When will we stop using Facebook? - <AUTHOR> http://www.thepinchandzoom.com/blog/2015/5/14/facebook-stop <comment><USER4> I stopped two years ago. As far as I am aware I'm not missing much.

I did have a lot of old friends on FB, but I didn't stay in contact with them in real life. I was just lazily snooping on their lives, without giving anything in return.

To be completely honest, I don't have space or time for them in my real life. It isn't because I didn't like them anymore, it was simply that I didn't have the time or energy to stay in proper contact. I had also moved away.

I had the realisation that some people are supposed to drift apart. The people who are important to you will remain in contact with, and it doesn't need Facebook spying on that friendship to enable it to keep functioning.

<comment><USER5> I stopped at about the same time as you, but I actually returned a couple of months ago. Without friending anyone. And the reason? I use Facebook as a very simple way to get news about really minor things of importance to me:

\+ my climbing gym has some new routes!

\+ a new video by K.I.Z, yeah!

\+ oh, demonstration against some Nazis demonstrating in my neighbourhood, should definitely go there

\+ Someone's looking for a climbing partner next weekend, finally heading out to the rocks again!

So likes have become a poor-man's subscription to an RSS feed and groups have become an easy to follow replacement of forums. The key in these cases is the newsfeed, which is okay for having an overview of important stuff (and without friends is not crowded with inane stuff).

I repeatedly have idle thoughts about a startup idea, combining Facebook with github's business model: Any entity such as users, companies, organizations get a page where they can post arbitrary stuff like on their current facebook profile. Users can subscribe and get an overview on their newsfeed. So far, just like Facebook but without the social crap. Financing is not done through targeted ads but by requiring companies to pay for the service - <USER2> like 500 subscribers are free, 1000 - 10 $/months etc. Quite rough around the edges, the idea, but I personally would like such a service. Anyone interested in working on that with me?

<comment><USER6> So, like twitter with more media and text options?

<comment><USER5> Yes, somewhat. Anything shareable. The major point would be the github-like financing model: It's not the individual users that pay for the service by enabling targeted ads but companies that want to get in contact with potential customers on _their_ page. It seems like a minor difference but would have quite strong effects on user privacy - there would not be a need for ever more tracking of every online activity.

<comment><USER7> Ello recently tried this, and they're still making good progress

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Is it time yet to repost this classic article?

"Will MySpace ever lose its monopoly?"

[http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2007/feb/08/business.c...](http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2007/feb/08/business.comment)

Key quote: _MySpace is well on the way to becoming what economists call a "natural monopoly". Users have invested so much social capital in putting up data about themselves it is not worth their changing sites, especially since every new user that MySpace attracts adds to its value as a network of interacting people._

<comment><USER9> Facebook has something MySpace never achieved and something that could easily set it's place firmly where it's at, given they don't make any major changes to mess it up: _The Geriatric Crowd_.

If I'm not mistaken, this is the first time in history that anyone in the tech industry captured this crowd in a major way. Those in my family over 70, on both sides, can barely make a phone call on a cell phone and don't even really know what texting is... but they sure know how to use Facebook. That's how they see their grandbabbies, of course they know how.

<comment><USER10> I know this is going to be morbid, but the problem with the geriatric crowd when it comes to technology is that they have a tendency to die. The current geriatric generation is using Facebook to some degree (though in the case of my family no one over 70 uses it). What about the next generation of old people? Facebook will have to keep recapturing this market. This is very problematic because the older generation only interested in family photos really couldn't care less about the service itself; they're going to use whatever their kids and grandkids use, so long as it's not too complex (and with each generation the maximum technological complexity for the geriatric crowd will go up quite a lot).

The other problem with having family on a social media is that this immediately limits what people can safely use the service for, which leads to an inevitable but slow exodus of users and their content. Facebook is the family friendly zone for sharing photos and short notes, and it's increasingly _only_ that and nothing else. You have Instagram for stuff you don't want your family to see. You have tumblr for stuff you don't even want many of your friends to see. And then there are the messaging apps. FB still performs very well in this arena, but it's clearly struggling against the likes of Snapchat, and I expect in 5-10 years Snapchat itself will be struggling against another newcomer with FB messenger a distant memory.

<comment><USER9> > _I know this is going to be morbid, but the problem with the geriatric crowd > when it comes to technology is that they have a tendency to die._

I actually thought about that too... but if you think about it relatively, the expected lifespan of someone who's 70 in 2015 (10-20yrs) is nearly an eternity in technology.

And those who are in that age group currently are very reluctant to change. It's just part of getting old. I can't see new generations of older people being much different. Maybe more accepting of change, but not actively seeking it like someone in their 20's.

> _Facebook is the family friendly zone for sharing photos and short notes, > and it 's increasingly only that and nothing else._

I don't see this as a bad thing, but as a huge positive. Look at movies. There has even been a push in the decade or so to PG-13 everything to make more money.

But unlike movies, where they destroy stories in the name of making them Family Friendly, you can just move your non-family friendly content somewhere else. Which is personally exactly what I do.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I hate Facebook, but I don't plan to stop using it anytime soon. Well - <USER3> don't hate everything about it, but I hate everything they're trying to do, so I agree with this article. But "hate"ing a company is odd, so I guess I really mean "I want to have nothing to do with".

I'll switch when there's a dominating replacement. All I want, for the rest of my life, is:

\- a way to see updates from friends and acquaintances and people I've fallen out of contact with, and post mine for them.

\- a way to search for and 'add' people I meet.

\- a way to chat with those people (including in groups)

\- all of those things, without social baggage that constrains it to 'only teenagers' or 'only colleagues and classmates' etc.

\- and in a network that contains most people I meet, or doesn't have social baggage that prevents most people from being willing to join it.

To me it's an enriched version of what I get by having lots of contacts in my phone or email address book: exactly a list of people, plus the additional fact that I feel physically _near_ them in some sense (and I think this is a concrete emotional thing. My family and friends don't feel too far away when I get to see snippets of their life streamed into mine).

Everything else - groups, events, pokes, company pages, apps, games, friend suggestions, wall posts, public about-me sections, places, reviews, ads, etc... I don't care about any of it. Maybe something that trims off all this fat would be innocuous enough to actually find adoption. I could see it living in some peer-to-peer structure too, but it has to still be absolutely trivial for anyone to join.

<comment><USER12> In other words - the Internet. You _don 't need_ to do all those things in a single place, or even in multiple places, but all owned by the same company.

The fact that people want to use Instagram, Vine, Snapchat and Whatsapp is proof many people don't want a single service for everything. It's just unfortunate that Facebook happens to have acquired many of those.

<comment><USER13>
      > In other words - the Internet.

Can you explain a bit more, because it sounds really strange.

<comment><USER14> It's a series of tubes that let you communicate information, but that's not important right now.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> I've been on various social media for about 30 years, starting with dial-up BBSes and Usenet (when small enough you could read _every_ message posted).

Time and again, I've seen sites appear, grow, become definitively dominant, taper off, and largely disappear (never quite _dying_ outright but gone from "everyone's on it!" to "who? what?"). High-profile lifespan is vaguely around 7 years. I've no question Facebook will do the same, already peaked and declining as the article notes, suffering from too many people, too much content, and not enough signal to retain users against the oppressive & discouraging noise. "Oh, but FB is different! _Everyone_ is on it, even my grandmother!" many will declare; yes, and odds are your grandmother can tell of her days when CompuServe and AOL were _the_ place to be (to the point of AOL having so much money they bought Time-Warner because they didn't know what else to do with all that cash), yet here she is on Facebook because that's what her grandkids use, but she's thinking of moving on more to Twitter/Instagram/whatever because those kids just don't post much on FB anymore.

<comment><USER16> I don't disagree, but the definition of "everybody" has gotten bigger and that counts too.

AOL may have been the place to be in the 90s, but it was still a sharp subset of my friends and acquaintances that were there, vs. the almost complete set on Facebook. And USENET/dialup/etc were even more selective. It's only been very recently (relatively speaking) that a majority of people were online at all, never mind aligned on a particular site.

