5 ms·

It took 5 years for this to work its way through the system. Facebook can probably just iterate a little and fight for another 5 years.

Bilal_io 4y ago
I hope Facebook doesn't survive another 5. But I won't hold my breath. Still amusing just a few years ago Facebook was described as a world government due to the influence they had. Maybe they still have that, but I've just detached myself from it to see it.
- RajT88 4y ago
  Facebook will still be around in 5 years. The question is whether it will be relevant. People make the comparison to MySpace, because it's the most comparable service - Facebook de-throned it as the king of social media. And incidentally, MySpace is still around. They survived the de-throning by pivoting, which is inevitably what Facebook will do. I think we've seen the groundwork for it already.
  - ethbr0 4y ago
    Facebook's survival (and MySpace's before them) is predicated on continued advertising revenue. Continued advertising revenue is predicated on user count and eyeball time. Consequently, the only thing that really kills Facebook is if users abandon the platform. And there isn't really a Mastodon-equivalent alternative for FB's feature set. Or even assurance that there could be (i.e. features that require centralization or expensive compute).
    - croes 4y ago
      Myspace is still alive
      - AnotherGoodName 4y ago
        Not really though. They even lost all user accounts before a certain date recently so there's not even much of a Ship of Theseus argument it's the same apart from the name.
    - BlueTemplar 4y ago
      What's wrong with Diaspora ? (As someone that never used it.) (P.S.: I haven't used Facebook in like half a decade either.)
  - maldev 4y ago
    Facebook's future isn't in the social media space though. Most of their endeavors are in VR and other cutting edge technologies, hence the name change to Meta. I wouldn't be surprised if they saw the writing on the walls years ago. They've been hiring AI, and VR researchers for years now and are the industry leader in VR at least.
    - wpietri 4y ago
      But a leader in what exactly? I have been looking for years for actual usage stats. E.g., MAU and UAM for VR headsets, especially ones broken out by length of ownership. I get that people are buying Oculus units because of the hype, but is there much sustained usage? If so, what exactly is keeping people engaged once the novelty wears off? As comparison, look at Amazon's smart speakers. $10 billion spent, lots of hype, part of the zeitgeist enough that SNL is doing jokes about it [1]. End of the day it's a "colossal failure": https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2022/11/amazon-alexa-is-a-colossal-failure-on-pace-to-lose-10-billion-this-year/ https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2022/11/amazon-alexa-is-a-co... [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YvT_gqs5ETk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YvT_gqs5ETk
      - imiric 4y ago
        Meta is betting on the long term. They're the leader of a very niche market _now_, but as XR technology improves, that market will only grow, and Meta will be ready for it, with years ahead of the competition at that point. That's their bet, anyway, and we can speculate whether it will come to pass or not. I'm inclined to think that the tech will eventually become mainstream, when headsets are as comfortable to wear as glasses. It's a prime opportunity for Apple to jump in near the tipping point, and claim to be the innovator, once again. It would be the mainstream push the industry needs, at least. I'm less confident that Meta's verse will succeed, though. They've shown to be incapable of delivering an appealing product people want to spend hours in. And the Meta brand is tarnished beyond repair, no matter how many rebrandings they go through.
        wpietri 4y ago
        I agree with you that Meta ads another set of ways to fail. But this is the thing I want to question: > that market will only grow I too have read science fiction, so I get the theory. You know what else is in science fiction? 3D movies and 3D TV. But we've had 3 waves of 3D films (1950s, 1980s, 2000s) and it turns out nobody cares. And 3D TV fared even worse. And let's not forget the 1990 wave of actual VR, which also cratered. So the question is: will facehugger VR go the way of other stereoscopic 3D entertainment? I think it's an open question, but my point is that it's very plausible that VR and the Metaverse will, like the jetpack, remain in the realm of sci-fi long after you and I are in the ground. And as far as I can tell, nobody is releasing data that shows it on a different arc. The Brewster Stereoscope sold a lot of units too, as did the Viewmaster. But ultimately people seem fine inferring 3D from 2D images without stereoscopic effects to help them along.
