Forgot your password?

Close
typodupeerror
Social Networks Facebook Google Stats The Internet Technology

Facebook Loses Users, Satisfaction Higher at Google+ 274

Posted by Soulskill
from the time-to-launch-facebook++ dept.
benfrog writes "Facebook has lost what (by the standards of their userbase) is a modest number of users over the last six months, which is perhaps one of the causes of a fall in their stock price. In the meantime, a study shows that Google+ users are more satisfied with the site than Facebook users, who are (understandably) upset about the number of recent UI changes, the amount of advertising, and other elements, according to a statement accompanying the study. Figures also show dramatic growth in Google+ usage."
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.

Facebook Loses Users, Satisfaction Higher at Google+ More

Facebook Loses Users, Satisfaction Higher at Google+

Comments Filter:

  • It's amazing.... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by UltimaBuddy (2566017) on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @04:43PM (#40690209)
    .... what actual revenue can do for morale.

  • Hmmmm, yeah (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Giant Electronic Bra (1229876) on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @04:43PM (#40690211)

    Is this like some sort of Google ad? I dunno. I like G+ too, but it is a little hard to use in the ways that you can use FB when people just don't do a lot with it. Maybe they'll hit some sort of critical mass? I'd like that, but...

    • Re:Hmmmm, yeah (Score:4, Insightful)

      by SomePgmr (2021234) on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @04:51PM (#40690321) Homepage

      I have to agree. I like it fine, but it's not a full-on Facebook replacement, and I'm not much interested in unique visitors as a useful metric when 800 trillion people already have google accounts. Show me big numbers for user engagement. Then I'll gladly accept that people are actually using it as a Facebook replacement.

      • Re:Hmmmm, yeah (Score:5, Informative)

        by GIL_Dude (850471) on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @05:07PM (#40690511) Homepage
        Why try to use it as a Facebook replacement? It isn't designed to directly compete. Facebook has a "two way" model (where two people have to agree to be 'friends'). This fosters a community of people who "post to each other"; sort of a friends keeping in touch type of model. Google+ is a one way thing. You put a person in your circles. Then, if they post to public, you get their content in your feed. (Google+ also has the concept of private posts where you can post just to your circles instead of public). However, just circling someone gets you their public content. So Google+ is a great place to get content from content producers, interesting people, etc. For example circle Mike Elgin, Wil Wheaton, Robert Scoble, etc. and you'll get lots of content (I can't vouch for whether you'll like said content). Circle LifeHacker, ArsTechnica, etc. and you get notified of their posts - and can engage with people on Google+ about them without registering accounts on Gawker, Ars, etc. It really is a different model and a different target. I don't view it as a replacement at all.

        Oh, and Google Instant (where photos you take automatically upload to a private area) is the killer feature there - just that alone can be so helpful even if you don't circle anyone or use the other features.

    • Re:Hmmmm, yeah (Score:5, Interesting)

      by stevencbrown (238995) on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @04:53PM (#40690353) Homepage Journal

      there is a definite spin to the article - not like slashdot.(!)

      I like G+ as well, but just don't see how it ever reaches critical mass, and even if it does, will it supplant facebook, or will it just become as annoying as facebook.

      I use 3 social media sites, and feel the all fulfill a certain niche, and not sure that will change for a while.

      Facebook, for semi-interesting mix of updates from a variety of friends and acquaintances, just dip in now and again when I'm bored, certainly don't feel I'm missing out on anything if I don't check.

      G+ fulfills more of my tech need, as I most of the stuff I follow in there is more tech related, and I tend to check it every day, and usually get some interesting reading out of it. (though had to unfollow NASA, they provide way too many updates if they had been landing somebody on Mars, let alone just updates about the effects of micro gravity on small screws).

      Twitter is good for when I'm on the toilet and doing a dump.

      • Re:Hmmmm, yeah (Score:5, Insightful)

        by macshit (157376) <miles@g[ ]org ['nu.' in gap]> on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @08:12PM (#40692439) Homepage

        ... and that sounds like it is exactly as it should be.