I think you probably should compare more to something like AOL Instant Messenger, which had much closer to a 1:1 usage ratio of online computer users to software users (at least in the US market). The only real reason they went away was because social networks like Facebook are much more cross-connected and oriented towards group communication. The tagging features are huge, for example, since they potentially engage a lot of people at once. Ditto resharing, etc.

So the IM paradigm in general got consumed by larger social media--it wasn't a problem with AOLIM itself. But that sort of obsolescence is a vulnerability of a system that only does one thing. Facebook would probably mutate in the same situation, not die off.

The other factor is smartphones: a much larger number of people are online all the time now. If MySpace had their rise in the smartphone era, I'm sure they would have been much harder to displace. The fact that Facebook's opening their doors to the general public corresponded roughly with the release of the iPhone and subsequent rise of the smartphone was a huge bump for them.

Upshot is that a vastly larger percentage of a vastly larger number of customers are aligned on Facebook compared to older social media, and Facebook itself, as a platform, is relatively resilient to the changing needs of the customer. In an industry where both the customer acquisition and customer retention metric is "how many of your friends use it," I think Facebook will prove to be much harder to displace.

<comment><USER15> I've seen way too many "too big to fail" services fail, to believe Facebook is that much harder to displace.

BTW: IBM just announced it's offering Apple computers to its employees.

<comment><USER16> We'll see, of course, but I tend to think that the self-reinforcing nature of social media has different market characteristics than, say, mainframes. Unfortunately, the most obvious comparison--telephone networks--hasn't been a free market for a long time.

Though to that point, interoperability between social networks would certainly be a nail in Facebook's coffin. As soon as the service commoditizes to a simple portal all bets are off.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Don't know if this will be popular here, but... I like Facebook. I like seeing people's pictures and updates. I like serendipitous moments where someone announces they're in town and I get a chance to see people I haven't seen in years. I like keeping track of social events with it. I like reading a lot of their articles. I like the conversations I get in (even some of the arguments). I think it complements and enhances my social life. I try not to let it replace it.

Sure, some of the acquaintances are obnoxious on FB. The mechanisms for focusing on what I like vs what I don't seem to work well enough.

I don't like the surveillance. I try to minimize it in a number of ways. I'm sure my measures have limited effectiveness and I'm leaking details about my whereabouts, reading habits, and other preferences anyway. If FB was the only place I was doing that -- if I wouldn't have to essentially give up mobile/internet communications to truly solve that problem -- I might think harder about whether the value I get out of FB was something I could trade for privacy.

<comment><USER18> Probably uncool but I like facebook too. Maybe I should have a more happening social life but in the absence of that it's not a bad way to keep up with people. I'm not even especially bothered about the privacy / surveillance stuff. I don't post anything I'd be particularly worried about being public and I'm not to fussed about the add tracking thing effecting which ads uBlock ends up blocking or that I don't read. I just scrolled through the last 35 posts in the main feed and couldn't find anything obviously sponsored. If there's one thing that bugs me it's not having much control over the filtering. On the phone I only tend to get quite a small subset of my friends posts.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> I really should flesh out my "why you can't have a good distributed social network" post some time.

What does FB provide that you don't get with a combination of email/USENET/blogs/chat? Branding, janitors, and indexing.

Branding is useful because these things are so scale-driven that you want to be on the one that everyone else is using. It's easier for the uninvolved to figure this out if it's the one with huge advertising billboards.

Janitors are a necessity. Some are human, some automatic. People want spam to be fought, and they want abuse to be removed.

Between those two is the "nudging" of people into how to use Facebook. Why should you post life updates? Because it's the "done thing".

Indexing is useful because it enables you to find people you want to get in contact with using their human-recognisable name. (Facebook occasionally undermines this by refusing to accept names that people are known by)

Both of these are ongoing effort that has to be paid for if it is to scale and be done properly. Hence all the underhand cash-extraction processes.

<comment><USER18> > Why should you post life updates? Because it's the "done thing".

No - it's because you've done something you think your friends would be interested in and it's a lot easier to take a photo and click 'post to Facebook' than to write to 30 people.

That's really the fundamental function of Facebook and any successor will probably succeed by doing it better in some way. eg. Snapchat enabling you to send naughty pics without them being archived on the web for the rest of your life and so on.

<comment><USER19> > eg. Snapchat enabling you to send naughty pics without them being archived > on the web for the rest of your life

You should read more. [http://www.prdaily.com/Main/Articles/Snapchat_admits_deleted...](http://www.prdaily.com/Main/Articles/Snapchat_admits_deleted_photos_arent_really_delete_16643.aspx)

<comment><USER20> I thought it was common knowledge on HN, that DRM, of which forced deletion is a special case, is fundamentally flawed.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> I read facebooks terms and conditions before I created my account (you can guess, I am over 50). After that, I never thought about joining. Tried to discourage our kids, too (no success - they are under 50 ;o).

<comment><USER21> I am impressed this got upvoted. A couple of years ago, telling everybody I am not on facebook and have never been for such uncool reasons, would have drowned like a lead-duck.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> I have never used facebook and never will. The only real reason is because I have no interest in the type of community it promotes. The communities on facebook usually seem like a popularity contest.

I've recently stopped using reddit for the same reason and I'm now using HN as my main/only source of social media.

<comment><USER23> Reddit is a gold mine for niche stuff. Don't stop using it for r/funny, r/politics, r/whatever. Those are shitholes. The small subreddits is what Reddit all about for me nowadays. The big subreddits are breeding grounds for young Redditors and to fend off those we don't want in smaller subreddits.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> Yes, we've passed Peak Facebook, but that's just because it has been distilled and pornographized to the point of desensitization. Pure capitalism at its finest.

What will set the trend for the future is our understanding of how digital slavery works. We can be entering one of the darkest eras of modern history, or one of the most liberating. The choice is up to us, human beings, whether we sell ourselves to whoever is better at manipulating our emotions and thoughts, or whether we choose the free and open path that liberates us from digital tyranny.

<comment><USER25> You remind me of digital tools that are just coming into existence. Distributed autonomous corporations could organize most of the digital communication functions that the social media bubble is currently exploring. So, ethereum, Turing complete blockchains, oracles and decentralized decision making. Consensus over conceit.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> I stopped using facebook in 2013 when I quit my part time job as a fitness instructor. The studio I worked for used it extensively to communicate with clients and post daily workouts and nutrition tips so after a month of holding out (had already deleted my account once in 2010) I signed back up (which was a hassle enough as it was, they already knew I had used that email and asked if I wanted to reactivate my old account even though I had explicitly deleted it).

It was useful but I pretty much only used it in my role as a fitness coach and when I quit that job I deleted all posts, photos and details, changed my primary email to nonsense and changed my password to something I would never remember before going through the two-week "cool-off" period they force on you to delete your account.

</comment><comment><USER27> I help run an open studios event in Massachusetts. We in the last couple years have recently started using more social media.

Facebook has been useful for us. It drives a lot of traffic to our site and presumably some of those people come to our event (we made an official facebook event so that we don't have a bunch of unofficial ones).

Oddly its a difficult way to communicate with members and build community. Facebook also requires payment to guarantee showing up in feeds now, for a non-profit its not worth it. A fair number of our younger and older artists just aren't on it (myself included). We're finding email is the best way to communicate whats going on with our members.

Facebook works best if Everyone is on it. Once fewer people aren't on it becomes less useful. I think thats its staying power currently. Its actually amazing that it runs at its scale. Myspace was popular, but it didn't have the nearly the volume of users as facebook (plus facebook is better at sharing photos, seemingly its reason for existing). If your not on it and your friends use it as an organizing tool, it can be a little isolating (Don't be that guy/gal who they have to go out of the way to invite to things...), but with more people not on it email seems to be returning as an organizing tool.

</comment><comment><USER28> See also [http://www.google.com/trends/explore#q=friendsreunited](http://www.google.com/trends/explore#q=friendsreunited) (in UK) or Digg or MySpace ...

FriendsReunited was /the/ social network [amongst a certain demographic at least] in the UK before anyone knew the term social network. They established a massive userbase including paid for users but Facebook came along and destroyed them, particularly because FR did the paid for communications like LinkedIn do.

