Facebook – How their decline may be more like AOL than MySpace



Contributing Writer
Facebook fragmentation


Facebook’s troubles of late have prompted many pundits to make the comparison to MySpace, a social site that briefly ruled the world between 2005-2008.  MySpace persisted through the first human face transplant, avian flu, the iPhone and the end of Fidel Castro’s rule in Cuba, but they couldn’t beat Mark Zuckerburg.

Facebook passed MySpace in traffic in 2008 and hasn’t looked back since.

The problem with the MySpace comparison is that MySpace was diminished by better competition.  On the other hand, America Online suffered a precipitous decline without the presence of a clear competitor.  They fragmented.  Users found any number of alternative internet service providers and their community may be somewhat reconstituted in the social networks that we see today.

Could user value of Facebook diminish enough to prompt a fragmentation rather than an exodus?

Is Facebook eating itself?

A big driver of the AOL’s community were volunteer Community Leaders, who were hand-picked because of their activity and contribution to online forums.   These CLs were given license to moderate forums, were given special access to AOL content and were given free AOL service.  With very little incentive these people were the backbone of the AOL community.

Facebook doesn’t have Community Leaders per se, but they do have advocates and super-users.  Advocates whose loyalty to Facebook is exceptionally high and the super-users who generate a large proportion of content on Facebook.  If this were the 90s, these would be the attributes that AOL would have used to recruit Community Leaders.

Clay Shirkey recounts in his book  Cognitive Surplus: Creativity and Generosity in a Connected Age that America Online continued to escalate their monetization efforts while their community leaders continued to work as volunteers.  Prompted by a scaling back of their minuscule compensation to a pro-rated version of AOL (recall that they received free internet in exchange for their work), AOL’s Community Leaders filed a class action lawsuit against AOL.  It was settled ten years later for $15 million, a somewhat paltry sum all things considered.  But the collateral damage was a loss of thousands of AOL’s staunchest advocates.

As Facebook implements the highly unpopular Timeline product, hits users with a barrage of various ad products, makes wholesale changes to user accounts, I’m curious if there is sufficient groundswell to move on without a clear alternative?  Are these changes alienating the people Facebook needs to grow?

 

Facebook is no MySpace

Although MySpace comparisons are popular, they probably aren’t relevant.  MySpace just got flat out beat by a better product.

With a long tail of more-popular products such as Twitter, Google Plus, Path, Pinterest, App.net and others vying for smaller pieces of the social pie – what is the likelihood that Facebook’s audience could  fragment?

I’m not sure how plausible the possibility is, but I think it’s interesting to consider what social media would look like if Goliath ceased to exist?

 

Image: FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Jim Dougherty

Jim Dougherty

Writer and chief of miscellany at leaderswest.com

I aspire to give people something to think about rather than tell them what to do. My favorite Google Alert is “social media research,” I am increasingly compelled by Gen Z, and I appreciate good writers agnostic of where they write. At one time I was Kred’s 12th most influential social media blogger and Klout’s most influential person on the topic of David Hasselhoff. Transplant from Seattle living in Cincinnati. Haven’t entirely adopted the local sports teams yet.

Jim Dougherty

@jimdougherty

Writer about social media and tech at Leaders West, I also tweet as @leaderswest.

Infographic: How to optimize photos for Facebook’s News Feed http://t.co/6OkhbTRkb0 – 8 hours ago

Jim Dougherty

Jim Dougherty

  • AmyMccTobin

    I get it, but I just don’t buy it. I know shares are down, but there is no better competitor that’s come along to steal the show. Users are still there, and they have built their networks. It’s going to take a lot more than hype to pry them away to a new platform…. there are a billion of them after all.

  • jimdougherty

    Thanks Amy for reading and commenting. I agree with you somewhat, but I have a really difficult time understanding how Facebook can resolve their stock issues and avoid alienating their users. I don’t see a clear alternative, but also sense a really strong dissatisfaction with Facebook that seems more enabled by the underperformance of their stock. I don’t disagree with what you’re saying, but it’s going to be a very tough year ahead for them… and by them I mean Facebook users. Cheers!

  • AmyMccTobin

    They should not have gone public. They’re still profitable!!! I don’t get it…

  • Marc Zazeela

    Jim – In my humble opinion, Facebook is now more concerned about Wall Street than about Main Street. When that happens, companies often forget what got them where they are in the first place. Their focus narrows to P & L as opposed to P as in people.

  • http://soldierswifecrazylife.com Julie

    I am not sure if it will look more like AOL or Myspace but I don’t think Facebook will be around forever. Either Google+ will become more and more popular or another site will come along eventually. I think businesses and brands are a little frustrated with Facebook right now. We can post something on our page and no one sees it. The biggest thing is that everyone is on Facebook. People in general want to be where their friends are. When people saw that their friends were on Facebook and not posting as much on Myspace, they made the change too.

  • http://harrington-court-apartments.blogspot.com/ Matthew Brooks

    I follow your thinking, Jim, but I don’t foresee an AOL decline happening. Two reasons:

    1. In the AOL case, as you mention, there were plenty of other ISP’s able to offer essentially the same service. This is not, as yet, the case in social media (and I write as a G+ and Pinterest user – for business).

    2. Facebook users, in the main, have way too much invested there to make a switch readily. Timeline has opposition, certainly, but it is a constant reminder to each user of just how long they have been on Facebook and just how much they have there – posts, photos and friends. Making a switch to something else is a major upheaval for most users, which will make them reluctant to go without something really way better to go to where they could see all of their friends and relatives also migrating.

    I could forsee a decline in the amount of time each Facebook user spends there as a result of the pull of other social media channels but right now there is no Facebook killer and no known prospect of one.

  • jasontoheal

    very interesting thoughts. I had considered facebook as too big to compete against, but if the things that it does get done buy a bunch of other services, only better, I can see how they could falter.

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