        The problem with facebook is not really facebook per-se—some people like it, it serves their needs, good for them.

        The problem is when facebook becomes so overwhelmingly dominant that they are essentially the only viable choice for most people, meaning that people who don't like it (and they are legion) are basically goaded into using it anyway.

        Ideally, there would be a range of services that are all popular, maybe even with content-transfer between them (I know, FB would royally freak, but ... from a user's point of view, this is ideal ... and the user's content does belong to the user, doesn't it ...?), allowing people to use the one they like best, and avoiding any one service from becoming too powerful.

        Diversity is a good thing!

    • Re:Hmmmm, yeah (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @04:55PM (#40690377)

      They will hit critical mass because Google is leveraging their other markets. Facebook doesn't have Google maps, YouTube, the Chrome browser, g-mail, etc. Google is going to integrate all of its technology and because the applications are there, people will use it. Google will surround Facebook, and then give an integrated alternative. People will move.

      The only thing that doesn't make sense is why Google hasn't yet bought Twitter. Maybe Twitter refuses to sell?

      • Re:Hmmmm, yeah (Score:5, Insightful)

        by MozeeToby (1163751) on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @05:06PM (#40690503)

        Android is the only market that matters as far as their leverage goes. Everyone on android has gmail, and everyone on gmail has Google+. My family suddenly realized that everyone had a video chat app installed on their phones, imagine their shock! But how to organize it so the whole family can be on together? Oh wait, Google+ supports events now. And sharing pictures and video is about 2 taps on the screen? Oh, but my friends don't want to see yet another picture of my daughter doing something adorable, luckily it's about 2 more screen presses to only share it with my family then. The Google+ app has a remarkable amount of functionality, Google has been putting a lot of effort into getting it right because they know that mobile is where Facebook stumbles.

      • Re:Hmmmm, yeah (Score:2)

        by Bigby (659157) on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @05:37PM (#40690917)

        Google+ functions as a Facebook and a Twitter. The whole idea of Circles allow this. Someone can add you to their Circle to see your public posts (Twitter) or you can add someone to your Circle to see your public/private posts (Facebook).

    • Re:Hmmmm, yeah (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Archangel Michael (180766) on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @04:59PM (#40690417) Journal

      I remember when "everyone" was on MySpace, "Everyone" was there and nobody used "Facebook". Until one day ... Nobody used MySpace and everyone was on Facebook.

      • It is true (Score:3)

        by Giant Electronic Bra (1229876) on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @05:08PM (#40690519)

        Of course MySpace REALLY just went noplace in terms of creating features. They piddled around but it was like everything was user interface nuclear disaster. It was the ugliest site in history. I guess FB COULD screw up that bad. I think they probably won't. They'll screw up a little bit, but so will Google.

      • Re:Hmmmm, yeah (Score:2)

        by Literaphile (927079) on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @05:36PM (#40690905)

        I remember when "everyone" was on MySpace, "Everyone" was there and nobody used "Facebook". Until one day ... Nobody used MySpace and everyone was on Facebook.

        But "everyone" was not on MySpace. Facebook has 10x more users than MySpace had at the height of its popularity. It won't be as easy for Facebook just to disappear.

      • Re:Hmmmm, yeah (Score:5, Informative)

        by UnknownSoldier (67820) on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @06:47PM (#40691693)

        That's why some of my friends call it "FazeBook" (or worse .. F**Book). I have no opinion, I don't use it.

        Just like LiveJournal before MySpace, the social medium is fad-based. Same with clothes / fashion.

        • Re:Hmmmm, yeah (Score:4, Interesting)

          by DerekLyons (302214) <fairwater@@@gmail...com> on Thursday July 19, 2012 @02:10AM (#40694711) Homepage

          Just like LiveJournal before MySpace, the social medium is fad-based.

          People keep saying that... so often it's become accepted truth, while ignoring reality. Not to mention that Slashdot, ever disdainful of anything the masses like, had been gleefully predicting Facebook's imminent demise since the day they opened their door to the public.
           