</comment><comment><USER29> I'm sorry but this article reads like a narcissistic wet dream. The author continues to quote himself and even misquotes himself several times (look up "facebook has tried tried to remedy" and "facebook has tried to repair"). The rest of the article slams Facebook for its success and tries to say users don't want to use Facebook. I personally love what Facebook developers are doing in terms of React and Jest. In terms of Facebook's core product, I use it for easy social login and have unfollowed anyone who posts things I don't agree with so my "feed" is pretty well curated. Myspace sank because a better product came out. When someone comes out and does Social better than Facebook, Facebook will fall but until then: if you don't like it, good news, you don't have to use it.

<comment><USER30> >I use it for easy social login and have unfollowed anyone who posts things I don't agree with so my "feed" is pretty well curated.

Isn't that a very very bad decision ? [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Filter_bubble](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Filter_bubble)

<comment><USER29> I would hesitate to say it's very, very bad. I don't filter people on Facebook only because I disagree with them; I filter people on Facebook because, at one point, I really enjoyed the company of that person and their current tirade of hating (the police/minorities/the west/the east/obama/republicans/etc) stands to slightly jade our friendship. Anyone who can actively filter ALL opinions they disagree with is either delusional, locked in a cabin in the woods or much more active at filtering than I am.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> >Facebook is an insanely rich company to the tune of $192 billion as of September 2014

That's not exactly being rich, those aren't billions that Facebook can go spend in the same way as Apple can spend their cash reserves. The $192 billions is the evaluation of Facebook, not the money Facebook has available to spend.

Profits are what makes companies rich, not that Facebook is doing to badly in that department.

<comment><USER32> Facebook is not a startup, it's a publicly traded company, meaning that its value is given by the numer of shares in the market times the stock price (which by this date is more than 226bn).

If we are talking about liquid cash, FB is sitting on 12 bn, which is not so far than AAPL 33 bn.

<comment><USER33> Apple cash reserve is $194 Billion ([http://americasmarkets.usatoday.com/2015/04/27/194b-apple- ca...](http://americasmarkets.usatoday.com/2015/04/27/194b-apple-cash-pile- hits-record/)).

<comment><USER34> That article actually confirms the 33B "liquid cash" quoted in your parent. The other ~160B is "long-term investments".

<comment><USER35> last I looked at apple's financial statement,s that other 160 is in pretty liquid assets, in that if Apple wanted to spend 190 billion tomorrow, it basically could

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER36> I used to actively post on facebook a lot through college and a bit later (joined when I started college, the year before facebook opened itself up to non-college accounts). For the last 2-3 years its been an idle account. Used to make several updates a week, now I make 2-3 updates a year. I removed the app a long time ago from my phone because of privacy reasons.

I've noticed I get bombarded with far more notifications as an inactive user than I was when I was active. I get emailed notifications far more frequently when I used to never have them emailed.

A friend posted on your wall? Notification. Someone liked a post on your wall? Notification. A friend is having a birthday? Notification. A friend's birthday is coming up? Notification. Invited to an event? Event coming up? Event tonight? Notification. Someone with no connections in common commented on a post you've never read on a large public group that you have never contributed to? Notification. Someone completely unrelated to you LIKED a post you've never viewed on the same large group? Notification.

Facebook gets desperate when a user starts churning, but holy crap I just _do not_ care. The only reason I keep this account is because of close family on the network. I could divide my friends list by 40 and I don't think I'd miss any of the lost content.

All the stream ever shows is shared posts from Buzzfeed-clones. It's not interesting. It's a feed of spam with a very, very rare text post or meaningful photo.

</comment><comment><USER37> Not soon enough. My son lost out on a job opportunity because of a photo of him published in fb when he was in grade 9. It's just a massive invasion of privacy, and for what? The "make a buck off the internet" guys hit the jackpot with that one.

</comment><comment><USER38> I wonder if the current "depression" is merely the tech savvy market. I find that many authors make the mistake of assuming that the average Joe thinks the same way that they (and their peers) do.

In the past 2-3 months I have heard two less savvy people recite the "it's not an official relationship until it's Facebook official" social norm, which inclines me to believe that Facebook is still firmly entrenched in the way people interact with each other: even if they never visit the site it needs to be there so that they can turn their significant other into that all important profile trophy/achievement.

I had this exact conversation with some coworkers (3 of us) and all of us found out that all of us only have our profiles because our significant others demand it. We never visit the site or use the site but have to exist there because of the people around us who do use it. My S/O can't have me as a partner, my sister can't tag me in a picture etc. People are worried that if there is no "paper trail" on Facebook, other people will think that they are an imposter.

Therefore I'm not inclined to agree that the current trend is a long term trend. There are many other websites that provide exactly the same features of Facebook, if not more. Facebook is a part of culture now. It's a verb. It probably has a good few decades of life left in it.

Finally "search query frequency" is the poster child of "correlation does not imply causation." E.g. People might not be searching for Facebook because everyone already knows what it is and what the address is. It's like ranking Google's health on how often people search for Google.

</comment><comment><USER39> What will be the next big thing in social networks? What are your thoughts?

Local neighbors network? No-interface social networks? Peer-to-peer? Anonymous social networks? Video based (YouTube/Twitch)? Messanger-only? No central news-feed?

<comment><USER40> Unfortunately, in my opinion, Facebook is here to stay.

Reasons: \- Local/OSS/decentralized social networks will not work for the common population because their friends and updates will not be there.

\- Video based is already a success, see Twitch, but people sometimes prefer text and likes.

\- Messenger only is also a success, see Whatsapp/FB messenger, but some people have the need to expose themselves to people outside their groups.

\- Pinterest, Instagram and Google+ have their own public which mostly likely are also in FB. They use it for difference purposes.

\- Twitter, well this one it's difficult. First of all most of the communication is public and some users are not interested in that. Also there's a lot of self promotion messages which does not mean it will engage users to communicate. Finally Twitter tries to reinvent itself and the features are not consistent. i.e. For several weeks they enabled translations and after it was disabled. Twitter might have a chance to engage more people with Tvshows, movies, music and personalities.

Facebook after all is the social network which is easier to get started, makes a balance between public and private/groups, lot's of features available (games, messenger, groups etc...) and families and friends in the same feed. I guess it's pretty hard to beat that currently for other social networks.

<comment><USER41> I agree with you that probably FB will stay longer than everyone thinks. At least the messaging part. What I think it's the biggest factor that will give it inertia, it's the userbase.

It has slowly become the centralized place for connecting with people, especially when not considering the minority of very tech-savy people.

I am at a party and I met somebody I want to hang out with? He/she's probably on facebook then we'll communicate on that. Wanna look up for my old class- mates? Let's search for them on facebook.

The timeline will be empty/boring/spam, but the messaging app will be full.

<comment><USER40> That's the point, FB is people personal ID in the Internet (I guess Google+ was suppose to have this task), and this is the reason why we have so many apps working with FB which is the central point for everything - login, pictures, address, tlf number etc...

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER42> So the bad news is that it is difficult to stop using Facebook. They let me export my data, but not birthdays of my friends list. I had to break the list down into family, friends, actual friends, then check each of their pages to update my address book. I had to disconnect the few apps that were attached which was easy for me as I avoided facebooks apps like the plague, but imagine losing all of your farm animals or whatever it is that people use the games for. Now that SMS is free and my carrier provides me a softphone for my PC and tablet for free, I have reverted to SMS (disabling iMessage is a PITA). Events I handle with my calendar app / email invites which hasn't been ideal, but since some of my friends refuse to use Facebook, it never was either.

Anyway, just some of my experience so far. At least they allow me to export my data, unlike Yelp bookmarks. I kept my usage of Facebook extremely light, but this has taken a lot of my spare time. Few people will go through this effort.

Before you start using a SaaS solution, figure out how you can stop using it.

<comment><USER43> > it is difficult to stop using Facebook

It's really not. All the saving of contacts, birthdays etc. that you talk about here... If you give a crap about any of these people, you will already have that information in another medium. The Facebook logins? Only one I had to change manually was Spotify, everything else I was able to switch to Google.

