It seems to me that Facebook has always been stuck with a damned lot: to make their product profitable, they have make their product worse. This is exactly the problem with "social" games. These games are lousy exactly because the lousy features make them money. With the direction that Facebook is going, it seems to be a service where users volunteer to receive spam. I do not think any company in this position is setup for long-term success.
On a philosophical note, I have always felt that Facebook is just a slot machine company. They make a fancy box that takes advantage of the weaknesses of the human brain (obsession with novelty, gossip, and visual stimulus) to keep users doing an activity for much longer than required to get the benefit of that activity. I could be radical and say that I think Facebook delivers no value to its customers and that most people end up actively regretting the time they spend on Facebook (I think it is uncontroversial to say that no one goes to bed wishing he had spent more of his day on Facebook), however there is always someone with a story about reuniting with a long-lost elementary school friend due to Facebook. Nonetheless, even if this value does exist, in no way does it justify the amount of time most Facebook users spend on the site nor does it describe the majority of user activity. This is not to say that Facebook is doomed any more than Las Vegas is doomed, but maybe people will wise up and be more careful about how they spend their time...
A bit of anecdote: I have noticed people on reddit commenting that they now use reddit more than Facebook as all the good content on Facebook is just copied from reddit. If reddit had some kind of social interface, it might move aggressively into this market.
I don't spend a lot of time on facebook and the time I do spend there I feel I get a lot more value from, or regret a lot less, on average than, say, time spent reading blog comments or reddit/HN or tech pundits or ...
1) If you read in a literal manner the reports companies file with the SEC, you'd think each and every one of them is going to fail. Know that when companies list all the "threats" they "believe" they face in SEC reports, you have to be aware that it's basically legal-ass-covering, and doesn't really actually reflect internal sentiment. They basically include those so that if they get sued by shareholders they can point to those reports as legal evidence that they informed them of all the risks. Anyone who has read multiple SEC reports will know that this is pretty mundane stuff.
2) The OP's right about the coolness. Facebook is not seen as cool among teens anymore. It's seen as necessary. You are seen as an unusual person if you don't have a Facebook. The same applies to having a cellphone - it's assumed you have one, and it's a surprise if you don't (disclosure: I'm going off personal experience from high school).
But you're right. It's not seen as cool anymore. I think this is a great thing: Coolness brings you users. Necessity bring you the money.
It goes without saying that Blake Ross was being sarcastic about his reason for leaving.
Don't agree 100%, but the quality of FB overall as a product has definitely degraded as of late as they've been pushing Gifts, Commerce, and other revenue streams onto users very strongly.
I've noticed several annoying redesigns / changes that hide convenient functionality in order to make the user click through "No, I don't want to give a gift"... Very annoying, definitely makes me less pleased and less engaged with the site.
As obnoxious as those gift suggestions can be for some people I'd never think of sending a gift, I've found the actual experience of sending a gift on Facebook to be great. You can send something across the country the day of someone's birthday (as opposed to sending something with a belated birthday card), because a lot of them give the receiver an option between a couple of gifts (say a bottle of red, white or rose wine).
> "Then we have the recent departure of Blake Ross, the company's Director of Products. In his now removed goodbye letter he mentioned that he did an informal survey and found that teenagers would actually answer 'no' to the question of whether they still viewed Facebook as 'cool', and this influenced his decision to leave the company."
I agree that he was being sarcastic about whether this was a realistic reason for him leaving. But I still think it's telling that he made the joke - it seems to me to indicate that there's some perception, internally, that teenagers no longer view them as cool.
For example, if I were to leave Google, and had the same sense of humor as Blake Ross, I might say something like "I'm leaving Google because my mom and her friends don't use Google+. But seriously..." I wouldn't actually leave Google for that reason, but it doesn't make it an untrue statement.
As usual, the title is a little bit sensationalist. According to the company, Facebook is curently being used actively by 1 billion users. For Facebook to go the MySpace way (let alone in single year), something incredibly extraordinary would have to happen, akin of Google as a search engine becoming irrelevant. I'm not saying it's impossible, just that it's a bit naive to suggest such thing because teenagers engage less with the site these days.