  - riskable 4y ago
    Facebook has already seen the writing on the wall and has been pivoting to VR. Probably not the best pivot but it is what it is. They clearly want to be the Apple/iPhone of VR. The part that confuses me is that they can't seem to decide whether or not to make consumer VR stuff or business VR/AR stuff. They're completely different markets. Consumers want games and apps/experiences that are fun and/or exciting (even if they're not games). Businesses want specialized apps and equipment that's suited to their industry/use cases. If you're going to make business-focused hardware like the Quest Pro you're not going to be making the highly specialized software that businesses want because that would be a waste of your time (too niche). So it would behoove Facebook to sell something like the Quest Pro with a significant markup (the "business tax" like with all things "enterprisey") instead of at or near cost like they're currently doing. The thing that baffles me the most is how much friction they've artificially introduced in order to develop for the Oculus platform(s). Firstly, you need a Facebook account to gain access to their developer portal. This makes zero sense considering that Facebook is primarily something meant for personal use. It also means you have to give your employer your Facebook account which is... Bad. To say the least! (Aside: You might be thinking, "just make a separate Facebook account for work" but that's actually a violation of Facebook's TOS!) Secondly, there's ZERO information about developing custom hardware for the Oculus platform in their developer portal. In their forums/community pages there's loads of people asking questions about how to do this and no answers from Oculus/Facebook staff. Nothing! The ability to integrate custom input devices would be a HUGE boon to business-specific solutions/use cases. Simple example: Imagine walking around a store doing inventory while wearing an AR headset... It automatically identifies the products on the shelves and estimates their counts for you but how do you enter in the real count? Hold a controller in your hand and use a virtual keyboard? That would be the peak of inefficiency. Sure, you can pair a Bluetooth keyboard/numpad to the Oculus (I think) but a customized input device that could say, weigh some bananas and measure the temperature, light/color, sound, and levels of ethene gas would be sooooo much better! It wouldn't be too difficult to make either except for the fact that Facebook has made it impossible.
    - BlueTemplar 4y ago
      It's pretty bad as a customer too : When I bought the CV1 Oculus Rift, it listed Windows 7 as being compatible, and no requirements of a Facebook account. Now the Oculus software has been "upgraded" by dropping compatibility with Win7, and the support for using it without a Facebook account will end on 2023-01-01. Where I suspect this violates EU consumer laws, is that Oculus/Facebook/Meta doesn't provide me with an option to keep running old versions of Oculus software (offline if need be) that work on Win7 and without a Facebook account, along with apps I bought from or outside the Oculus Store ! Also, not much advance warning (if any??) between starting to warn about the end of Win7 support on the box and dropping Win7 support - we got plenty of time with the mandatory Facebook account requirement, though I haven't checked whether it was the case on the boxes ? And the less said about Oculus promise of CV1 Rift Linux support that is still nowhere to be seen 6 years after release, the better. And this would have reduced developer friction a lot !
alkonaut 4y ago
If they challenge it, surely they still pay the fines retroactively if they lose? And given their size and how the fines are structured, couldn't it be very expensive to keep this in courts when it looks like a losing case on paper?
- layer8 4y ago
  The may believe it’s worth it vs. the loss of ad income.
  - zelphirkalt 4y ago
    In a just world, of course they would have to pay back all that ad income, because as it turns out, they obtained it illegally and have been told so. Merely them thinking that it was not illegal and going to court does not make it suddenly legal and just to keep it. Like any ordinary citizen, of course they would stop doing the thing, that they have been warned about to be illegal, riiiight?

