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Facebook hype will fade

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Re: Facebook hype will fade

#51

Post by pharrington »

A bubble created around a legitimate service does not itself kill the service; the service becoming obsolete does.

The author seems to completely miss this. AOL didn't die because it was bought by TW, it died because broadband became commonplace and people realized there was much more to the internet than AOL's walled garden. Myspace died because it was the last vestige of the "personal homepage" style internet and never ran with its burgeoning use as a network for musicians.

Facebook will fade when the next major gap in social connections+communication is filled. Simply saying "something more popular than Facebook will happen" seems a horribly obvious and empty statement. Now talking about what we still need or might discover with connections would prove insightful, but of course no one's going to blog about that until it's launched.

Re: Facebook hype will fade

#52

Post by d2viant »

yannickt wrote: post #50
d2viant wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you really think LinkedIn is a chink in Facebook's armor? I question how many people regularly use LinkedIn as opposed to those who just update when their job title changes. All Facebook needs is for an intern of theirs to add a couple more features around the career section of people's profiles and LinkedIn is toast.

"and LinkedIn is toast" I doubt that. I think people who take career networking seriously tend to keep their personal and professional lives separate.

I'd venture to guess that nearly all LinkedIn users are on Facebook, but I don't think the opposite is true. Along with that the information recorded under both sites overlaps quite a bit. At that point it's just a matter of how and to who you show your information on Facebook. I don't think Facebook is the least bit worried about LinkedIn.

Re: Facebook hype will fade

#53

Post by muppetman »

lotusleaf1987 wrote: post #16
klochner wrote: post #5

facebook growth went something like this: college --> high school --> young adults --> everyone Trendy stuff generally follows the same cascade, more or less, where you don't see college students emulating the dress habits of the elderly. facebook's biggest potential for failure is in not capturing the next generation of young users. The young users pick up some other social network, everyone else follows suit, and f…

I got my Facebook account in 2005 when I was a college freshman. At first it was amazing, then they opened it up to high schoolers which was okay, but not really what I wanted from Facebook. Then they added things like the Friend Feed which bombarded you with "Your friend [name you know] just added [someone you don't know or care about}." Which was okay, but then they opened the gates and suddenly all your coworkers…

Facebook Purity can go a long way to helping with this sort of stuff too. It started life as a Greasemonkey addon (and still is available in that format) but is now also a native FF addon and Chrome Extn.

www.fbpurity.com

Re: Facebook hype will fade

#54

Post by ladon86 »

jupiterj wrote: post #40
lotusleaf1987 wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've never met anyone on Facebook, they're all people I knew somehow previous to our friending .

Interesting. I would like to know if the majority of people use Facebook like you (with people they knew previously) or they use it to get new connections. How can I get this information? Any poll published somewhere?

I think I can say pretty confidently and without providing any data that most people use Facebook to connect with people they know from real life.

I believe that adding a complete stranger is seen as a bit creepy. Maybe the new Groups feature (like the hacker news group) will change that, but that's only a recent addition.

Re: Facebook hype will fade

#55

Post by ibejoeb »

"...the merger turned out to be a disaster: AOL's revenue stream was reduced to a trickle as net users ventured out onto the Web directly."

So facebook will fail when people venture out and socialize in real life?

Seriously, though, I get the point generally, but I don't think it's quite the same. AOL and MySpace were assimilated and stifled by their parents' ways of doing things, whereas Facebook will likely continue to do things its own way. This is a company that is able to convince its investors that it knows best, and I don't think things will change with the Goldman investment.

I don't know if Facebook will be on top in 10 years, but I don't think this is the beginning of the end.

Re: Facebook hype will fade

#56

Post by Retric »

d2viant wrote: post #52
yannickt wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"and LinkedIn is toast" I doubt that. I think people who take career networking seriously tend to keep their personal and professional lives separate.

