….You Should Leave Facebook
1. Facebook has lost its mojo. A year ago, it captured the imagination of people fascinated or just curious about social networking. Getting a Facebook account was the “in” thing to do. Today, Facebook has more than 30 million users but the sizzle and buzz has started to disappear in a major way.
Sure, there are lots of people who still find it to be useful, entertaining and/or valuable but my sense is those people are becoming a smaller percentage of Facebook community every day. This is not to suggest Facebook is going to become the next Friendster but Facebook’s already on the slippery downward slope.
2. It seems to have become all about the money. As soon as Facebook received its $250-million investment from Microsoft, which valued it at $15-billion, it’s hard to think about Facebook as not just a M&A or IPO waiting to happen. Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg is worth a few billion dollars on paper, so how long will he, Facebook’s early employees and the company’s venture capitalists stick around when they could cash out and start something new again?
3. Given privacy is a growing concern for many people, Facebook dropped the ball when it tried to force Beacon (an advertising system) on the market as it scrambles to find vehicles to generate revenue. While perhaps good in theory, Beacon was a huge strategic mistake because it did silly things like send data to Facebook about other Web sites that were visiting.
The concerns about Facebook’s ability or willingness to protect your privacy was highlighted recently when four summer law interns at the Canadian Internet Policy and Public Interest Clinic filed a complaint with Federal Privacy Commissioner Jennifer Stoddart, accusing Facebook of 22 violations of Canadian privacy laws. Among the complaints is an allegation that Facebook can’t control who sees their profile information despite privacy setting used by Facebook users.
4. If you really want a lot of friends, join a club, take some classes, volunteer for a good cause or take up a hobby. Real friends will be there when you need them; something you really can’t say for digital friends. And truth be told, who really cares you have 100 or 500 or 1000 Facebook friends. At the end of day, all you really need is a small group of loyal friends to get you through the ups and downs of life.
More: The Financial Times suggests Friendfeed may be another reason that Facebook and MySpace are losing users.
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