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Facebook loses users for the first time

washingtonpost.com

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Re: Facebook loses users for the first time

#571

Post by blitzar »

petesergeant wrote: post #544
gman83 wrote: post #535

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The acquisition strategy could have worked going forwards, seeing as there's not much anti-trust will in the U.S. against M&A, but the problem is that they missed the chance to buy musical.ly (bought for $1 billion by ByteDance in 2017) which became TikTok. If they had made this acquisition they would be in a very different position. Looking at my teenage kids and their friends, they barely use Instagram (let alone F…

> Looking at my teenage kids and their friends I wonder how important this demographic really is. I understand there's an argument for kids being the future, and so on, but almost everyone I know with disposible income is on Instagram and Facebook, via the apps, and seeing ads. As teenage kids stop being teenage kids, they're going to start caring about sharing baby photos and travel photos and cyber-bullying their m…

> considering kids don't actually have much money to spend

This does presume that the metric is money and not eyeballs; from where I sit tech in general cares little about revenue and a lot about "daily active users".

Despite that, if you can brainwash 0-15 year olds into the belief that your brand is great, the future goodwill may offer significant rewards as you evolve with your users.

Re: Facebook loses users for the first time

#572

Post by karmasimida »

websap wrote: post #554
randomsearch wrote: post #504

This is how the narrative of Facebook looks to me: Zuckerberg got lucky and then executed brilliantly, transitioned from nerd hacker to CEO amazingly well. He deserves a lot of credit for that. Since then, Facebook have innovated very little. Zuckerberg recognised this, and bought Instagram and Whatsapp in lieu of building an innovative company. The latter is clearly really difficult to do. Without a stream of new id…

You lost me at Zukerburg got lucky. Facebook changed social media forever, they completely innovated this domain.

but TikTok comes and basically wins the war because it is as un-facebook as it can be. It can be enjoyed, or better if you follow nobody.

Whatever FB's innovation is, it doesn't age well, otherwise fades so fast

Re: Facebook loses users for the first time

#573

Post by raxxorrax »

barbazoo wrote: post #142
kajaktum wrote: post #116

People like to hate on Facebook, but how is any other social media different? They are all free services that profit from your personal information. Some just have better PR than the other.

Personally, I applaud decline in engagement with any of the social networks, not just Facebook.

I hope platforms that are focused on topics instead of people will prevail. There is still some exaggerated self-promotion, but it is far less pronounced.

Oversharing is a really bad idea in the long run. Your opinions from 30 years ago are probably hated today. Imagine the trauma that is caused if you could read what your parents thought before you were born.

Re: Facebook loses users for the first time

#574

Post by AndrewTerry »

nabla9 wrote: post #534
AndrewTerry wrote: post #522

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You may think you've deleted your FB account, but its probably still there... I "deleted" my FB after they acquired FriendFeed (still the best social network I've ever come across) back in 2009. I was puzzled, then, to receive an email in November last year asking if I had tried to log in. "Impossible", I thought, "that account was deleted!". So, I visited Facebook, and because my old username/password were still in…

You just deactivated your FB account. Deleting FB account is slightly more complicated. After you have deleted it, don't try to login for months to check out if it's gone. To permanently delete your account: 1. From your main profile, click account in the top right of Facebook. 2. Select Settings & Privacy, then click Settings. 3. Click Your Facebook Information in the left column. If you have Facebook access to a pa…

It was a while ago (2009) so I can't remember the exact process, but I seem to recall that even back then it was quite convoluted, and differentiated between deactivate and delete.

That said, I certainly haven't touched it since 2009 to check if it really was deleted.

Re: Facebook loses users for the first time

#575

Post by websap »

Lamad123 wrote: post #484
frob wrote: post #257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I fall into a 3rd category: I used to log into FB once a month or so to check in. For some reason, they decided I was a fake account (despite working for them for 4.5 years) and asked for my ID. The resolution on my 10-year-old MBP was too low for FB's contractors so they rejected my ID 3 times and I seem to now be locked out of my account indefinitely. Definitely in the top 10 best thing to ever happen to me.

I was locked out of amazon almost a year ago because of some security issue blah blah!!! I never tried to unlock the account and I am OK living in a world where I don't need to deal with that monster!

You wait for a week for items to get delivered and pay for expedited shipping each time? What a wonderful world!

Re: Facebook loses users for the first time

#576

Post by rvba »

randomsearch wrote: post #504

This is how the narrative of Facebook looks to me: Zuckerberg got lucky and then executed brilliantly, transitioned from nerd hacker to CEO amazingly well. He deserves a lot of credit for that. Since then, Facebook have innovated very little. Zuckerberg recognised this, and bought Instagram and Whatsapp in lieu of building an innovative company. The latter is clearly really difficult to do. Without a stream of new id…

> Without a stream of new ideas and products (unlike, say, Apple)

Apple has no new products in a long time, just overpriced toys that are sold due to good marketing. Most of their money comes from market positioning and closed eco system.

