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Folks have tried starting alternatives to facebook: I think the real problem is that facebook is more similiar to a phone company that only connects its users to others that have the same phone company. It was the only game in town for a while, so this has made it into a near-monopoly.

If facebook was required to have some level of across-platform access, this might level the playing field and give us actual choice. Unfortunatly, I think this will take legislative action to accomplish. Until then, luck and time might change the course of things.

> If facebook was required to have some level of across-platform access

That would be very interesting, and I think it would be a good idea. But I imagine it would be rather hard to pull of on the technical side, even if Facebook full-heartedly supported such an effort, and I don't want to begin to think of the kind of pressure we would have to put on our politicians to create such a law without making humongous mess out of it.

Facebook has never been the only game in town. It has just been and continues to be the best game in town.

And the best by being the largest...

Orkut and MySpace were both a lot larger than when Facebook started. Facebook did some great things and innovated during their early years. But yeah, nowadays they can just coast by being marginally better than any new product.

"People use it" is a pretty important feature for a social network though.

Whatever replaces Facebook will have to be "cool" enough to get people to actually want to use it. "Facebook but with better privacy" just isn't cool, so the average person isn't going to bother.

Not only is that addage showing its age, even though it's as applicable now as it was from its point of first usage, but I would suggest it's a disgrace that humans both think and act in such a manner. In other words, just because it's free shouldn't mean the user should be the product.

I realize a lot of people will not agree with me, however I tend to think way beyond the general human conception and as a consequence hold to a very different perspective.

> just because it's free shouldn't mean the user should be the product

I agree with you that that should not be the case. When I look at all the good things human beings have accomplished over the millennia, I cannot help but think that we can do better than this if we set our mind to it.

But life is not the way it should be (IMHO) in so many different levels in so many different ways I would not even know where to begin counting.

> The only solution I can think of is for lots and lots of people to pool their money and start a non-profit Facebook.

See https://diasporafoundation.org/

Not that they've actually made any sort of dent in the problem - as you say, the network effect is just too strong.

Sometimes the only way to win is not to play at all. If you want to contact me on Facebook about that... well, I never had an account, and I am surviving... somehow.

BTW https://mastodon.social is making some headway. I see a lot of security people have switched to it.

Isn't that a twitter clone?

(My point is that IMO twitter was the most useless of all the mainstream social networks until snapchat arrived.

I reached this conclusion by seing that you can get to twitter functionality from both facebook, instagram and google+ just by removing features and introducing limitations.)

When Twitter was launched Facebook didn't have a news feed and Google+ was non existent.

> My point is that IMO twitter was the most useless of all the mainstream social networks

I Twitter is the most honest social network. Everything is public, the end. Unlike Facebook's "privacy" settings.

You can slightly mitigate this particular problem mentioned in the article (the author used it to manage FB pages): I always use at least 2 personal accounts for managing a FB page. One is actively used whereas the other one is just a backup in case something happens to the first one. Redundancy is always important, also in social media.

How did you create 2 fb accounts? Don't they ask for phone number confirmation?

I don't think so. I have 3 accounts (I never use any of them, or FB at all, these days, but they are all still active). None of them are in my real name, but all have plausible-sounding names.

I have several private FB accounts. I created them when text message verification wasn't required. But if I had to do it now, I'd have bought a couple of cheap SIM cards and still set it up the same way. I feel it's important to split your account into several ones instead of using groups of friends as recommended by FB. It's harder to profile and track you, you have more freedom and privacy in expressing yourself, you mitigate several risks etc. Only one of these accounts has my real name - I log in every couple of weeks and just accept invitations (if I care to). The other ones use common names to protect my privacy. For example, I have a separate account for reviews. Reviews are important tool for consumers to influence the quality of service/product. While I don't want to hide behind a fake name when writing a review, and if asked I can reveal my identity to the organisation in charge of the product/service, I definitely don't want everyone to see what products/services I'm using. That's just one example - if you have to use social media, do it in such a way you have at least some control in this unequal battle.

The actual solution would be something like "pool all our money, then execute a hostile takeover of Facebook, kick the entire board, and pivot the company to a nonprofit business model". Until then, well... https://xkcd.com/743/

I don't fully understand the point this comic is trying to make. Can someone give me their perspective please?

It says you gave up your ownership (and the control that goes with it) for convenience, and now the new owners are doing things you don't like with what used to be yours.