Five Things That Could Kill Facebook

hi mark -

great post, and interesting list. personally, as an advisor to startups (who are all working on or have done Facebook apps), i think i’d be most concerned about what #1 looks like in 6-12 months. the others strike me as less likely / important.

i’m up at Foo Camp right now, and Adam D’angelo, CTO from Facebook, was up here and gave a small group of us a reasonably deep dive on Facebook Platform. I saw it at the f8 launch as well, but it was great to get to ask Adam questions in a small group & have him walk us through a few scenarios.

your points #2, 3, & 5 feel like they’re all about the same issue — namely, does Facebook / app / msg overload reduce the interest level in Facebook. while i think we’re already seeing some app fatigue & notification spam, after talking with adam i’m not that worried about this point… the system is somewhat self-correcting in that spammy / less-interesting apps will not be reinforced by your friends in the social graph, and Facebook already can “dial” down the volume on msgs / news feed notifications based on community interest. (interestingly, i think we’ll likely see some of the same community rants we see about Google’s rules for ranking — aka “the Google Dance” — now being applied to Facebook in how they optimize the news feed messaging.

but overall, when you’ve got 50% (half, is said HALF!) logging in every day, i really don’t think i’m that worried in the community backing off on the stickiness. many of us would LOVE to have this problem.

re: the IPO, sure some concerns there… but it didn’t kill Google’s fundamental business model or site stickiness, and similarly before when i was at PayPal it didn’t really matter there either.

the ONE thing i think might be relevant is if Facebook has to tweak their business model down the road, and/or they make some rather subjective decisions on how much money they want to make / how much control they give to platform developers. however, positively for them, right now they’re being pretty wide open and biased towards letting a lot of flexibility in the system. there are obviously risks for startups investing a lot on a platform that’s early in its maturity, but the potential payoff is very large, measured in millions of users (acquired in very short time).

so overall, i’m still pretty bullish & i’m voting with my feet — i’m encouraging the startups i work with to look pretty darn closely at Facebook & to invest a pretty big chunk of time seeing if they can use it for distribution & customer acquisition. so far, the bet seems to be a good one.

- dave mcclure

for some related thoughts on the discussions, see my post here:
http://500hats.typepad.com/500blogs/2007/06/facebook-world-.html

Interesting points on what will do Facebook in, I think you are right. It is likely to be one of them.

I think also in general the buzz will fade, the press will die down. Something shinier will come along and the Web will just plow forward beyond Facebook.

Though I am also impressed with it as a platform and social network phenomena, I think it won’t last too long.

Other then the IPO, these points are familiar issues with most other social networking apps.

The huge difference, for me, is that Facebook has allowed me to re-network with people I haven’t seen or heard from in over 20 years (people who have never used myspace of Virb etc.). No other social app has done that for me, and unsurprisingly, Facebook is the only social app I’ve really used for a serious period of time. Why? Because it wasn’t for networking and work, it was for re-connecting with long lost friends.

So – if I’m not alone in my Facebook experience – I guess I’m wondering if Facebook has done it right, like Google did with search, and if they have the momentum will be just as hard to move off of the top of the pile as GOOG…

I think a lot of people in the general community, having recently discovered Facebook in the past year, don’t understand the deep roots Facebook has planted in its foundation at American Universities. I’m class of ’06, and 99% of my friends are bona fide facebook addicts (and have been for about three years now). 99% is not an exaggeration – it’s literally shocking to meet someone at school that doesn’t use Facebook. It has intertwined with the social landscape of college life so fundamentally that I honestly can’t envision how it would disappear any time soon.

I’ve watched as Facebook has become a bigger and bigger part of each class – ’05 used it a little but graduated before the takeover, ’06 was there at just the right time. The newer classes such as ’09 have had Facebook as a pillar of their social lives since they came to college. That’s not something that can easily change unless something new, better, and (most importantly) with more critical mass comes along.

With the albums and tagged photos, throwing away Facebook is like throwing away the chronicles of your time at university. On average I would guess that each of my friends have 150 photos tagged of them by other people. For me, leaving those photos behind is is not an option, and I can say that most long time Facebook addicts would agree.