I notice my teenage sister using Facebook as something like an appliance: like email or SMS...it's just a little tool. When I was in highschool, it was a platform; a destination.
With un-monitized mobile apps and notifications on every device, it's just a communication tool nowadays. Instagram and Pinterest are what I notice teens using the same way I used Facebook in highschool.
So my predicion: it either becomes like Google and Email...or it dies. But nothing can bring back its coolness factor.
If we're going to compare myspace and facebook... it's worth pointing out that myspace, at its peak, had 110m active users. In other words, MySpace never achieved what Facebook has.
Facebook is the World of Warcraft of social networks.
- Previous competitors were big, but only about 10% of what they've become.
- They struck a nerve somewhere and didn't fill just a niche, they fulfilled what everyone wanted at the same time.
- Made changes to satisfy the masses.
- Made changes to satisfy the bottom line.
- They will (or already have) reach a saturation point where they are losing people at the same clip as they are gaining them.
- They will very, very slowly degrade, being eaten by many competitors but probably not just one.
- Reach a lower equilibrium, nowhere near their peak, where they can continue for a very long and profitable future.
The last one is how WoW is doing right now. I don't know if Facebook has a 'very profitable' future for how big they are, although I do think they will be a portion of their current selves and sustain that for a very long time.
As a side note, I think the reason people are so pessimistic about Facebook's future (and has been discussed on HN before) is that if it was completely abandoned tomorrow, all of it's content is irrelevant. It's not really a blogging platform, it's not really an image archive, all that is there is connections - and even those might not be all that significant.
Nope. Here's a difference: My parents never signed up for MySpace. It takes a lot of momentum to stop a beast as big as Facebook. MySpace was never even close.
While true, is this just the first example of a social site that has gotten big enough to attract your parents? Or is this the first site your parents will, for lack of a better term, abandon just like others did with myspace?
Serious question: Did your parents think you might be groomed on MySpace by perverts? Were the worried for you in any way? (In this context of course, I'm sure in general they care about you!!!) See, a lot of parents sign up to facebook because of the various scare stories, and want to monitor their kids. I know quite a few in that category.
On the other hand, I'm a parent and I signed up before my kids even knew FB existed. My parents have not signed up, and likely never will. Neither will my parents parents, but then Im not sure they even know what a "facebook" even is.
I have since closed my facebook account. Unless places like here are some how called "social", I don't do "social" at all. Well, I do, but I don't call sitting in front of a computer social. I call it giving over personal information so a web site can make money. Not that there is anything wrong with that, its fair enough for those who want to partake. But to me, that is what it is. I communicate with friends via email if I have to use a computer to do so.
> We believe that some of our users, particularly our younger users, are aware of and actively engaging with other products and services similar to, or as a substitute for, Facebook. For example, we believe that some of our users have reduced their engagement with Facebook in favor of increased engagement with other products and services such as Instagram.
Anecdotal evidence that happens to be confirmed by this FB press release: one of my younger colleagues (she's in her early 20s) just told me a couple of days ago: "I almost don't use FB anymore, I'm only using Instgram". She's the only person I know face to face who had a MySpace account (I live in Europe, where MySpace wasn't really that big of a thing anyway) and she has generally been among the first to experiment with new social thingies.
I'm not saying FB will "be dead" anytime soon, but is good that they've chosen not to bury their head in the sand like Google does with Google+. Of course, it just happens that Instagram is now owned by FB.
It already has, in the sense that early adopters and content creators have largely abandoned it in favor of other services (mostly Twitter, Tumblr, Instagram and now Vine). Facebook is now mainly the realm of corporate-sponsored pages and gossip among non-technical folk, so basically MySpace circa 2004.
Granted, it's much less aggressively bad than MySpace was at that time, since people can't arbitrarily embed HTML/CSS/JavaScript wherever they want, but its stock prices are absurdly over valued and it has never found a way to monetize its audience, and it has totally lost the trust of its users.
The main thing Facebook has going for it is that everyone is on it. But most high-profile people only use it as a place to link to their profiles on the services they actually use, and people will follow the people they "follow" on to new services, if you follow me.
