Social Networks Implode Quickly

Network effects are not indefensible. I don't understand why so many people in the bay area think that network effects are impossible to break in. Here is an example. Orkut. All my friends including myself were on Orkut in 2004/2005. By 2008 everyone moved to FB. Why? Orkut had horrible UX and buggy system. FB was breath of fresh air compared to that. Even though Orkut has superior privacy features (I still say they had best privacy features for any social app). FB is moving in that direction. It's quite buggy system and if FB must address the overall quality of application. It looks like Orkut in 2007.

I think MS will acquire FB.<p>The FB social network will die, in time, but it's still the world's largest email address list, plus all sorts of personal information that can be used to insidiously coax consumers.<p>Every FB user should gather up all the email addys of their friends and keep them in a safe place offline. This way you never lose contact.<p>FB allowed people to submit their email addresses to a central website and thereby connect/reconnect with friends, colleagues and so forth. This sharing of email addresses is not a new thing, but with FB it occurred on an unprecendented scale. Billions of email addresses (that work!). That is FB's contribution. Gather those email addresses and keep them offline. Soon you may be able to form your own social networks that are private, secure and more functional than FB. But you will need the email addresses of your friends to get it started. Don't believe that FB should be the safe keeper of your email address book. They will do what they have to in order to survive as their business winds down. Those email addresses are its most valuable asset.

One lesson from reading this text is: if your site has googleable content, it will not decay as fast as if you rely on (semi-)active following. Seems quite obvious when stated this way.

I don't think Facebook will die, for two good reasons:<p>1) there are many more people on facebook than networks like myspace ever had. This makes a transition much, much harder.<p>2) facebook is not only used for facebook, but for many third-party apps as well. People will keep their facebook accounts so that they can log in to external services.

"TL;DR: Big social networks need to take advantage of the spotlight, and solidify their position to rely less on network effects. Otherwise, they are extremely risky investments."<p>Very good point.

Interesting. I can see Quora having that long tail of useful traffic, even if the community collapses.

Growing a company is one aspect while sustaining a company is another. Social Networks naturally take advantage of network effect while growing. It is not easy to sustain the company if perceived value provided by the company erodes quickly from its core customers' point of view. Whenever a company collapses usually it is because customers do not want its products for whatever reason.

There are various historical examples of various online networks. The one I began with in 1992 was the Prodigy commercial online network (which I had actually tried out as early as 1989). My paradigmatic example of an online network that faded away is AOL, which is still in business. My prediction about Facebook, posted previously here on HN, is "Facebook will go the way of AOL, still being a factor in the industry years from now, but also serving as an example of a company that could never monetize up to the level of the hype surrounding it." I could be wrong, but that's my sense of where Facebook is in the market.