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Comment by notpachet | Hacker News Reader

This article operates on the premise that companies can keep their users around indefinitely, if only they treat them with respect. I am not sure that's true in the case of social media companies (and probably other types of companies, too). I think there's an element of fashion to it. Companies go out of fashion. If you're in Gen Z, it's more fashionable right now to use Tiktok than it is to use Instagram. It's still more fashionable to use Instagram than it is to use Facebook.

How fashionable these platforms are seem to be inversely correlated with how deeply they've penetrated society. Once a teenager sees that her grandma is using Facebook, it starts losing its special luster.

That's not to say that shitty product choices don't also play a factor, but I have a feeling that it's a smaller factor than fashion at the end of the day.

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Yep, this is it. When I ask my younger friends why they prefer IG over FB the reaction is "ew, Facebook? That's so over." The cycle is repeating now with IG becoming uncool in favor of TikTok.

If I were a social media mogul, my strategy would be to relaunch the same platform under a different name every 5 to 10 years. Put some new css in there, release some flashy ads, and users will think it's a different thing. Most IG and Whatsapp users are shocked when you tell them those apps are owned by the same company as FB.

On the other hand, there are some platforms so solid that they seem to transcend fashion. I'm thinking YouTube.

I think youtube just has so much content that is nowhere else that it can't go 'out of fashion.' It's a massive public archive of creative and educational content which you can't just discover on another platform.

It'd take a very long time for something (like rumble/vimeo) to catch up or an amazingly large stuff-up at Youtube to drive people away.

Yeah Facebook posts and even tiktok videos are short lived things. No one will care about them in a year, but YouTube regularly shows me old stuff that’s great.

YouTube premium is the only streaming service I use on my TV because it’s got a never ending list of good content.

YouTube lacks a personality like Facebook/Instagram have. It just “is”.

It’s closer to infrastructure than any other social platform out there. Kind of blends into the background as you browse it.

Also, there’s a better separation of the content from the vitriolic comments than other platforms. I use YouTube all the time, and literally never read comments. Instagram/Facebook, the comments are integral to the consumption pattern, showcasing just how very fuckin awful almost everyone is when they can be internet tough guys vs basically decent human beings in real life.

I think it’s more about the centerpiece being subjects rather than people. I read Reddit threads all the time and comments there are front and center. There’s plenty terrible subs and people but they are easy to ignore and not the norm with what I look at.

It’s kind of fascinating to me that things have ended up like this. There was a period where Facebook was incredibly bland because people were using their real names. At some point that boundary got crossed and now most of what I see when I look at it is excoworkers who would have never gone on about politics around the workplace trying to get their message across. The rest of the people I followed who posted interesting moments about their lives have stopped posting altogether.

YouTube seems to have cleaned the comments up a huge amount over the years. Whenever I check them it’s always full of people thanking the creator, talking about the stuff they want to see more of, and continuing on the talking points of the video.

Sure it probably depends what kind of content you watch but I seem to remember old YouTube had a dumpster fire in every comment section.

I'd say that's certainly part of it. Even just escaping the hordes to stand out in a new place/way would be important to people. Think about how strongly teenagers define themselves with clothing and music to carve out a niche.

Beyond that, I think social networks are heavily reliant on active creators. If those people feel like minnows amongst the masses and grandmas, they're more likely to strike out in new territory whether it's a fresh network or mode of creating. Become a bigger fish in a smaller pond. Which leaves behind less-active users or people who've found reward/profit on the previous platform, making that platform start to feel more like TV than a mingling, social space.

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