I think it's safe to say that it will become more and more of a ghost town over the coming year or two.
fb is the premier social product in a world going social. they have a great foundation. everybody needs to take a step back and allow them to make some mistakes as they build a better product. think about some of the most revolutionary companies out there. everyone of them has a hiccup or two.
I wonder how much the "we no longer show all your posts to all your friends" issue is going to hurt Facebook?
I have limited data on this - but I know it's the reason I've stopped bothering to post anything on Facebook. I'll post on Google+, Livejournal or one of many blogs or forums where 100% of my friends can see what I'm saying, thanks, rather than have Facebook decide how my social interactions work and which 15% of my friends it'll show my posts to.
In my experience, when the "Facebook chooses who sees your posts, and it's never everyone" rule is demonstrated to other semi-"normal" Facebook users, they react very negatively.
I miss being able to unsubscribe from my annoying acquaintances. It's too socially awkward to defriend some people who post 15 inspirational messages a day.
You can still do that they just changed the name. Where the unsubscribe thing was there is now a drop down that you can uncheck put posts in your your feed.
I think it's a poor metaphor. But I do think Facebook's future is going to more as a platform for connecting third party services. Few users are going to be on just one of these other services, and there's value in creating the best space to share content from disparate services.
Facebook can lose 50% of its users and still have more users than basically anything else on the Internet. All they need to do is figure out how to monetize these users consistently, and they will be fine.
Hmm, if so and so is going to happen, it will take someone to actually do it, so the real question is who will do it, and how? Anyone up for it ? Anyone?
10 bucks says, it will be 2014, not 2013, given how much time it will take at minimum to catch up to FB
[+] [-] rohern|13 years ago|reply
On a philosophical note, I have always felt that Facebook is just a slot machine company. They make a fancy box that takes advantage of the weaknesses of the human brain (obsession with novelty, gossip, and visual stimulus) to keep users doing an activity for much longer than required to get the benefit of that activity. I could be radical and say that I think Facebook delivers no value to its customers and that most people end up actively regretting the time they spend on Facebook (I think it is uncontroversial to say that no one goes to bed wishing he had spent more of his day on Facebook), however there is always someone with a story about reuniting with a long-lost elementary school friend due to Facebook. Nonetheless, even if this value does exist, in no way does it justify the amount of time most Facebook users spend on the site nor does it describe the majority of user activity. This is not to say that Facebook is doomed any more than Las Vegas is doomed, but maybe people will wise up and be more careful about how they spend their time...
A bit of anecdote: I have noticed people on reddit commenting that they now use reddit more than Facebook as all the good content on Facebook is just copied from reddit. If reddit had some kind of social interface, it might move aggressively into this market.
[+] [-] contextfree|13 years ago|reply
Granted that's not saying much ...
[+] [-] panacea|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] minimaxir|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] lifeisstillgood|13 years ago|reply
Which is not meant as facaetious as it sounds - in financial terms Facebook is the Belgium Dentist of ephemeral trivia.
[+] [-] brianchu|13 years ago|reply
2) The OP's right about the coolness. Facebook is not seen as cool among teens anymore. It's seen as necessary. You are seen as an unusual person if you don't have a Facebook. The same applies to having a cellphone - it's assumed you have one, and it's a surprise if you don't (disclosure: I'm going off personal experience from high school).
But you're right. It's not seen as cool anymore. I think this is a great thing: Coolness brings you users. Necessity bring you the money.
It goes without saying that Blake Ross was being sarcastic about his reason for leaving.
[+] [-] cargo8|13 years ago|reply
I've noticed several annoying redesigns / changes that hide convenient functionality in order to make the user click through "No, I don't want to give a gift"... Very annoying, definitely makes me less pleased and less engaged with the site.
[+] [-] bzalasky|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] anotherbadlogin|13 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] arasmussen|13 years ago|reply
Blake Ross was being sarcastic.
[+] [-] endtime|13 years ago|reply
For example, if I were to leave Google, and had the same sense of humor as Blake Ross, I might say something like "I'm leaving Google because my mom and her friends don't use Google+. But seriously..." I wouldn't actually leave Google for that reason, but it doesn't make it an untrue statement.
