Actually I thought Myspace would be a flash in the pan, but I was of the mind that most social media was fad-like. Everyone was asking me if I was on Myspace, so I finally checked it out and though “OK, this is it? I don’t get it, what’s so special about this?”
5 Likes
When the /. karma cap was instituted, I built six karma-capped accounts with the intention of selling them for cash, but I happened to meet Rob Malda in NYC, and he very nicely asked me not to do that, so I didn’t.
10 Likes
In fact, slashdot more closely resembles 4chan these days than social media – overrun with anonymous idiots spewing hate and lies.
Oh, wait…
5 Likes
Facebook most likely won’t die until a competitor is able to provide something better or different - or FB does something so bad EVERYONE stops using it. I think FB was superior to MySpace in many ways when the migration and surge in FB happened.
I guess time will tell.
Whatever new platform or existing one overtakes it, there is no promise it won’t also commit the same or similar sins as FB.
3 Likes
Yeah I think my prediction that social media as we know it will go away. It’s not that folks don’t want to connect online but that the realization that corporations can snoop on you is finally sinking into the minds of users. It’s just sad that most people aren’t aware of how computers work in that data can be easily reproduced and stored. People just treat computers as if they’re magic and that kind of behavior is easy to exploit. I hope in the future people will be wiser with their actions and not let some third party fool them again.
4 Likes
Yeah, but my point is that online advertising is some % of the total available advertising $. Even assuming it completely pushes out traditional media, after that where will the rapid growth come from to justify these companies’ astronomical share valuations?
Edit:
50% and growing fast:
2 Likes
Oh God, yes, it’s one of my big gripes about /. these days. There’s too many T_D nerds on it for my taste.
From that Washington Post article (my italics):
Bosworth deleted the memo after learning it had been obtained by reporters this week and then wrote a new message to employees complaining about leaks.
“If we have to live in fear that even our bad ideas will be exposed then we won’t explore them or understand them as such,” the vice president wrote, according to the Verge. “We run a much greater risk of stumbling on them later.”
TRANSLATION: We can’t articulate and impose our philosophy or facilitate and achieve our sinister business strategy if our philosophy our strategy are known by the general public, so stop with the leaks.
Bosworth appears to be more concerned with ‘misuse’ of company-related info than of user-related info.
9 Likes
Wow, I didn’t realize it was on track for 50% by 2020, assuming this article is correct. That’s crazy. And good for me in many ways, from a professional perspective, heh.
Oh that’s just any unmoderated comments section on the internet… /. was always trollish, even when there were insightful comments. Don’t read the comments there. 
1 Like
And 15 years ago people were also already talking about how far downhill BoingBoing had gone.
3 Likes
You’re right that Facebook’s - and let’s not forget Google’s - customers are the advertisers, but I’m not sure how that’s relevant to what I was saying. If I’d said “user population” or “demographic” instead of “market” it would still be true that Facebook has reached a level of saturation that Myspace never did. I’ve found and been able to stay in touch with dozens of long-thought-lost friends and family members on Facebook. I’m not sure that would ever have happened even once on Myspace. I know a lot of people with similar stories. It’s a major tipping point. You’d be hard pressed to find someone nowadays who has never searched for something on Google or bought something at Amazon either, whereas back in the Myspace days it would have been easy. The world has changed, in ways that are very relevant when one tries to equate a company from that era with one of today’s. It’s like saying that General Motors is doomed because look what happened to General Buggywhip. There might be some commonality, but it’s easy to extrapolate too far.
1 Like
(Getting a bit OT perhaps), but a lot of my fellow old fogies still use traditional media (and there will still be billboards, car radio, …) so the online penetration could stall at say 80% in a very few years.
1 Like
19 Likes
Yeah and I think that number will be lower than 80 when it stalls. People still watch live broadcast TV, read magazines (paper), drive by billboards, eat Happy Meals, etc. But even 50% is extremely impressive — I mean, remember when there were zero adds on the internet? Well, I suppose I was auctioning things on USENET 25 years ago, but you know what I mean.
2 Likes
Quit being so reasonable or I’ll get my posse together… lol I think trump anger (on both sides guys both sides) is also a huge “elephant” in the room that MySpace didn’t have to deal with since foxnews took the brunt of that heat and was perfectly willing and in fact hoping to be the influencer that Facebook appears to be and is acting… well… two faced about it… wanting the money but not the responsibility. Or at least it can appear that way… I’ve worked in social media, online publishing and journalism, and entertainment and have landed on filming and editing porn and my conscience is clear and I can finally sleep at night without weed.
Edited because I’m in a car but not driving
2 Likes
2 Likes
You can still get an @netscape.com email address (and unlimited dialup!) for $10/mo, I seriously considered it just to be an @netscape.com
This is how it works: Facebook won’t “die” just like Myspace hasn’t died completely. It’ll just become a joke (it already is, in many circles…) and lose users until it’s a ghost town.
2 Likes
That’s freaking awesome… and kinda freaky.
1 Like
Can’t believe how much money I spent on Compuserve back in the '80s . I’m sure it was over 200$ / month. That’s with an offline reader. They couldn’t turn away from those high hourly charges…
1 Like
