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Can Anyone Stop Facebook?

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Re: Can Anyone Stop Facebook?

#11

Post by electromagnetic »

marltod wrote: post #6

Facebook's business model is busted. Costs are higher than revenue per user. The model has to change, become a search gateway, start selling products people want to buy, or cut costs features and charge high bandwidth users.

Facebook should be cornering its games market with online payments. Charge $5 for 450 'game points', basically you charge $5 for 450 real-world equivalent 'cents' that you can spend arcade style in whatever game you want.

No facebook game will ever get a payment from me while they're relying on third party providers. There's a slim chance they'll get my money through paypal (since I've had a paypal account longer than I've had a facebook account), but as the money you pay goes into solely one game there's no interoperability. Every developer is stuck developing their own way to implement credits using companies that have no reason to care.

People are going to trust facebook, but they're not going to trust 'cherry credits' or whatever suckass companies you know nothing about that you're signing your credit card information over to. Facebook is already trusted by its users (or they wouldn't be users), which gives them an unbelievable edge without them having to play unfairly against the other game credit providers.

Re: Can Anyone Stop Facebook?

#12

Post by bumblebird »

tiffani wrote: post #2

I have to ask of that article, though, how many people are actively using Facebook nowadays (as in, how many login everyday and actually do something), too. It never mentions it like a lot of articles about Facebook do (although I suspect it's a lot). I ask this because my Facebook usage has declined greatly since graduating from college last year and it's really gone down since they introduced the stream and became…

>> "It doesn't help that my stream is populated by my friends' constant romps on Farmville or Mafia Wars"

So surely that shows your friends are using it a lot :/

Personally, I find facebook far more usable than twitter - upload images/videos/share URLs, no silly char limit etc.

Re: Can Anyone Stop Facebook?

#13

Post by ams6110 »

figital wrote: post #8

Look at Facebook ... look at ChromeOS .... it's the same thing (only Facebook is further along). The business is data mining and advertising. The issue will be who do you distrust the least. Who is going to make it easiest to export my personal data to use somewhere else? Hopefully us geeks will keep pushing for this and then help everyone else follow. Until then I feel like I'm just toying around with the flavor-of-…

I don't trust any of them. That's why I don't have a Facebook page, I don't have a MySpace page, I don't use gmail or any of Google's services. I don't have a Twitter account. I do have an account on LinkedIn because my boss at my last job asked me to set one up, but I never update it.

Re: Can Anyone Stop Facebook?

#14

Post by electromagnetic »

henrikschroder wrote: post #3
tiffani wrote: post #2

I have to ask of that article, though, how many people are actively using Facebook nowadays (as in, how many login everyday and actually do something), too. It never mentions it like a lot of articles about Facebook do (although I suspect it's a lot). I ask this because my Facebook usage has declined greatly since graduating from college last year and it's really gone down since they introduced the stream and became…

Well, that's highly anecdotal and as long as Facebook keeps growing your observation does not hold true for the majority of the users. Everything goes in waves though, it lies in human nature to grow bored with sameness. Ten years ago there existed a community product in my country that had managed to capture 90% of all high-school students, and they seemed unstoppable. Now, the product is almost forgotten, they lost…

It depends if Facebook will be gone. Trust and reliance become significant things in stopping migration, I haven't changed from Google despite it being eternally the same because #1 I rely on it, #2 I trust it.

If facebook can get one, or both, of these from its 350 million users it has a significant chance to stick around. You also have to consider teen markets shift much faster than adult markets. I know in my high-school a single thing could spread throughout the whole school, but when a new grade entered the viral spread had disappeared and they remained 'uninfected' by it. So any trend automatically lost 1/5 of its teen market if it didn't capture the new grade.

This happens less so with more mature crowds, who tend to be more loyal. You don't see people buying from the same car manufacturer time after time because it's an 'in thing', it's because they're loyal, which is in essence reliance and trust.

Re: Can Anyone Stop Facebook?

#15

Post by mark_l_watson »

ams6110 wrote: post #13
figital wrote: post #8

Look at Facebook ... look at ChromeOS .... it's the same thing (only Facebook is further along). The business is data mining and advertising. The issue will be who do you distrust the least. Who is going to make it easiest to export my personal data to use somewhere else? Hopefully us geeks will keep pushing for this and then help everyone else follow. Until then I feel like I'm just toying around with the flavor-of-…

I don't trust any of them. That's why I don't have a Facebook page, I don't have a MySpace page, I don't use gmail or any of Google's services. I don't have a Twitter account. I do have an account on LinkedIn because my boss at my last job asked me to set one up, but I never update it.

