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Facebook is an attack on the open web

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Re: Facebook is an attack on the open web

#231

Post by wuliwong »

irrational wrote: post #11

I have a feeling that Facebook will be on the decline. My teenagers and early-20 year-olds and their friends (not just local, but all over the US) think Facebook is for old people. I actually heard a 16 year old recently giving a speech where he mentioned Snapchat Stories, then, as an aside, said, "That's like Facebook or Pintrest for you old people."

The 16 year old is saying you probably don't know what SnapChat is if you are "old." But you can't assume that he doesn't use Facebook based on that quote.

Re: Facebook is an attack on the open web

#233

Post by wuliwong »

b0rsuk wrote: post #214
kirse wrote: post #21

All this open-web bitching sounds oddly familiar from back when AOL was a tech monstrosity with nearly everything inside its walled-garden. Facebook is basically just a worldwide version of AOL, and plenty of people are tiring of it, just as they tired of AOL's dialup shenanigans and obnoxious floppy disk marketing. And Facebook, too, will eventually crust away when the underlying tech improves (universal 5G? who kno…

Facebook has wider reach than AOL. Maybe walled garden builders are getting better at their tricks ?

It's a bit of tough comparison. When I used AOL, it was literally my "portal" to the internet. I may have even used a browser embedded in AOL? Facebook is not that for most of it's users.

But that being said, if we are just concerned with statistics, obviously Facebook's user numbers are much larger than AOL ever saw but I wonder what percentage of people using the internet use Facebook today vs. AOL "back in the day"?

Re: Facebook is an attack on the open web

#235

Post by wordupmaking »

aeorgnoieang wrote: post #56
gthtjtkt wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Facebook was great in the early years. No ads, no political spam, no viral garbage, no pictures of what your friend ate for dinner, no psychologically manipulative algorithms. Just people talking to their friends and posting pictures of themselves hanging out. If someone made a new social network like that, I'd sign up today.

Excluding the "ads", how would you prevent users from posting "political spam", "viral garbage", and "pictures of what your friend ate for dinner"?

Allow people to tag their posts, and have friends who tag their posts. Then have an option to not see posts of type X (link, photo, text, video, audio) tagged with Y by contact Z. Have further options to display little icons with some info for hidden posts to easily expand them inline. And so on.

Yes, you'd have to manually curate some things, but otherwise I think it's mostly just a matter of not hiring any marketing people, and creating the features first and looking how to make them easily usable second. Especially if the goal isn't to "kill FB", but simply offer an alternative to those who want the good bits and actually like, uhh, reading manuals and being proficient with the tools they use.

They can't come if there is nowhere for them to come to, and then it's easy to pretend they don't exist. But they do, even among the old and young and not so technical.

Re: Facebook is an attack on the open web

#236

Post by sfRattan »

b0rsuk wrote: post #182

There's a string of submissions critical of Facebook on HN recently. I agree and approve. But one thing interests me: doesn't Facebook have something like that, but in reverse ? I mean updates along the lines "We need more Facebook", "Open internet is for nerds", "Why more websites need to migrate to Facebook"... ? Unless you have a Facebook account, you don't know what's going on on the other side of the barricade.…

I suspect the lower number of job postings related to react has to do with the legal language in the repository concerning patents[1] and the uncertainty that generates for many businesses, especially those in the 'social' space. Legal concerns often have as much weight as technical merits when deciding which framework to use for a project within a company.

[1] https://github.com/facebook/react/blob/master/PATENTS

Re: Facebook is an attack on the open web

#237

Post by wordupmaking »

MachinShinn- wrote: post #74

I'm baffled by some of the comments here... Is it so difficult for you guys to just have a facebook account that you don't check in on? You can still sign into random sites that require it that way, arrange meetups, etc but without 'scrolling your life away' I expect people like me who spend most of their day on the computer to have at least as much digital self discipline as I have, but perhaps that's a poor assumpt…

> Is it so difficult for you guys to just have a facebook account that you don't check in on?

Yes. Is that so difficult for you to accept? Tough shit.

Re: Facebook is an attack on the open web

#238

Post by Yhippa »

Tossrock wrote: post #19

I deactivated my Facebook account several months ago, and it's been about 90% great, 10% frustrating. It's great for all the obvious reasons (less timesuck, less compulsion to endlessly scroll your life away, no notification interruptions). The frustrations are real, though. Primarily it's around events and photos. There are some communities I participate in that regularly organize events through Facebook, and now I…

I haven't deactivated my Facebook but I've used it much less over the past few years. Same for Instagram. I've actually moved back to MMS, WhatsApp, and email to communicate with people I care about the most. I end up using Google Photos to host and quickly share individual and groups of photos. It's not perfect but does the trick for the most part.

Re: Facebook is an attack on the open web

#239

Post by wuliwong »

compiler-guy wrote: post #190
blazespin wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I really like facebook. It's nice to stay in touch with your friends, especially when abroad.

Facebook is really nice for many usecases. But it could be way more open without ruining those usecases. It is just so hostile to non-facebook users. The primary example being the one cited in the article: The only reason to block 1/3 of a page to nonlogged in users is to convince you to either sign up or log in. There is no user-based reason to do so. That is open-web hostile. There is no need to make the all the co…

I think the reason it seems so strange is because they do let some things be "public." There was a time when you could see zero content without being logged in to an account. I would prefer if Facebook were a 100% walled garden. It would make the usage more simple. But then Zuckerberg wouldn't have as much money, I suppose.

Google is murky too but they were coming from the 100% open side of things.

I just wish everyone would go back to their corners!

Re: Facebook is an attack on the open web

#240

Post by lolsal »

darksaints wrote: post #58

By altering the title, you've taken something deliberately strong and watered it down. This isn't a situation where a different title better conveys the authors intent or content...this is explicitly an opinionated essay expressing exactly what the title summarizes. It is unnecessary censorship. Sure it is a word that commonly is considered vulgar, but it is also a word that has significant visceral meaning. HN shoul…

I disagree that it is a form of censorship. I think the title of the post linked is more click-baity than the HN title. I am more interested in this article as it's presented on HN than I would have been if I had stumbled on an article named 'Fuck Facebook'.
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