Live data from Hacker News

Facebook's Three New Products

blog.facebook.com

181–186 of 186 posts

Re: Facebook's Three New Products

#181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Basically returning results and ordering by the +1s your social graph has possibly already marked?

If I search for "2011 movies", that sounds great. If I search for "digital camera", it might help a bit but if I were looking for the opinions of my photographer friends, I'd just ask them. If I search for "us air strikes in libya" it might help but I would expect an algorithm to be able to find me some decent news articles without too much help from my friends. Besides, I don't want to live in my friends' 'filter bu…

If I search for "AT91SAM9G20 datasheet", I doubt anyone in my immediate social graph has even seen what I'm looking for, let alone +1'd it.

That's true, but then how many competing documents are going to pop up? The social graph helps give precedence when their are many results.

The Libya example is interesting. If you want outside of your bubble there is no reason you couldn't reverse the order and try to see news that none of your friends have seen (or at least +1ed).

Re: Facebook's Three New Products

#182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hate to put it this way, but what are you doing on HN? Seriously. I apologize if I offended you, Ryan. All I am asking for is for an example of one company that had reach the sort of mass FB has (coupled with a total dominance in its vertical)and ended up loosing to a competitor. Enlighten me.

Yahoo

Yahoo was a portal that was made "irrelevant" by Google. Google was not in the portal business. This is what happens when a company comes in and changes user behavior. In other words Google did not build a better portal, they build something that made portals irrelevant over time.

Re: Facebook's Three New Products

#183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You may have been one of the few using ICQ and MSN after AIM. ICQ was much earlier in the chronology (we used to play with it when we got bored on IRC) and no one used MSN. :-P

I used all of those - and ICQ was still largely my favorite, if only because it supported offline messages. I think its largest drawback was using account numbers, instead of allowing alphanumeric vanity names.

Let's not forget the tack-a-tack sound...

Re: Facebook's Three New Products

#184
post #178
post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I totally agree. I'm wondering what made the group leaders adopt? Was it features? Trendy name and logo? Did it seem like the hip thing to do? Exclusivity / scarcity?

Large marketing firms dedicate resources to finding "trend setters" and "cool kids". http://www.google.com/search?sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&#3... Older video: "Merchants of Cool" http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/cool/ Or look at a Goog search "marketing trendsetters | "trend-setter" Lots of noise. The Merchants of Cool is a good relevant watch.

I heard about that "Merchants of Cool" video but never got around to watching. Thanks for the reminder, it's back near the top of my TODOs.

Re: Facebook's Three New Products

#185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> everyone was there This is exactly why I turned chat off. I have no desire to be contacted by old high school classmates who happen to be bored and browsing facebook, and see me pop up.

Look into facebook groups. A bit of a pain to setup (especially compared to circles) - but it gives you quick ways to limit the news-feed to only a subset of friends or to limit who can see you online.

I assume you mean FB lists, as the groups feature is quite different. /pedantic

Re: Facebook's Three New Products

#186
post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Look into facebook groups. A bit of a pain to setup (especially compared to circles) - but it gives you quick ways to limit the news-feed to only a subset of friends or to limit who can see you online.

I assume you mean FB lists, as the groups feature is quite different. /pedantic

Oops. Me bad. FB lists it is.
Post reply on HN