I understand where you are coming from re: privacy issues, but aren't you also missing some real value?

I check Facebook 2 or 3 times a week to see what family and friends have been doing. With Twitter, I follow people into the same technologies that I am interested in, and I get a lot of interesting links.

re: gmail: I have never bought anything from a sponsored search link, but I do occasionally buy things from advertisement links on my email - also, sometimes I get an email from a customer asking me to help them with a problem and a useful link is on the right side of the customer email.

Sure, privacy issues are huge, but I think that people need to make a personal calculation of benefits vs. potential problems.

Re: Can Anyone Stop Facebook?

#16

Post by eru »

henrikschroder wrote: post #3
tiffani wrote: post #2

I have to ask of that article, though, how many people are actively using Facebook nowadays (as in, how many login everyday and actually do something), too. It never mentions it like a lot of articles about Facebook do (although I suspect it's a lot). I ask this because my Facebook usage has declined greatly since graduating from college last year and it's really gone down since they introduced the stream and became…

Well, that's highly anecdotal and as long as Facebook keeps growing your observation does not hold true for the majority of the users. Everything goes in waves though, it lies in human nature to grow bored with sameness. Ten years ago there existed a community product in my country that had managed to capture 90% of all high-school students, and they seemed unstoppable. Now, the product is almost forgotten, they lost…

About which community product are you talking?

Re: Can Anyone Stop Facebook?

#17

Post by far33d »

zaidf wrote: post #9
mmphosis wrote: post #5

I have one facebook account with a totally fake profile that I used once to view someone's photos. I'm done with facebook, but I guess my once-only fake account still counts towards the growing number of facebook users. I am surprised by how pervasive facebook is. I insist that people post their photos on flickr or some other service because I don't want to use facebook. They in turn insist that I sign up to facebook…

You're in the absolute minority with your fake profile. I've been a heavy fb user for 5 years and can't recall the last time I saw a fake profile.

The only fake profiles I ever see are from other developers testing their facebook apps.

Re: Can Anyone Stop Facebook?

#18

Post by notaddicted »

mmphosis wrote: post #5

I have one facebook account with a totally fake profile that I used once to view someone's photos. I'm done with facebook, but I guess my once-only fake account still counts towards the growing number of facebook users. I am surprised by how pervasive facebook is. I insist that people post their photos on flickr or some other service because I don't want to use facebook. They in turn insist that I sign up to facebook…

I'm a frequent user -- but I mainly use messages. All your friends are like a contact list and you can send them messages. No changing emails, you can use their real names, and the search is very good. Usually the person I want is the first result (for people I'm not friends with.) Phone/email is always changing (and you can lookup phone numbers on facebook: very useful.)

I have been a member since before they added the photo feature, and I have deactivated my account for over 4 months before, but messaging + events + all my friends are on it compels me to stay.

Also, I know people who are either or both email and voicemail bankrupt (more messages than they can possibly ever check), and facebook is the best way to contact.

EDIT: Purpose of this reply: why do I find it compelling to use facebook. Also I don't do IM, don't even answer the phone some days (need quiet time) so it isn't just because I can't help myself.

Re: Can Anyone Stop Facebook?

#19

Post by Quarrelsome »

ams6110 wrote: post #13
figital wrote: post #8

Look at Facebook ... look at ChromeOS .... it's the same thing (only Facebook is further along). The business is data mining and advertising. The issue will be who do you distrust the least. Who is going to make it easiest to export my personal data to use somewhere else? Hopefully us geeks will keep pushing for this and then help everyone else follow. Until then I feel like I'm just toying around with the flavor-of-…

I don't trust any of them. That's why I don't have a Facebook page, I don't have a MySpace page, I don't use gmail or any of Google's services. I don't have a Twitter account. I do have an account on LinkedIn because my boss at my last job asked me to set one up, but I never update it.

I don't either which is why i'd never use my real name when signing up to them. I dont mind giving them free content, i'm just not comfortable with how they can tally that content back to me.

Re: Can Anyone Stop Facebook?

#20

Post by michael_dorfman »

ivenkys wrote: post #4

"Perhaps one day not long from now, everything on the Web will be a mere extension of Facebook." - a very optimistic view of the growth of FB , to put it mildly.

Sure. But remember that there was a time in recent memory where the notion that AOL would be a mere extension of the web was a very optimistic thought as well, or that some young upstart would knock AltaVista from king-of-the-hill in Search.

"Prediction is very difficult, especially about the future."

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