It's seriously easy. Just stop using it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER44> "based this prediction on the number of times Facebook is typed into Google as a search term".

If that's their only set of data, then I'm guessing this is equally likely to indicate that Google is losing users, or at least losing users trying to access common sites, at a pretty steep rate.

</comment><comment><USER45> Did I get that correctly, that the hypothesis of facebook loosing 80% of its users (in the next years) is based on a link between google searches and facebook use?

What if people google facebook less than a while ago because they already know what it is and have remembered the domain name?

<comment><USER46> Or, more likely, they just use the mobile app.

<comment> jay-saint I was just going to point out the mobile app factor. Looking only at Google does not count search on App stores. It also does not take into account that over half a billion people are mobile only users. Source Q414 earnings slide deck. [http://files.shareholder.com/downloads/AMDA- NJ5DZ/3515235624...](http://files.shareholder.com/downloads/AMDA- NJ5DZ/3515235624x0x805520/2D74EDCA-E02A-420B-A262-BC096264BB93/FB_Q414EarningsSlides20150128.pdf)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER47> Most people are already happily migrating to IM platforms where they can contact people more directly and form relevant ad hoc groups. Facebook was smart enough to recognize that and buy one of them.

I'd be interested in seeing action metrics over time for FB. My gut feeling is that people use it more passively these days (I do, it's mostly a fancy contact book for me). Every now and then I catch myself posting stuff for reasons of "look isn't this great...please like it" but for the most part my FB use is fairly passive these days.

I also feel like I should just delete my FB account for various reasons every now and then but usually talk myself out of it.

</comment><comment><USER48> About the Coke analogy: everybody loves Coke A Cola, Santa Claus, polar bears, summertime, Perfect harmony, cans with your name on it, it's the greatest brand name in the world.

Facebook is creepy, most people hate it and hate themselves for using it. Everybody knows somebody who lost friends because of it, or who broke up or got divorced. It's supposedly cited in one out of seven divorce cases. In terms of branding it's pretty toxic.

I don't know how long it will be around, probably for a while (if you run Facebook and Snapchat through Google trends Snapchat barely registers) but brand loyalty isn't going to keep it afloat.

</comment><comment><USER49> The methodology and reasoning behind this study is dubious at best.

[http://www.google.com/trends/explore#q=myspace%2C%20facebook...](http://www.google.com/trends/explore#q=myspace%2C%20facebook%2C%20instagram%2C%20uber&date=1%2F2010%2061m&cmpt=q&tz=)

If google trends is of any predictive value, Uber and Instagram should not exist (or at least be worse than myspace). The keyword 'snapchat' also shows near zero volume.

<comment><USER50> There are so many more reasons for declining search volume. It could just be that your users are starting to type terms directly into the address bar.

Or that browsers have gotten smart enough that they're autocompleting facebook.com instead of just letting you search for facebook.

I do love a good Google trends "research" dive but I'd hardly consider it good enough to cite for a scholarly paper. There aren't even real numbers, just relative search volumes.

</comment></comment><comment><USER51> I still have FB but I never use it unless I'm tagged or messaged on it. I use it primarily as a massive rolodex but I never read my news feed except for on accident if I log in to read a message or notification. I tweet some and those are auto-pushed to FB so it kind of looks like I'm active (that was not the goal, just a side-effect). I've got way too many friends that use FB to plan events and the like to leave it anytime soon.

I don't hold it against you if you don't have a FB but I'm also not going to feel back if you miss out on an event because you were harder to reach. I find the vast majority of FB-Defectors to be insufferable to listen to when they talk about how they aren't on FB (seriously, they fucking talk about FB MORE than the people ON FB!) and when they whine about a group of us talking on FB (therefore leaving them out) I just ignore them. I don't like FB and the reach it has into our lives but I'm not about to cut off my nose to spite my face by deleting my FB. There are plenty of ways to use FB without letting it use you IMHO and people who just flat out quit are too lazy to do so (Sign up for an account, don't add any info, turn off all location stuff, block the FB widget so it can't track you one sites, etc...).

What I really want is identity provider and FB gives that to me today (along with "first party" chat, messaging, photos, etc). Ideally I would have something like OAuth (but not OAuth) and all my friends could pick a messaging platform that supported it but right now nothing like that exists and/or the UI/UX is so terrible I'd never get my friends to switch.

</comment><comment><USER12> That's quite a disappointing future the author is painting there. The best I can hope for is that future "hot startups" will prefer to sell themselves to _any_ other company but Facebook when Facebook comes knocking on their door with a bag of cash. Otherwise I'll continue to express my distaste for such an acquisition, just like I did with Oculus and Whatsapp and will try avoiding them in the future. Vote with your wallet as they say.

<comment><USER25> Is that because you dislike facebook, or this kind of acquisition pattern?

</comment></comment><comment><USER52> The only thing Facebook was ever good for was finding those old friends. Now that you found them, now what? Do you need Facebook? The easy way out is to message all of them saying you are quitting Facebook and ask them for their email address. That's all you ever needed, but there was no index/search engine for it until Facebook. And once you have that part of the index you care about, you'll never need it again.

<comment><USER53> Hmmm... And I did this (had fb for a few years, deleted for a few, had for a semester abroad, deleted as soon as I had my first steady girlfriend, broke up and now about three and a half years later I'm back on). The problem I found was, as soon as I deleted my fb no one had my e-mail as it was deleted with it my account and messages.

I'm not the biggest fan of facebook obviously, but when I wqs studying abroad in France it really was a handy way to connect with people when I didn't have a cellphone. Now, after deleting for such a long period, I don't have any connection to my old friends which is a shame.

There's the argument that if people wanted to talk to you they'd make it happen but then there's the argument that if you're on facebook people are more likely to talk to you because of the convenience. No one wants to lose touch, and facebook provides and easy way to make sure that (had I not deleted) when I wanted to go back to Europe I'd have easy access for communication lines to the individuals I might want to visit.

Everything is double edged and while I've enjoyed my time off of facebook (why does everyone have to hate on the poorest in America? I will never understand. If the people on welfare were actual leechers maybe they'd own a portion of the country, anyways I digress).

That being said, it's a total privacy invasion, and the people I apparently know don't critically think too often unfortunately even as I try to gently prod, and yet, it has allowed me to find events I might not have gone too, and friends I may not have seen.

I hate to do this to hackernews where the discussion is the key reason I come here... but I did not read the article. Sorry!

</comment></comment><comment><USER54> This may seem crazy, but I think the reason use facebook is psychological and to some extent, it's a rationalization of gov'ment spying. "if someone else is going to know everything about me, it might as well be my friends(as well as the NSA)". I think once we end NSA spying, people will value their privacy more, and thus not need social crutches.

</comment><comment><USER55> My experience: the platform is amazing, but too addictive and the format does not permit in-depth discussion. Most of the good content on the web still resides on old forums.

Less and less people can write with the energy of Erik Naggum. Its not rewarded. Searching that great article from 6 months ago is a PITA. Almost no one reads longform articles anymore. Thanks Obama.

</comment><comment><USER56> > It used to be the place where you tried to sell all your unwanted stuff, but > now now people are using Craig's List or Gumtree.

Dude.

</comment><comment><USER57> Facebook has too many elements of "poisonous Internet": ignorant rants, memes, political correctness, exaggerated display of public affection,...

Gradually, users find other websites to channel their interests and avoid biases, like Reddit, Pinterest, HN,...

It's a serious falacy to assume one will always need a network filled with friends and family.

<comment> aaron-lebo The same problems you list with Facebook exist on Reddit, too. Reddit is an echo chamber.

One of the great things about family (if you have a good one) is you have to put up with them no matter how much you disagree on the little things. Interest sites like Reddit let people form into their own ignorant cliques without serious personal effort.

It seems to be a fundamental problem of humanity.

