> People even discovered more of the Internet, such as things like "file transfer protocol," where they could get lots of stuff no one had ever seen in the form of files. Programs such as "finger" let a person see who had been online, which, again, blew people's minds. People were so excited by the World Wide Web, they never wanted to go back to AOL or Compuserve or Prodigy.
This person's explanation for why AOL died does not match up with my memories. I remember regularly using AOL's built in web browser (which was just a wrapper around IE) to surf the web. The reason my family switched away from AOL was because we could get faster internet through our cable company. It had nothing to do with FTP, fingering, or "discovering the world wide web".
> The business people decided that there should be a way to make something like AOL, even though everyone thought Web sites were amazing and didn't want to go back.
Again, this just doesn't line-up with how I remember things. I remember people liking the sense of community AOL had (the chats, IMs, forums, etc). It was other factors (faster internet, etc), that led to AOL's downfall.
I grew up on AOL's internet and it really wasn't that bad. The WWW was a lot different back then. Remember, this was even before Google! The article acts like AOL was some wasteland that the company never bothered to update.
AOL offered a lot of content, games, file sharing, chat, message boards, email, etc. that was difficult to get elsewhere for most people.
Our family (myself included) liked AOL enough that we continued to pay a reduced monthly fee to connect to their service over TCP/IP when the local ISP's started offering better connection options.
Exactly, AOL failed to move on broadband because the subscription model they had with dial up internet was very profitable. Additionally, the cable companies realizing the opportunity were not about to let AOL to continue to collect rent over their wires... Facebook is very different from AOL.
I had the exact same reaction to reading those lines. Everyone I knew was more than happy to use AOL to surf the World Wide Web it was only when their cost and speed stagnated next to competitors did people jump ship.
Your memory of AOL isn't old enough, then. I remember AOL before they had a web browser, which they later reluctantly added in a bid to keep relevance. You remember the latter days of AOL, when the writing was on the wall.
Eventually the replication of free versions of AOL's services on the broader Internet devalued its offering to the point that once standalone Internet connections were cheaper and more broadly available (especially things like NetZero) people simply dumped their AOL subscriptions or never subscribed in the first place.
What this has to do with Facebook I do not know -- for what Facebook does, centralization is a feature and not a bug.
I do wish the author had at least read the Wikipedia page on AOL before writing their piece though, although it probably would have invalidated their premise.
And the price. AOL charged by the minute and were slow to switch to unlimited...much like Blockbuster was reluctant to kill late fees and ended up losing to Netflix's DVD distribution (even before they got into streaming).
A lot of people I know have online lives that live within or around facebook and nothing else.
They get their news from facebook as the news/media organisation posts updates to their feeds, which they can share with others via WhatsApp or messenger. No need to visit the news sites it's all there.
They get their local second hand marketplace through Facebook Marketplace, no need for eBay et al.
They get their local community updates, gossip, business recommendations etc. through Facebook Groups. No need for nextdoor or neighbourhoood specific websites/forums.
They can find local businesses through the Facebook as the businesses have a Page that describes what they do, testimonials from previous customers, bit of a social feed to add some personality/'blogging'. Contactable through messenger. The businesses don't need to setup a website, Facebook offers all the tools.
You never have to leave, especially on iOS/Android if you use the facebook app. Even links to external sites are rendered in a webview, so no need to look at URLs.
For months now I've been searching for some good used furniture. Mostly MCM stuff. I'd prefer private party sales, but am open to dealers as well.
For the personal side I was checking Nextdoor, Craigslist, and OfferUp. Hours of scrolling and modifying search queries and I couldn't find anything worth checking out. Those sites are for $50 couches and $20 bookshelves.
For the dealer side, I was just searching the web. My impression was that furniture dealers were either a dying business, or all search engines suck. The only results I kept getting were Pinterest, 1stdibs, or Chairish. These are sites with insane markups where (I suspect) you're supposed to be smart enough to haggle down. I gather they also take a large cut, so not many dealers list with them at all.
I finally got a clue and re-animated my ancient IG account. Whaddayaknow? That's where everyone is! Suddenly I've found and followed a couple dozen resale shops that offer all sorts of cool stuff. All within an hour of where I live. Half the time, the URL they have in their bio is a dead website. Or, it exists but hasn't been updated in months. They've given up on having their own website and sell only inside the walled garden now.
It's a shame.
I still haven't logged into Facebook proper. I probably should find out if Marketplace is better than Craigslist, et. al. for classified ads.
