4 ms·

There's a similar effect in meat-space too, I remember my (boomer) father telling me that when he moved for work in the 70's that he found he was able to meet p

There's a similar effect in meat-space too, I remember my (boomer) father telling me that when he moved for work in the 70's that he found he was able to meet people in the area via a society (some kind of rambling and general activity group) that was really good for meeting others in their early 20s. When he suggested I try the same group for meeting new people when I moved to my first job post-uni we looked up the society, but it was almost exclusively populated by people much closer to his age than mine. While the remit of the society hadn't changed, as people had got older they had never actually left the society to make space for the young, and so the group lost the ability to deliver on its promise. It's a natural effect and you can't really fight it, people will grow in places their parents aren't, and so they'll seek spaces where their parents aren't. Facebook has the luxury of generally being able to buy competition as it grows before it's too large to grow too big. Generally they'll still have the metrics and data to be able to spot new competition before it grows very large at all. Tik Tok is of course an exception, fueled by both a vast amount of inorganic early growth and being out of reach of an easy acquisition before it grew too large.

pavlov 5y ago
Great example. I’d add that Facebook had the luxury of buying the competition. They even used to own a fairly popular mobile VPN provider just for the purpose of collecting data about which apps and services are on the rise. But that was five years ago. Now every move by Meta is under intense scrutiny by three regulators who love to assert their power: USA, EU and UK. Post-Brexit, the UK’s antitrust regulator wants to demonstrate its new independence. They blocked Facebook’s acquisition of Giphy even though the latter has no operations in Britain, on the theory that Giphy might eventually sell ads to UK businesses and thus become a competitor to Meta. Meta isn’t eager to risk another of these multi-year acquisition drama episodes. They’re all in on decades-long metaverse platform building, with organic growth at Instagram and WhatsApp hopefully tiding over until Zuck’s dream AR devices become feasible.
- lumost 5y ago
  I don't understand what meta is building. The tech to even conceive of building a metaverse is at least 10 years away. Not only do you need photorealistic graphics (just becoming feasible) but you need these graphics in 8k, on a mobile device with long battery life. The hardware to support this will run 20 pounds with a 500+ watt power draw. Beyond that, you need to ability for everyone to interact seamlessly over the internet in “fun” spaces that they enjoy hanging out in. This means next generation immersive haptics etc. I don't see much excitement for haptica in the wild. Then there is a whole crazy idea that users should be able to bring stuff across meracerse games/worlds and have it just work... I see this ending in 3-5 years with a major AAA studio making a billion dollar met averse experience that flops.
  - pavlov 5y ago
    > "The tech to even conceive of building a metaverse is at least 10 years away." Zuck knows this. He's spending $10-15 billion per year on this tech with the goal of having a compelling consumer experience ready in 2030 — still optimistic, but not outrageously so. I'm not sure if being early will work for Meta. One could look at Symbian which was very early in the smartphone market, with major investments into a power-efficient C++ based OS and GUI API already in 1996. They got app-capable devices with relatively good graphics and resistive touchscreens in the market early, but all that R&D then became a boat anchor when the iPhone happened and Symbian's embedded-style paradigm was immediately obsolete.
    - lumost 5y ago
      I suppose this is the inevitable evolution of a large tech firm. At some point the only way to drive further growth is with fundamental research, but fundamental research has a mixed track record when it comes to value capture. Part of my concern is that it's not clear that we even have enough tech to sensibly spend money on. Is the money going to go into BCI interfaces? Haptics? VR? Software? All of the above? Or just big marketing campaigns promising the metaverse?
    - johannes1234321 5y ago