</comment></comment><comment><USER58> I keep thinking about deleting my facebook but a few days ago I went back a few years to figure out what I needed to do to drag myself out of a horrible depression I've put myself in the past few years and I found the exact thing I needed and all I could think was, I could never delete this if it was this important to me. I feel chained to the website in a way, I've had it for 6 years and quite a bit of important social interactions are hidden in between things that don't matter that I might never find again and completely forget that part of my life.

Is there any way I can separate myself from the website without losing these things that I might need later in life at some point? I'm really wanting to just delete it but the history makes it important to me.

</comment><comment><USER59> _When will we stop using Facebook?_

We? I never became a user. Apart from that: Our children will, at the latest. For our children's generation, FB already is the pinnacle of boredom and stuffiness. Whatever is cool about "where our parents humiliate themselves publicly"?

</comment><comment><USER60> ITT: people with no kids. Facebook is indispensable for sharing baby pictures with extended family.

<comment><USER61> I have a 3 year old and he has no photo (that I know of) in facebook. Both me and my wife don't post anything online (also don't have FB) and if I find any family member/friend posting a picture of my son online, they will have picture taking permissions revoked. Also, there are a lot of people like us where I live.

<comment><USER28> What's your aim in doing this? For what reason?

Surely your family and acquaintances and people in the street are free - depending where you live (?) - to take pictures. So you're going to have to police all of those images in perpetuity to prevent images from appearing online. The likelihood is that when they're a teenager they'll put their lives online themselves in some way ... so?

If your child goes on a playdate or attends a nursery or goes to a public location then there's a good chance (at least in the UK) that they'll appear on Facebook no matter how many "I do not consent for my child to appear in photographs" statements you sign. Once they appear in the background of images then in the not too distant future face recognition is likely to be good enough to trawl the net for images of them. I think what you'll find is that the images are all one's you haven't curated whereas if you were adding your own images (no matter if it's only a few) then you at least have some control over the general presentation of images.

<comment><USER61> Aim/Reason: I don't really trust facebook/google, but more importantly, if he decides when he is 14-15 to put his photos online, it will be his decision. Also, growing up, baby/young pictures were usually something would use to make fun of each other.

As for the other people taking photos, sure, if he is in the background there is not much we can do, but other places (nursery or school or even playdates) can't by law do that and to be fair, those places we tend to hand pick them and they do share this with us.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment> rm_-rf_slash My best friendships are maintained by calling by phone or Skype, calling regularly when it comes to closer friends. I keep in touch with important people in my life using technology available to my parents when they were my age, and I feel more satisfied for it.

</comment><comment><USER62> When Facebook first launched dedicated apps for groups and messages, I was confused. But now I only have those installed, and not the primary app. I've also bookmarked both the messages page and the groups main page (which actually took some searching). I get a lot of groups, and there are some people I'm only able to talk with via Facebook messages.

Malls are ubiquitous in much of the US, and people use them differently. Some people wander, some people run in to the one store they need and leave. Some people hang out at the food court. I view Facebook the same way - as they continue to build out features, different people will choose to use the bits and pieces that work for them.

</comment><comment><USER63> My wife cut off FB 2 years ago but I still use it mostly like a forum. Locally we have a group of 50ish gamers (Warhammer, 40k, Warmachine, etc) and this is the primary way games / tournaments / campaigns are set up. Even a trading area since gamer nerds are apt to constantly buy and trade their toys.

What's funny is we've had to convince our younger members to even sign up so we could communicate with them. Anyone younger than 20 in our group didn't usually have an FB account.

We've tried running traditional forums for the local group but it has never worked. FB is the only way to do it for now.

<comment><USER48> Sounds like a job for Slack.

<comment><USER63> Same issue we had trying to get people to forums. Signing up is hard to do no matter how easy you make it. Including if it allows for Facebook sign-ons.

They're already ON Facebook. It's on their phone. They don't have to do anything.

Trust me, I -want- an updated platform to use, but the rest of the gamer community here just doesn't seem to want to migrate.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER64> I dislike posts about Facebook's usage, if for no other reason than how many people tend to come out and say "I don't use it and I can't imagine why anyone would".

That statement is just so intellectually dishonest, it completely ruins the entire conversation. Pretending like there's no value in what Facebook offers ignores billions of dollars and billions of users who _do_ find value. Now I'm not one for an ad populum, but when we define usefulness as "provides value to others", how _can 't_ Facebook be considered useful?

</comment><comment><USER65> Story today on the BBC, from analysis of 500 word stories written by UK kids between 5 and 13 for a competition 'Words including email, mobile and Facebook are in decline, it said.'

[http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment- arts-32902170](http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-32902170)

(Interesting that mobile is declining, suggests the distinction is lost in a world of tablet, laptop and phone use where desktops are a thing of the past domestically)

<comment><USER66> > (Interesting that mobile is declining, suggests the distinction is lost in a > world of tablet, laptop and phone use where desktops are a thing of the past > domestically)

I would say that mobile is declining because land lines basically don't exist anymore, so we can just say phone instead of mobile phone.

<comment><USER28> >land lines basically don't exist anymore //

Everyone I know has access to a landline (UK).

True the only reason I have a landline really is that you can't get a broadband internet connection on its own that's cheaper than phone + broadband.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER67> I use it for:

\- Informing old friends about so-called "Life Events" \- not by actually posting, but by private messages

\- Private groups of separate friend circles, mostly for sharing cool news/websites or music

\- My facebook newsfeed mostly constitutes local news, international editorial/opinion pieces and lots of pictures of nature stuff which I like. I've unfollowed most people so I don't get their posts.

I don't have a one-stop shop for all the above except facebook, so I think I'll definitely be using it for a while.

</comment><comment><USER68> No need to Google for it, because everybody has it in his bookmarks.

<comment><USER69> I also found this graph to be a bad start. I mean, search queries? If facebook.com isn't bookmarked it's still presented as suggestion right after "f" is typed in close to any facebook users omnibox. The only reason I ever search for facebook is because I accidently mistyped it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER70> Keeping in touch with friends, family, and acquaintances is a core need for a large fraction of humans.

Facebook, like everything, will disappear some day, but it will be because people decide to start using some other way of keeping in touch -- not because they decide that they're bored of keeping in touch. Many people just stop using Facebook, don't replace it with anything else, and are happy with that decision -- but that will not be the norm.

</comment><comment> norea-armozel Unfortunately, I keep using Facebook to keep in contact with my family (this includes part of my extended family whom I haven't seen since childhood). I'm not sure it has much value since we rarely communicate through Facebook as we all have each other's phone numbers and other contact information. I'm hoping eventually my family will get off Facebook and maybe onto a more viable platform to maintain contact.

</comment><comment><USER71> Who's we, white man?

FB is superb for organizing events with people. IMHO that's its strongest offering. But I'd rather just use webapps, word of mouth and email.

</comment><comment><USER72> Email is so far the best social network that I know.

</comment><comment><USER73> When we will start using [https://diasporafoundation.org](https://diasporafoundation.org)

<comment><USER74> Maybe when it leaves being an alpha.

</comment></comment><comment><USER75> Facebook has long said they want to be the glue of the Internet, the guys that tie it all together. And they're winning at this through their login feature, their messaging, their ad platform, and their commenting features. I don't know if in the future people will still visit FB like they do today, but I doubt they are truly going away anytime soon.

</comment><comment><USER76> Never used it. Still don't get the point.

<comment><USER77> Nicely put. I never saw what it would do for me that I wasn't already doing with email. Never signed up.

</comment></comment><comment><USER78> They will stop when a better perceived alternative is out there. Until then FB is solving socializing pretty well.

</comment><comment><USER79> I stopped using it a long time ago. For a while I mostly used Facebook connect to log into other web sites but I don't even do that anymore.

Other people are still engaged; my NEET friends will come over and look at Facebook for hours and even people I know with jobs find it compelling but I don't.

</comment><comment><USER80> Never started. [http://seapegasus.org/wp- content/uploads/seapegasus.org/2011...](http://seapegasus.org/wp- content/uploads/seapegasus.org/2011/09/funny-facebook-fails-oinkonomics.jpg)

</comment><comment><USER81> For those using fb mostly as a directory/contacts books, I highly recommend FB Purity.

