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Facebook's TikTok-like redesign marks sunset of social networking era

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Re: Facebook's TikTok-like redesign marks sunset of social networking era

#71

Post by jahewson »

next_xibalba wrote: post #50
maxfurman wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They just posted their first net user loss - so maybe not "in droves" but their username is certainly declining and will continue to do so without drastic change

Where are you getting this information? AFAIK, 2Q22 earnings (and metrics) are released tomorrow. The whispers I've heard are that any loss of M/DAU is contained to Europe and is caused by Russia going offline.

Given that they lost users in the final quarter of 2021 that’s a remarkable time travel machine your whisperers seem to have invented.

Re: Facebook's TikTok-like redesign marks sunset of social networking era

#72

Post by thenerdhead »

> Facebook and its rivals call this a "discovery engine" because it reliably spits out recommendations of posts from everywhere that might hold your attention.

All I can think about is how every big social media company continues to invent persuasive technology to keep everyone glued to their devices and steal away our most precious asset in our lives; our attention.

Where your attention goes, your life goes. I'm only 30 and much of my 20s went to these platforms. I can't say for the better. I think we all need to be bored again and not have a constant IV drip of dopamine in our hands at all times.

https://wikipedia.org/wiki/Persuasive_technology

Re: Facebook's TikTok-like redesign marks sunset of social networking era

#73

Post by ulfw »

What's going on with Facebook product management? It's shocking to see core products deteriorate, others barely every improve (where's instagram and whatsapp for iPad?), while competitors (these days tiktok, before Snap) are merely imitated years later.

Actually kind of sad to see considering I'm a big fan of Social and 'Meta' has been on the forefront for years. I hope they find a way to rethink this.

Re: Facebook's TikTok-like redesign marks sunset of social networking era

#74

Post by xwdv »

It’s crazy to think the social media era may finally be ending. There’s really no viable platform anymore where you can just go passively keep up with what friends and acquaintances are doing. Everything is about feeding you content you didn’t ask for but may be targeted enough to catch your attention.

And for what? To show you some ads here and there? To collect data that can be used to… sell more ads and products?

Instagram was once my favorite app. There was a golden age before stories came a long where people just posted random pictures of what they were up to or what they were seeing. Things weren’t too memefied or political, unlike Facebook. Then photos got more and more glamorized and more about flexing and showing how much cooler and more awesome your life was. People started following themes and niches for their profile content rather than just posting random unorganized series of photos. Businesses and brands started getting built on the platform.

Building an Instagram clone the way it used to be is fairly trivial these days. I could probably throw one together in a few months, but growing its popularity is practically impossible these days with such entrenched incumbents and no niches left to start a user base with.

…unless perhaps… we build a social network on the blockchain

Re: Facebook's TikTok-like redesign marks sunset of social networking era

#75

Post by ulfw »

naravara wrote: post #41
groffee wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Facebook is dying, but not because of TikTok. Facebook is dying because they stopped being Facebook. If they gave what's left of their userbase what they actually wanted (chronological feed, seeing friends posts, not seeing spam, more ways to interact (bring back pets, gifts, superpokes etc)) they'd do ok. It doesn't help that their core code is a steaming pile of bloated dung that doesn't seem to be tested by anyone…

When I started using Facebook it wasn't a newsfeed, it was just a personal homepage with a photo album and a bulletin board attached. I'd love to have something like that again that everyone uses, but everything is about goosing the influencer economy now rather than letting me socialize.

You're basically describing myspace.

Re: Facebook's TikTok-like redesign marks sunset of social networking era

#76

Post by ulfw »

quartesixte wrote: post #17
SrslyJosh wrote: post #6

Nobody hates Facebook users more than Facebook, I guess. :-/ I've tried to type out several pithy comments, but the bottom line (to me) is that Facebook just doesn't respect its users or care about their needs. Can you imagine if brick-and-mortar businesses tried to do this? You go out for a Big Mac, but it's not on the menu anymore because Taco Bell had a few really good quarters, so McDonald's decided to pivot to t…

This isn’t “Taco Bell outsold McDonald’s for six months so all of a sudden McD’s sells McTacos.” This is, “McDonald’s realizes about two years too late that no one wants to eat burgers anymore so in a last-ditch attempt they add tacos to the menu.”

Then you make burgers hip again. You extend the menu. You bring out cool new styles. You advertise hard. You give samples, you discount, you run specials, you collab with others. 100 things you can do to reinvigorate your 'boring Burger' business.

You don't just pivot to copycat the tacos business years late. Why would customers go to you rather than staying with their Taco brand of choice?

Re: Facebook's TikTok-like redesign marks sunset of social networking era

#77

Post by robswc »

I know it sounds dumb but its hard to say we haven't moved closer to what only ~10 years ago we considered a "playful exaggeration" on the worst of humans and social media.

In WallE, everyone is floating around in chairs having their content spoon-fed to them with a generous amount of ads mixed in. If you've ever scrolled or seen someone scroll, its kinda close. Just mindlessly moving their thumb up and down, taking in content that will be forgotten within minutes. Ask a tik tok user to tell you even 10% of the videos they saw within the last hour. I'd be surprised if they could.

I hope its not too "old man yelling at cloud" because I do my 15 minutes of mindless instagram scrolling but I have a timer that locks the app and I usually only need 15 minutes, more just feels bleh. Some of my family/friends "brag" about having 7+ hrs of "tik tok time" on their iphone stats. Just crazy.

Re: Facebook's TikTok-like redesign marks sunset of social networking era

#78

Post by [deleted] »

naravara wrote: post #41
groffee wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Facebook is dying, but not because of TikTok. Facebook is dying because they stopped being Facebook. If they gave what's left of their userbase what they actually wanted (chronological feed, seeing friends posts, not seeing spam, more ways to interact (bring back pets, gifts, superpokes etc)) they'd do ok. It doesn't help that their core code is a steaming pile of bloated dung that doesn't seem to be tested by anyone…

When I started using Facebook it wasn't a newsfeed, it was just a personal homepage with a photo album and a bulletin board attached. I'd love to have something like that again that everyone uses, but everything is about goosing the influencer economy now rather than letting me socialize.

[deleted]

Re: Facebook's TikTok-like redesign marks sunset of social networking era

#79

Post by JohnJamesRambo »

ulfw wrote: post #75
naravara wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When I started using Facebook it wasn't a newsfeed, it was just a personal homepage with a photo album and a bulletin board attached. I'd love to have something like that again that everyone uses, but everything is about goosing the influencer economy now rather than letting me socialize.

You're basically describing myspace.

I honestly liked MySpace. I think it was superior to Facebook in every way. At least you could enjoy some cool music on someone’s page when you visited it. The page was about them.
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