Sure, young people may not use FB too much these days, but there are a ton of adults that are close to 100% invested in FB usage. It's simply a one stop shop for almost all their needs.
And I'm gonna be honest, a LOT of my previous forum and classifieds usage has been taken to facebook, which I'm using every single day.
I have thought about this before. As someone who would never use Facebook, I want to judge the Facebook—centric view of the web, but then I think about how I live my entire online existence around an RSS reader (Feedly in my case). There’s obviously a level of manipulation in Facebook that isn’t present in an RSS reader, but I understand the mindset of setting a central portal in the online world.
IIRC, in addition to being an "online portal" to online content, it was also an ISP. Back in those days, most internet access was via a Dial-Up modem. If you wanted to get online, your computer had to make a phone call. Where we were, dialing outside of the region defined by our prefix (the 3 numbers after the area code) was considered a "long distance call" and was like 10 cents per minute or something. Connecting to the internet ran up your phone bill ~ fast! if you did not have a LOCAL ISP. IIRC (which is questionable), AOL had toll free numbers, but they'd charge you for your time online - so your internet bill came from your ISP only and not from ISP + Phone Company. Part of AOL's marketing gimmick "first 1,000 hours free!" or some such amount of time to get you to sign up.
This was nearly 30 years ago, and I didn't really understand how it all worked back then, and my parents paid the phone bills (not me!) so my recollection may be full of partial-truths or downright falsehoods. But point being - I think the article really understates AOL's role in being an ISP (especially for rural folks who didn't have local ISPs).
Large dial-up ISPs had huge lists of numbers you could use to dial in with so that you could pick the one which was local to you. I'm not sure how this worked on the provider side, but customers pretty much never payed by-the-minute fees to dial into their ISP.
That matches my experience. We were limited by the number of hours for our local ISP, too. Think they even had different plans for how many hours per month we wanted.
"The 1990s had a word for being trapped inside a manipulative notion of human contact: AOL. Facebook and its ilk are the rebirth of that limited vision."
Okay, but the tone is critical, so let's ask the question, if this limited vision is somehow a bad thing, why have we seen it for 30 years? If it was there at the beginning of the Web, and it is here now that the Web is mature, then there must be something compelling about "this limited vision."
Keep in mind, I was a huge fan of the original blogosphere of 2000-2008, and I was sad when it was killed off with the emergence of Facebook and Twitter. My first startup, from 2002-2008, was originally focused on weblog tools, before we moved onto ecommerce tools.
But, again, the question needs to be faced, why did people find Facebook more interesting that the blogosphere, and why did decentralized attempts at social networks (such as FOAF, Friend Of A Friend) fail to take off, despite a lot of hype from all the major dev personalities?
Merely whining about the way the world is doesn't really help anyone. Instead of complaining about "this limited vision" it would be helpful to see more essays about why, exactly, people continue to choose limited walled-gardens. Why don't more people want to see some wider vision fulfilled? Why don't more people explore more widely? Why don't more people take out there wallet and spend more money for the kind of independent content that, in theory, they might want to see?
I left Facebook years ago and have no reason to go back. I can share photos and videos with friends and family easily enough. Most of the online relationships were pretty superficial as well, so I don't need them anyway.
Facebook does have some value, but it seems like the signal to noise ratio is very low. I'm not sure how rare my case is though. How many people in there 20-40s feel the same?
I feel the same. Most my friends just use Instagram (for memes mostly). I like using just Snapchat for sharing photos with my close friends, which is better than sharing with literally everyone.
Of course, you still have people who's primary motive is to farm for likes. I don't see their attitudes changing anytime soon..
I stopped following any groups or pages, and I'm only friends with people who I'm on a first name basis with. This is probably Facebook as originally intended. The signal to noise ratio is only middling and my usage has gone way down
I mostly use it for family that is on there. The "feed" is horrible, filled with ads and timely things always appear out of order. Stuff from neighborhood sometimes shows something from 3 days after something occurred higher than something today.
Not sure why this is being downvoted. Deleting posts via scripts gave my Facebook a second life. I just use it for messenger and events. Highly recommended.
All this talk about Facebook without mentioning their huge investment in FB Reality Labs (FBRL) and the statements from Mark that he will turn them into a "Metaverse" company in 5 years. Now, will they be "the AOL of" this Metaverse is still to be determined but FB are pulling XR out from the tech fringes into a mainstream audience. Apple may well be making similar moves if rumors are to be taken seriously. As far as the Metaverse is concerned, we are still in the late DARPA-NET or early BBS days so while this title may hold true, it would be for reasons that are unintended by the author or those commenting here so far.
