It's really interesting to see, that all these Megacorps are apparently completely unable to see, what actual people actually want. Especially Meta seems to be hellbent to press everyone in their schemata, and fails constantly.
this post was submitted on 09 Jul 2023
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Part of it (I think) is that they treat their userbase as their customers, when in fact, we're not - the companies they're farming out our data to are the customers. We're the product, or rather, we're producing the product.
The ideal case for both them and us would be for them to keep us as complacent and happy as possible, so we use their service more - remove as many roadblocks as possible, add in QOL features, charge nothing, etc.
Then, when they have a bigger, more consistent influx of data, they put the thumbscrews to the companies that want to purchase that data, or want access to the API for AI training or whatever, and charge them a mega premium.
Not that I love the idea of being "the product", but from a purely utilitarian view, that seems like the most long-sighted way for them to operate.
It's not so much being the "product" that bothers me, as it is the whipping-horse manipulation to force us to give more more more with while they give less less less.
Even in that logic, it doesn't make sense to create products that nobody wants.
They seem to fundamentally not understand, what users actually want - and fulfilling that need would actually make them money. But they can't fathom what we want.
and fulfilling that need would actually make them money
That's basically the point I'm trying to make. Users produce the product (data), and by keeping users happy, we produce more of the product, which they can then sell at a better rate.
But do they? Meta is absolutely raking in cash, so they're obviously doing something that users engage with.
What users want and what makes money are often at odds.
I'm talking about their new apps. Like Threads, Metaverse...
Facebook, Instagram, and even YouTube only work on momentum. Facebook is clearly running out of steam and lost almost all relevance in the younger (that is, under 50) population. Instagram can still catch a large audience, but the young people already switched to TikTok.
All in all, the old cash cows are slowly drying up and there's nothing new coming.
Yeah, Zuckerberg wasted a ton of time and money on the Metaverse stuff, but they're still insanely profitable and they seem to be turning it around. I'm not happy about that because I was hoping they'd fade away to irrelevance, but that doesn't seem to be the case.
Notice that neither twitter nor meta want to put in the work to moderate a political social network.
They just want to make money
Not so sure it’s the moderation. More so the backlash that comes with it. The sort of backlash that ends with legislation.
It's just Instagram without images. It'll be influencers and meme accounts, for better or worse.
For better. 90% of Twitter's and Facebook's toxicity comes from political disputes.
I haven't seen that kind of toxicity in instagram, only the "look at my perfect life" toxicity, which isn't as bad. At least they are cool pics.
If I had to pick my poison, I'd pick Threads and Instagram. Thankfully, I don't have to.
Yeah I view it as negative but closer to neutral. Hopefully the "look at my perfect life" posts are understood as being fake or requiring inheriting great wealth by now.
2 main issues I have with Threads right now -
- Inability to tailor your feed to just follow your friends. The amount of brand activity in my feed is frankly overwhelming and puts me off using the app completely atm.
- I don’t really see how this is going to be any different to IG in terms of content if it’s NOT going to be a place for breaking news and stories like Twitter was/is. If I’m just going to be served random content the algorithm thinks I like, then why bother having an account at all? Most people just seem to be using it in the same way as IG with pics accompanying a few lines of text.
I don't think it's in its final form.
It's obvious that brands and influencers were offered the chance to be pre-verified and, while I haven't seen direct evidence myself, the word is that they could get some kind of FB/insta promotional discounts by being there to post on day 0 with a witty canned line about how great it was to be on threads
So when the app opened to the masses, they don't have to follow anybody or wait for their friends before it had "value". They open it up and there are a bunch of brands and "personalites" making it looking like it's already alive and the place to be
The other stuff will probably come later... although there's the chance that they're going after tiktoks model of "we know what you want"
Yes, and after such valuable discussion on Twitter such as "How much do Jews control the world: completely or just excessively?", a little vapid inanery with a side of brands doesn't sound so bad.
this whole saga is great to watch.
Obviously..
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