          Yes, Livejournal and Myspace had a lot of users - among the early adopters and the young. Neither had anything even remotely approaching the depth and penetration that Facebook has. So, are they fad based? Or did it just take a couple of tries before someone got it right, or close enough to right, to capture and dominate the market? The jury is still out, but the evidence is somewhat in favor of the latter.
           
          A new social network, to topple Facebook, has to both replace Facebook functionally *and* capture a huge number of users across a broad range of social strata. (Just capturing the tech elite and next-best-thing adopters won't cut it anymore due to deep and broad penetration of Facebook.) That's a tall order, even for Google.

      • Re:Hmmmm, yeah (Score:3)

        by recharged95 (782975) on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @09:33PM (#40693097) Journal

        Same thing for Friendster, Linked-in, and foursquare.

        Twitter appears to be the only social media outlet that has stabilized--thing about it.

    • Re:Hmmmm, yeah (Score:4, Interesting)

      by bedroll (806612) on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @05:02PM (#40690453) Journal

      I doubt it's an ad or a distortion. It's common for a smaller, more committed user base to be happier with a product. There's a lot of ownership bias. At this point most people have at least a clue what G+ is, and the ones who use it know that they're dealing with a smaller user base. They're happy with it despite its flaws and lack of ubiquity. It shouldn't be surprised.

      The slowing of FB adoption is the bigger story. It probably doesn't mark a shift toward G+, but it may be that Facebook is at the upper bounds of users interested in its service. For my part, I didn't close my FB account but I've moved almost all of my social networking activity over to Twitter. I wanted to like G+ but none of my social circles use it.

      • Re:Hmmmm, yeah (Score:5, Insightful)

        by Daetrin (576516) on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @05:22PM (#40690691)
        There's also the fact that a number of people (including me) only use Facebook because they feel "forced" to do so. Friends or family members they want to keep in touch with only use Facebook, or events they want to be notified of are only announced on Facebook, or some game or website or something forces people to use Facebook to participate.

        That "forcing" is part of what keeps Facebook's numbers so high, but it also leads to discontent. No one likes being forced into something, and it tends to aggravate any negative feelings they already have. On the other hand no one (except possibly Google employees =) feels forced to use G+. If you're there, it's because you want to be there.

        I have noticed some swings in G+ activity, at least amongst the people i follow. Sometimes it slows down to four or five dedicated people/groups posting on a somewhat regular basis, sometimes it swings up. Currently it seems to be in a bit of an upswing with about a dozen "regular" posters, but that's a _very_ small and biased bit of anecdotal data.

        • Re:Hmmmm, yeah (Score:5, Funny)

          by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @06:52PM (#40691753)

          Whenever my relatives get in my face and are all, "Why don't you have a facebook account?!" I'm like, "Why don't you go f*ck yourselves." Then there is a beautiful moment of realization and, meanwhile, I can get back to eating my mashed potatoes.

        • Re:Hmmmm, yeah (Score:3)

          by humanrev (2606607) on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @09:02PM (#40692883)

          here's also the fact that a number of people (including me) only use Facebook because they feel "forced" to do so.

          Facebook has now become something of a liability for me. It's gotten to the point where even though I'd probably like> to close the account, I won't simply because others would notice. They probably wouldn't appreciate me telling them that their narcissism and attention-seeking posts reveal a side of them that I didn't want to see, and that I'd be much happier not knowing. Something about Facebook brings out narcissist traits in people, I'm not sure why, and it's awfully off-putting.

          If I wanted to be nice I'd give them another reason, like I'm concerned with the behavior of Facebook's management and the privacy issues related to the site, but they would consider me a tinfoil-wearing paranoid fool for such things, probably. Or at the very least they wouldn't accept it as serious enough to leave.

          So, I keep the account but don't do much with it. It serves as an indicator that I exist, but not much else.

        • Re:Hmmmm, yeah (Score:4, Interesting)

          by elashish14 (1302231) <profcalc4@gm[ ].com ['ail' in gap]> on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @10:48PM (#40693591)

          Pardon me for being idealistic here, but I don't see how any good friend would force you to use a social networking service, especially if you have a legitimate problem with it.