In fact I'm surprised no one has mentioned it yet.

It lets you filter out certain posts or in my case, put in a bit of custom CSS to never show the news feed => no distractions when I go onto fb chat.

<comment><USER82> There is also Messenger.com which would appear to do what you want.

</comment></comment><comment><USER83> I think Facebook has staying power because they're the first social network to have made serious AI/ML investments. They'll be able to project user's likes back at them better than anyone else.

</comment><comment><USER84> I was early to join Facebook and early to leave. It's been well over half a decade since I've used Facebook.

Nothing I have heard about them since I quit has made me regret my decision to leave.

</comment><comment><USER85> Isn't that correlated with mobile devices being more popular?

</comment><comment><USER86> I thought that the article was worth it but it is completely stupid. The reason of MySpace curb is because Facebook started, they aren't two independent events.

</comment><comment><USER87> The linked article quotes some research which is highly dubious. Using Google trends data [1] for anything other than the start of an analysis seems a little dangerous.

Facebook won the social network land-grab and it will be difficult for anyone to assail their stronghold. I hope someone does, but it's probably going to take a lot of money and time.

[1] [http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/mar/27/google- flu...](http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/mar/27/google-flu-trends- predicting-flu)

</comment><comment><USER88> > losing 80% of its peak user base

I'm assuming this is just for the main FB platform? They still have access to many users through messenger and FB login.

</comment><comment><USER89> > Facebook has been haemorrhaging interest from fresh faced teenagers for a > while. In the US, the percentage of teens between 13 to 17 using Facebook > fell to 88% in 2014. - See more at: > [http://www.thepinchandzoom.com/blog/2015/5/14/facebook- > stop#...](http://www.thepinchandzoom.com/blog/2015/5/14/facebook- > stop#sthash.HEYdWxIy.dpuf)

And? They own Instragram and WhatsApp which, apart from SnapChat, makes up 50%+ of what teens are doing on their phones

</comment><comment><USER71> Does anyone use XML or JSON feeds connecting to multiple apps to manage events, news updates etc? Curious about your setup.

</comment><comment><USER90> Not a moment too soon. I've been free from the USG's best tracking program for 5 years. Never looked back.

</comment><comment><USER91> When will social networks be federated?

</comment><comment><USER92> reminds me of this article I loved about how Facebook is the new myspace

[https://medium.com/@nickgrosvenor/facebook-is- myspace-7559ff...](https://medium.com/@nickgrosvenor/facebook-is- myspace-7559ff9b9f8f)

</comment><comment><USER93> Well, as developers, we reached peak facebook (usefulness as a plaform for apps) years ago.

</comment><comment><USER94> I use it mostly as a replacement for ICQ and MSN and to gather some photos after events.

</comment><comment><USER95> When a major security flaw in FB exposes all your private data to the world;

</comment><comment><USER96> I just keep my account to sign-up easily to other webpages.

</comment><comment><USER97> Piece needs an editorial once-over badly. Some of the pull quotes don't even match up to the same body text. Is it too much to ask for people to run spellcheck as a bare minimum of due diligence?

</comment><comment><USER98> Been without for about four months. Burden lifted.

</comment><comment><USER99> Never? I am not even registered yet.

</comment><comment><USER100> I don't have fb and I don't miss it. Soon many more will join the trend and nurture their real friendships instead...

</comment><comment><USER101> I haven't read the article yet, but I stopped using Facebook a couple of years ago and it was the best decision.

</comment><comment><USER102> I don't see my self stop using Facebook any time soon, I find it very useful.

</comment><comment><USER103> I quit facebook 2 years ago. When I greet people that I haven't seen in a while they are surprised by how genuine I feel.

<comment><USER104> Tell me about it! It's great being able to ask what they've been up to, and actually mean it!

</comment></comment><comment><USER105> Facebook is already two years ahead of the analysis in this article. They spun off messenger and groups into their own apps because they saw the monolithic approach was no longer working.</comment>


Using MicroCOVIDs to Quantify Your Covid Risk - <AUTHOR> https://www.microcovid.org/ <comment><USER2> Cool idea. Would it be possible to further break down the risk? Getting Covid has different levels of risk for different people.

I've never seen a clear analysis that explains the risks for a particular person of 1. Having symptoms 2. Having symptoms severe enough to be unable to function for several weeks 3. Severe enough to require oxygenation/short hospitalization 4. Severe enough to require long term hospitalization

The other question is how this risk compares to other activities. I have no idea whether driving to the store is more or less risky than being in the store during the pandemic.

<comment><USER3> interesting, although the risk to one person might be calculable, but each of us interacts with others who might not be fortunate enough to take on that risk. It would be much harder to take those people into account also. Taking on risks that might have negative consequences with the clerk at the grocery store, or your own family members feels selfish.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> This looks pretty thorough and is a better stab at quantifying things than I've seen before. Thank you!</comment>


Ask HN: With gas prices dropping, when will carrier (UPS/FEDEX) costs decrease? - <AUTHOR>

<comment><USER2> I would imagine that UPS/FEDEX, like airline carriers, play with futures to stabilize their fuel costs. As such, they are likely not reaping much in the way of immediately benefits from the recent and unexpected price drop.

</comment><comment><USER3> brd makes a good point, but...

If UPS and FedEx are the 2 biggest courier-service companies in the US (with at least 80+% combined market-share), they have no incentive to decrease costs except as a planned duopoly to show they are "competing".

Cost drop should be minimal, as they will swallow the the value as "profit".

##I don't know if the duopoly scenario is true or not, but that is my opinion if they exist as such.</comment>


Science vs. Religion - <AUTHOR> http://neuronphysics.com/religion/science-vs-religion/ <comment><USER2> I do try and avoid these arguments for obvious reasons but one simple point I'd like to make:

At no point did Stephen Hawking say "God did not create the universe"

He did however, clearly state that it is not necessary to invoke God into the creation of the universe, meaning he believed there is now enough information to quantify the beginning of the universe without being mysticised by the process and assuming some greater power must have been involved.

</comment><comment><USER3> The whole premise of this debate is flawed at its core, but keeps propagating because of the flawed idea that religion is supposed to explain physical phenomenon (creation of the Universe, existence of life, Earth orbiting the Sun, to name a few).

Science and Religion asks and attempts to answer completely different questions. Science asks "How does this happen" and "Why does this do that". Religion asked "Why does this all even exist?" and "What's our purpose in life?"

Full disclosure, I'm a Christian, and the way I see it is that we were put in this Universe and given the brains and capability to try to understand the Universe we live in. IMO to discount Science and the findings thereof is an affront to God and His creation.

It's a shame that in this modern day and age we are still arguing the same things we were hundreds of years ago.</comment>


Eric Schmidt to Sell $335 Million of His Google Shares - <AUTHOR> http://mashable.com/2011/01/21/eric-schmidt-google-shares/ <comment><USER2> Ho, hum. Of course they are selling. And will continue to sell. This is perfectly normal for the big insiders in any successful tech company. Because of portfolio diversification.

Back when Microsoft dominated the industry every year there would be similar stories about all of the Microsoft insiders who were selling shares. People who didn't understand would jump up and down. People who did, would know that it was entirely expected and a non-story.

In a few years you can expect to hear the same about Facebook.

<comment><USER3> What I've heard from investor-types is that there are 1000s of reasons to sell shares, and it doesn't mean too much.

But when insiders are _buying_ shares, that can only mean one thing...

<comment><USER4> They are going to spend the company's cash reserve buying back stock and artificial restrict supply which will raise the price?

<comment><USER5> You're thinking of buybacks. That's when the company buys the stock.

Insider buying is when the insiders themselves spend their own money on the stock. It's very difficult for them to successfully manipulate it upward--if they buy e.g. 5% of the outstanding shares, then to profit from their manipulation they have to _sell_ 5% of the outstanding shares. The net result is likely to be that the stock ends up where it was, and the insiders have just paid their brokers a lot of money.