      It is not only about building. It is also having eyes open and trying to buy anything they can (sellers willing to sell and anti-trust authorities agreeing). "Metaverse" is so imprecise so that whatever scheme in the end works, will be retrofitted to be Metaverse as envisioned from the beginning.
- ironlake 5y ago
  > Now every move by Meta is under intense scrutiny by three regulators who love to assert their power: USA, EU and UK. Facebook has proven they need more regulation, not less. Brexit could not have happened without Zuckerberg's gormless leadership. He built a machine for influencing populations and he mindlessly loans it out to authoritarianism while he's off slaughtering goats in his back yard, pretending he's a hunter.
notacoward 5y ago
Organizations outliving their founders (or more generally their original cohort) is hard. For example, my wife and I belong to a ski club. (It's not as swanky as it sounds. It's just a way to co-own a kind of dumpy converted motel up in New Hampshire, with arrangements to maintain it and coordinate its use during the season.) The club was founded in 1965, which among other things mean that within the last ten years or so the leadership shifted from the founders' generation to my own. There was quite a bit of conflict about things like maintenance priorities (e.g. do we upgrade some of the bathrooms to be more senior-friendly or do we bring the kitchen up to code) and expanding membership. One of the biggest controversies has been use of electronic devices in common areas during social hours, which mostly put my own generation on the side of our elders opposite those even younger. Apparently the debates about smoking were even more contentious, but that was before we joined. At this point the oldest members have passed on or shifted to weekday-only use (it's cheaper), so things have mostly settled down, but there was definitely some drama during the transition. And that's with ~50 families engaged in a recreational/social activity. Imagine the same in a huge company with customers and business needs and people's livelihoods involved. That is always going to be a bit rough.
Aperocky 5y ago
> had got older they had never actually left the society That is actually nice, it's good to know association of people/friends that are long lasting (for non-political purposes). I figure the society didn't get inherited from before your father's time, maybe you'll just need to find/found your own group/society.
iainmerrick 5y ago
It happens in neighborhoods too. At one point a neighborhood is full of families with school-age children, so similar people tend to move there. Then 30 years later the same neighborhood is full of retirees and there are hardly any children to be found.
- huevosabio 5y ago
  Interesting, I wonder if in trying to replicate real world social networks, digital social networks are bound to replicate the brith and death cycle. In that sense, being the "town square" (e.g. Twitter) is a better bet than being the place where you meet your friends. Unless you are able to continuously create the new space where the young meet. But, historically, that does not seem to be the case.
- TheRealNGenius 5y ago
  I noticed this especially come Halloween. Used to be swarms of children me included out and about, now no longer.
Kon-Peki 5y ago
> I remember my (boomer) father telling me that when he moved for work in the 70's that he found he was able to meet people in the area via a society (some kind of rambling and general activity group) that was really good for meeting others in their early 20s. When I first moved to Chicago, I signed up for "sports" leagues via "Chicago Sport and Social" (it also includes card games and trivia games). They matched you up with a team in a league with your requested skill level (from "I suck but like going through the motions" to "I played in college and want to WIN WIN WIN"). Your team would be sponsored by a bar or restaurant near the playing fields and your team was supposed to go there after the game and get a free pitcher of beer or appetizer to share while you all socialized. It was around 20 years ago and (checking the website) is still around now, with the same 20-something target market. I honestly can't imagine that there isn't a similar organization in every single big city that has a constant influx of fresh college grads. https://chicagosocial.com/sports/ https://chicagosocial.com/sports/