I’ll believe Mark when it happens. In 2017 he also said he’d ship a billion oculuses; I think they sell maybe 3M a year.
My 2c; I did see their remote work demo and thought it was kind of cool, although (anecdotally) coding in a virtual screen tends to give me headaches. But until the headsets arent heavy, expensive, and silly-looking or require goofy paddles I do not think the VR metaverse will be gaining any mass traction.
Personally I have found current VR is fun for some games and tedious for everything else. The wow factor of a large expensive facial protrusion with a screen and gyro was gone by the time Oculus was acquired. What followed was a lowering of price, allowing for 4-5x more users per year to be disappointed. And Facebook has more or less failed at all their hw offerings thus far despite much PR, right? I dont see that changing. They should stick to monetizing your information IMO, they’ve been able to make that highly efficient and it doesn’t cost $800 for the end user or leave large imprints on their faces.
Geez, that article takes its time to get to the point doesn't it, WTF is the detour to Snap! and Friendster for?
Skimming the second half it seems the author got lost, he started talking about all the ways Facebook with its terrible anti-consumer actions isn't AOL...
> But there our story ends, because that chapter has not yet been written.
I think it will be harder to unseat Facebook than it was for AOL simply because of size.
At its peak, AOL had around 34 million subscribers. Thus you could easily grow and build by service by appealing to people who had never been on AOL and who we’re not enmeshed in the AOL ecosystem.
Facebook has billions of users. There aren’t enough people in the world who have Internet access to allow someone to build a massive service out of people who have never been on Facebook. Add to that Instagram and WhatsApp and there are not that many people who are on the Internet but not a part of Facebook’s ecosystem.
Facebook doesn't get unseated, it splinters, losing potency gradually (assuming regulators keep them from buying the competition).
Facebook will still be the dominate global social network 10-20 years from now. What will change is that there will be more niche social networks with approaches/audiences/subjects-of-focus that Facebook couldn't cater to well enough (which is why Pinterest, Snap, Twitter, TikTok, LinkedIn, Reddit, Imgur exist).
AOL died when private rooms stopped being private and the personal filing cabinet (unlimited storage) was discontinued. AOL easily had the biggest warez scene, once that was over and nobody could share files they went elsewhere.
Yahoo is perhaps more apt of a comparison: They do not offer anything that is not easily replaceable, they fail to innovate at every turn, and their revenue is almost completely tied to advertising.
You might say this describes Google as well, but search provides a real utility and I honestly don’t know what Facebook provides anyone other than an addicting experience that makes the user feel actively worse.
This article is sadly lacking in historical accuracy. AOL grew out of Quantum Link which definitely predated the Internet. In its heyday it provided far more utility than the Internet of the time. This is a terrible comparison.
AOL died because the world went broadband and AOL was dial-up. That's it. That's the only reason. It was pretty good in a lot of other ways, and I'd argue there's still a place for it today.
If you think FB is destined for failure because AOL failed, you're crazy.
FB is still on the leading-edge of change in this industry (Oculus). There's zero sense of stagnation in that company.
Zero sense of stagnation because what they do is actively tricking the user at every turn (lying about Instagram and Whatsapp acquisitions, same thing with the Oculus) and users have no choice
As I remember, AOL was a dial-up internet provider. The reason it held up for so long is because large swaths of USA didn't have broadband access up until very recently.
[+] [-] patorjk|4 years ago|reply
This person's explanation for why AOL died does not match up with my memories. I remember regularly using AOL's built in web browser (which was just a wrapper around IE) to surf the web. The reason my family switched away from AOL was because we could get faster internet through our cable company. It had nothing to do with FTP, fingering, or "discovering the world wide web".
> The business people decided that there should be a way to make something like AOL, even though everyone thought Web sites were amazing and didn't want to go back.
Again, this just doesn't line-up with how I remember things. I remember people liking the sense of community AOL had (the chats, IMs, forums, etc). It was other factors (faster internet, etc), that led to AOL's downfall.
[+] [-] ssharp|4 years ago|reply
AOL offered a lot of content, games, file sharing, chat, message boards, email, etc. that was difficult to get elsewhere for most people.
Our family (myself included) liked AOL enough that we continued to pay a reduced monthly fee to connect to their service over TCP/IP when the local ISP's started offering better connection options.