Also, what's artificial about this? It seems natural to me that if there are fewer shares outstanding, the price per share would go up (unless the company was knowingly buying them back for more than they're really worth). And "artificial" restriction in supply would be something like paying a group of shareholders not to sell for a certain period, to reduce the number of tradable shares. That stuff's usually illegal.

<comment><USER4> When I say "artificial" what is mean is that if for example a turn-around CEO and/or team is compensated partly or largely in stock options then they can decide the best way to raise the stock price is not to grow sales and profits but to spend the company's cash reserves on a buyback.

Other investors are often supportive of this as it gives them a profitable exit from the soon to rise stock.

On its own, less supply leading to higher prices is perfectly natural.

<comment><USER3> You seem to be implying that share buybacks aren't a legitimate or ethical way to use a company's funds.

Imagine that there are 3 partners each owning a 1/3 interest in a firm. If the firm decides to buy out one of the partners with company money, and that the partner agrees to this, this leave the other two with a 50% interest in the company. Nothing wrong with that at all and nobody has been forced to do anything it doesn't want. It's not artificial, the stock prices are higher because _each share is now a bigger piece of the comapny_.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Note to Googlers.

If there's one thing I learned from working in Yahoo during its crazy rise in the early 2000's, it's that you should sell when your founders / CEO sell!

Our stocks were almost doubling every 6 months, we thought we were invincible! Many of my colleagues joined when Yahoo stocks were at its highest, so they were holding off for more gain. I was lucky enough to have joined when it was close to its lowest at $9 a share, so I happily sold some. Boy am I glad I did.

<comment><USER7> With a p/e of 25, a lot of growth is still priced in, and I see Google's competition speeding up. 0\. Google's cpc is expensive. 1\. I will happily spend my advertising on facebook - once I get around to it, this weekend. 2\. Bing adcenter is cheaper (though astoundingly shit so far - but only working with it a few days). 3\. I would advertise with duckduckgo in a shot. 4\. I will give twitter a go too.

<comment><USER8> Good luck getting any better value from Facebook unless your not directly selling anything. My experience has been Facebook ads cost just as much or more and convert terribly. Unless your providing something fun to do or building a brand they seem like bad value.

<comment><USER7> Just put $50.00 on it. They had a recommended cpc of $1.40 - which seems really, really extravagant. What would you say is the norm? We are newbies at marketing.

<comment><USER8> it depends who you are targetting i guess, 1.40 sounds very high but prob what they want for some us targetting? I tried getting specific, going for slightly cheaper groups and it still recormended like 50 cents. dont know what your ads are but i didnt find people at all interested ads for products, very low conversion

<comment><USER7> It's a domain name generator - it's 'mildly' fun. Still in beta testing so not posting it up on forums or anything. We are getting approximately 15 visitors a day (since last week), all paid for using google adwords, and largely from Egypt. CPC is about 5cent, bid set at 20c or something like that.

If I set bing adcenter to decide my bids it goes to $14 - pretty insane. I think we might push a buck fifty margin once we make our first sale. Exciting stuff.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I think the impressive thing about the story is that he'll still own over $5.4 billion in Google shares which represents 2.7% of the company.

</comment><comment><USER10> I never know what to think of CEOs, founders, and large institutional shareholders selling a proportion of their stock. Everyone seeks to cite a benign reason for selling, they wouldn't want to hurt their investment, but inherently isn't selling a sign of a lack of confidence?

The article cites the idea of diversification - which at face-value seems harmles - , but is this a lack of confidence in the stock? Diversification implies to minimize risk, and that is reasonable only if Eric Schmidt thinks that there is significant risk that Google will underperform market (or at least his expectation of return in a different investment). Unless he has a specific purpose in mind with his extra cash-flow, I would imagine this can only reflect poorly on Google's future expectations.

Here's to hoping that Eric Schmidt only wants to live extravagantly for next couple of years.

<comment><USER11> Diversification can be prudent and doesn't necessarily reflect lack of confidence.

Example: pick the stock in your portfolio that you are MOST bullish about. Why isn't every penny you own in that stock?

<comment><USER7> To agree with your comment, it is as dumb as a bag of hammers to have all of your savings in the company you work in. You lose your job, and your savings all in one day! This happened, as far as I know, to an awful lot of Bear Stearns employees - because it was considered good teamwork to own nothing but Bear Stearns shares.

<comment><USER12> Don't forget Enron.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Interesting timing, to say the least...

<comment><USER14> Sensible timing... can't see it raising as many alarm bells as if he did it at any other time.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> Wow that's a shitload of money, but he did a great work during the decade of being CEO.

</comment><comment><USER16> when does a major company post huge numbers - only to shitcan their CEO and bring back a co-founder? there is a lot of damage control in the media, but companies don't just 'do this sort of thing'

</comment><comment><USER17> Why is everyone talking about diversification, when this could point to something altogether?

What if he leaves the company to go work for a competitor, and to own those shares would reflect a conflict of interest?

I'm looking at you, Steve.

FTA he's not cutting a materially significant stake, but it's fun to speculate.

N.B. Just because insiders are selling shares does not make the stock a sale. The market's seen record sales from insiders during this entire market rally.

</comment><comment><USER18> see my post yesterday...

</comment><comment><USER19> For a little "walking around money".

But I imagine it's for liquidity's sake. Why would he think that the thing he has the most control in would stop being the best thing to invest in? It's like someone who owns a bagel shop selling some shares to own part of a coffee shop down the way.

Unless there are things out of Google's control that are coming, which might change the valuation. Or more importantly, impact their profit potential/share value increase potential?

<comment><USER20> _Why would he think that the thing he has the most control in would stop being the best thing to invest in?_

Because he knows he's fallible?

 _It's like someone who owns a bagel shop selling some shares to own part of a coffee shop down the way._

That might actually be a smart move.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> With 335MM, you can spend 31K every single day for the next 30 years.</comment>


Study: The Pill Causes Women to Like Different Men - <AUTHOR> http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/health/article4516566.ece <comment><USER2> This is a great science article, thanks DanielBMarkham!

"Several previous studies have suggested that women tend to prefer the smell of men who are different from them in a cluster of genes ... which governs the immune system"

"when the women started taking the Pill their preferences shifted towards the scent of men with more similar genes to their own."

"The research also found differences between women in relationships, who tended to prefer odours of men with different MHC genes, and single women, who tended to prefer the smell of MHC-similar men. This could potentially indicate that if women are tempted to have an affair, they are more likely to choose a man with very different genes, to maximise the diversity of any offspring that they might have."

"Women on the Pill tend to prefer macho types with strong jaw lines and prominent cheekbones. However, women who are not taking that form of contraception seem to be more likely to go for more sensitive types of men without traditionally masculine features."

If these findings are all true, how many things that have happened over the last 30-40 years would it explain? Sicklier children, cultural attitudes towards men, rising divorce rates, etc. Wow.

</comment><comment><USER3> We really need a male oral contraceptive. The pill would be far less likely to ruin relationships. Most men's desires are so, well, "broad spectrum" it's hard to imagine a change in our tastes that would eliminate our desire for our present partner.

<comment><USER4> Never happen.

1) No woman would believe you if you said you were on it (remember we are talking about initial stages of attraction here) 2) Society has ingrained prejudices against men dosing themselves with synthetic hormones in support of lifestyle choices

<comment><USER3> My girlfriend would be delighted if there were a male contraceptive pill. She is barely over 100 pounds and is very sensitive to medication across the board. (Just one cup of coffee in the afternoon is enough to give her insomnia.)

We went through 4 different contraceptive pills, each switch taking over a month. They had obnoxious side effects: made her feel irritable, cut her sex drive down to nothing, made her feel not attracted to me, and made her feel like she "wasn't herself." It was horrible and it did test our relationship. The pill is not really an option for her, and I wish I had an option other than a vasecctomy.

(We currently use condom & foam, which ruins a lot of the spontaneity, and which isn't quite effective enough for her tastes.)

<comment><USER5> > made her feel irritable, cut her sex drive down to nothing, made her feel > not attracted to me

I went through this for a year, and apparently a lot of our married friends have too. I think that this particular side-effect of the pill is more common than drug companies would like to admit. Worse, I think it's been attributed to female nature instead of recognized as a side effect of this far-too-common drug.