          I kicked Facebook permanantly over a year ago. In that time, I've found that the friends I communicate most with send me updates from Facebook anyways, or link me to pictures on Facebook (which I need a proxy to view since I've blocked as much FB as I can in my hosts) - quite a few of my friends do this in fact. This was what I figured would happen when I chose to delete my account; if they're good enough friends, we'll find other ways to keep up anyways, and that's certainly turned out to be true.

          Maybe everyone who's finding this dissatisfaction should just try it. Disable the account for a few months and see what happens. Maybe you too will find that Facebook is not the only medium of communicating with other people. Personally, I feel thoroughly liberated since I deleted (not disabled) mine.

    • Re:Hmmmm, yeah (Score:5, Insightful)

      by flitty (981864) on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @05:15PM (#40690593)
      FB's failing is due to it's users, mostly. About 3-6 months ago, everyone decided that pictures with text on them is all they were going to post. Or food pictures, or Spotify playlists.

      Facebook was never awesome, but it did have a lot of my friends and family posting interesting discussions and information. Then everyone ran out of things to say, so now they just post funny pictures.

      A lot of this isn't just users fault though, many issues arise out of the lack of Grouping, which is something G+ fixes and is awesome at. I don't want my pictures of partying being shown to employers, or my neices and nephews which causes issues with my conservative siblings. Sorting what information I want to send to select groups easily is the main reason I wish people were using G+.

      • Re:Hmmmm, yeah (Score:2)

        by Algae_94 (2017070) on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @05:28PM (#40690789) Journal
        Let me start by saying I have a Facebook account, but would not call myself a Facebook user. I don't post anything on there.

        Now that that is out of the way, I have heard anecdotal evidence that Facebook does have some way to do grouping. Even if this is true, it points out an issue Facebook will have a hard time getting over. If it didn't have it when it started up, and they add a feature later, a lot of people will never know about it. Others will be upset with changes.

        I like the way G+ has been set up from the beginning. It seems like more of a useful tool to me than a way to annoy people with ads and requests to do meaningless things. Of course I don't really use G+ much more than Facebook.

        • Yup (Score:4, Insightful)

          by Giant Electronic Bra (1229876) on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @05:37PM (#40690919)

          They will both do grouping, the g+ version is just infinitely easier to deal with. I guess FB has been working on that, but honestly I only use it myself basically so I can actually see all the messages that people I know mysteriously seem to think that posting to FB will magically get to everyone. FB is OK, G+ is definitely nicer in most ways.

    • Re:Hmmmm, yeah (Score:2, Insightful)

      by mcmonkey (96054) on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @05:23PM (#40690705) Homepage

      I'm skeptical. I've tried to use Google + a couple times, but quite frankly, I can't figure out what it does or how I use it.

      Most of the problem is I can't tell which communications are from real people and which are spam from Google. Someone wants to connect with me...is that the G+ equivalent of an fb friend request? Or is it just because I have someone with a gmail address in my address book? And if I (attempt) connect with someone, is it someone who is using G+? Or just someone with a gmail account?

      I tried to connect with a few people (real friends I know in meat space) and there was no one on the other end. It seems like Google just created G+ accounts for everyone with a gmail address and then spammed me with messages to connect with everyone in my address with a gmail address.

      Maybe it isn't a ghost town, but it's a ghost metropolis built around a very small settlement.

      • Sort of (Score:3)

        by Giant Electronic Bra (1229876) on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @05:40PM (#40690941)

        G+ is less designed around getting everyone to join and more around actually communicating. You can put people in your circles that are just email contacts. They'll get invited of course, but you can happily post things to them. I get what you're saying though. FB is conceptually easier to wrap your head around in a sense.

    • Re:Hmmmm, yeah (Score:5, Funny)

      by nospam007 (722110) * on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @07:00PM (#40691833)

      As I see it, get Facebook and you get an unwanted email address.
      Get a Google email address and you get an unwanted social network with it.

