Diaspora raised a slew of money back in 2010 but flopped.... it’s almost as though we knew this would happen....<p><a href="https://techcrunch.com/2010/05/12/diaspora-open-facebook-project/" rel="nofollow">https://techcrunch.com/2010/05/12/diaspora-open-facebook-pro...</a>
Building a better product isn't the issue, it's convincing people to use it. The entire value proposition of using Facebook is that a lot of people use Facebook.<p>You kill Facebook by ceasing your use of Facebook, if you can without too horrible consequences.
I'm curious to see what the next 'social networking site' is going to be, but I'm also wondering how much our expectations of 'social networking' have changed since Facebook entered the room and took over the conversation. (Took over, not changed)<p>My chief complaint, personally about these sites is that I'll use it, just let me use it the way <i>I</i> want to in relative peace. That means: unless I subscribed to a specific type of update, I don't want to hear about it. No "In case you missed", no "Your other friends liked x, why don't you go indicate the same by interacting with UX feature 42", no "Hey friend 88 is on the platform, go look at what they're doing and signal your emotional reaction to it".<p>Never thought I'd ever say this: I want to see the baby pictures again. What are your families up to? <i>How are you doing?</i> Haha that video you shared is great, gave me a good laugh during my work break, here's a quick private message, let's catch up over a cold one this weekend. I miss our humorous conversations. THAT'S the kind of interaction I miss, when I was the one initiating it.<p>Some say this stuff is driving us further apart and I couldn't disagree more. It keeps us involved while respecting the fact that we want to have independent lives we live on our terms. It lets my friends four states a way know I'm not affected by the bombings here in Austin while also giving me another resource to pop in more 1-to-1 and see if I can crash on their couch when I come to town.<p>I like that. It allows groups of friends to breathe when the pressure isn't to share everything but actually....create....NETWORKS.<p>Get it social networking sites? I want to use these features, but I want to use them on <i>my</i> terms, for crying out loud.<p>So to anyone who wants to take up this challenge...I'm not telling you how to run your site, but if you heed the above I may sign up.
Diaspora, Pulse and a half a dozen other sites and apps tried, and failed spectacularly.<p>The replacement to Facebook, when it comes along, will look nothing like Facebook.
How could we get the government involved? There's public broadcasting, NPR, PRI, etc.... Is 'social media' so different rather than just being the next communications' platform?<p>It's a serious question too, what would it look like to create a public/government arm of social media?
Maybe we shouldn't replace cancer with cancer, and should simply get rid of it.<p>Edit: I honestly don't think it's hard. Delete your facebook, stop using it and don't replace it with something else. People lived without being used by social media services for a very long time.
One problem other than convincing people to use it is convincing people to pay for it.<p>If we don't like Facebook's business model of using user data to make money we'd have to charge people to use it, and not a lot of people would be willing to do that.<p>Of course, one could argue that it's possible to make money with user data without being evil, but no one seems to have managed to do that so far. I bet if this project became as successful as Facebook it would be hard not to end up in the same exact spot.