Bilal_io 4y ago

I hope Facebook doesn't survive another 5. But I won't hold my breath. Still amusing just a few years ago Facebook was described as a world government due to the influence they had. Maybe they still have that, but I've just detached myself from it to see it.

RajT88 4y ago
Facebook will still be around in 5 years. The question is whether it will be relevant. People make the comparison to MySpace, because it's the most comparable service - Facebook de-throned it as the king of social media. And incidentally, MySpace is still around. They survived the de-throning by pivoting, which is inevitably what Facebook will do. I think we've seen the groundwork for it already.
- ethbr0 4y ago
  Facebook's survival (and MySpace's before them) is predicated on continued advertising revenue. Continued advertising revenue is predicated on user count and eyeball time. Consequently, the only thing that really kills Facebook is if users abandon the platform. And there isn't really a Mastodon-equivalent alternative for FB's feature set. Or even assurance that there could be (i.e. features that require centralization or expensive compute).
  - croes 4y ago
    Myspace is still alive
    - AnotherGoodName 4y ago
      Not really though. They even lost all user accounts before a certain date recently so there's not even much of a Ship of Theseus argument it's the same apart from the name.
  - BlueTemplar 4y ago
    What's wrong with Diaspora ? (As someone that never used it.) (P.S.: I haven't used Facebook in like half a decade either.)
- maldev 4y ago
  Facebook's future isn't in the social media space though. Most of their endeavors are in VR and other cutting edge technologies, hence the name change to Meta. I wouldn't be surprised if they saw the writing on the walls years ago. They've been hiring AI, and VR researchers for years now and are the industry leader in VR at least.
  - wpietri 4y ago
    But a leader in what exactly? I have been looking for years for actual usage stats. E.g., MAU and UAM for VR headsets, especially ones broken out by length of ownership. I get that people are buying Oculus units because of the hype, but is there much sustained usage? If so, what exactly is keeping people engaged once the novelty wears off? As comparison, look at Amazon's smart speakers. $10 billion spent, lots of hype, part of the zeitgeist enough that SNL is doing jokes about it [1]. End of the day it's a "colossal failure": https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2022/11/amazon-alexa-is-a-colossal-failure-on-pace-to-lose-10-billion-this-year/ https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2022/11/amazon-alexa-is-a-co... [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YvT_gqs5ETk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YvT_gqs5ETk
    - imiric 4y ago
      Meta is betting on the long term. They're the leader of a very niche market _now_, but as XR technology improves, that market will only grow, and Meta will be ready for it, with years ahead of the competition at that point. That's their bet, anyway, and we can speculate whether it will come to pass or not. I'm inclined to think that the tech will eventually become mainstream, when headsets are as comfortable to wear as glasses. It's a prime opportunity for Apple to jump in near the tipping point, and claim to be the innovator, once again. It would be the mainstream push the industry needs, at least. I'm less confident that Meta's verse will succeed, though. They've shown to be incapable of delivering an appealing product people want to spend hours in. And the Meta brand is tarnished beyond repair, no matter how many rebrandings they go through.
      - wpietri 4y ago
        I agree with you that Meta ads another set of ways to fail. But this is the thing I want to question: > that market will only grow I too have read science fiction, so I get the theory. You know what else is in science fiction? 3D movies and 3D TV. But we've had 3 waves of 3D films (1950s, 1980s, 2000s) and it turns out nobody cares. And 3D TV fared even worse. And let's not forget the 1990 wave of actual VR, which also cratered. So the question is: will facehugger VR go the way of other stereoscopic 3D entertainment? I think it's an open question, but my point is that it's very plausible that VR and the Metaverse will, like the jetpack, remain in the realm of sci-fi long after you and I are in the ground. And as far as I can tell, nobody is releasing data that shows it on a different arc. The Brewster Stereoscope sold a lot of units too, as did the Viewmaster. But ultimately people seem fine inferring 3D from 2D images without stereoscopic effects to help them along.
- riskable 4y ago
  Facebook has already seen the writing on the wall and has been pivoting to VR. Probably not the best pivot but it is what it is. They clearly want to be the Apple/iPhone of VR. The part that confuses me is that they can't seem to decide whether or not to make consumer VR stuff or business VR/AR stuff. They're completely different markets. Consumers want games and apps/experiences that are fun and/or exciting (even if they're not games). Businesses want specialized apps and equipment that's suited to their industry/use cases. If you're going to make business-focused hardware like the Quest Pro you're not going to be making the highly specialized software that businesses want because that would be a waste of your time (too niche). So it would behoove Facebook to sell something like the Quest Pro with a significant markup (the "business tax" like with all things "enterprisey") instead of at or near cost like they're currently doing. The thing that baffles me the most is how much friction they've artificially introduced in order to develop for the Oculus platform(s). Firstly, you need a Facebook account to gain access to their developer portal. This makes zero sense considering that Facebook is primarily something meant for personal use. It also means you have to give your employer your Facebook account which is... Bad. To say the least! (Aside: You might be thinking, "just make a separate Facebook account for work" but that's actually a violation of Facebook's TOS!) Secondly, there's ZERO information about developing custom hardware for the Oculus platform in their developer portal. In their forums/community pages there's loads of people asking questions about how to do this and no answers from Oculus/Facebook staff. Nothing! The ability to integrate custom input devices would be a HUGE boon to business-specific solutions/use cases. Simple example: Imagine walking around a store doing inventory while wearing an AR headset... It automatically identifies the products on the shelves and estimates their counts for you but how do you enter in the real count? Hold a controller in your hand and use a virtual keyboard? That would be the peak of inefficiency. Sure, you can pair a Bluetooth keyboard/numpad to the Oculus (I think) but a customized input device that could say, weigh some bananas and measure the temperature, light/color, sound, and levels of ethene gas would be sooooo much better! It wouldn't be too difficult to make either except for the fact that Facebook has made it impossible.
  - BlueTemplar 4y ago
    It's pretty bad as a customer too : When I bought the CV1 Oculus Rift, it listed Windows 7 as being compatible, and no requirements of a Facebook account. Now the Oculus software has been "upgraded" by dropping compatibility with Win7, and the support for using it without a Facebook account will end on 2023-01-01. Where I suspect this violates EU consumer laws, is that Oculus/Facebook/Meta doesn't provide me with an option to keep running old versions of Oculus software (offline if need be) that work on Win7 and without a Facebook account, along with apps I bought from or outside the Oculus Store ! Also, not much advance warning (if any??) between starting to warn about the end of Win7 support on the box and dropping Win7 support - we got plenty of time with the mandatory Facebook account requirement, though I haven't checked whether it was the case on the boxes ? And the less said about Oculus promise of CV1 Rift Linux support that is still nowhere to be seen 6 years after release, the better. And this would have reduced developer friction a lot !

alkonaut 4y ago

If they challenge it, surely they still pay the fines retroactively if they lose? And given their size and how the fines are structured, couldn't it be very expensive to keep this in courts when it looks like a losing case on paper?

layer8 4y ago
The may believe it’s worth it vs. the loss of ad income.
- zelphirkalt 4y ago
  In a just world, of course they would have to pay back all that ad income, because as it turns out, they obtained it illegally and have been told so. Merely them thinking that it was not illegal and going to court does not make it suddenly legal and just to keep it. Like any ordinary citizen, of course they would stop doing the thing, that they have been warned about to be illegal, riiiight?