Is Facebook a Fad?

Facebook is taking the world by storm.

In terms of unique users and time-spent on the site, it will likely soon be the largest web site on the planet.

What's more, the company's new "self-serve ads" (see demo below) are off to a terrific start and could end up being the massive revenue engine the company has long been looking for--the "AdWords" for social networking.

So, for the time being, it's all good.

When I wrote the other day about how Facebook now accounts for 1 in 4 online pageviews, though, many readers repeated a refrain we've heard a lot lately: I used Facebook heavily for a while, but then I got bored:

I think Facebook will fade. I already find many of my friends not logging on that often. Indeed, of those freinds that are on FB that frequently they are very much of a lower socio economic class. Honestly.. they are just playing Mob Wars....It's fun to update a status every now and then, but I think it will become the next Linked IN...

I am of the view that people will become less engaged with FB over time. That's my experience and my friends experience and they are all PhD's, MBAs or JDs so I can't tell you about the rest of the demographics...

I went from checking Facebook several times a day to once a day to once a week to, well..., it's been a few weeks. I have interesting friends, but it turns our that reading about their day standing in line at Starbucks or promoting their latest indie film just isn't all that exciting. In the first few months it was fun to catch up with a lot of old friends, but you quickly discover why you let many of these relationship slip away in the first place.

In the history of the Internet, there have been an alarming number of sites that caught people's attention for a while, but then eventually lost their allure. Is Facebook one of them?

It's certainly worth asking.

If current trends continue, most of us will end up spending most of our waking lives interacting with Facebook one way or another (wait until the mobile engine really gets cranking). If Facebook is like some other Internet boom stories, however, it's just a fad that will fade away as quickly as it came. (MySpace, for example, appears to be this generation's Lycos).

I don't have a confident answer to this one. I suspect that Facebook is here to stay, if only because the stuff people do on Facebook is the stuff people do all day anyway. Facebook just makes it a hell of a lot easier. And the company seems hell-bent on maintaining its focus on the quality of the product.

Also, there isn't a single activity on the planet that captivates EVERYONE, so I'm not surprised to hear anecdotal stories that some folks are bored.

And you? Do you think Facebook will soon become the online glue that holds us all together now and forever? Or is it another MySpace in waiting?

See also:
20 Guesses About What The Apple Tablet Will Look Like

 

 

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Comments

[SonofLiberty1]

I use it to connect and stay connected with high school and college friends.

I think it's great.

I don't post everything either...t­hat's the way to do it.

[EminemsRevenge]

i was a reluctant facebooker since i built my rep on Xanga, which i STILL use for posting my more outrageous stuff...bu­t FOUND not only my aunt, who disappeared from the family, but my sixth grade teacher who retired years ago...HE was very influential in MY life.

NOW all i need to do is find my high school English teacher and nirvana will be attained!

[Jeff Yablon]

Eventually, all things reach their zenith and then pull back. Will Facebook? Yes, of course. What will stave this off for (a while)? Real Management. Young Mr. Zuckerman, smart as he may be, is not equipped to lead Facebook forward (note his recent hiring a 29-year-old unknown journalist to be Facebook's lead lobbyist in DC. I can just see it:

"Yo, Congressdude . . . 'SUP?"

The IDEA of Facebook, on the other hand, is not a fad. This method of reaching out . . . just . . . works. And will get bigger. WAY bigger

Jeff Yablon
http://answerguy.com

[jayrayspicer]

It's a fad. As is Twitter. Nobody needs to be that hyperconnected, and after the initial amusement, it gets stale real fast. Plus, Facebook just doesn't seem to give a damn about privacy. Who writes the third-party apps? Does anybody vet them for security issues? I doubt it.

[unitron]

"Is Facebook a Fad?"

Isn't everything, eventually?

[Ken Gibbs]

So so right. Maybe their constant innovations will help it keep interest. Otherwise, can't we expect for every single social site to eventually become the next blackplanet, myspace, or whatever place you wouldn't be caught dead posting in today? Maybe Facebook Connect is key: launch some of the "innovations" in a new product they create, that lets users join using FB Connect. That way we all get excited about being BETA testers and early adopters of this cool new product/"place" ...

[dpiyjrtmfr]

I find it ironic that I receive "friend requests" from people who never spoke to me once during four years of college.
I have realized that it is best not to connect with many of the people on FB.

[SonofLiberty1]

I have one or two of these..the rest is made up of real friends.

[blackwhitegirl]

I'm not sure what FB will become. But you can look at "email" and wonder why anything that allows people to send and receive inane jokes, stupid youtube videos and pleas for wire transfers to someone in Nigeria, can remain as popular a form of social communication as it is.

