9 ms·

many have nailed this on the head. It’s dead to us. The next few paragraphs then go on to describe Facebook as essential social plumbing. I think an FB product

by bgun 12y ago

many have nailed this on the head. It’s dead to us. The next few paragraphs then go on to describe Facebook as essential social plumbing. I think an FB product manager would be delighted to hear that Facebook is "dead" in this way. This is precisely why the most successful social network of its generation was built, first and foremost, to be a platform rather than a cocktail party.

josu 12y ago
So were Yahoo and AOL. If specialized apps start to show up, people may start ditching FB altogether.
- Chronic30 12y ago
  You can be sure Facebook will acquire any threatening social networks.
  - billions 12y ago
    Except Snapchat which refused acquisition so far
    - crazypyro 12y ago
      Probably because Facebook hasn't offered them enough billions yet. This article and author certainly seems to be promoting Snapchat well though.
      - josephpmay 12y ago
        Facebook could offer Snapchat 20B and Evan Spiegel wouldn't take it
        manticore_alpha 12y ago
        He's an idiot, then.
- joshstrange 12y ago
  Not too sure about that. All of my friends (I'm 23) have FB and while we all more or less hate it we wouldn't dream of not being on FB. It's the best way to connect with someone you meet (through friends, at a bar, etc) and you don't have to ask for a number. Just friend request, chat a little bit and if it works out swap numbers and move to SMS. Like your parent said I see FB as "essential social plumbing", not the most glamorous or best but a necessity and way to connect to people before you go "off FB" to another app or SMS to chat/interact. The only reason I "post" to FB is b/c my Twitter posts to FB. I rarely use Twitter except from trying to get companies attention after having them ignore support requests or not having any other support at all. Multiple times I've used a websites/app's built in ticketing system only to get no response. A pissed tweet a couple days later and I've got a response within the hour... The squeaky wheel...
  - rando3826 12y ago
    > we wouldn't dream of not being on FB And 10 years ago I wouldn't dream of not having my ICQ friends. Your dreams are not the /most/ relevant.
    - joshstrange 12y ago
      I am not talking about the future, I'm talking about right now, at this moment. I can't predict the future but I can give my view point from this point in time and that's what I've done. I'm sorry that's not good enough for you.
      - rando3826 12y ago
        Your reply was in reference to the future, so it's logical for a reader to assume that's what you were talking about. > If specialized apps start to show up, people may start ditching FB altogether.
    - dntrkv 12y ago
      And just because it's happened in the past does not guarantee that it will happen again. People have been predicting the downfall of Facebook for years, but it keeps growing.
- solarmist 12y ago
  He mentions exactly that in the article. A lot of 10-16 year olds he knows don't even have FB accounts.
  - sehutson 12y ago
    10-16 year olds also live with their parents and often "hate" them. Now that more adults are there, it's not as natural to get on Facebook as a teenager/pre-teen. Will they join later when they move out and seek ways to stay connected with family? Who knows - but I can definitely see why they're not there yet. I'm older, but the only reason I joined Facebook was to have a way to keep in touch with family once I moved 2000 miles away to California.
Animats 12y ago
What he's saying is that Facebook is a great contacts directory, because everyone is on it. But most of the other features are useless. (Recently, most of the features of Facebook broke for the combo of Ubuntu 14.04 LTS, Firefox 34, and Ghostery. Messaging and notifications still work most of the time, but many of the other features just stall, probably waiting for some tracker. This turns out to be a feature, not a bug. No ads, no timeline, no crap.)
- rewqfdsa 12y ago
  > many of the other features just stall, probably waiting for some tracker. Ubuntu adds a Firefox extension for integrating some web sites into the desktop. It's incredibly buggy and, IME, frequently breaks on Facebook. Try disabling the extension in Firefox.
btbuildem 12y ago
Yup, just like growing up with roads and water in taps makes those invisible and boring - just part of the background.
tomashertus 12y ago
I think that Facebook's NewsFeed is the biggest mess and the over-algorithmization just killed that product. People don't want to have fancy algorithms sorting their lives. Rather have people decide what they want to see. They aren't geeks like we are. I'm usually delighted when I see heat map and sorting alg based on heatmaps and heavy machine learning. But these kids? They don't care that you have there 2k developers sitting and optimizing news feed. Once you have there an ad and you start "hidding" content, you are done. Ironically, I think that it's the over-thinking of NewsFeed what set FB to this position. The worst on this is, that the guys from Twitter are doing the exact same mistake. Simple simple simple, simplicity is the key for teens. You see these examples all around - Snapchat & Instagram & YikYak - these are all simple services. I bet you once Instagram starts introducing "smart" sorting of feed, they will be abandoned by teens in a instance.
- nikster 12y ago
  Spot on. FB news feed is completely broken, and the only reason is that they're constantly tinkering with it - I guess to optimize for views, for staying time, for click throughs - whatever it is. They need to show posts from people I follow in the order they were posted. To prove the point, that's exactly how Facebook groups works. And I totally agree with the author that Facebook groups is great, certainly better than other ways of organizing groups.

by bgun 12y ago

josu 12y ago

So were Yahoo and AOL. If specialized apps start to show up, people may start ditching FB altogether.

