Facebook, I want my friends back • Hacker News Board

Re: Facebook, I want my friends back

#161

Post by rolux » Thu, Oct 25, 2012, 1:17 AM UTC

sirmarksalot wrote: post #127

Splines wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That bugs me too. I like a lot of things, but I don't want to hear or see any of them in my timeline. I used to click "Like" on various things in Facebook, but after starting to see them in my feed I immediately un-Liked them. I'm willing to tell my friends I like Logitech keyboards, but I'm not willing to see whatever posts the Logitech PR decides to write. If I'm interested to learn about what new keyboards/mice th…

This is a tricky thing. Facebook's business model, and its value proposition to advertisers to a large degree depends on oversharing, and your "Likes" are an example of this. If somebody asked me if I wanted my email subscriptions broadcast to all my friends, I would say "heck no." But if nobody agreed to share their subscriptions, then how would advertisers get word of mouth? So they phrase it a bit differently. You…

In this case, to call a spade a spade would be to call EdgeRank a spam filter, and "promoted posts" a paid option to circumvent it - right?

Re: Facebook, I want my friends back

#162

Post by rolux » Thu, Oct 25, 2012, 1:29 AM UTC

incongruity wrote: post #120

pdonis wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I understand why people are frustrated, but you are failing to identify the root cause of their frustation: they were getting something of value (PR for businesses, sharing of personal information, etc.) from Facebook for free, and now they're complaining because Facebook wants to charge them for it. Guess what: Facebook owns their site, their servers, and their PR mechanisms. It's up to them what things to charge fo…

Bait and switch is absolutely still accurate, IMHO, but it doesn't matter what you call it, the effect is real. First, let's unpack your justification a little – you actually offer two claims: 1) You aren't Facebook's customer. You're just a user. and 2) You agreed to let them change their services without your consent when you signed up for your account. To the first: most of us may not be their customers, but there…

but I'm not just a user I'm a supplier

Unfortunately, you're neither of those two. If you have an account on Facebook, you're their product.

A lot of the disappointment here seems to be a result of ignoring this relation.

Re: Facebook, I want my friends back

#163

Post by theflubba » Thu, Oct 25, 2012, 1:37 AM UTC

tensor wrote: post #105

reinhardt wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In particular, the best restaurants in the world are small. So are the worst.

Sure, and the market won't likely be kind to them. My point is that it's illogical to "think most [small businesses] should be out of business". By their continued existence and success we can see first hand that they deserve to be in business. There are even really high end and successful places that ban cell phones and still do well. Sometimes places do well because of quirks like these. Other times not. There are…

Thank you, now I know there is at least one hacker news user who knows how markets work. Faith in humanity restored. Not really.

Re: Facebook, I want my friends back

#164

Post by brianlovin » Thu, Oct 25, 2012, 1:37 AM UTC

Um...am I the only one that would chalk this up to usage? Obviously not 100% of your fans are going to see your posts because 100% of people don't use Facebook every day, not to mention within the 2-3 hours your post would even be seen in their news feed. For the people that log in a day or two later, they most likely won't be scrolling through pages upon pages of updates in order to see yours.

This isn't Facebook scamming you - it's simply that 100% of your fans don't check 100% of your posts 100% of the time.

Re: Facebook, I want my friends back

#165

Post by richardjordan » Thu, Oct 25, 2012, 2:15 AM UTC

rolux wrote: post #161

sirmarksalot wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a tricky thing. Facebook's business model, and its value proposition to advertisers to a large degree depends on oversharing, and your "Likes" are an example of this. If somebody asked me if I wanted my email subscriptions broadcast to all my friends, I would say "heck no." But if nobody agreed to share their subscriptions, then how would advertisers get word of mouth? So they phrase it a bit differently. You…

In this case, to call a spade a spade would be to call EdgeRank a spam filter, and "promoted posts" a paid option to circumvent it - right?

