Hacker News Reader

Comment by clickety_clack | Hacker News Reader

It’s hard to believe now, but Facebook was a good product for a while there.

That's why I wonder if, deep down, Zuck realizes the walled slop garden he's ultimately created instead of what it looked like he'd set out to create 18-20 years ago.

Facebook came after FaceSmash, a site for rating the attractiveness of women at Harvard who did not consent to being put on the site with photos.

He was always like this and never intended to create something actually valuable.

The problem is, despite all of the slop and garbage and surveillance and everything, Facebook is still actually valuable for many people.

People use it to keep in contact with relatives and friends, I follow work groups, my mother took COPD therapy through Facebook and chatted with relatives in other countries. I think Hacker News has been so radicalized against social media and "algorithms" that they forget most people's relationship with social media is entirely mundane.

You are right that a lot of people use social media for good things. The problem is that these usages are orthogonal to what these platforms are designed for and the reason why people use them for that anyway is mostly not for the value they provide but due to the network effects they have achieved though their market capture. On the technical side these are all long solved problems and many others could provide a platform for actually connecting real people. Facebook and etc. are parasitically absorbing this markets while actively undermining any healthy activity they platform.

> most people's relationship with social media is entirely mundane.

I think the engagement numbers of the social media platforms say something different. They wouldn't keep feeding everyone all that toxic stew if it didn't work with most people.

The large social media platforms are hostile to actual social activity.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com