Chronic30 12y ago
You can be sure Facebook will acquire any threatening social networks.
- billions 12y ago
  Except Snapchat which refused acquisition so far
  - crazypyro 12y ago
    Probably because Facebook hasn't offered them enough billions yet. This article and author certainly seems to be promoting Snapchat well though.
    - josephpmay 12y ago
      Facebook could offer Snapchat 20B and Evan Spiegel wouldn't take it
      - manticore_alpha 12y ago
        He's an idiot, then.
joshstrange 12y ago
Not too sure about that. All of my friends (I'm 23) have FB and while we all more or less hate it we wouldn't dream of not being on FB. It's the best way to connect with someone you meet (through friends, at a bar, etc) and you don't have to ask for a number. Just friend request, chat a little bit and if it works out swap numbers and move to SMS. Like your parent said I see FB as "essential social plumbing", not the most glamorous or best but a necessity and way to connect to people before you go "off FB" to another app or SMS to chat/interact. The only reason I "post" to FB is b/c my Twitter posts to FB. I rarely use Twitter except from trying to get companies attention after having them ignore support requests or not having any other support at all. Multiple times I've used a websites/app's built in ticketing system only to get no response. A pissed tweet a couple days later and I've got a response within the hour... The squeaky wheel...
- rando3826 12y ago
  > we wouldn't dream of not being on FB And 10 years ago I wouldn't dream of not having my ICQ friends. Your dreams are not the /most/ relevant.
  - joshstrange 12y ago
    I am not talking about the future, I'm talking about right now, at this moment. I can't predict the future but I can give my view point from this point in time and that's what I've done. I'm sorry that's not good enough for you.
    - rando3826 12y ago
      Your reply was in reference to the future, so it's logical for a reader to assume that's what you were talking about. > If specialized apps start to show up, people may start ditching FB altogether.
  - dntrkv 12y ago
    And just because it's happened in the past does not guarantee that it will happen again. People have been predicting the downfall of Facebook for years, but it keeps growing.
solarmist 12y ago
He mentions exactly that in the article. A lot of 10-16 year olds he knows don't even have FB accounts.
- sehutson 12y ago
  10-16 year olds also live with their parents and often "hate" them. Now that more adults are there, it's not as natural to get on Facebook as a teenager/pre-teen. Will they join later when they move out and seek ways to stay connected with family? Who knows - but I can definitely see why they're not there yet. I'm older, but the only reason I joined Facebook was to have a way to keep in touch with family once I moved 2000 miles away to California.

Animats 12y ago

What he's saying is that Facebook is a great contacts directory, because everyone is on it. But most of the other features are useless. (Recently, most of the features of Facebook broke for the combo of Ubuntu 14.04 LTS, Firefox 34, and Ghostery. Messaging and notifications still work most of the time, but many of the other features just stall, probably waiting for some tracker. This turns out to be a feature, not a bug. No ads, no timeline, no crap.)

rewqfdsa 12y ago
> many of the other features just stall, probably waiting for some tracker. Ubuntu adds a Firefox extension for integrating some web sites into the desktop. It's incredibly buggy and, IME, frequently breaks on Facebook. Try disabling the extension in Firefox.

btbuildem 12y ago

Yup, just like growing up with roads and water in taps makes those invisible and boring - just part of the background.

tomashertus 12y ago

I think that Facebook's NewsFeed is the biggest mess and the over-algorithmization just killed that product. People don't want to have fancy algorithms sorting their lives. Rather have people decide what they want to see. They aren't geeks like we are. I'm usually delighted when I see heat map and sorting alg based on heatmaps and heavy machine learning. But these kids? They don't care that you have there 2k developers sitting and optimizing news feed. Once you have there an ad and you start "hidding" content, you are done. Ironically, I think that it's the over-thinking of NewsFeed what set FB to this position. The worst on this is, that the guys from Twitter are doing the exact same mistake. Simple simple simple, simplicity is the key for teens. You see these examples all around - Snapchat & Instagram & YikYak - these are all simple services. I bet you once Instagram starts introducing "smart" sorting of feed, they will be abandoned by teens in a instance.

nikster 12y ago
Spot on. FB news feed is completely broken, and the only reason is that they're constantly tinkering with it - I guess to optimize for views, for staying time, for click throughs - whatever it is. They need to show posts from people I follow in the order they were posted. To prove the point, that's exactly how Facebook groups works. And I totally agree with the author that Facebook groups is great, certainly better than other ways of organizing groups.