Facebook Bankruptcy
Fred Wilson and Jason Calacanis are declaring "Facebook bankruptcy". They are complaining that they are getting too many friend requests, app requests, etc. In the comments on Fred's post are a few people agreeing with him, saying that they have a blog, and email and that's all they need. That feels pretty shortsighted to me. Here's why:
1. These guys are internet famous. Facebook allows you to ask to be friends with anyone who has a profile. They are probably getting a lot of friend requests from people they don't really know. Oh well, tough on them. How many people are in that situation? Feels like an edge case to me.
2. They probably aren't managing their privacy very well. Are they actually accepting friend requests from all these people? If they aren't really friends with them, and they start installing the vampires and zombie and all these "silly" viral apps, then it's not surprising that everyone uses them as well. Don't install that stuff guys! Again, they're not managing their stuff properly.
If anyone should know better, it's Fred. He doesn't use his wife's name in his blog because of privacy, he complains in his blog about being in the paper for selling his house for a lot of money. So, he knows about privacy, but he doesn't know how to manage his Facebook profile? I say user error.
There are complaints about Facebook being a walled garden. I don't think so. Yes, there are walls, but the walls are the kind that the internet needs - stuff to keep out the popups, popunders, spam, and other things that make the internet annoying. At the same time, any company can come along and set up shop inside this walled garden. They don't have to negotiate some onerous deal which rev shares back all the money to Facebook. Yes, a lot of the apps that are out there stink, but it's only been 2 months - give it time! There are lots of apps which can take advantage of the Facebook social network which would not justify a social network on their own. A good example is wine recommendations. There is an app called Snooth which is supposed to do this. Unfortunately, they send you back to their site, so the implementation is lacking, but the concept is right on. I'm never going to go out and maintain yet another social network just to deal with wine, but it's a great idea on top of an existing social network. Done right, these guys can make a lot of money.
I think Facebook is here to stay and there will be some people who build up amazing businesses inside of it. I will be one person saying "Why didn't I think of that?!?"
Fred Wilson and Jason Calacanis are declaring "Facebook bankruptcy". They are complaining that they are getting too many friend requests, app requests, etc. In the comments on Fred's post are a few people agreeing with him, saying that they have a blog, and email and that's all they need. That feels pretty shortsighted to me. Here's why:
1. These guys are internet famous. Facebook allows you to ask to be friends with anyone who has a profile. They are probably getting a lot of friend requests from people they don't really know. Oh well, tough on them. How many people are in that situation? Feels like an edge case to me.
2. They probably aren't managing their privacy very well. Are they actually accepting friend requests from all these people? If they aren't really friends with them, and they start installing the vampires and zombie and all these "silly" viral apps, then it's not surprising that everyone uses them as well. Don't install that stuff guys! Again, they're not managing their stuff properly.
If anyone should know better, it's Fred. He doesn't use his wife's name in his blog because of privacy, he complains in his blog about being in the paper for selling his house for a lot of money. So, he knows about privacy, but he doesn't know how to manage his Facebook profile? I say user error.
There are complaints about Facebook being a walled garden. I don't think so. Yes, there are walls, but the walls are the kind that the internet needs - stuff to keep out the popups, popunders, spam, and other things that make the internet annoying. At the same time, any company can come along and set up shop inside this walled garden. They don't have to negotiate some onerous deal which rev shares back all the money to Facebook. Yes, a lot of the apps that are out there stink, but it's only been 2 months - give it time! There are lots of apps which can take advantage of the Facebook social network which would not justify a social network on their own. A good example is wine recommendations. There is an app called Snooth which is supposed to do this. Unfortunately, they send you back to their site, so the implementation is lacking, but the concept is right on. I'm never going to go out and maintain yet another social network just to deal with wine, but it's a great idea on top of an existing social network. Done right, these guys can make a lot of money.
I think Facebook is here to stay and there will be some people who build up amazing businesses inside of it. I will be one person saying "Why didn't I think of that?!?"
posted by Chris at 3:21 PM
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