Thry were innovative in the past (that first iphone reveal), but for last years they basically are an app store that takes a 30% cut.

Re: Facebook loses users for the first time

#577

Post by Zenst »

My take away from this is amazed they have had increased daily user activity for 18 years, that alone (whatever you think of FB) is pretty amazing from a business perspective. Which is probably why this is an eventful news worthy note.

I'm now wondering if such a blip could snowball via the markets and see a tech crash at some level and a sign of that will be how this news from Facebook plays out upon the other social media outlets. Will TikTok, Twitter and in-part via YT, google, also see a dent in share prices based upon this! Maybe, given how much of the market is based upon perception and momentum. Though that is just my thoughts upon this and certainly I'm not burried into the markets knowing every nuance and sign.

[EDIT ADD] I somehow missed this poignant aspect in the article "Shares in other social media platforms, including Twitter, Snap and Pinterest, also fell sharply in extended trading." So does somewhat lean into my thoughts upon how markets operate in some ways. How that holds and if this blip is just a knee-jerk reaction over a period of time is more the indicator in-play here.

Re: Facebook loses users for the first time

#578

Post by netcan »

randomsearch wrote: post #504

This is how the narrative of Facebook looks to me: Zuckerberg got lucky and then executed brilliantly, transitioned from nerd hacker to CEO amazingly well. He deserves a lot of credit for that. Since then, Facebook have innovated very little. Zuckerberg recognised this, and bought Instagram and Whatsapp in lieu of building an innovative company. The latter is clearly really difficult to do. Without a stream of new id…

Microsoft, for all its flaws, has strengths. They're grittier than most and ultimately, know how to deliver software products and build businesses around them... very different products and very different businesses. Leadership was a lever to these, but there was something to lever

FB have never built a successful product besides Zuck's original. They have never created a good business besides the FB and program. They pushed both to the max.

FB pushed the walled garden hard. They pushed hard on acquiring the competition. They pushed hard on making the product "addictive" and optimising it on a "what FB wants from users" basis.

In its ad business FB pushed hard on leveraging data. Google's AdWords was always based on user intent. Someone searches for "divorce lawyer," and AdWords finds them a divorce lawyer. FB ads are premised on targeting, not intent. So... leverage data to create a segment with >n chance of wanting a divorce lawyer. It worked.

That's FB in a nutshell. They push hard on simple things.

What they need is something else to push on. I agree on making WhatsApp a payments app. IMO, retail finance would suit FB perfectly. They'd be better at it than Apple or Google. Look at retail banks, like Citi. It's all about pushing for revenue. Some newly invented fee that most customers don't know they're paying. Some new way of charging both sides of a transaction. More of something. Generating revenue from customer data, float, 3rd party deals... taking advantage of moat. FB would be really good at that.

Controlling the VR metaverse... I just don't see it. Too much innovation. Too much invention. Too many elements to balance. Too avante garde. It's not Zuck.

Re: Facebook loses users for the first time

#579

Post by airstrike »

yakshaving_jgt wrote: post #519
WeekSpeller wrote: post #368

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I recently reported a hate speech targeted at Indian minority (not Muslim). The text literally had gen$c!d3 threats and other usual trigger words in it, and there were like copy paste of same post in thousands (probably a campaign). Facebook replied "does not violate their conditions blah blah".

Just curious, why did you write “gen$c!d3”? The options I can think of are: 1. You’re worried that a script on HN will delete your comment, similar to how this seems to work on YouTube 2. You’re censoring that word to avoid “triggering” people 3. You’re copying verbatim an excerpt from the hate speech you’re referencing I’m asking in earnest; I honestly don’t know which of those three (or any other option?) it is.

4. 7h3y d0n’7 kn0w 13375p34k

/s

Re: Facebook loses users for the first time

#580

Post by throwaway473825 »

pratnala wrote: post #561
PaulRobinson wrote: post #523

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think it's going to die as quickly as you think - it's a pretty sticky product. The network effects that made it attractive might kill it pretty fast when they evaporate, but it's going to be a major player in adtech for at least a decade, which might just give it time to be "saved" by some of the plays they're now pivoting towards. On the ethics thing: they introduced some mechanisms around this, but the app…

WhatsApp already does payments in India (and few other countries?) [1] [1]: https://www.whatsapp.com/payments/

This is what I see when I click on your link:

> The payments feature on App is not available in this country.

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