  • Not just UI changes - stop changing SETTINGS! (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Mitreya (579078) <mitreya@gm a i l.com> on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @04:46PM (#40690241)
    Facebook screws with actual settings all the time, which goes well beyond UI changes
    There was a recent email replacement issue. And logging in today I realized that my facebook chat now shows my online status, even though I explicitly disabled it a couple of months ago.
    Keeping your settings on Facebook where you want them (if that is even feasible) is a full time job.

  • Just the next step in the social network lifecycle (Score:5, Insightful)

    by dkleinsc (563838) on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @04:46PM (#40690249)

    1. Make it really easy to use and feature-full, to build a user base.
    2. Attempt to monetize it by loading it with a ton of ads and other annoyances.
    3. Sell to investors for big bucks.
    4. Users get fed up and leave, leaving a hulking mess.

    • Re:Just the next step in the social network lifecy (Score:3)

      by LoudMusic (199347) on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @04:54PM (#40690369)

      Except I don't see Google pawning off their service. They ARE the conglomo-corp. And historically their ads are not terribly invasive in their services, because the ads are so much better targeted at the users that they don't have to pepper the page with a dozen ads.

      Google can really stick it (gymnastics term, weird of me) if they don't force the UI changes on the user. Develop new stuff, absolutely, don't force it.

    • Re:Just the next step in the social network lifecy (Score:3)

      by shentino (1139071) on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @07:56PM (#40692315)

      Let's see...I don't recall G+ ever playing with my privacy settings behind my back.

      If I hadn't gotten my naive fingers caught in facebook's "too late we already have your data and we're not giving it up" mousetrap I'd have deleted my account there a long time ago.

      And this stupid "2 week of no access" didn't work. I deleted my account there and then had facebook completely firewalled from my computer, and I waited a *month* for my "deleted" facebook account to disappear.

      Not a god damned fucking thing happened.

  • FB market oversaturated (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Haoie (1277294) on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @04:46PM (#40690253) Homepage

    There are only so many people in the world who are interested in social networks; it's impossible to attain infinite growth.

    Besides, a lot of folks at some point wake up to how much time they spend on FB and the like [a lot!].

  • I'm out. (Score:2)

    by Ehgeekay (2022008) on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @04:48PM (#40690273)
    My brother dropped his at the start of the year. I was six months later. Just last night a friend said hey why can't I find you on Facebook? I gave them my phone number.

  • Misleading google+ figures (Score:3, Insightful)

    by MichaelusWF (2225540) on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @04:48PM (#40690287)
    The same site (siteanalytics.compete.com) that shows "dramatic" growth in Google+ usage (from 20.2 million in April to 31.8 million users presently) also shows considerable growth in facebook usage over the same time period (from 154.5 million to 158.5 million). If you're going to compare sites, use the same metrics for each site, otherwise you look like kind of an asshole.

    • Re:Misleading google+ figures (Score:5, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @04:57PM (#40690409)

      In absolute numbers, that's G+ increasing by 11.6 M and Facebook increasing by 4 M - or G+ increasing 2.9X as fast as Facebook. In percentages, that's G+ increasing by 57% and Facebook increasing by 2.6%. So I'd say that's dramatic growth at G+, and mild growth at Facebook. Mind you, part of that is because Facebook is practically saturated.

    • Re:Misleading google+ figures (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Cro Magnon (467622) on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @04:58PM (#40690413) Homepage Journal

      It's a question of scale. If a social network has 800 million people and 10 join, that's not "dramatic". If it has 2 people and 10 join, that is dramatic.

      • Re:Misleading google+ figures (Score:3, Informative)

        by MichaelusWF (2225540) on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @06:30PM (#40691519)
        That's a fair point, and it was admittedly uncharitable of me to put "dramatic" in sarcasm quotes. It's objectively a pretty big leap for them. It also detracts from the point I was going for, which is that if a social network has 154 million people and 4 million people join, that is not a decline. The problem I had was just that the OP presents one set of statistics for facebook, and another that uses a different site and a different methodology for google+. Using his own google+ site as a reference, both facebook and google+ grew over the same time frame.

