4 ms·

If a $500b company with a product used by 1/3 of the human population isnt a success, i dont know what is. As for whether its beneficial to society is another

If a $500b company with a product used by 1/3 of the human population isnt a success, i dont know what is. As for whether its beneficial to society is another question.

tablespoon 4y ago
> If a $500b company with a product used by 1/3 of the human population isnt a success, i dont know what is. It's not exactly a success (except from the most selfish and financial perspectives), it's more like proof you can abuse your users and get away with it.
- xeromal 4y ago
  This take reduces the idea too much. If everyone was just "Abused", they'd stop using it. Clearly, many people see benefit despite the abuses. I used facebook messenger to keep in touch with my family across the world. My family is incapable of using signal, whatsapp, sms, email, telegram, phone calls, or anything else. I also use facebook to buy stuff on the classifieds. It's like craigslist except there's at least a picture of someone and a paper trail if they decide to murder me. My neighborhood organizes events using a facebook group and we've been able to have festivals and organize groups to go fight against companies that want to industrialize the area. Facebook is trash at what it was initially built to be, but it is still very useful.
sosull 4y ago
But the point is about the quality of the product, not the financial size or userbase of the company. Isn't it possible to have the (impressive) attribute of size while simultaneously making a bad product? What about Myspace? $800m in revenue from 115m users. The classic 'good product' story, right?
- altdataseller 4y ago
  It's used regularly by over 1/3 of the human population. I think that by itself tells you it's an useful product. It might have some flaws (as do many other products), but it seems the vast majority of users overlook those flaws. I'm definitely not a regular FB user, and even hate it, but I can't deny many many people find it useful in their daily lives, flaws and all.
- devbot9 4y ago
  People that are calling it a failure because of quality are missing the point. Facebook makes its money by leaving the feed an unorganized mess of random posts, leaving the user disoriented so that more eyeball time can be harvested for advertisements while the user searches for the content they want (or gets stuck mindlessly scrolling the infinite reel of videos and other content for that dopamine hit). It's not lost on the army of six figure salaried engineers that a lot could be done easily to make the experience better. But that isn't in the interest of the shareholders. The quality is a feature, not a bug.

If a $500b company with a product used by 1/3 of the human population isnt a success, i dont know what is. As for whether its beneficial to society is another question.

tablespoon 4y ago

> If a $500b company with a product used by 1/3 of the human population isnt a success, i dont know what is. It's not exactly a success (except from the most selfish and financial perspectives), it's more like proof you can abuse your users and get away with it.

xeromal 4y ago
This take reduces the idea too much. If everyone was just "Abused", they'd stop using it. Clearly, many people see benefit despite the abuses. I used facebook messenger to keep in touch with my family across the world. My family is incapable of using signal, whatsapp, sms, email, telegram, phone calls, or anything else. I also use facebook to buy stuff on the classifieds. It's like craigslist except there's at least a picture of someone and a paper trail if they decide to murder me. My neighborhood organizes events using a facebook group and we've been able to have festivals and organize groups to go fight against companies that want to industrialize the area. Facebook is trash at what it was initially built to be, but it is still very useful.

sosull 4y ago

But the point is about the quality of the product, not the financial size or userbase of the company. Isn't it possible to have the (impressive) attribute of size while simultaneously making a bad product? What about Myspace? $800m in revenue from 115m users. The classic 'good product' story, right?

altdataseller 4y ago
It's used regularly by over 1/3 of the human population. I think that by itself tells you it's an useful product. It might have some flaws (as do many other products), but it seems the vast majority of users overlook those flaws. I'm definitely not a regular FB user, and even hate it, but I can't deny many many people find it useful in their daily lives, flaws and all.
devbot9 4y ago
People that are calling it a failure because of quality are missing the point. Facebook makes its money by leaving the feed an unorganized mess of random posts, leaving the user disoriented so that more eyeball time can be harvested for advertisements while the user searches for the content they want (or gets stuck mindlessly scrolling the infinite reel of videos and other content for that dopamine hit). It's not lost on the army of six figure salaried engineers that a lot could be done easily to make the experience better. But that isn't in the interest of the shareholders. The quality is a feature, not a bug.