

The End of the Facebook Era - thinkcomp
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/aaron-greenspan/the-end-of-the-facebook-e_b_575921.html

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char
This article was absurdly dramatic. He's right about one thing, though -- that
the media is largely influencing the public opinion of Facebook. The number of
emotionally fueled articles that have been written about Facebook recently (at
least in my opinion) greatly outweighs the actual severity of the situation.

~~~
yaroslavvb
I agree. And personally, I find a big gap between what concerns "the media"
and the people around me. Among my 400 facebook friends, I've gotten 2 or 3
status updates concerned with new privacy rules. Meanwhile on hacker news I
see a dozen of articles in a day about it

~~~
hugh3
Selection bias? People concerned with facebook privacy aren't making status
updates any more?

~~~
electromagnetic
If the people concerned with privacy issues leave the service, doesn't it
inherently resolve the issue?

~~~
hugh3
For them, yes. For Joe Whoops-I-Didn't-Want-My-Mother-To-Know-I-Was-Gay
perhaps not.

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rjurney
I feel like its 1994 and all my friends are on AOL, while I enjoy the open
internet.

~~~
fuzzmeister
I disagree with that analogy. AOL was trying to put the entirety of the
internet within its walled garden: the Web, games, email, everything. Facebook
is only trying to dominate one space: communicating with your friends.
Admittedly, that is a very important area, but the benefits of having all of
your friends on one platform are huge, and Facebook is simply working towards
that.

Further, what's "the open internet" in your analogy? There is no decentralized
social platform that at all compares to Facebook, and currently I fail to see
how there could be one that is viable. Diaspora will certainly not be it,
unless the readership of HN encompasses all of your friends.

~~~
rythie
I'd argue that email is already a decentralized social platform and so is XMPP
(for instant messaging) and NNTP was (for newsgroup discussions)

~~~
smackfu
You could also argue that email and NNTP are failed social platforms, mainly
due to spam issues. Newsgroups have been almost entirely replaced by one-off
forums like this one, and email requires massive continuing efforts to block
spammers.

~~~
rythie
You could also argue that the solutions to that are known but not currently
widely used. If you were to create an iteration of email where there only
people aloud to email you were the people in your address-book, would that not
be a bit like Facebook is now. Identifying people can be done via signing
messages with GPG so no one could forge the sender.

Having everyone sign messages on NNTP would work too since you could whitelist
a set of people or alternatively a black list of known bad people.

Forums like this are good, but lack the convenience that a NNTP news reader
used to have of having all your conversations in one place.

------
varjag
A visionary stands on the shoulders of giants, but for some, a pile of small
people will do.

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orblivion
I've been suspecting that he's a sociopath. First, being in a position of
power puts him in the right demographic. Then, he seems to continue to do
whatever he can get away with, then come with an apology that seems sincere
enough that people buy it, and then he keeps on as before. I don't know how
you can launch Beacon, the way it was launched, with other people knowing what
was going to happen (1), and be surprised when it's a PR disaster. Either he's
stupid or he was just testing what he can get away with.

(1) <http://gigaom.com/2007/11/06/facebook-beacon-privacy-issues/>

~~~
hugh3
Honestly, I've always been skeptical that "sociopaths" really exist as a
psychologically distinct group from, say, run-of-the-mill jerks.

It's easy to find first-person accounts of what it's like to be, say,
schizophrenic or delusional or manic-depressive or to have Asperger's, but
I've never heard of anyone admitting "I'm a sociopath. Here's what it's like
to be me."

~~~
klochner
It wasn't really that hard:

[http://www.amazon.com/Little-Bastard-Autobiography-
Sociopath...](http://www.amazon.com/Little-Bastard-Autobiography-
Sociopath/dp/1605639451)

~~~
orblivion
Well, this guy is quite different from the reddit link I posted nearby in this
thread. He seems concerned about his children's wellbeing, and curing his
condition, I didn't think that sociopaths could do this.

~~~
klochner
agreed. I liked your reddit link - interesting read.