The point is FB is just a social tool that the people who are "social creatures" will use as they do their other social tools. Some people have 100s of FB "friends" - some have just 10. Some are on FB several times a day - (hence the "I'm having meatloaf for dinner" posts), and others may go on just once a quarter. It's up to the individual.

What I do know is that for this very busy woman, who has many dear friends all across the country - FB makes a sudden impulse to connect with an old friend that much easier to satisfy.

[caveman1313]

fad. will go the way of mybook or was that facespace. uh, myspace.

[mandymarleyandme]

I don't know about facebook, but I sure as hell hope that twitter is on the list of quickly passing fads. I honestly don't know a single person that actually uses it in any way shape or form. Instead, it seems to be a way for reporters and celebrity gossip columnists to do their "job" without getting out of bed. No one cares about the minutia of your every day life. They are just waiting for you to post something controversial, which you will probably do as soon as your celebrity status starts to slip a bit. Every media outlet I tune into, read, etc. obsesses over twitter, yet it does not show up anywhere in my day to day life. Please go away twitter.

[dpiyjrtmfr]

Agreed.

[vickris]

Well, I enjoy Facebook. I'm in my late 40's and have interesting friends from all periods of my life (actually, my old HS friends are my least interesting group) and I'm really happy to have re-connected with them. I enjoy reading their posts and all the funny comments and threads that follow - it sometimes is very lively! I like to read their opinions on politics and others who comment with opposing views - oh boy...fire­works! I've been on a year and so far at least 6 of my friends have had babies; now those are joyous occasions that I'm happy to hear about. And I love to see what others post, especially music videos from YouTube (most of my friends are music obsessed, like me). Plus, my friends are in all parts of the country and world so I love to get instance feedback from around the globe. This is not my only social life. I have a lot of friends that I see in, get invited to a lot of parties, and live in a wonderful community. It is only one part of my extended family of friends that I'm really grateful to connect with again. And I'm not one of those who collect friends since I only have around 220. So I guess you get what you want from Facebook. If you don't have interesting friends then what's the point? I'm lucky that I do and I love keeping in touch with them.

[jillian222]

I fell into the insidious world of Facebook during a period in my life when I felt isolated and yearned to reach out to others. I did not realize how far those arms could stretch. The people who would emerge
each day were lost family members, old beau's, genuine friends, business associates, lovable misfits and names that mystified me.

At first it was a rush, this sense of instant gratification, news feeds, a plethora of information.
My "friends" list grew beyond my wildest expectations. I began to promote my work and receive positive results. Relationships flourished that had stagnated with the passing of time.

It was addictive. I will not admit how many hours each day I dedicated to reading and checking in
on the latest from my triple digit community.

Until I learned what someone was eating for breakfast or the ordinary comings and goings of people I deemed to be quite extraordinary.

I pulled back for a while but like a tempestuous lover, I would return for one more tryst.

Facebook can be a wonderful communication tool, a place to visit for personal reinforcement, professional connections or sheer guilty pleasures. I, too, wonder about its longevity. With some shame I confess I am in its spin once again.

[Winning09]

Yes, it's totally inane.

[ohjodi]

I used FB for about a week. Found the kid who ate paste in 1st grade.

Discovered that it's best to NOT learn whatever became of assorted boys I had crushes on in school.

I prefer to leave the past where it is, whether good or bad.

Anyone I care to hear from probably has my phone number, already.

[andrewsmarilyn]

I can't stand FB for the reason that some other people have alluded to below -- "friending" everyone that you once knew from HS is really lame. When I first got on FB it was to find a friend that I had lost contact with. Once I had an account, I was inundated with friend requests from people that I had absolutely no interest in knowing anything about from HS (in fact, each day hit a new level of irony on who had friended me as they were some of the people I had the strongest dislike for in high school, but apparently they didn't know it! Hah!). Anyway, I would agree with other posters that if that element were not there, FB is useful to look at people's photos and see what's going on in the lives of friends you don't get to talk to everyday. As one person commented, I wish that the format enabled more interesting discussions.

[onlinesavant]

I think in order to see where the popularity of facebook is going, all one has to do is look at where it is.. Essentially, it's primary strength lies within media awareness and it's....fa­ddishness. The utilitarian advantages to the user of the site seem to be---lagging. At most , the site's leverage comes from the juvenile concept(s) of narcissism and curiosity, both ephemeral in scope.So, yes, I do believe facebook will be around in say, ten years, but I think that it's "popularity" will only be a vestige of what it is now. I actually believe that twitter has a longer shelf life than facebook, because I feel it has more once again, utilitarian heft, at least for business. Coupled with the generalized impatience of the average American, I think the only thing holding twitter back from pre-emiminence is a solid revenue model, but I do believe that given enough time, one will emerge.Onl­y time will tell, but I think the trajectory of facebook has reached it's apex, and will gradually at first, but then will precipitously, degrade.