[+] [-] Mahn|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] firefoxman1|13 years ago|reply
With un-monitized mobile apps and notifications on every device, it's just a communication tool nowadays. Instagram and Pinterest are what I notice teens using the same way I used Facebook in highschool.
So my predicion: it either becomes like Google and Email...or it dies. But nothing can bring back its coolness factor.
[+] [-] rgbrenner|13 years ago|reply
http://www.web-strategist.com/blog/2008/01/09/social-network...
[+] [-] Zimahl|13 years ago|reply
- Previous competitors were big, but only about 10% of what they've become.
- They struck a nerve somewhere and didn't fill just a niche, they fulfilled what everyone wanted at the same time.
- Made changes to satisfy the masses.
- Made changes to satisfy the bottom line.
- They will (or already have) reach a saturation point where they are losing people at the same clip as they are gaining them.
- They will very, very slowly degrade, being eaten by many competitors but probably not just one.
- Reach a lower equilibrium, nowhere near their peak, where they can continue for a very long and profitable future.
The last one is how WoW is doing right now. I don't know if Facebook has a 'very profitable' future for how big they are, although I do think they will be a portion of their current selves and sustain that for a very long time.
As a side note, I think the reason people are so pessimistic about Facebook's future (and has been discussed on HN before) is that if it was completely abandoned tomorrow, all of it's content is irrelevant. It's not really a blogging platform, it's not really an image archive, all that is there is connections - and even those might not be all that significant.
EDIT: formatting.
[+] [-] bzalasky|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mitchty|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] alan_cx|13 years ago|reply
On the other hand, I'm a parent and I signed up before my kids even knew FB existed. My parents have not signed up, and likely never will. Neither will my parents parents, but then Im not sure they even know what a "facebook" even is.
I have since closed my facebook account. Unless places like here are some how called "social", I don't do "social" at all. Well, I do, but I don't call sitting in front of a computer social. I call it giving over personal information so a web site can make money. Not that there is anything wrong with that, its fair enough for those who want to partake. But to me, that is what it is. I communicate with friends via email if I have to use a computer to do so.
[+] [-] paganel|13 years ago|reply
Anecdotal evidence that happens to be confirmed by this FB press release: one of my younger colleagues (she's in her early 20s) just told me a couple of days ago: "I almost don't use FB anymore, I'm only using Instgram". She's the only person I know face to face who had a MySpace account (I live in Europe, where MySpace wasn't really that big of a thing anyway) and she has generally been among the first to experiment with new social thingies.
I'm not saying FB will "be dead" anytime soon, but is good that they've chosen not to bury their head in the sand like Google does with Google+. Of course, it just happens that Instagram is now owned by FB.
[+] [-] bradwestness|13 years ago|reply
Granted, it's much less aggressively bad than MySpace was at that time, since people can't arbitrarily embed HTML/CSS/JavaScript wherever they want, but its stock prices are absurdly over valued and it has never found a way to monetize its audience, and it has totally lost the trust of its users.
The main thing Facebook has going for it is that everyone is on it. But most high-profile people only use it as a place to link to their profiles on the services they actually use, and people will follow the people they "follow" on to new services, if you follow me.
I think it's safe to say that it will become more and more of a ghost town over the coming year or two.
[+] [-] davidmspi|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mehrzad|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] thenomad|13 years ago|reply
I have limited data on this - but I know it's the reason I've stopped bothering to post anything on Facebook. I'll post on Google+, Livejournal or one of many blogs or forums where 100% of my friends can see what I'm saying, thanks, rather than have Facebook decide how my social interactions work and which 15% of my friends it'll show my posts to.
In my experience, when the "Facebook chooses who sees your posts, and it's never everyone" rule is demonstrated to other semi-"normal" Facebook users, they react very negatively.
[+] [-] d0gsbody|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] darrylb42|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] aeturnum|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] kjackson2012|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] malkia|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mattryanharris|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rikacomet|13 years ago|reply
10 bucks says, it will be 2014, not 2013, given how much time it will take at minimum to catch up to FB
[+] [-] unknown|13 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] durbin|13 years ago|reply