pavlov 5y ago

Great example. I’d add that Facebook had the luxury of buying the competition. They even used to own a fairly popular mobile VPN provider just for the purpose of collecting data about which apps and services are on the rise. But that was five years ago. Now every move by Meta is under intense scrutiny by three regulators who love to assert their power: USA, EU and UK. Post-Brexit, the UK’s antitrust regulator wants to demonstrate its new independence. They blocked Facebook’s acquisition of Giphy even though the latter has no operations in Britain, on the theory that Giphy might eventually sell ads to UK businesses and thus become a competitor to Meta. Meta isn’t eager to risk another of these multi-year acquisition drama episodes. They’re all in on decades-long metaverse platform building, with organic growth at Instagram and WhatsApp hopefully tiding over until Zuck’s dream AR devices become feasible.

lumost 5y ago
I don't understand what meta is building. The tech to even conceive of building a metaverse is at least 10 years away. Not only do you need photorealistic graphics (just becoming feasible) but you need these graphics in 8k, on a mobile device with long battery life. The hardware to support this will run 20 pounds with a 500+ watt power draw. Beyond that, you need to ability for everyone to interact seamlessly over the internet in “fun” spaces that they enjoy hanging out in. This means next generation immersive haptics etc. I don't see much excitement for haptica in the wild. Then there is a whole crazy idea that users should be able to bring stuff across meracerse games/worlds and have it just work... I see this ending in 3-5 years with a major AAA studio making a billion dollar met averse experience that flops.
- pavlov 5y ago
  > "The tech to even conceive of building a metaverse is at least 10 years away." Zuck knows this. He's spending $10-15 billion per year on this tech with the goal of having a compelling consumer experience ready in 2030 — still optimistic, but not outrageously so. I'm not sure if being early will work for Meta. One could look at Symbian which was very early in the smartphone market, with major investments into a power-efficient C++ based OS and GUI API already in 1996. They got app-capable devices with relatively good graphics and resistive touchscreens in the market early, but all that R&D then became a boat anchor when the iPhone happened and Symbian's embedded-style paradigm was immediately obsolete.
  - lumost 5y ago
    I suppose this is the inevitable evolution of a large tech firm. At some point the only way to drive further growth is with fundamental research, but fundamental research has a mixed track record when it comes to value capture. Part of my concern is that it's not clear that we even have enough tech to sensibly spend money on. Is the money going to go into BCI interfaces? Haptics? VR? Software? All of the above? Or just big marketing campaigns promising the metaverse?
  - johannes1234321 5y ago
    It is not only about building. It is also having eyes open and trying to buy anything they can (sellers willing to sell and anti-trust authorities agreeing). "Metaverse" is so imprecise so that whatever scheme in the end works, will be retrofitted to be Metaverse as envisioned from the beginning.
ironlake 5y ago
> Now every move by Meta is under intense scrutiny by three regulators who love to assert their power: USA, EU and UK. Facebook has proven they need more regulation, not less. Brexit could not have happened without Zuckerberg's gormless leadership. He built a machine for influencing populations and he mindlessly loans it out to authoritarianism while he's off slaughtering goats in his back yard, pretending he's a hunter.

notacoward 5y ago

Organizations outliving their founders (or more generally their original cohort) is hard. For example, my wife and I belong to a ski club. (It's not as swanky as it sounds. It's just a way to co-own a kind of dumpy converted motel up in New Hampshire, with arrangements to maintain it and coordinate its use during the season.) The club was founded in 1965, which among other things mean that within the last ten years or so the leadership shifted from the founders' generation to my own. There was quite a bit of conflict about things like maintenance priorities (e.g. do we upgrade some of the bathrooms to be more senior-friendly or do we bring the kitchen up to code) and expanding membership. One of the biggest controversies has been use of electronic devices in common areas during social hours, which mostly put my own generation on the side of our elders opposite those even younger. Apparently the debates about smoking were even more contentious, but that was before we joined. At this point the oldest members have passed on or shifted to weekday-only use (it's cheaper), so things have mostly settled down, but there was definitely some drama during the transition. And that's with ~50 families engaged in a recreational/social activity. Imagine the same in a huge company with customers and business needs and people's livelihoods involved. That is always going to be a bit rough.

Aperocky 5y ago

> had got older they had never actually left the society That is actually nice, it's good to know association of people/friends that are long lasting (for non-political purposes). I figure the society didn't get inherited from before your father's time, maybe you'll just need to find/found your own group/society.

iainmerrick 5y ago

It happens in neighborhoods too. At one point a neighborhood is full of families with school-age children, so similar people tend to move there. Then 30 years later the same neighborhood is full of retirees and there are hardly any children to be found.

huevosabio 5y ago
Interesting, I wonder if in trying to replicate real world social networks, digital social networks are bound to replicate the brith and death cycle. In that sense, being the "town square" (e.g. Twitter) is a better bet than being the place where you meet your friends. Unless you are able to continuously create the new space where the young meet. But, historically, that does not seem to be the case.
TheRealNGenius 5y ago
I noticed this especially come Halloween. Used to be swarms of children me included out and about, now no longer.

Kon-Peki 5y ago

> I remember my (boomer) father telling me that when he moved for work in the 70's that he found he was able to meet people in the area via a society (some kind of rambling and general activity group) that was really good for meeting others in their early 20s. When I first moved to Chicago, I signed up for "sports" leagues via "Chicago Sport and Social" (it also includes card games and trivia games). They matched you up with a team in a league with your requested skill level (from "I suck but like going through the motions" to "I played in college and want to WIN WIN WIN"). Your team would be sponsored by a bar or restaurant near the playing fields and your team was supposed to go there after the game and get a free pitcher of beer or appetizer to share while you all socialized. It was around 20 years ago and (checking the website) is still around now, with the same 20-something target market. I honestly can't imagine that there isn't a similar organization in every single big city that has a constant influx of fresh college grads. https://chicagosocial.com/sports/ https://chicagosocial.com/sports/