I'd venture to guess that nearly all LinkedIn users are on Facebook, but I don't think the opposite is true. Along with that the information recorded under both sites overlaps quite a bit. At that point it's just a matter of how and to who you show your information on Facebook. I don't think Facebook is the least bit worried about LinkedIn.

Hours spend doing social networking things on sites other than Facebook cost Facebook money and relevance. Also, plenty of "important" people avoid Facebook like the plague because it's a time sink, so there is plenty of pull in the other direction.

Re: Facebook hype will fade

#57

Post by anonymous246 »

d2viant wrote: post #38
lotusleaf1987 wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I got my Facebook account in 2005 when I was a college freshman. At first it was amazing, then they opened it up to high schoolers which was okay, but not really what I wanted from Facebook. Then they added things like the Friend Feed which bombarded you with "Your friend [name you know] just added [someone you don't know or care about}." Which was okay, but then they opened the gates and suddenly all your coworkers…

Do you really think LinkedIn is a chink in Facebook's armor? I question how many people regularly use LinkedIn as opposed to those who just update when their job title changes. All Facebook needs is for an intern of theirs to add a couple more features around the career section of people's profiles and LinkedIn is toast.

Linkedin does a very good job of keeping me engaged.

When any of my contacts update their info, it sends me a weekly email. I like that. (And when I click on a link in the email, the web page HIGHLIGHTS the changed sections. I love that.)

The interactions on Linkedin, although fewer in number are of higher value.

And they charge to contact people outside your network. I think this is fair and lucrative to them. This seems like a steady source of income.

All in all, I'm impressed with Linkedin. They've avoided becoming sleazebags and managed to remain useful.

Re: Facebook hype will fade

#58

Post by samtp »

cookiecaper wrote: post #34
kprobst wrote: post #29

"We will move on, just as we did from the chat rooms of AOL, without even looking back. When the place is as ethereal as a website, our allegiance is much more abstract than it is to a local pub or gym." I disagree with this, simply because grandma wasn't on any AOL chat rooms, but she _is_ on Facebook. The only reason I'm on FB is because Aunt Tilly and Uncle Bob and grandma are also on there, and I can connect with…

This isn't really unique to Facebook. It's called lock-in and it's the desire of every service provider and software maker; they want you to be held hostage to their network, so that even if you want to leave, you can't without potentially serious ramifications (like losing contact with your grandma, or losing access to your documents). Facebook has reached a level that had never been reached by any social network be…

It's not really 'lock-in' unless the potential switching costs are too great to overcome. If another social network could set up your friend network with minimal effort (and are better than Facebook), they will win. No one has long term contracts to use Facebook or pay a monetary penalty (like a cell phone). So if someone can re-create your social graph with you putting in less effort than you normally put into facebook, they will win.

Re: Facebook hype will fade

#59

Post by jasongullickson »

kprobst wrote: post #29

"We will move on, just as we did from the chat rooms of AOL, without even looking back. When the place is as ethereal as a website, our allegiance is much more abstract than it is to a local pub or gym." I disagree with this, simply because grandma wasn't on any AOL chat rooms, but she _is_ on Facebook. The only reason I'm on FB is because Aunt Tilly and Uncle Bob and grandma are also on there, and I can connect with…

It's funny, my mom just sent me a Facebook message saying that I need to build a replacement because all of her friends on Facebook are getting sick of the ads and spam...so it's not just "us geeks" who have had enough.

I told her I'll get on it.

Re: Facebook hype will fade

#60

Post by Tichy »

kragen wrote: post #8
klochner wrote: post #5

facebook growth went something like this: college --> high school --> young adults --> everyone Trendy stuff generally follows the same cascade, more or less, where you don't see college students emulating the dress habits of the elderly. facebook's biggest potential for failure is in not capturing the next generation of young users. The young users pick up some other social network, everyone else follows suit, and f…

Most of the teenagers I know have Facebook accounts. Facebook might lose the high school class of 2018, but they already have the class of 2014 sewn up.

Do they like Facebook, or are they only on there because of peer pressure?
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