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Social networks wouldn't have any users if they didn't solve a problem and/or fulfill a need that people have. What problem is it that they solve? IMO they solv

Social networks wouldn't have any users if they didn't solve a problem and/or fulfill a need that people have. What problem is it that they solve? IMO they solve exactly two problems. 1) People with no technical skills or knowledge (can't setup their own web site) want to be able to publish text, photo, and video content to the public, to a community, and/or to their direct contacts. They do not want to have to use any technology other than their phone, and they refuse to pay for this with any amount of money. 2) Since there are texts, photos, and videos being published, people want to be able to gather all the published content that interests them in one place for convenient reading. As long as people have these needs, someone will make software that fulfills them, regardless of how they measure success. Because people can't be serving the content directly from their phone, we have no way to do this today without some form of cloud hosting. Non-technical people can't set that up themselves. And even if they could, it would cost them money. The only solution we have right now is for some organization to create and manage a centralized-ish platform. Even if that organization were a benevolent non-profit, it needs to pay the bills for hosting and labor. You could maybe ride on donations, but good luck with that. Therefore, the organization needs to somehow extract some value from the non-paying users. This inevitably leads to advertising, selling user data, locking users into a walled garden, and all the other mechanisms we have seen that harm the platform in order to get the resources to keep it alive. And this is the key to making a successful social network that will last. How can you meet those two needs, and pay the bandwidth and storage bills, without doing any of the things that make the platform suck? Nobody's figured it out yet!

carlosjobim 3y ago
The cost per user to maintain these kinds of platforms is extremely low. That's why advertising supported models work. So that means if you charged for a platform, you wouldn't need to charge each user very much on a monthly or yearly basis. Such a platform could still be one that require no technical skills or knowledge from the users, who just want to publish their stuff. Many people (especially tech people) have an almost psychotic adversity against any kind of paid online services. But do we always have to cater to those people, who'd refuse to pay $10 per year for an ad-free social network? I even suspect that a paid social network would be of higher quality, since the payment is an effective barrier against bots and some low-quality users.
- ShroudedNight 3y ago
  > Many people (especially tech people) have an almost psychotic adversity against any kind of paid online services. > who'd refuse to pay $10 per year I've not actually seen many services that charge $10 per year. Most instead charge $5 per month / $50 per year. The few services I know of that do charge in the range of what you specify are near universally regarded as really good value.
  - carlosjobim 3y ago
    Yes, $10 per year was just a number, but maybe not too far from the truth. I've seen estimates of $5 to $30 to $300 per user and year for sites like Instagram. Something for $10 per year is usually a promotion, and maybe a good place to get started. Since the social media giants have been giving it for free for a decade...
- deleted 3y ago
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- danjoredd 3y ago
  >Many people (especially tech people) have an almost psychotic adversity against any kind of paid online services. That is what confuses me...we are strongly in favor of privacy and tracker blocking, but then get upset when we have to pay money to join a social media. Are there any third options to support platforms that don't require payments, or advertisement viewing?
  - kelnos 3y ago
    > we are strongly in favor of privacy and tracker blocking, but then get upset when we have to pay money Speak for yourself; whenever I have the option to pay to remove ads on a service I get value from, I sign up nigh immediately. And on top of that, I'm always running with aggressive ad and tracker blockers running. If given the option, I would have paid a small yearly fee to use Instagram back ~10 years ago when the platform was actually decent and didn't do icky things to push engagement up. Of course, the problem is that most people would not have paid a yearly fee to use Instagram, so if payment were required, it would be a ghost town. And, all things being equal, advertisers would prefer that there isn't an ad-free paid option, since then the ads reach fewer people.

carlosjobim 3y ago

The cost per user to maintain these kinds of platforms is extremely low. That's why advertising supported models work. So that means if you charged for a platform, you wouldn't need to charge each user very much on a monthly or yearly basis. Such a platform could still be one that require no technical skills or knowledge from the users, who just want to publish their stuff. Many people (especially tech people) have an almost psychotic adversity against any kind of paid online services. But do we always have to cater to those people, who'd refuse to pay $10 per year for an ad-free social network? I even suspect that a paid social network would be of higher quality, since the payment is an effective barrier against bots and some low-quality users.

ShroudedNight 3y ago
> Many people (especially tech people) have an almost psychotic adversity against any kind of paid online services. > who'd refuse to pay $10 per year I've not actually seen many services that charge $10 per year. Most instead charge $5 per month / $50 per year. The few services I know of that do charge in the range of what you specify are near universally regarded as really good value.
- carlosjobim 3y ago
  Yes, $10 per year was just a number, but maybe not too far from the truth. I've seen estimates of $5 to $30 to $300 per user and year for sites like Instagram. Something for $10 per year is usually a promotion, and maybe a good place to get started. Since the social media giants have been giving it for free for a decade...
deleted 3y ago
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danjoredd 3y ago
>Many people (especially tech people) have an almost psychotic adversity against any kind of paid online services. That is what confuses me...we are strongly in favor of privacy and tracker blocking, but then get upset when we have to pay money to join a social media. Are there any third options to support platforms that don't require payments, or advertisement viewing?
- kelnos 3y ago
  > we are strongly in favor of privacy and tracker blocking, but then get upset when we have to pay money Speak for yourself; whenever I have the option to pay to remove ads on a service I get value from, I sign up nigh immediately. And on top of that, I'm always running with aggressive ad and tracker blockers running. If given the option, I would have paid a small yearly fee to use Instagram back ~10 years ago when the platform was actually decent and didn't do icky things to push engagement up. Of course, the problem is that most people would not have paid a yearly fee to use Instagram, so if payment were required, it would be a ghost town. And, all things being equal, advertisers would prefer that there isn't an ad-free paid option, since then the ads reach fewer people.