Facebook-Not Sweet?
Does anyone else have a problem with Facebook loading? I find that at least 50% of the time that I click on the links in a Facebook email, it doesn’t log me into the system. Don’t get me wrong, I am totally impressed by the growth of Facebook and business acumen of Zuckerberg and his advisers, but if your company has that many users and that much money, shouldn’t you get the page loading working?
I am in Facebook to explore and learn, I haven’t yet figured out why I love it. I know my brother, who is a senior in college is addicted, but I am still haven’t figured out what problem Facebook is solving for me. For now, I will stick with it and learn from the excellent UI and business execution. That said the only social network that remains truly interesting to me right now is LinkedIN.
Thoughts?
November 29th, 2007 at 8:54 am
Stumbled across your post searching for others having problems with Facebook loading. I’m experiencing that problem all the time. I’ve discovered that it seems to be (at least partially) related to the network hostnames that Facebook uses. For instance, this morning I can’t get to any Facebook page if I use the hostname of my college: http://wheatonil.facebook.com, but if I just go to http://www.facebook.com, it works fine.
I share your appreciation for the UI and execution of Facebook. Especially when compared to the nauseating MySpace, Facebook is a thing of beauty and elegance. It is somewhat unfortunate (but perhaps unavoidable) that the Facebook development platform has reduced the cleanliness of the UI and threatened to reduce it to the clutter of MySpace, but the platform is the very thing that demonstrates the fantastic architecture and forward-thinking of Zuckerberg and crew. MySpace would have to be re-written from the ground up to accomplish anything at that level.
As for the usefulness and viability of Facebook, I’m surprised this has escaped you — though I have no idea of your place in life, and how that my affect your impressions.
Though LinkedIn can be useful when networking and job searching, I haven’t found it very interesting beyond that. It’s a good business tool, but it doesn’t serve a daily need, at least in my experience.
Facebook, on the other hand, provides much better ability to simply “share life” together. I’m in my mid-thirties, and have been able to reconnect with dozens of people from high school, college, and elsewhere whom I haven’t talked with in years. Now, I keep up with what’s going on in their lives, see pictures of their kids, wish them happy birthday, know about their job changes, and basically keep in touch with old friends the way I’ve always claimed I wanted to.
I’m also a part-time youth pastor, and as you might imagine, Facebook pays enormous dividends in that role, since it allows me to keep up with the students in my group.
Anyway, those are some thoughts — thanks for your post.
November 30th, 2007 at 11:58 am
Besides providing a online gathering place that may be cleaner (in a couple ways) than others (MySpace), I don’t see what people would use it for other than to see friends and what they’re doing. But to crib someone I just read, as long as the users keep coming and the universe grows and GDF remains addicted there will be some way to make money off it. It doesn’t have to have a clear benefit, just keep you there and entertain you (enrich you, enthrall you, etc.). I don’t know about biz acumen, but they’re smart as to how people want to interact.