So while I agree that the community at large may or may not use Facebook a year from now, I can guarantee that its (huge) base of college students are happily and inextricably connected to it for a while to come.

You forgot #6: Google opening an API for Orkut.com applications or stealing the best features from Facebook and implementing it there.

Mark,

Great list!

The previous comment hits on an important theme – is it possible to ever be a part of an virtual community without suffering some of the negative effects of the real world? With Facebook, you have the problem associated to a profile putting an otherwise model employee in an awkward or embarrassing situation because a boss or future employer happens across a photo that was taken at a time when they were young an immature.

In virtual rooms like Red Light City, you have avatar-based personalities indulging in their deepest and darkest fantasies. The strange part of looking at online experience in the Web 3.0 as a lifestyle replacement is that negative effects portrayed in the virtual world will be considered a form of personal expression, but what happens when people begin to have a problem differentiating between the virtual and real world?

Has the Web allowed our namespace to evolve and mature enough to understand the difference between the person who gets into character for their virtual-world avatar, and the average person that views their online experience in a holistic way, and how one “portray’s” oneself online doesn’t necessarily imply that they are that way in real life. The downside so far is that if your online footprint reveals an personality too extreme for people’s liking, then you might not be added as quickly to a friends list, or worse, your new boss, potential business partner or client may take a pass.

We may begin to take notice on just how flawed our current namespace has become with the rise of vertical search engines focused on people. For years, people have been signing-up using mock id’s to avert spammers, and the current sign-in models have no way of identifying that the person registering for an account is who they say they are.

And as much as I agree with your points on the aspects that could kill Facebook, it will be interesting to see how sites like Facebook and even MySpace with their ability to capture more precise information on its users will work to correct some namespace deficiencies by contributing a more precise ring of person-specific profile data, which could include full name, age, geography, family/friend associations and links to online communities they frequent.

While this might not be such a good thing for some, there might be a huge potential for a vertical search engine focused on people, especially for employers and recruiters wanting to do background checks on employees or prospects. Difficult to say with any degree of certainty, but it might also be the kind of evolutionary step in allowing others to be more accepting to various online identities and this idea that the avatar isn’t totally modeled after the real life.

I have two teenagers, whose behavior I observe with respect to their use of technology; it counts for a lot more than just my own opinion as to what is likely to be successful or happen.

Three years ago, LiveJournal was all the rage. A year or two later, it was MySpace, and my kids were checking and updating their MySpace pages constantly. Then, somehow, overnight, it was Facebook. What will it be tomorrow? I don’t know for sure, but I do know that these things move with a mysterious momentum all their own, as do most fads.

In short, I’d be leery about pinning too much on Facebook’s long-term prospects.

Great article and good points.

But Facebook is slowly becoming another version of Myspace. The original appeal of Facebook was the maturity level. With Facebook you didn’t have twelve year old girls shoving their chests out and taking whore-ish pictures. Now facebook is open to anyone…and has tons of annoying applications,requests,and raunchy dating site attached.

I used to think that Facebook being a social thing, would have it’s day, then naturally fade. But now I’m beginning to think that maybe Facebook has just got social networking right, and with their extra-solid foundation, they could go ahead and dominate that niche for a really long time.

A point could reach(if it hasn’t already) where Facebook manages to take control of it’s destiny; where only a monumental screw-up on their part could bring them down. Next year’s IPO could put such a process in motion. Share price adjustments may force them to adjust their design and start trying to fix what ain’t broke.

Hai
your post is very much informative. i enjoy the post through out the reading especially
The answer to #5, of course, is the same as with all social networks. People will stop checking their Facebook profiles when all their friends stop checking their profiles.

Tried and tried not to join FB but after launching own site decided needed networking. FB is just full of people making comments! no dialogue, just things like “I like cheese” and then “yeah that cool” what? i’m checking in daily to read this crap from my friends? no thanks! just deleted account fully!!!!! not deactivated!! back on my high horse now that social media sucks

thank you. facebook should be shut down for good. i have never had an account nor will i ever make one. its useless.