Is the redesign killing Facebook apps? Yes, say app developers

OH yes the redesign is killing apps. But wasnt that the point?

you and me both.

I also question the so-called diligence of VCs who invested in fb app developers believing a viable and sustainable model existed. Why? Here are a few of my reasons: 1. social flight 2. arrogant leadership (i'm CEO bitch) 3. unstable platform in regard to design changes (fb is fb, it's not an OS).

Now, I certainly feel a few indies and bootstrappers can make a great salary... but 10:1 return is high-risk and an unlikely scenario, IMO. I dunno, maybe I'm bias because I've been a long time user of fb (having left both Friendster and MySpace) and absolutely can't stand 99% of the fb apps.

The apps I notice now are the ones that are actually useful. I've got a Projects app from the DivShare team, and that one comes up a lot because I'm active using it. I haven't found many other applications that actually provide me with value.

So you know what, Slide, with your Top Friends and your FunWall? Screw you. Maybe now we'll get developers who actually care about adding functionality to Facebook. (Incidentally, Top Friends functionality is now a part of Facebook, though nobody's mentioned that in the blogs. I'd like to see how many users start to rely on that instead, though it's less of a circlejerk and doesn't notify friends.)

Agreed. When Facebook introduced apps the signal-to-noise ratio went way up. It was to the point where I couldn't see what my friends were doing because I was getting pelted with app notifications.

Finally Facebook went back to their roots and brought the signal-to-noise ratio back to something I can keep up with.

Plus, didn't the app developers see this coming?

The facebook redesign is indeed hurting many existing apps. But it's one of those things that hurts in the short term but will help in the long term. Or at least I think that's the intention.

Firstly, the type of app that is currently dominant, i.e. the "Joe bit you, CLICK HERE TO BITE HIM BACK" junk, does indeed need to die. I don't think Facebook initially intended for this type of thing to be the dominant form of facebook app, but the amount of distribution power they exposed was a new thing for app developers and users. So we've all installed the zombie app now. Whoopee. It's time to trade away some of the noise that comes from fad apps and instead promote some serious apps. Apps that might be useful to people even when sober.

That's why I'm pleased that, alongside the redesign, facebook is exposing more and more of the API you'd need to do serious things on facebook. For example, just a month or two ago they finally released an API call that can create facebook events. In case you hadn't noticed, facebook events are one of the most useful features in FB, and letting third-party apps connect more meaningfully with the built-in Events app will probably make them more useful. That's certainly going to be the case for an app I'm currently building (for a client) that helps you get from "I wanna see a movie next week" to specific plans with a guest list. One of the most common responses to this app is "wow, finally a facebook app that's actually intended to be useful". If zombies and its ilk continue to get prime billing, people will eventually assume that all apps are trivial and the whole platform will be written off by most users. Preventing that is the long-term benefit.

Finally, this article is just not credible. Suppose your app started to lose traffic around the time of the redesign. You'd have one of those sad-looking graphs and you'd feel shitty. Maybe you were just unlucky? Maybe August just happened to be the point when your fad started dying down? Why make your app better when you could just blame facebook!

That said, Facebook's platform doesn't come with any guarantees. Facebook Inc. can make or break you if they ever decide to care. AFAIK they've been more reasonable than, say, Apple+iPhone, but Facebook dependence is a big risk. This may actually be another thing they should try to solve in order to motivate more serious app development.