They are relevant in that they provide a platform for everyone to get and stay connected with anyone they have ever known. I am defining mainstream as non cutting edge (read fickle) users. By appealing to tech laggards there is less risk that they suffer the fate of Friendster. Inertia will work in their favor.
Patrick V. Barrett From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Will Evans Sent: Wednesday, September 17, 2008 10:36 AM To: Patrick Barrett Cc: jeff lippiatt; [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: [IxDA Discuss] The New Facebook Redesign: The Beginning of The End? How are they relevant and how do you define mainstream? Everyone (except me) goes there - for what purpose? I wonder how they might monetize their eyeballs relative to others, and why they even matter? I argue they don't, and they can't. On Wed, Sep 17, 2008 at 11:32 AM, Patrick Barrett <[EMAIL PROTECTED]<mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]>> wrote: Facebook is just now becoming relevant to a mainstream audience--something no other social network has done before. Their traffic and membership continue to grow at a pretty good clip. I don't have the answer for how they can monetize their traffic, but I think moving beyond college students is a smart move. Patrick Barrett -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]<mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]<mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]>] On Behalf Of jeff lippiatt Sent: Wednesday, September 17, 2008 3:24 AM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]<mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: Re: [IxDA Discuss] The New Facebook Redesign: The Beginning of The End? Weighing in. Facebook became obsolete a while ago. Soon to become the relic of Yahoo, aka Geocities. All of these sites will eventually fail unless they address something of value. Currently they are all riding the plummet of social entertainment. They have mainly ignored their core audiences: Myspace was music, Facebook was college students and grad students. Both have annoying advertisements that have no context...just battering people over the head to make advertising money on which is steadily declining...How long do you really need to stay on either site to catch up? Not long, because all of the new changes you can get a snapshot of everything now in under 5 minutes. That leaves no incentive to stay on the site. All the widgets and mini-apps that bog down both sites are 99% pointless because people just add and delete them sometimes within hours or minutes. In summation, you can't please everyone any of the time. They abandoned their niches and have been sliding downhill since. Social entertainment is not robust enough to keep users online and engaged. I use both Myspace and Facebook, but am not pleased with either. I use them mostly for keeping up with friends and birthdays and posting pictures of my some what ridiculous but fun cooking antics. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Posted from the new ixda.org<http://ixda.org> http://www.ixda.org/discuss?post=33019 ________________________________________________________________ Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ....... [EMAIL PROTECTED]<mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Unsubscribe ................ http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines ............ http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .................. http://www.ixda.org/help ________________________________________________________________ Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ....... [EMAIL PROTECTED]<mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Unsubscribe ................ http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines ............ http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .................. http://www.ixda.org/help -- ~ will "Where you innovate, how you innovate, and what you innovate are design problems" --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Will Evans | User Experience Architect tel: +1.617.281.128 | [EMAIL PROTECTED]<mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> aim: semanticwill | gtalk: wkevans4 twitter: semanticwill | skype: semanticwill --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- ________________________________________________________________ Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ....... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe ................ http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines ............ http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .................. http://www.ixda.org/help