[+] [-] dumbfounder|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] taf2|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jamestenglish|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] sammalloy|4 years ago|reply
This is exactly the reason AOL went away. People initially switched to ISPs, then to local telecoms, then to cable providers.
[+] [-] Eric_WVGG|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] empressplay|4 years ago|reply
What this has to do with Facebook I do not know -- for what Facebook does, centralization is a feature and not a bug.
I do wish the author had at least read the Wikipedia page on AOL before writing their piece though, although it probably would have invalidated their premise.
[+] [-] markandrewj|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] madrox|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jdkee|4 years ago|reply
See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternal_September
[+] [-] djhworld|4 years ago|reply
They get their news from facebook as the news/media organisation posts updates to their feeds, which they can share with others via WhatsApp or messenger. No need to visit the news sites it's all there.
They get their local second hand marketplace through Facebook Marketplace, no need for eBay et al.
They get their local community updates, gossip, business recommendations etc. through Facebook Groups. No need for nextdoor or neighbourhoood specific websites/forums.
They can find local businesses through the Facebook as the businesses have a Page that describes what they do, testimonials from previous customers, bit of a social feed to add some personality/'blogging'. Contactable through messenger. The businesses don't need to setup a website, Facebook offers all the tools.
You never have to leave, especially on iOS/Android if you use the facebook app. Even links to external sites are rendered in a webview, so no need to look at URLs.
[+] [-] function_seven|4 years ago|reply
For months now I've been searching for some good used furniture. Mostly MCM stuff. I'd prefer private party sales, but am open to dealers as well.
For the personal side I was checking Nextdoor, Craigslist, and OfferUp. Hours of scrolling and modifying search queries and I couldn't find anything worth checking out. Those sites are for $50 couches and $20 bookshelves.
For the dealer side, I was just searching the web. My impression was that furniture dealers were either a dying business, or all search engines suck. The only results I kept getting were Pinterest, 1stdibs, or Chairish. These are sites with insane markups where (I suspect) you're supposed to be smart enough to haggle down. I gather they also take a large cut, so not many dealers list with them at all.
I finally got a clue and re-animated my ancient IG account. Whaddayaknow? That's where everyone is! Suddenly I've found and followed a couple dozen resale shops that offer all sorts of cool stuff. All within an hour of where I live. Half the time, the URL they have in their bio is a dead website. Or, it exists but hasn't been updated in months. They've given up on having their own website and sell only inside the walled garden now.
It's a shame.
I still haven't logged into Facebook proper. I probably should find out if Marketplace is better than Craigslist, et. al. for classified ads.
[+] [-] TrackerFF|4 years ago|reply
Sure, young people may not use FB too much these days, but there are a ton of adults that are close to 100% invested in FB usage. It's simply a one stop shop for almost all their needs.
And I'm gonna be honest, a LOT of my previous forum and classifieds usage has been taken to facebook, which I'm using every single day.
[+] [-] wsostt|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] aledalgrande|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] daveslash|4 years ago|reply
IIRC, in addition to being an "online portal" to online content, it was also an ISP. Back in those days, most internet access was via a Dial-Up modem. If you wanted to get online, your computer had to make a phone call. Where we were, dialing outside of the region defined by our prefix (the 3 numbers after the area code) was considered a "long distance call" and was like 10 cents per minute or something. Connecting to the internet ran up your phone bill ~ fast! if you did not have a LOCAL ISP. IIRC (which is questionable), AOL had toll free numbers, but they'd charge you for your time online - so your internet bill came from your ISP only and not from ISP + Phone Company. Part of AOL's marketing gimmick "first 1,000 hours free!" or some such amount of time to get you to sign up.
This was nearly 30 years ago, and I didn't really understand how it all worked back then, and my parents paid the phone bills (not me!) so my recollection may be full of partial-truths or downright falsehoods. But point being - I think the article really understates AOL's role in being an ISP (especially for rural folks who didn't have local ISPs).
[+] [-] magila|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jaredsohn|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] lkrubner|4 years ago|reply
"The 1990s had a word for being trapped inside a manipulative notion of human contact: AOL. Facebook and its ilk are the rebirth of that limited vision."
Okay, but the tone is critical, so let's ask the question, if this limited vision is somehow a bad thing, why have we seen it for 30 years? If it was there at the beginning of the Web, and it is here now that the Web is mature, then there must be something compelling about "this limited vision."