    • Re:Misleading google+ figures (Score:2, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @05:00PM (#40690435)

      otherwise you look like kind of an asshole.

      Or a shill, which is what I suspect is behind this slashvertisement.

  • My biggest facebook annoyance (Score:4, Interesting)

    by cpu6502 (1960974) on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @04:49PM (#40690289)

    They keep redirecting my tablet from www.facebook to m.facebook. That's like me telling my taxi driver to take me to Baltimore, and instead they take me to the tiny town of Columbia. I can't figure-out why the programmers would arbitrarily decide to overrule my desire to vist the full WWW page.

    As for google, none of my friends are over there, so I have no interest. It would be like standing in a room by myself.

    • Re:My biggest facebook annoyance (Score:2)

      by gl4ss (559668) on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @05:04PM (#40690473) Homepage Journal

      They keep redirecting my tablet from www.facebook to m.facebook. That's like me telling my taxi driver to take me to Baltimore, and instead they take me to the tiny town of Columbia. I can't figure-out why the programmers would arbitrarily decide to overrule my desire to vist the full WWW page.

      As for google, none of my friends are over there, so I have no interest. It would be like standing in a room by myself.

      why? because they hired some mobile "expert" fucker asshole, that's why. extra work, shittier results to visitors( and then they go on complaining about fragmentation.. that they could just ignore if they had smarts). oh and they copied that from what google did circa 2002(it was really, really annoying to use from ip addresses they had determined to be wap browsers, so they translated every fucking page through their god awful wapizer even if you had been better off with the original page, the god awful wapizer even cut sentences midw prev (1)(2)(3)(4) next ).

      out of curiosity does it do it both when you're on 3g and on wifi? also, I suspect the right place for that mobile expert fucker to forward you would have been touch.facebook.com if not to the real full page(touch.facebook.com is a bit like the mobile app, it's different from m.facebook.com which is optimized for dumbphones).

      as for google+ satisfaction, I got no doubt that it's higher. but it's like I said the other day, the people on google+ are google employees, facebook haters and people who have no friends. 2/3rds of that group would say they're more satisfied with g+ even if it stuck needles into their eyes and the remaining 1/3rd is using social networks as yet another news aggregator.

    • Re:My biggest facebook annoyance (Score:5, Insightful)

      by JohnFen (1641097) on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @05:16PM (#40690609)

      This is one of my pet peeves in websites today. It's not just FB that does this.

      Attention web developers: PLEASE STOP forcing us to the mobile versions of your sites. Just stop it.

    • Re:My biggest facebook annoyance (Score:3)

      by FatLittleMonkey (1341387) on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @06:40PM (#40691623)

      If you have Firefox/Firefox-mobile on your tablet, you can use the addon "Phony" [mozilla.org] to spoof your user-agent if you want. (Or "Modify Headers" addon for something a bit more full featured.) Chrome might have a similar addon. Opera probably already has something like that built in (it usually does).

      If you're using an iPad, I can't help you.

      As for google, none of my friends are over there,

      G+ doesn't have friends, it has circles. So many circles...

    • Re:My biggest facebook annoyance (Score:2)

      by shentino (1139071) on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @08:01PM (#40692367)

      Quite simple. Because it's their fucking website and they'll have their servers send you hither and yon as they damn well see fit.

      Don't like it? Leave.

      Oh right, you can't because they don't honor account deletion requests.

      I am being sarcastic, but the fact that they own the domain name pretty much means they get to do what they darned please. You cannot force them to change, and because they already have your information by the balls and refuse to delete it even when you tell them to, they pretty much have you locked in.

  • Your Mom's on Facebook (Score:4, Funny)

    by jrmcc (703725) on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @04:50PM (#40690299)
    'nuff said!

