But hey, that's just me.
    - browningstreet 5y ago
      They’re not dunking on people who stay near home and eat at Olive Garden.
    - ubermonkey 5y ago
      I just realized you're basing your ire here on a misread of my post. The joke is not from a journalist. The joke was copied widely when originally posted, and it wasn't clear to me who wrote it in the first place -- but if I was going to reference it here, I wanted to give proper credit. I found a story in the WaPo about online joke plagiarism, and it used this joke as an example -- and cited musician Kevin Farzad as the original author. Based on this, I credited him in my comment accordingly.
      - xdavidliu 5y ago
        I misread your post in exactly the same way and thought the joke was made by a journalist.
tamaharbor 5y ago
What’s the matter with Olive Garden?
- r00fus 5y ago
  Joke is thinking OG is somehow fancy digs.
  - jsnodlin 5y ago
    I wonder where that comes from. Do they pre-prepare their food and microwave it?
    - zamadatix 5y ago
      It's one of the cheapest casual dining restaurants that provide table service but avoids being fast casual dining and still tries to avoid a cheap look. Basically if eating out in general is a luxury due to cost then to you an Olive Garden or an Applebees type place is where you go to have your celebratory types of dinners because either your small town doesn't have much more to go to and/or your income doesn't really let you go spend on 1 12oz steak what could cover the entire meal for a small group at Olive Garden. Of course there is nothing wrong with thinking OG is fancy and so on. Better to avoid folks who make a big deal out of it IMO.
  - meowtimemania 5y ago
    It is fancy to a lot of people. I think the parent tweet is funny, but no need to dunk on people that don’t have a lot of money.
- effthisis 5y ago
  It's a cheap, sly way to make an anti-White dig.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

dionidium 5y ago

This probably sounds like a real zinger to a certain kind of young person who moved to Brooklyn and thinks everybody back home is a total loser, but this is not the modal Facebook user, so I'm not sure it matters much.

uncomputation 5y ago
You’re trying to characterize OP as a condescending out of touch hipster, but in my opinion your characterization of the “modal” Facebook user is actually more so. The “modal” Facebook user is equally capable of being dissatisfied with the product as your 2013 hipster caricature is because FB has failed to deliver on its mission. The social side is boring and doesn’t generate as much engagement because it turns out your friends from high school truly are not relevant to your life, yes even the “modal” Facebook user is capable of change and evolution; and the content side leaves users feeling angry, divided, and exhausted after the hundredth flame war they find themselves embroiled in over the political upset of the day. It does matter.
- jamal-kumar 5y ago
  "2013 hipster caricature" "largely irrelevant to your life a decade later." hey, 2013 was about a decade ago, you nailed it
wegs 5y ago
I won't argue whether it's accurate, but I think you missed the point. You can swap words around, and get the same for any demographic. The friend's perception of the poster would be "HEY IT'S ME your facebook friend from high school who went to New York and thinks is better than you. Anyway, here's a woke article."
- nopenopenopeno 5y ago
  But that wouldn’t support their argument that FB is failing to keep up with the times. I think it matters largely because I don’t believe that most people just want content. Everyone I speak with who uses FB on a daily basis has made the decision to excuse the habit purely because they are interested in keeping in touch with people. But by excusing that habit, they end up mostly consuming content because that’s what the feed gives them. I left FB the day their “timeline” stopped supporting chronological sort.

earthboundkid 5y ago

A girl I thought was cute in college was totally convinced T***** would retain the Presidency on 1/6, so I guess it was useful as a sign something was going to happen.

AzzieElbab 5y ago
I haven’t seen anyone voledermord trump b4
- earthboundkid 5y ago
  Really? I’ve been doing it continuously since mid-2016, and I don’t think I’m alone.
  - AzzieElbab 5y ago
    why?
    - synthos 5y ago
      He probably wants to avoid having a discussion with trolls and astroturfing 42 supporters who have trouble filling in blanks.
      - Case81 5y ago
        And you’re saying the supporters almost all share this particular characteristic that makes them incapable of filling those blanks. Well…it makes sense.
  - tekknik 5y ago
    Do you think if you say his name 3 times he’ll appear?
- Macha 5y ago
  Just a couple of late night US talk shows, including the most viewed one, have done this.

RC_ITR 5y ago

Well, it was always kind of doomed in this way. When everyone is still actively building their friend list (remember this started for college students) its an amazing product because it brings you closer to people in a new way and allows for curation without investing a ton into AI/ML. For people who stay in a static social bubbles for long times (e.g., your parents, your friends from HS who didn't move to a coastal city) it's also perfect, because they tend to value content related to their social group more than something new and interesting. But for the highest value users (e.g., the ones with high-paying knowledge-based jobs and a willingness to try new things) the social graph will never keep up with their lives. Bad content from the edges of the graph will slowly creep into feeds (MLMs being a prime example) and those high-value users will seek out new platforms that conform better to their interests. Instagram was a brilliant stop-gap, but Mark never saw the writing on the wall about algorithmic content (probably b/c Bytedance had the advantage of cutting its teeth in China first) and is just too far behind to ever really catch up. So now he's trying to out-future Bytedance with VR (and even got them to burn $1bn on Pico), but unless he has some hard-tech rabbit to pull out of his hat, there's just not anything there. We may very well be seeing the largest (negative) turn-around story in history since Yahoo! play out in front of our eyes.

kwertyoowiyop 5y ago
When do the desperate acquisitions start?
- RC_ITR 5y ago
  https://techcrunch.com/2019/11/26/facebook-buys-the-vr-studio-behind-beat-saber/ https://techcrunch.com/2019/11/26/facebook-buys-the-vr-studi... They already have, and if the US Government would allow them to make another acquisition over $1bn, they already would have (I guarantee 5 different Biz Dev associates have made very long PowerPoints about Roblox and Rec Room only to be told the idea is DOA). It's actually kind of amazing that Mark's off-putting personality and desire to remain the face of the company is what will kill it (let's just hope Aaron Sorkin stays alive long enough for the sequel, because it might rival Citizen Kane).

stevofolife 5y ago

Actually it’s not. Your early life social group becoming irrelevant to your life a decade later is NOT representative at all. What is accurate to say is the OP is not connecting with his old friends anymore. But let’s be real here, not everyone’s like that. Facebook is just a tool to connect with people. Attributing and expecting Facebook to make your friendships more relevant and meaningful is foolish and hopeless.