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budu3
I'm confused. Did Greenspan create HouseSystem or theFacebook? In the article
he say, "In late 2003 I created an on-line, opt-in web site referred to as
"the facebook" exclusively for Harvard students..."

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master
Aaron... Aaron... Aaron! GET OVER IT!

House System, was, at best, about 10% as influential in the creation of
Facebook as was Friendster. You take every opportunity to hate on Mark and
Facebook, even when it makes no sense... Why can't you just move on?
Mark/Facebook owe you nothing; quit deluding yourself. Go be productive!!

~~~
thinkcomp
Always this comment... Sigh.

<http://www.thinklink.com>

I can be productive and write too.

~~~
adrianwaj
Why not go help the Diaspora folks? They won't rip you off, it's all open
source.

~~~
stanleydrew
There's no "it" yet. Just a lot of promises.

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chrischen
I too stopped signing in to facebook well before it became trendy. My reason
was that facebook was becoming more open and less like the closed social
network I shared with my friends.

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alanh
Interesting that it's on HuffPo, considering how completely (some would say
intrusively) they have embraced Facebook (and Twitter) on their website.

~~~
tokenadult
Huffington Post embraces lots of illogical points of view.

<http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/?p=463>

~~~
tokenadult
Okay, I am curious about downvotes to my reply above this. No disagreement was
posted in reply, so I'm not sure what is being disagreed with here.

Thanks for your wisdom.

------
waxman
"Facebook is a ponzi scheme... of people and sense." Great line.

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adrianwaj
All Facebook needs to do is create a few generic privacy profiles, and default
to one of the more private ones. Privacy problem solved. But, I get the
feeling there's a corporate culture of vicariousness, exposure and a touch of
schadenfreude. That culture is permeating into popular culture.

~~~
megablast
It might not be that simple. I was reading an article earlier today that
pointed out these privacy decisions have mostly been made to simplify the
internal processes of the application. That linking too many different parts
of data was having a huge effect on the growth of facebook, and this has
driven the problems we are facing today.

It also helped them escape the growing pains we have seen form twitter and the
like.

~~~
tokenadult
_That linking too many different parts of data was having a huge effect on the
growth of facebook_

This is why I'm still not sure that Facebook can do anything to monetize its
user base without being off-putting to many members of its user base. To not
be annoying takes a lot of data processing for every page view (and every
advertisement served up), while to be profitable (and speedily responsive to
user page requests) requires as little demand on the Facebook server farms as
possible. It may not be technically possible today to run a profitable
Facebook that pleases many normal users.

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marknutter
Remember Zuckerberg's 60 minutes interview? Perhaps he was nervous, but there
was something _off_ about him. I don't think this is evidence that he's a
sociopath, but if I squint my eyes and add a dash of the damming condemnations
that are leaking out left and right these days, he certainly seems like a
sociopath.

Who knows, but Facebook isn't just Mark, it's a large team of highly
intelligent and talented (and in most cases PHD level) engineers who I'm sure
want nothing more than to protect people's privacy, make a fantastic product,
and above all help people connect with current and past friends.

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dasil003
This article has zero credibility. Aaron Greenspan tries to dress it up as
some sort of analysis, but it's actually just more of the same: sour grapes.
To Aaron:

Aaron, I don't doubt that Zuckerberg screwed you over. Unlike many, I'm
willing to take you at your word. You should have written your book, _profited
from it to the max_ , and then relegated the whole thing to cocktail party
joke. There's no reason to cling to this story; it can only make you look bad.

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jonmc12
The word sociopath is used here with kind of an 'evil' bias. But the term
really has more to do with how social / external inputs affect decision
making.

Really, what is the difference between being a sociopath and being
relentlessly resourceful?

~~~
klochner
They're orthogonal issues:

To be relentlessly resourceful is a great quality in anyone. You get things
done.

To be a sociopath means you have lack of empathy or remorse, usually with an
inflated sense of self worth.

