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Facebook lost around 2.8M U.S. users under 25 last year

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Re: Facebook lost around 2.8M U.S. users under 25 last year

#161

Post by asymmetric »

beamatronic wrote: post #33
f055 wrote: post #10

I'm 34 and Facebook lost me as well. I can't remove my account as I need to use as a developer, but I unfollowed everyone and my newsfeed is empty. It's a bliss. Funny thing is, it's all Facebook's fault. Back in the days, the service was simply brilliant to see what's going on at your friends, at home and abroad. But when Facebook introduced the algorithmic newsfeed, the usefulness ended. I could no longer see all t…

I agree that the algo sucks. I want a LinearBook. I want a time-series database for my social network updates.

Isn’t that what Twitter is?

Re: Facebook lost around 2.8M U.S. users under 25 last year

#162

Post by AndrewKemendo »

Didn't they plan for this with the acquisitions of Instagram, Whatsapp, and most recently tbh?

They know the particular property of facebook.com can't last forever, so they go where the users are going. Last I checked Instagram is the hottest app out there for anyone 35 or under. As of last year at least Facebook, messenger and Instagram were each still in the top 5-10 most used apps.

I feel like people somehow don't see facebook as the digital conglomerate that they are and focus on what is happening on facebook.com as though it's a harbinger of the rest of the company.

Also, IMO they have the best Machine Learning (specifically vision) team on the planet and are consistently making amazing tools open source. That alone is worth a lot.

Re: Facebook lost around 2.8M U.S. users under 25 last year

#163

Post by baby »

jasode wrote: post #15

Facebook suffered from 2 waves of "Eternal September" [0]: wave 1: the addition of everybody outside your immediate friends and close family. You get the goofy uncle, the distant high school acquaintances, and all the work acquaintances from every previous job that submitted a "friend request" that you didn't reject out of politeness. The newsfeed gets polluted by nonsense such as forwarded memes, politics, and other…

Also, I get invited to "groups" all the time. Because my friends want to win beauty cream and free flights to X. I leave the group, then I get re-invited again. Then I leave, then I get re-invited again. Why is this a thing?

Re: Facebook lost around 2.8M U.S. users under 25 last year

#164

Post by opportune »

krn1p4n1c wrote: post #40

The US hasn't been the focus for several years. Africa/India/Asia were far more important than sustaining US numbers.

I'd guess that 500-700 million people in the world from $50k+ GDP/capita countries are actually a lot more valuable for advertisers than the billions from $5k GDP/capita countries. Africa/India/Asia may indeed be driving growth but not all users are equally valuable to Facebook

Re: Facebook lost around 2.8M U.S. users under 25 last year

#165

Post by GCU-Empiricist »

askafriend wrote: post #49
GCU-Empiricist wrote: post #2

Anybody know a worthwhile open source social network alternative?

A viable alternative requires your friends and family to be on it. So there is no viable alternative for most people - decentralized or otherwise.

The people I want to talk to will probably follow, or can text me.

Re: Facebook lost around 2.8M U.S. users under 25 last year

#166

Post by damontal »

jasode wrote: post #15

Facebook suffered from 2 waves of "Eternal September" [0]: wave 1: the addition of everybody outside your immediate friends and close family. You get the goofy uncle, the distant high school acquaintances, and all the work acquaintances from every previous job that submitted a "friend request" that you didn't reject out of politeness. The newsfeed gets polluted by nonsense such as forwarded memes, politics, and other…

My problem is that I share certain things with friends from college, certain things with my parents, certain things with coworkers. When my friends list contained all of the above and there was no intuitive way to separate what I share to them, I stopped posting.

Re: Facebook lost around 2.8M U.S. users under 25 last year

#167

Post by ryanmarsh »

opportune wrote: post #116
ghostbrainalpha wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Similar experience, I think my problem with the algorithm is similar to slowing down to look at the car wreck on the side of the road. I have a few a"friends" that post horrible stuff. Conspiracy theories, rants, and other posts that are just symptoms of poor mental health. At first I stopped to read these in HORROR and disgust, because they stood out so much from the rest of my feed. Facebook takes that as a signal…

Facebook's algorithm almost seems like a quintessential example of why you need to choose good metrics in optimization problems. Maximizing user engagement sounds great - it means people are using your website and enjoying it more, right? Turns out people weren't enjoying it more, they were using it more because Facebook was shoving controversial content (e.g. dubious-quality news, debates, crazy people) down people'…

Facebook's algorithm almost seems like a quintessential example of why you need to choose good metrics in optimization problems.

IMHO Facebook gave the golden goose (algo) enough feed to gorge itself on and now it is unhealthy and only lays rusty iron eggs.

Yes, they optimized for engagement, and it destroyed the platform. This is like a parable or something. Truly.

In business school 10 years from now I fully expect people to write case studies on the business effects of algo optimization and local minima, etc, etc...

Re: Facebook lost around 2.8M U.S. users under 25 last year

#168

Post by roymurdock »

jliptzin wrote: post #32

Started using FB in 2004 when there were barely a few hundred thousand users. It was great as a college freshman going to a new place not knowing anyone and needing to make friends fast and keep up. In my 30s now and have almost completely stopped using facebook. I check in once every few months, usually when I need to sign in because someone messages me there instead of email. It's actually stunning to me that Faceb…

Facebook is used differently outside the US.

When I worked at a telco in Afghanistan in 2014, Facebook was basically its own utility - SMBs and individuals used Facebook (and their precious cellular data) almost exclusively to message each other and conduct business. So much so that the most popular consumer/retail plans for Afghans were "Facebook usage plans" giving you X amount of data per month to be spent exclusively on Facebook. Amazon/google have little to no power over there, facebook has a ton. Ditto whatsapp.

I think you'll find this is true for almost any country where social ties are stronger than the US, and biz is newer, or built around mobile/face-to-face transactions - fbook is much more important than it is here as a photo feed and news consumption hangout.

That said I agree for the US case and deleted my facebook ~2 years ago :)

Re: Facebook lost around 2.8M U.S. users under 25 last year

#169

Post by pbhjpbhj »

Unkechaug wrote: post #56

How many of these users simply aged out of the demographic? I wouldn't be surprised if it's just a combination of people aging out and not too many new users signing up.

Let's assume 25% of the USA population is on Facebook (2.2B of ~8B in the World apparently are, it's probably higher). So we have about 80M USA FB users. About 40/320 or 1/8 are in the 20-24 age group; but they're more likely to be represented on FB, so let's say 1:6 of USA FB users are 20-24.

So, back of the napkin we can expect around 13M/5 or ~2.5M Facebook users to age out of the under-25 age-group in USA in a year. It's around the same ball-park.

Disclaimer: I'm recovering from flu.

Re: Facebook lost around 2.8M U.S. users under 25 last year

#170

Post by krn1p4n1c »

Slansitartop wrote: post #80
krn1p4n1c wrote: post #40

The US hasn't been the focus for several years. Africa/India/Asia were far more important than sustaining US numbers.

> The US hasn't been the focus for several years. Africa/India/Asia were far more important than sustaining US numbers. I figured they were only important to keep of the facade of forever increasing user growth. If North America and Western Europe aren't were the bulk Facebook's revenue is coming from (and where most of its focus in placed), I'd be very surprised.

They are the bulk of its revenue, but my point was that average daily/monthly were already peaked by most counters and growth markets were a higher priority. Why do you think they paid so much for WhatsApp.
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