As a mid-30s guy, I use Facebook primarily to share pictures and updates of my son and things we do together with my friends and family.<p>Every. Single. Person. that I personally know despises the political crap, occasional venting of some personal problem, and news outrage fishing that comes across on there. I wish there was some way to "categorize" these posts, and to allow me to simply filter out what I don't want to see. As an example, there is a person I am friends with on there who I greatly admire and enjoy being friends with. But every time I see "Drumph" with a big red background, I sigh and scroll on. I don't need that in my life.<p>Even if that makes me miss the odd post here and there, they are practically valueless anyway and seeing only the categories of updates that I want greatly outweighs that minuscule loss.
Facebook offers some good functionality for keeping in touch etc, but it's littered with too much noise and too much influencing (to the point that it's unpleasant to use). If they fix that, they'll be okay. If not, there may be a mass exodus to something else once enough people get sick of it.
> "ripping apart the social fabric." ... "literally changes your relationship with society, with each other ... God only knows what it's doing to our children's brains."<p>I'm not saying he's entirely wrong, but a lot of what he's saying sounds very much like how TV was once described.
I removed the FB and Messenger apps from my phone about 2 weeks ago, and I've mostly managed to not open it on my desktop until after 6PM, which has drastically reduced my usage. What finally did it for me was trying to turn off notifications for messenger and realizing there is apparently no way to really do this. You can "mute" them for up to 24 hours but in 5 minutes I couldn't find a way to turn them off permanently. Whether it is possible or not is besides the point. It's an obvious feature and should be easily accessible. I decided to start actively avoiding software that doesn't respect my agency. I'm moving to open source where possible and paid products where not. I'm sick of software designed for engagement rather than user experience.
> A third line of attack is likely to become important soon, perhaps as soon as next year. Former Facebook executive (yes, another dissident insider) Antonio Garcia-Martinez argued earlier this year that Facebook's ad targeting based on data collected from users is essentially unethical (and also that Facebook oversells its targeting ability).<p>That last parenthetical about overselling points to a fourth line of attack: fraud. There's been a lot of rumbling for years that FB (and Google for that matter) are not doing enough to combat fake clicks / views / likes and are essentially ripping off advertisers. If everyone smells blood in the water all of a sudden due to these other issues heating up, there could be a lot of pressure on these companies to provide more transparency. That could bring their revenues way down.
Surprised that the article didn’t mention the EUs incoming data protection laws (GDPR) compliance with which is bound to be costly for Facebook as well as shifting power towards individuals more broadly.
I'm not sure what all these articles are complaining. Facebook is in the business of selling influence, just like Google or Twitter, that's how they make money. The product is people's attention span, just like TV or newspapers or any website or business financed by advertisement.<p>So what is the problem here? the fact that anybody around the world can buy influence on Facebook? When you needed millions before to buy a spot on TV or newspapers?<p>It's the black smith complaining about the automaker all over again.
I uninstalled the facebook app from my mobile and only use once in a day for about 10-15 mins in the evening to get update on web. This has become very effective and I still keep update with some of my friends/relatives there.<p>I think facebook has to do much larger research on the impact it is having on wider group of people and not just in western world in terms of politics, news, kids, humans behavior, etc. I have seen people spending hours and hours of unproductive time on facebook in very poor and developing countries where the same time could have been used for more useful stuff.
For me the biggest problem with Facebook is that you bust your ass to obtain an audience and then you can't reach them all because they change the algorithm and you have to pay extra. So you're paying initially to advertise and reach an audience and then you pay again to actually be allowed to say something to them. That's fucking pathetic. I mean come on Facebook, get your shit together. Either you'll make money from advertising or from promotions. You can't have it both ways. You're pissing off businesses, especially the smaller ones.
2017 Was Bad for Bloomberg. 2018 Will Be Worse. All of these anti-Facebook articles should have disclaimers informing readers that they are in competition with Facebook and that Facebook is winning.
Though many have mentioned in their posts and comments, following things made me weary of using FB:<p>1. More friendlier to businesses - after each N number of posts (where N sometimes < 5) we can see sponsored posts<p>2. Feeling of stalking - after searching few things in e-commerce sites (the exact same items getting listed in advertisements of sponsored feed). Though its through the Ad affiliation this happens, its totally creepy to see the "things" you searched for following you all over the social media.<p>3. Pushing for wider attention - though you haven't uploaded any picture of you, if in someone else's photo you get a part (even in a corner) all your friends will be notified!<p>4. Always-on-top - Their messenger app displays always-on-top floating bubble in mobile phones whenever there is a notification! Never ever look anywhere else!<p>5. Feeling of being their product - if the data we generate (not the moments we cherish) is their selling point for being an attractive platform, then there is no human part to it. We are just the products they sell!<p>6. Getting annoyed when an user doesn't login for a long time - sending an email and text message to say "if you have trouble logging please click this link"<p>7. Thank you animations other custom generated animations - All these animations are auto generated (may be mostly using AI), though in the end of the animation it says "Team FB", its more of a "AI @ FB". Why bother creating it, if it is auto generated!
FB's business model will eventually clash with its value proposition to users.<p>The hedge fund and institutional investing world has fallen in love with facebook because it obviously is growing like crazy and scale and in a profitable manner, but also because it is viewed by many as a modern-day "value investment" (strange as that sounds), in the sense it has a powerful competitive moat and compounding returns on investment. but ultimately this thesis comes down to placing more paid ads in front of users. facebook will have to choose between cramming more and increasingly intrusive ads into its platform or dealing with a falling stock price. when it happens who knows, but it will at some point<p>the regulatory risk is real but vague. out of curiousity, i wonder how many people thought the regulatory risk for microsoft in the late 90s was real
I only use Facebook for work - promoting nonprofit events, but its utility is diminishing as there is a growing share of people who flee Facebook and it's now creating double work as I both need to support Facebook, and email and the format of work are different. Facebook made it especially hard when they removed the ability to invite the same people from an old event - now I have to go thru my over 1,000+ and select who I should invite to which event, which is total nonsense! For personal stuff, I still use Skype and Viber to keep up with friends and family.
The title and content is not matching. As a to-customer company, whether it is a good or bad year depends on how much they earn from their customers and how much they grow instead of how badly they are regulated or criticized. As long as people love using Facebook, every year is a good year. If the article describes that Facebook is losing their users either drastically or gradually, I would agree with the title saying that it was bad for Facebook.
I think that the main reason of Facebook's failure is that people need someone to listen to them. Facebook is just about sharing. People will hear you but you want someone to listen to you, eventually.<p>So,this feeling of being heard can only satisfy you temporarily until a certain point, meaning until you realize you need something more. Facebook has failed iked at what their main purpose is: communication.<p>Is there an alternative? Yeah, it's called life, listening, opportunities, etc.<p>My 2 cents.
Does anyone take Bloomberg and their "predictions" seriously? I may be biased (I think, most of the predictions I've seen are in "Apple is suffering badly and will be suffering" context). But it looks like their "predictions" never ever hit their mark and only serve to drive traffic.
I stopped using FB because the feed was full of promoted posts, which made me really mad. And when your interested in finance/fintech/investment you get some really suspicious(most likely some scam) ads for promoting some X crypto-coins.
Every technological revolution has profound effects on society, our brains and our ability to interact. Witness [0]. From the printing press to the internet, a change occurs, it affects our brain and the way we interact, and then eventually we begin to deal.<p>The start of the vaccine(/backlash/response) to social media has begun.<p>[0] <a href="https://xkcd.com/1227/" rel="nofollow">https://xkcd.com/1227/</a>