<comment><USER6> _made her feel irritable_ is an understatement for many women.

<comment><USER7> Sir, may I suggest you better explain your comment a little bit better? It'd be a shame to come across like a sexist soundbite.

<comment><USER6> I know two women that didn't want to take the pill because _they_ said it made them psycho. Don't shoot the messenger!

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Who made the study? Where and when? On how many women? Why so many people believe anything the press says without questioning it?

<comment><USER9> Science and health reporting in particular is notoriously bad.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> Now, should I forward this article to my gf or not?

</comment><comment><USER11> An interesting article describing attraction and smell in humans:

[http://psychologytoday.com/articles/index.php?term=pto-19960...](http://psychologytoday.com/articles/index.php?term=pto-19960301-000030&print=1)

It's interesting that the pill, which intentionally tampers with a woman's reproductive system, also tampers with what a woman finds attractive in a potential mate, sans the intention of mating for reproduction.

</comment><comment><USER12> So, all I have to do to get that girl that isn't interested in me to change her mind is convince her to take the Pill?

</comment><comment><USER13> Beer causes me to like different women.

</comment><comment><USER14> This capitalization of "Pill" is intriguing.

<comment><USER15> Capitalisation is conventional in English for proper nouns, which the Pill (an abbreviated form of the Combined Oral Contraceptive Pill) certainly is.

<comment><USER14> Ah! Thank you

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> it's too bad sterilization is so stigmatized.</comment>


Followup: Ask HN: Struggling to pay rent this month. Can I help you with a gig? - <AUTHOR> Original: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10813746
I wanted to share with HN what happened, since a lot of these "hey, help me" posts go unanswered.
I was able to successfully pay rent thanks to a few quick gigs that came my way. I was able to work about $2k, a comfortable position while I decide what my next move is.
Said invoice remains unpaid. I'm now a debt collector. There are options to consolidate, but the amount is in excess of $25k which makes things difficult. I do have contracts in place, and counsel I can lean on, but it's an incredibly exhausting and lengthy process. As a 24-year-old dev-shop founder I have learned my lesson. I'll require pre-paid invoices from here on. There's more to the story, but in short, I've wound things down after my co-founder (design/sales) unexpectedly left us in early Q2 2015.
The response was overwhelming. I was quickly playing catch-up with the number of emails I received. It brought tears to my eyes, especially coming from HN where elitism is often bred and found.
I'm unsure what my next steps will be. Obvious question of "why don't you ask your clients?" My answer is either, "they don't have a need for me where I can make a direct impact" or "they're too big/too corporate and couldn't justify being billed by a one-man consultancy/dev-shop, let alone a felon."
What other options may I have that I'm failing to see? As I said, I can't pass a background check. It has rarely hurt me, but I've rarely put myself in a position to find out if it will matter. As you can tell, I'm pretty open and honest about it, but a little timid.
If you'd prefer to reach out to me directly, you can send me an email at firstname.lastname@example.com and it'll forward directly to my email.
All-and-all, I'm entirely thankful (albeit surprised) that HN came through with such a response. The elitism is still here, and I still get a little perplexed reading some comments, but for the most part we're good peoples. <comment><USER2> Glad it worked out. I wasn't able to contribute unfortunately, but I wish you good luck for the future.</comment>


PayPal Fraud Measures are too extreme - <AUTHOR> http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/02/technology/paypal-antifraud-measures-are-extreme-some-users-say.html?_r=1&smid=tw-nytimes&seid=auto

<comment><AUTHOR> Is Esponoza's case one of the reason they hold money back is people wanting refunds/change their mind. A lot of people sign up for sporting events with the best of intentions but then soon realize they won't be able actually do the event.</comment>


FastMail acquires Pobox and Listbox - <AUTHOR> http://blog.fastmail.com/2015/11/03/fastmail-acquires-pobox-and-listbox/ <comment><USER2> Congrats to everyone! Thanks for keeping pay for email alive. If you're not the one paying, you're the product!

<comment><USER3> I do pay for my personal account to FastMail, but I still predominantly use Gmail. In fact, I pay for FastMail just to keep the address. For some side projects, it gets really expensive for me and for that I use Mail-in-a-Box [0], which I still pay for, but much less if I have to use the business tiers of FastMail, which still don't give me as much flexibility.

[0] [https://mailinabox.email/](https://mailinabox.email/)

<comment><USER4> > For some side projects, it gets really expensive for me

I'm curious what's making it expensive.

For what it's worth, I'm on the Enhanced $40/year plan and I use it for personal email as well as side projects.

I just setup a new virtual domain, a new profile, and a rule to move all mail addressed to that domain to a folder for that project.

<comment><USER5> Does that approach work well for you? I had been considering it, but I couldn't find anything concrete saying that would work. I never did put the time into doing the trial to find out.

<comment><USER6> I do this and it works fine though there are some limits to be aware of (see "Quotas for other services" [https://www.fastmail.com/help/account/limits.html](https://www.fastmail.com/help/account/limits.html)).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I've only been using FastMail for a few months now but my experience has been quite positive. Its speed lives up to its name and I've never had trouble with it working. It even works better with Apple Mail than iCloud does, which is crazy.

The prices seem a little steep but they're manageable.

</comment><comment><USER8> It seems like everyone I read loves using FastMail for personal email/calendar/contacts.

What I haven't found is many Businesses using FastMail for corporate email/calendar/contacts.

Can someone compare FastMail (for business usage) to Office 365 and/or Google Apps?

<comment><USER9> Rackspace Mail (formerly MailTrust) has over 200K customers and 3 million hosted mailboxes, all paid. For just $2/month/mailbox, they give you an SLA- backed 100% uptime guarantee and 24x7x365 live (phone, chat or email) support. They also do hosted Exchange with Active Directory support, assisted migrations and Outlook setup. At first glance, FastMail is missing a lot of the business oriented stuff for bigger companies.

<comment><USER10> Well, yeah, on paper it's $2/month/mailbox, but there's a $10 a month minimum, so it's really at least $120 a year.

Fastmail is really $40 a year for their "Enhanced" plan and you can pay it in 5-year chunks at $160 so you just don't have to worry about it.

I've used both (and used to work for Rackspace) and I use Fastmail. YMMV.

<comment><USER9> He asked why businesses aren't choosing FastMail for corporate use even though people love it for personal use. I don't think the $10/month minimum for 5 seats is an issue there.

<comment><USER8> Exactly!

I'm interested in hearing from businesses their review of FastMail. It goes without saying that nearly all love FastMail for personal use.

Trouble is, I can hardly finding any reviews of people using the service for business use.

Curious to know if it's as good for business use as personal.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Here is a simple usecase: I would like to use fastmail for their mail offer on my own domain, but not for their calendar and contacts. I need something to keep my google calendar and contacts in sync with icloud calendar and contacts, with bonus points if it keeps that in sync too with outlook calendars and contact. (By keeping in contact I mean 2 way sync)

I haven't seen such a product yet. What I would like is to have this mix of fastmail + the calendar and contacts gmail accounts on ,y desktop computer, and another mix of fastmail plus the icloud contacts and calendar accounts on my ipad and have both synchronize their data. Fastmail makes sense because it's better, but the contacts/calendar offering not so. Icloud has great sync features (push etc) for apple hardware, gmail for android, and it's a pain when you don't move fully to an ecosystem or another.

The closest thing I've seen is Nuevasync to add Exchange Activesync to regular gmail accounts, but I'd prefer leaving icloud sync in its own way on the ipad.

<comment><USER12> Can't you use Google calendar/contacts with an Apple device? So use FastMail for mail (works great with any mail client, or they have an app for iOS/Android), and google for calendar and contacts. That's what I do for Windows Phone and Android, because I just have the lite FastMail account -- only web based calendar and contacts.

<comment><USER11> I totally can, but no, it's not the same. As mentioned above it's a pain if you don't fully move to one system or another. I want to use ios devices with icloud data syncing - and have something else sync google data to icloud.</comment></comment></comment>