Keep in mind, I was a huge fan of the original blogosphere of 2000-2008, and I was sad when it was killed off with the emergence of Facebook and Twitter. My first startup, from 2002-2008, was originally focused on weblog tools, before we moved onto ecommerce tools.
But, again, the question needs to be faced, why did people find Facebook more interesting that the blogosphere, and why did decentralized attempts at social networks (such as FOAF, Friend Of A Friend) fail to take off, despite a lot of hype from all the major dev personalities?
Merely whining about the way the world is doesn't really help anyone. Instead of complaining about "this limited vision" it would be helpful to see more essays about why, exactly, people continue to choose limited walled-gardens. Why don't more people want to see some wider vision fulfilled? Why don't more people explore more widely? Why don't more people take out there wallet and spend more money for the kind of independent content that, in theory, they might want to see?
[+] [-] 7thaccount|4 years ago|reply
Facebook does have some value, but it seems like the signal to noise ratio is very low. I'm not sure how rare my case is though. How many people in there 20-40s feel the same?
[+] [-] TrackerFF|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] warp|4 years ago|reply
So they've moved away from Facebook the product, but not Facebook the company.
[+] [-] blitz_skull|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dummydata|4 years ago|reply
Of course, you still have people who's primary motive is to farm for likes. I don't see their attitudes changing anytime soon..
[+] [-] majani|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] matt_s|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] hopesthoughts|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mclightning|4 years ago|reply
This is what I did. You will not have any way to "re-activate" it, this way. You will keep your access to fb signin, events and messenger.
[+] [-] johntran|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] emerged|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] hopesthoughts|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jimmySixDOF|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] noobquestion81|4 years ago|reply
My 2c; I did see their remote work demo and thought it was kind of cool, although (anecdotally) coding in a virtual screen tends to give me headaches. But until the headsets arent heavy, expensive, and silly-looking or require goofy paddles I do not think the VR metaverse will be gaining any mass traction.
Personally I have found current VR is fun for some games and tedious for everything else. The wow factor of a large expensive facial protrusion with a screen and gyro was gone by the time Oculus was acquired. What followed was a lowering of price, allowing for 4-5x more users per year to be disappointed. And Facebook has more or less failed at all their hw offerings thus far despite much PR, right? I dont see that changing. They should stick to monetizing your information IMO, they’ve been able to make that highly efficient and it doesn’t cost $800 for the end user or leave large imprints on their faces.
[+] [-] fourseventy|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] bellyfullofbac|4 years ago|reply
Skimming the second half it seems the author got lost, he started talking about all the ways Facebook with its terrible anti-consumer actions isn't AOL...
[+] [-] RcouF1uZ4gsC|4 years ago|reply
I think it will be harder to unseat Facebook than it was for AOL simply because of size.
At its peak, AOL had around 34 million subscribers. Thus you could easily grow and build by service by appealing to people who had never been on AOL and who we’re not enmeshed in the AOL ecosystem.
Facebook has billions of users. There aren’t enough people in the world who have Internet access to allow someone to build a massive service out of people who have never been on Facebook. Add to that Instagram and WhatsApp and there are not that many people who are on the Internet but not a part of Facebook’s ecosystem.
[+] [-] adventured|4 years ago|reply
Facebook will still be the dominate global social network 10-20 years from now. What will change is that there will be more niche social networks with approaches/audiences/subjects-of-focus that Facebook couldn't cater to well enough (which is why Pinterest, Snap, Twitter, TikTok, LinkedIn, Reddit, Imgur exist).
[+] [-] hopesthoughts|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] bastardoperator|4 years ago|reply
AOL died when private rooms stopped being private and the personal filing cabinet (unlimited storage) was discontinued. AOL easily had the biggest warez scene, once that was over and nobody could share files they went elsewhere.
[+] [-] etempleton|4 years ago|reply
You might say this describes Google as well, but search provides a real utility and I honestly don’t know what Facebook provides anyone other than an addicting experience that makes the user feel actively worse.
[+] [-] unknown|4 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] empressplay|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mvkel|4 years ago|reply
If you think FB is destined for failure because AOL failed, you're crazy.
FB is still on the leading-edge of change in this industry (Oculus). There's zero sense of stagnation in that company.
[+] [-] annadane|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] threshold|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] EVa5I7bHFq9mnYK|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] kazinator|4 years ago|reply
Thanks ZDNet; that's the most succinct explanation I've ever read for why I've never had a Facebook account.
[+] [-] hopesthoughts|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] stjohnswarts|4 years ago|reply