Nice. I'm stealing this line. :-)

Re: Facebook, I want my friends back

#166

Post by richardjordan » Thu, Oct 25, 2012, 2:21 AM UTC

caster_cp wrote: post #84

chaz wrote: post #28

If you're posting 10-16 posts a day and you forcibly put each of these into 100% of your fans, you're going to shrink your base. If you did that to me, I'm going to hide or Unlike your page. If you emailed me those posts, I'd be hitting unsubscribe in half a day. The Facebook News Feed isn't an RSS reader, and the Like button isn't Subscribe. I would suggest just posting once a day, and using the Promoted Posts for t…

That's the first thing I thought when I read the post. I was against Facebook's position at the beginning, but now I'm really glad they are charging that fee. Besides that, Facebook is not the channel for you to get that ammount of data to your users. Facebook is a SOCIAL network, not a brand catalog. If they let that abusive behavior happen freely(sorry, but 16 posts a day is abusive behavior at least to me) their o…

That's a good perspective. I'm enjoying this thread because both sides make solid points I can agree with. Which highlights to me the challenge inherent to the position Facebook finds itself in.

Re: Facebook, I want my friends back

#167

Post by antidoh » Thu, Oct 25, 2012, 2:30 AM UTC

Tell me again what's wrong with RSS for update notification?

Re: Facebook, I want my friends back

#168

Post by owenfi » Thu, Oct 25, 2012, 3:11 AM UTC

tedunangst wrote: post #80

tocomment wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm curious why you think they should be out of business.

You can find better selection, better prices, and better advice on the Internet. Also, Jeff bezos doesn't give me the "I hate young people" stink eye when I browse his store. The local hardware store opens at 9:00am. Or 9:30. Or whenever pop finishes his breakfast. Because whatever I have planned for the day is not nearly as urgent as his crossword puzzle. That shit doesn't happen at Home Depot.

Interesting point about this: I recently needed a tool while visiting a friend. I found the nearest hardware store's website and was irate that they didn't have hours listed. So I called. And while they technically closed 90 minutes previously, somebody was in setting up a new POS system they were switching to. He opened the shop and I got what I needed. That also doesn't happen at Home Depot.

Re: Facebook, I want my friends back

#169

Post by Evbn » Thu, Oct 25, 2012, 3:27 AM UTC

macspoofing wrote: post #95

kscaldef wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I object to Facebook making this decision for me. I _didn't_ add too many friends. My newsfeed _wasn't_ overrun. Yeah, I had to hide a few annoying Apps, but no big deal. And then, one day, I stopped seeing posts from lots of people, including many of the people I most wanted to see posts from. It took a while before I even realized this was happening. Then I slowly had to go through and fix the settings for people t…

>I object to Facebook making this decision for me. That's a funny way to characterize a SaaS service. They make service decisions for you all the time. Don't like Timeline? Too bad. Want the 2007 version instead of the current one? Too bad.

What does SaaS have to do with it? It isn't Feature Decisions as a Service.

Re: Facebook, I want my friends back

#170

Post by incongruity » Thu, Oct 25, 2012, 3:52 AM UTC

rolux wrote: post #162

incongruity wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bait and switch is absolutely still accurate, IMHO, but it doesn't matter what you call it, the effect is real. First, let's unpack your justification a little – you actually offer two claims: 1) You aren't Facebook's customer. You're just a user. and 2) You agreed to let them change their services without your consent when you signed up for your account. To the first: most of us may not be their customers, but there…

but I'm not just a user I'm a supplier Unfortunately, you're neither of those two. If you have an account on Facebook, you're their product . A lot of the disappointment here seems to be a result of ignoring this relation.

See, that's a pithy little saying that tries to be pointedly opinionated about Facebook's view of its users and I used to say the same thing... but it's not fully accurate. I chose my words carefully. Each of FB's users are supplying the data and page views that FB resells to advertisers.

The problem is that the market is flooded with suppliers so we have very little individual leverage, but we do have the choice to leave the market. Done en masse, it could well change the dynamics of the equation.

Still, my point is that supplier is the accurate term. Unless of course you mean to say that FB is in the business of human trafficking.. then, well... um..