Facebook: What If More Is Less?: "Communication - The Very Point Of Social Networks The primary goal of a social network is to connect people, to simplify their communication, and to help them stay in touch. Before the rise of social networking, online communication occured via email, chat and forums.
The early social networks made their case by making communication easier. In particular, MySpace made it easy to communicate by leaving messages on people's profile pages. For many users, this was more convenient than sending email, but the reason this communication style really took off was because others could see the messages and become engaged - conversations between groups of users could emerge.
The communication on Facebook is not as simple. First, the message board is typically pushed way down a users' profile page, below tens of other applications. Just comparing the activity between random MySpace and Facebook profiles you see that MySpace members communicate with each other much more actively via messages. Second, Facebook has its own in-network private messaging system. The idea itself is fine, but it can't possibly compete with email."
The early social networks made their case by making communication easier. In particular, MySpace made it easy to communicate by leaving messages on people's profile pages. For many users, this was more convenient than sending email, but the reason this communication style really took off was because others could see the messages and become engaged - conversations between groups of users could emerge.
The communication on Facebook is not as simple. First, the message board is typically pushed way down a users' profile page, below tens of other applications. Just comparing the activity between random MySpace and Facebook profiles you see that MySpace members communicate with each other much more actively via messages. Second, Facebook has its own in-network private messaging system. The idea itself is fine, but it can't possibly compete with email."
No comments:
Post a Comment