You can be a resourceful sociopath, or you can be resourceful but empathetic
and socially responsible. The former implies you're likely to screw people
over and not care about it.

~~~
jonmc12
I really think this is an unfair stereotype. Being relentlessly resourceful is
only a great quality as it relates to a great goal or ambition.

You could have an evil resourceful person who is not a sociopath. You could
have a good resourceful person who is a sociopath.

Just because you are a sociopath does not mean you can't pursue a socially
responsible goal. Also, the the definition of 'good', 'evil', 'socially
responsible', we know are relative terms. In history, some sociopaths have
used resourcefulness to re-define these norms for society.

The point I am trying to make is that being relentlessly resourceful, in the
most rational sense, often means acting like a sociopath in the sense that you
need to disregard social inputs unless they help accomplish your goal.

~~~
klochner
Sociopaths are unconstrained or uninfluenced by how they affect the well being
of those around them, unless the effects help achieve their own goals or
ambitions.

You can certainly find a sociopath that is helpful to society, they just
wouldn't care on an emotional level.

I would be hard pressed to find an evil person who is relentlessly resourceful
and social responsible.

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paulnelligan
Ok, facebook is fucked - great!!! Zuck creeps me out big time.

now give me an alternative, where I can just transfer all my information,
friends, and photos in one click, and I'll move - no questions asked...

damn, didn't think so.

~~~
rogeriopvl
<http://www.joindiaspora.com> , not ready yeat. You just have to wait :)

~~~
paulnelligan
I'm aware of diaspora, but do you think that it will import all my account
info, friends, and photos from facebook?

~~~
lallysingh
Sure, a little web-scraping/API python script goes a long way.

~~~
paulnelligan
true, but who actually owns the data?

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FabriceTalbot
I sincerely doubt this is going to be the end of the Facebook era. There are
way too many people using the service and only a tiny fraction of them are
going to delete their profiles anytime soon.

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balding_n_tired
And the Huffington Post is built to last, and has a sane & modest founder?

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wakeupthedawn
Read some more of Aaron's stuff, including his _Authoritas_ thing he promotes
at the end of the article, and _he's_ the one who comes across as the possible
sociopath.

~~~
FluidDjango
I don't believe one must label every self-promoter a sociopath. And Aaron's
post is foremostly a promotion for his self-published 2008 book, _Authoritas_
, whose sales are currently lagging ([http://www.amazon.com/Authoritas-
Students-Admissions-Foundin...](http://www.amazon.com/Authoritas-Students-
Admissions-Founding-Facebook/dp/1606690000))

------
Aetius
Bias much?

~~~
devinj
ad hominem much?

------
Jun8
Is it just me or is this a real piece of crap? He talks about how it was _his_
idea and how he was maligned by Harvard admins, yada yada, which is typical
talk. However, what the heck is the thing about Zuck being a "sociopath"? Now
I don't know him, and he does look and (from what I read) act weird sometimes
but who cares? Most founders and successful CEO's are in that same boat,
otherwise they wouldn't _be_ that successful. Examples range from Oracle's
Ellison to RoR's DHH, and of course Jobs.

The FB privacy thing has turned into a true media frenzy. Look, FB is not
going to go away anytime soon, users just have invested too much time into it.
So, forget about the whole "four brave kids take on FB with open platform".
How to make FB behave nicely without any viable competition is the question
here.

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jasonwilk
Honestly, I don't care what old people like this have to say about Facebook. I
was in college when it launched and I still use it every single day. People
like this and Calacanis can shove it when they say the Facebook Era is over.
Go ask a bunch of highschool and college students right now if they think
Facebook is dead, because they are who matter. Anyone that knows that demo can
agree they are hooked and don't give a shit about 99% of the privacy concerns
all over the news. Give it up grandpa, Facebook doesn't care about you. We
never wanted you anyways. : /

~~~
whyenot
_Honestly, I don't care what old people like this have to say about Facebook._

If you're going to comment on an article, you might want to take the time to
actually read it. The author graduated from college in 2004 and is in his mid
to late 20's.

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swombat
And Aaron Greenspan is at it again.

Seriously, he needs to find a new hobby. He looks like an absolute twat,
pursuing that "OMG Mark Zuckerberg stole my idea" horse for half a decade.