    • Re:Your Mom's on Facebook (Score:2)

      by HeckRuler (1369601) on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @05:56PM (#40691145)
      Yeah, that was one of the signs for me to get out. Facebook was pretty hip and useful with just the right amount of local connectivity and compartamentalization that I found it useful but not scary. Then they let the highschool kids join. That was a mistake. Facebook was a college thing and highschool kids didn't really need in. No, they really didn't. Facebook handled the immediate events and social circles in college. Prospective students might have an interest, but they didn't need access while still in highschool. If facebook really wanted to enter that market, they should have fired up a seperate server for the school. Or kept a wall between the two groups. Yeah, those walls were important. And when the walls that were around every college broke down and suddenly everyone could be friends with everyone. And everyone could stalk everyone. And when my mother joined. Yep, that was a pretty clear sign that this cool local network was no longer local. Scrutiny would be up. Spam would be up. I was no longer dealing with my just my peers. I was now dealing with EVERYONE.

      Now, I appreciate a tool that let's me manage, coordinate, and deal with the masses. But you add my mother to that mix, as much as I love my mother, it becomes lame.

      Any party with my mother is just not one I'm going to have a good time at.

  • I never will

    For that, I was a smelly old geeky kook before.

    But now, I am smelly old PRESCIENT geeky kook.

    Yeah!

    People are finally understanding they can do everything Facebook does for them without feeding an advertising and spying machine in other venues.

    Not that Google is an improvement in that department, but eventually Fabebook's crass manipulation and even Google' subtle manipulation will make way to the realization: you own your data, and you control your data, and it's time everyone woke up and realized what they were giving away for free and what it was doing to their privacy and their integrity.

    So what's the next hub? Diaspora?

  • Not sure if trolling or just stupid (Score:4, Funny)

    by stevegee58 (1179505) on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @04:56PM (#40690391) Journal
    -insert pic of Fry from Futurama-

  • Seems obvious (Score:5, Insightful)

    by amRadioHed (463061) on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @05:04PM (#40690477)

    It sounds kind of obvious that Google+ would have higher satisfaction then Facebook. The only people using it are people who really want to use it, no one is there just because all there friends are there.

  • Yeah, right (Score:2, Funny)

    by fiannaFailMan (702447) on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @05:06PM (#40690501) Journal

    Google+ users are more satisfied with the site

    I'm sure they are. Both of them.

  • The fall in facebook stock (Score:5, Insightful)

    by damn_registrars (1103043) <damn.registrars@gmail.com> on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @05:16PM (#40690597) Homepage Journal
    ... is not due much to the loss of users. It is due primarily to the fact that the investors realized facebook has no long-term business plan. The notion of "bring in users, sell their information" only works for so long. They don't have a good plan for getting users of mobile devices to pay attention to advertising. They don't have a plan to keep users interested. Eventually the novelty wears off.

    Facebook wants people to believe they are the next google. They are more likely the next AOL.

  • The high water mark. (Score:4, Informative)

    by gallondr00nk (868673) on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @05:19PM (#40690655)

    Hardly surprising really that just after the IPO the numbers start flatling. It seemed obvious to me that the IPO was simply to cash in while the going was good, rather than to move on from there.

    There's no sustainability in social networking, and I imagine the smart money knew that already. I imagine the people who invested in it were the same ones who thought that the housing market would never crash.

  • Google+ GUI & Privacy (Score:2)

    by lilfields (961485) on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @05:46PM (#40691019) Homepage
    I find the Google+ GUI to be way too intrusive and annoying to use. Others will disagree, but I absolutely hate their GUI. Neither of the two giants have great privacy policies...so why should I switch to Google+ from Facebook, if it has less people, annoying to use and has the same or worse privacy policies.

  • Bzzt all.worship.facebook.bzzt (Score:2)

    by gelfling (6534) on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @06:10PM (#40691329) Homepage Journal

    We identify with the Zuckerberg peaceful ruler of the 9 galaxies. All hail facebook. All hail.

  • Facebook is a bloated website (Score:2)

    by Svartormr (692822) on Wednesday July 18, 2012 @06:24PM (#40691465)
    Doesn't work without telling NoScript to run its scripts. Then its scripts freeze your browser every now and then. And you have to keep killing the process to recover all the memory lost to leaks.

Given its constituency, the only thing I expect to be "open" about [the Open Software Foundation] is its mouth. -- John Gilmore

Close