Facebook Traffic Declines 10% in April

The year-on-year figure is up 56%, and myspace is also up y-o-y and down from March. Could it be that as spring kicks in, people leave their computers more? Or as end-of-year exams approach, students procrastinate less?<p>I wouldn't cry wolf just yet.

Sounds pretty bad. They should have seen a big bump as students go into finals (at least in the past it seems like people I know are more active on facebook when they have lots of work to do).<p>Just from my personal experience, I've noticed less and less of my friends using facebook - people aren't listing parties/events on it anymore, groups are annoying, and the apps are mostly useless spam.

You know what happens in April? Exams.<p>To me, all this means is that their prime audience (students) are actually working. It'll be interesting to see what happens with their May numbers.

Facebook is boring. I like FriendFeed, Twitter, for keeping in touch, sharing new things, etc.<p>Only problem is, none of my friends use those (Well, except one), most of my other friends aren't really "early adopter" crowd and essentially a ton of apps and various things plague their Facebook profiles. To me, Facebook seems like a waste of time apart from hooking up with a few older colleagues. Once I hook up with them, I can find other methods to stay in touch (IM, Email, etc)

What's strange about it? Facebook, twitter, ...., don't solve any tangible problem: they are generic social networks that are more subject to fashion than intrinsic value, because people to communicate and get in touch need very little: ability to send message, profiles with photos, and so on.<p>This is why I never understood the facebook buzz around tech people, for example here in YC news: it does not care. I don't want to state that only things like a search engine or a bug tracking system can care. Flickr cares a lot, changed the way people put photos online, is a social community in some way but driven by a common interest: it as a side effect it's a database of images.<p>The same like delicious, social bookmarking cares: it is a place where you can really find interesting resources, and it is useful for individuals. It is also one of the best applications for tags that is a very important semantic concept.<p>Instead generic social networks will came and go away one after the other, like Pubs do: they are mostly about fashion.

School's out and it's warm. I'll get back online when I get bored of the pool.

You know what happens in may? Prom. That means tons of pictures. That means tons of traffic.

Removing the clutter is definitely a step in the right direction, not sure if its a big enough step...

Social networking is a commercial trend. Why? Technology replacing social life in the real world is a bad idea.