Why Facebook is screwed, why Twitter is (already) the next hot thing, and what can Facebook do about it?

June 21st, 2009 | Tags: , ,

I’ve gone on this rant (in a less formalized way) to a few friends, but I thought I’d codify here it to see what people on the Internet say.

I think Facebook is screwed.  Famous last words?  A “No Wireless. Less Space Than A Nomad. Lame” comment a few years from now?  We’ll see!  But here’s why I think Facebook is in trouble.

Facebook has been immensely successful at building community and attracting members.  A social network is only as powerful and useful as the number of people connected on it, and Facebook’s 250 million members is a powerfully large presence.  But it’s not all lollipops and rainbows.  Getting a network that’s that large has some nasty side-effects, and I bet Mark and co are feeling them pretty fierce right now.

The first one:  You can’t change the way people use your site anymore.

This is a big one.  No matter how powerful and agile your organization is, your userbase is just not that nimble.  People know Facebook and are comfortable with it.  You change the littlest thing and you’ll see millions (literally) of your members backlash because they won’t like the change.  Sometimes these changes (like the newsfeed) are actually great (and fundamentally change the way people use the site) but some (like the new layout) don’t work.   But, ultimately, you’ve lost that flexibility.  People often ask me “What makes Twitter so great?  Who cares?  It’s facebook status updates basically.”  Yea, it is.  But people USE twitter in a fundamentally different way (mobile appliances, quick lightweight updates.)  Facebook might be many things, but lightweight is *not* one of them.  It’s a *beast*.

This correlates to the second issue, and its a tricky one.  Social Networking sites work best when everyone is on them, but they also thrive and live by “cool”.  Once you hit a mainstream critical mass, you’ll start losing your younger and trend-setter users (a cute example is this NYMag poll [pdf] of 5th graders. One mentions he doesn’t have a Facebook page because his brother has one and he doesn’t want copy him.) Once you start registering parents, co-workers, grandparents, you end up losing the younger kids.  New college freshmen are probably a little more apprehensive using Facebook knowing dad is a “friend.”  This happened with Myspace in the past, and other things back further (AIM?)

Finally, Facebook has STOPPED adding value.  Right now on Facebook, I know a friend of mine is a “Fan of New York City”.  Really?  Do I really fucking care?  I can’t think of a more useless piece of knowledge EVER.  And all of Facebook is full of this spam.  I mean, when College Humor is making fun of your innane shit, you know there’s a problem.

The “Next Social Network” always shows up when the previous fastest grower hits this saturation point. Note – I didn’t say slows growing, the saturation point happens BEFORE growth rate peak.  There’s a reason Myspace came out when it did (replacing Friendster) and that Twitter is now getting big (The concept of Twitter and status updates has existed and been attempted many times in the past — with no success or traction.)  People are aching for the next great thing.  For a new interaction model.  Twitter feels lighter, more mobile, faster and more nimble.  It’s why its become the service of choice for the Iranian protestors.

Twitter is also less about connecting people and more about broadcasting (it comes from the Blogger guys, so it shares the same ‘everyone can be a publisher+author’ mentatility.  This makes it an ideal platform for advertising and relatively-one-way “more intimate” celebrity interactions (Ashton Kutcher’s Twitter account vs Ashton Kutcher’s fan page — note which one is more updated.)  Facebook, in a desperate attempt to mitigate this, started the previously mentioned incredibly lame “fan” concept.   But again, within the parameters of the Facebook network and how people use it, it just doesn’t work (and sadly for facebook, it can NEVER work. )

So, now that I’ve kind of ragged on Facebook, what do I think is the next step for them?  What should they do?

They need to become the next social network.  What does that mean?  I’m envisioning a new social network by the same company.   Leverage the Facebook API+Connect.  Start a new network with the lessons learned.  Rethink social interaction.  Rebrand it as something else.  Become the next cool thing and get the trend-setters and college kids onto it.  Make it more nimble and mobile.   Let people re-register or use their Facebook logons.  Hell, Fb might be a good name for it.

