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FB feed is 98% suggested pages and barely any friends' posts

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Re: FB feed is 98% suggested pages and barely any friends' posts

#271

Post by JediLuke »

bazeblackwood wrote: post #261
fairity wrote: post #258

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, this isn't a consequence of the status quo newsfeed algorithm. This is a consequence of Facebook making a purposeful strategic shift away from in-network content to suggested content. This strategic shift was highlighted in their last earnings call as a way to compete with TikTok, whose success is partly explained by their focus on suggested content. On the earnings call, they signaled that they were shifting mor…

Bad strategy, imo. Sounds like they should have tried to answer why people used their product in the first place. “A competitor does it” isn’t a valid excuse—its like suggesting The French Laundry switch to fast food because McDonald’s is a competitor.

No post body was provided.

Re: FB feed is 98% suggested pages and barely any friends' posts

#272

Post by timbit42 »

FBPurity is a web browser plugin that will hide whatever you don't want to see in your FB feed. If a sponsored post shows up you can click the 3 dots menu to flag it.

I have it set to not show Likes or Comments my friends make on other people's posts or shares. All I see is what my friends post.

Re: FB feed is 98% suggested pages and barely any friends' posts

#273

Post by kelsolaar »

I just spent 20 mins hiding all the Ad, Sponsored and Sugges content and now my feed is clean upon refresh. I do that from time to time and it stays fine for a bit but that type of content starts creeping up again. Lately it has been insane though, for example this morning after seeing this post my feed was everything but content I follow.

Re: FB feed is 98% suggested pages and barely any friends' posts

#274

Post by kolbe »

bazeblackwood wrote: post #261
fairity wrote: post #258

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, this isn't a consequence of the status quo newsfeed algorithm. This is a consequence of Facebook making a purposeful strategic shift away from in-network content to suggested content. This strategic shift was highlighted in their last earnings call as a way to compete with TikTok, whose success is partly explained by their focus on suggested content. On the earnings call, they signaled that they were shifting mor…

Bad strategy, imo. Sounds like they should have tried to answer why people used their product in the first place. “A competitor does it” isn’t a valid excuse—its like suggesting The French Laundry switch to fast food because McDonald’s is a competitor.

They also need to be honest with themselves about whether TikTok is a competitor, or if TT has simply won a completely different business that happens to take customers' finite resources (time) from Facebook.

Re: FB feed is 98% suggested pages and barely any friends' posts

#275

Post by briandoesdev »

I wish FB had a way for me to disable posts from companies, pages, "shared" content etc.. I only want to see photos and status updates from friends. That is all. I don't want memes or reels. It's sad that in the first 10 items on my FB Home, only 1 is from a friend and its just a shared meme.

Re: FB feed is 98% suggested pages and barely any friends' posts

#276

Post by cbozeman »

ziddoap wrote: post #262
cbozeman wrote: post #206

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This wasn't meant for you, but the other guy deleted his question, so here we go. Instagram is a photo-sharing application at it's core. So when you share photos, you're sharing your lifestyle. You're advertising. This is especially prevalent down here in Miami. So much so that people oftentimes at clubs don't exchange phone numbers; they exchange Instagrams. The women can see by your Instagram posts what kind of lif…

I can see your argument, and it's certainly an interesting way of looking at it, but this just explains the "dating app" part of your assertion (" ... it's a dating app for women, "). It's missing the explanation on why it's a "dating app for women ".

Because even now in our so-called "sexually liberated" world, men make the overwhelming amount of approaches that indicate sexual interest. Put simply, "Men make the first move."

In a way, Instagram is the digital / technological pinnacle of the "Personals" ads from newspapers of yesteryear.

I wonder if Rupert Holmes will update "Escape" with the line, "There was this post that I saw... on my Instagram feed..."

Re: FB feed is 98% suggested pages and barely any friends' posts

#277

Post by mingfli »

bazeblackwood wrote: post #261
fairity wrote: post #258

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, this isn't a consequence of the status quo newsfeed algorithm. This is a consequence of Facebook making a purposeful strategic shift away from in-network content to suggested content. This strategic shift was highlighted in their last earnings call as a way to compete with TikTok, whose success is partly explained by their focus on suggested content. On the earnings call, they signaled that they were shifting mor…

Bad strategy, imo. Sounds like they should have tried to answer why people used their product in the first place. “A competitor does it” isn’t a valid excuse—its like suggesting The French Laundry switch to fast food because McDonald’s is a competitor.

The French Laundry is a very niche product, which Facebook is not. I think a more apt analogy is suggesting McDonald's to include more "healthy" options or a coffee bar because the competitors do it and it's a successful business strategy.

Re: FB feed is 98% suggested pages and barely any friends' posts

#278

Post by drusepth »

ok123456 wrote: post #240
BbzzbB wrote: post #237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's funny how much projection people do when speaking of FB, as if their personal experience offers some deep insight into a platform of 3.5 billion users whose usage varies by user, demography and geography.

It's funny how people try to deny the simple truth that the site hasn't been fun to use in 15 years.

I'm not sure an opinion (how fun a site is to use) that surely varies wildly across FB's billions of users can even be a universal "simple truth".

Re: FB feed is 98% suggested pages and barely any friends' posts

#279

Post by itake »

fairity wrote: post #258
darth_avocado wrote: post #37

Yes it’s a negative feedback loop created by the very bad product decisions they made to optimize for local maxima of getting more ads revenue. You inject more and more ads followed by more and more suggested content, thereby reducing the in network content. The in network content doesn’t get as much of traction, therefore people stop posting. This in turn forces the feed to have more and more suggestions and a few s…

No, this isn't a consequence of the status quo newsfeed algorithm. This is a consequence of Facebook making a purposeful strategic shift away from in-network content to suggested content. This strategic shift was highlighted in their last earnings call as a way to compete with TikTok, whose success is partly explained by their focus on suggested content. On the earnings call, they signaled that they were shifting mor…

I think the crux is do users want to see in-network or out-of-network posts?

FB's bet (that tiktok user behavior validates) is high quality out-of-network creates higher engagement than in-network content.

Re: FB feed is 98% suggested pages and barely any friends' posts

#280

Post by yamrzou »

fairity wrote: post #258
darth_avocado wrote: post #37

Yes it’s a negative feedback loop created by the very bad product decisions they made to optimize for local maxima of getting more ads revenue. You inject more and more ads followed by more and more suggested content, thereby reducing the in network content. The in network content doesn’t get as much of traction, therefore people stop posting. This in turn forces the feed to have more and more suggestions and a few s…

No, this isn't a consequence of the status quo newsfeed algorithm. This is a consequence of Facebook making a purposeful strategic shift away from in-network content to suggested content. This strategic shift was highlighted in their last earnings call as a way to compete with TikTok, whose success is partly explained by their focus on suggested content. On the earnings call, they signaled that they were shifting mor…

Yes, here is a chronology of key events:

2020 — Facebook launches its TikTok rival, Instagram Reels: https://www.axios.com/2020/08/05/facebook-launches-its-tikto...

2021 — TikTok overtakes Facebook as world's most downloaded app: https://asia.nikkei.com/Business/Technology/TikTok-overtakes...

Feb. 2022 — Facebook loses users for the first time in its history — https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/02/02/faceboo...

July 2022 — Facebook and Instagram are going to show even more posts from accounts you don’t follow — https://www.theverge.com/2022/7/27/23281451/facebook-instagr...

July 2022 — Instagram knows you don’t like its changes. It doesn’t care. — https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/07/27/instagr...

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