3 ms·

The same frustrations (and more) are constantly levied against Facebook (as well as nearly every other platform). The reality is, however, that people are joini

The same frustrations (and more) are constantly levied against Facebook (as well as nearly every other platform). The reality is, however, that people are joining much, much faster than they're leaving. So even if 1 in 10 hates a platform and refuses to use it, that is negated by the 5 that are joining.

girvo 12y ago
Basically, this is just the lament of the early adopters realising that as a space gains more and more users, the more it begins to reflect the mainstream regular person. That's okay, in my opinion, and I disagree with the premise of the article. Personally, I still get tonnes of value out of Twitter. I follow a lot of people I admire, and a lot of my friends, and my Twitter feed has none of the toxic bickering that it's come to be known by, so I disagree that Twitter has crossed a precipice and can only ever be a negative force in your personal life. But, hey, that's just like, my opinion man.
- ducuboy 12y ago
  Exactly my point here "The Beginning of Big Twitter" - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8262519 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8262519
mjn 12y ago
In my own limited experience, Facebook has changed less than Twitter from the perspective of conversation dynamics, to the extent that I now prefer FB, while I used to prefer Twitter. For one thing, FB is less "flat". On FB, my updates only go to my FB friends, or optionally to "friends of friends". They are the only people who can either see or comment on them. So the size of my friend list has a large effect on discussion dynamics. That grows pretty slowly, so my FB experience hasn't changed too much. On Twitter, I could have a "locked" profile, but the norm is to post publicly, and certain things that are iconic of the platform (like retweeting) don't work if you're locked. There is also no "friends of friends" option, so you're either locked or public. That wasn't a problem until recently, but in the past year or so, there seem to be a lot of people (sometimes called "randos") using the search functionality, and sending weird, often abusive, replies to people they don't even know, because of a tweet that came up in a search. The "virality" of retweets also accentuates that. Sometimes an offhand comment ends up read by 1000+ people because a chain of people retweeted it, and then there are all these really out of context replies by people who aren't even within three degrees of relationship to me. That can be welcome sometimes, and not welcome other times. Once in a while, if you're unlucky, something you say will get retweeted in a negative context by someone quasi-famous, which results in this weird swarm of mindless acolytes. And some of those acolytes feel the need to dig up your contact information and harass you outside of Twitter as well, even though 30 seconds ago they had no idea who you were, and still really have no idea who you are. These kinds of dynamics just aren't that enjoyable imo, and not worth the effort it takes to deal with them, so I've been using Twitter less.
- Istof 12y ago
  Do you use email when you want to be even more private? Sure if you don't want a stranger to reply to your message, don't send it to everybody.
  - deleted 12y ago
    [deleted]
pron 12y ago
> The reality is, however, that people are joining much, much faster than they're leaving. I'm not saying this is the case with Twitter, but early adopters leaving (or reducing use) -- even while total adoption is on the rise -- might be a sign of unsustainable growth: http://data.heapanalytics.com/what-unsustainable-growth-looks-like-herbalife-groupon/ http://data.heapanalytics.com/what-unsustainable-growth-look... If your growth is always in new markets, that might be because "they're not onto you yet". Eventually you run out of markets. If your product is unchanged yet early adopters leave because some quality you have no control over changes the experience, that could be a really bad sign.

girvo 12y ago

Basically, this is just the lament of the early adopters realising that as a space gains more and more users, the more it begins to reflect the mainstream regular person. That's okay, in my opinion, and I disagree with the premise of the article. Personally, I still get tonnes of value out of Twitter. I follow a lot of people I admire, and a lot of my friends, and my Twitter feed has none of the toxic bickering that it's come to be known by, so I disagree that Twitter has crossed a precipice and can only ever be a negative force in your personal life. But, hey, that's just like, my opinion man.

ducuboy 12y ago
Exactly my point here "The Beginning of Big Twitter" - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8262519 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8262519

mjn 12y ago

In my own limited experience, Facebook has changed less than Twitter from the perspective of conversation dynamics, to the extent that I now prefer FB, while I used to prefer Twitter. For one thing, FB is less "flat". On FB, my updates only go to my FB friends, or optionally to "friends of friends". They are the only people who can either see or comment on them. So the size of my friend list has a large effect on discussion dynamics. That grows pretty slowly, so my FB experience hasn't changed too much. On Twitter, I could have a "locked" profile, but the norm is to post publicly, and certain things that are iconic of the platform (like retweeting) don't work if you're locked. There is also no "friends of friends" option, so you're either locked or public. That wasn't a problem until recently, but in the past year or so, there seem to be a lot of people (sometimes called "randos") using the search functionality, and sending weird, often abusive, replies to people they don't even know, because of a tweet that came up in a search. The "virality" of retweets also accentuates that. Sometimes an offhand comment ends up read by 1000+ people because a chain of people retweeted it, and then there are all these really out of context replies by people who aren't even within three degrees of relationship to me. That can be welcome sometimes, and not welcome other times. Once in a while, if you're unlucky, something you say will get retweeted in a negative context by someone quasi-famous, which results in this weird swarm of mindless acolytes. And some of those acolytes feel the need to dig up your contact information and harass you outside of Twitter as well, even though 30 seconds ago they had no idea who you were, and still really have no idea who you are. These kinds of dynamics just aren't that enjoyable imo, and not worth the effort it takes to deal with them, so I've been using Twitter less.

Istof 12y ago
Do you use email when you want to be even more private? Sure if you don't want a stranger to reply to your message, don't send it to everybody.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]

pron 12y ago

> The reality is, however, that people are joining much, much faster than they're leaving. I'm not saying this is the case with Twitter, but early adopters leaving (or reducing use) -- even while total adoption is on the rise -- might be a sign of unsustainable growth: http://data.heapanalytics.com/what-unsustainable-growth-looks-like-herbalife-groupon/ http://data.heapanalytics.com/what-unsustainable-growth-look... If your growth is always in new markets, that might be because "they're not onto you yet". Eventually you run out of markets. If your product is unchanged yet early adopters leave because some quality you have no control over changes the experience, that could be a really bad sign.