Basically, Facebook, you won Round 3.  But you need to reinvent yourself for Round 4. (And all the rounds after it. )

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  • yes , there are gamers who post as Al C$pone, however, ultimately, facebook may have staying power simply because people aren't afraid to post up with their real name something that tweetz and mysp@ce could never capture.
    I think you miss a big picture about facebook, maybe a few things.
    yes, it may not be so great for creating that super secret life, which made myspace big.
    The myspace gangsters have been rounded up.
    Facebook has allowed my family to reconnect. Yes, those cousins i haven't seen since well since my mom/ dad were no longer on speaking terms with well their mom/ dad.
    Respectfully, it has rejoined parts of my family tree who i have lost.
    This wasn't my fault nor theirs but it plays a part in our sense of well being of connection.
    Are they great family, you know, does it really matter
    i can share my triumphs , my setbacks with people who knew me back when.
    Facebook IMHO won't be going anywhere soon
    Its a place to post pictures of kids and friends, a way to postmark where we were and where we intended to go.

    ME
  • chazasm
    Not true, Facebook is forever reinventing themselves. They're forever stay fresh and that is not good news for the likes of Google and YouTube. Facebook has video loading features incorporated into its product offering.
  • Facebook, so far, has continued to reinvent itself (although, I wouldn't call a UI tweak as 'reinvention', and I haven't seen anything new since their much more restricted closed version of OAuth.) My worry is, as they continue this walled garden with a large user base, they're not going to be as nimble as two guys in a garage coming up with the Next Big Thing.

    Thinking otherwise is ignoring history.
  • ejesse
    You might want to checkout Jason Kincaid's followup to FB's privacy conference call:

    http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/07/01/the-looming-facebook-privacy-fiasco/
  • ejesse
    Here's another thing, it's really difficult on FB to stumble onto conversations with anyone who isn't a a "friend". On Twitter, that sort of thing happens all the time.
  • I think you're right in some respects, but wrong in others.
    For one, I think you're overestimating the cool factor and frankly, showing your age and the knowledge of facebook features. When you look into how those college freshmen are dealing with Mom being a "friend", what you see is not the same friend parity that you and I allow on our networks. I don't know about you, but I don't really have friend lists (even though I realize I should). But kids do. And Mom only gets to see a barebones profile. So I'd say there's a way to manage the coolness factor.
    Second, you make a factual error. MySpace became successful not because Friendster reached a saturation point but because there were some significant issues with Friendster that users were upset about: deletion of "fakester" and band accounts, limited ability to alter the profile, and the plain ol' fact that most of the time, Friendster couldn't handle the traffic. Same with Facebook: people became frustrated by the Wild West that was MySpace and gravitated towards the Facebook walled garden where profiles were clean and organized in the exact same way. So I think the main player gets displaced when users find features of the entrant more appealing.
    And here's the issue. Facebook offers a ton of features, Twitter offers only one.
    And yes, this lightweightness is a tremendous feature, especially when you're still living off of venture capital funds, because frankly, the server bills are not as high. But it may be enough for some people. Some people need photo albums. And apps. And all that crap.
    So I'd say the situation is far less defined. And Twitter is still TINY compared to Facebook. It will not be that easy to unseat them.
  • Eh, I don't agree with a few of your comments.

    First, Facebook has become a monster to log into. It now has integrated chat which puts people who barely know each other into awkward buddy lists, it has an email system (which makes no sense and adds no value over normal email), the newsfeed has become polluted with "Which Color Am I!?" bullshit, and various other things. No offense, Facebook kind of feels like the Wild Wide West now too (Hey did you know 2 of my friends are fans of Victoria's Secret?)

    And let's not discount the "lightness" feature in terms of costs. I can think of at least 3 monetization strategies for Twitter, but I can't really think of *any* for Facebook -- couple this with the fact that Facebook's costs are ridiculously higher than Twitter's (and not just because of size of userbase, its also all the other crud that Facebook provides.)

    Facebook was built in another era -- an era where every college kid had access to many computers, but not one with smart phones and always on connectivity. Something else *is* coming. It might be Twitter, it might be a reinvention of Facebook, or it might be something else entirely, but I refuse to believe I'm the only one who's not sick of "xxxxx has score a 85% on the 80s Quiz!"
  • Btw, Twitter logins work for Disqus unlike *some* people's Facebook logins :-P
  • maybe i don't want people to know who i am. :P
  • Why don't you just block sender? It' easy!
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