Now that I’m one day out from Facebook’s acquisition of FriendFeed, I’m starting to see the move through a less emotional lens. Do I still feel like the FriendFeed team sold us out? Absolutely. Is it their fault, though, that all the work we’ve put into our FriendFeed accounts might vanish one day? I’m afraid not.
The fact is, nothing lasts forever, and the FriendFeed sale has made that more apparent to me than ever. Money talks, and not just for small startups but bigger companies, as well. If a product or venture isn’t making money, it either needs to start or it needs to disappear – that is what is in the best interest of the investors or shareholders. And unfortunately, while we the customers help these companies grow, they don’t answer to us.
I fear for the future, now. FriendFeed is not the only service I use on a regular basis and it certainly isn’t the only free service I use. What if AOL decides one day that the AIM servers aren’t worth keeping on? What if Twitter can’t monetize, its investors become impatient and it sells in a way similar to FriendFeed? The only platform I can truly depend on to stick around is my blog, which is why I’m going to bring it back into the fold again. The blogosphere needs to become a bigger piece of my conversation pie because, honestly, my trust in microblogging has been shaken.
If you’re a FriendFeeder with a blog, I would love to connect with you and toss your feed into my Google Reader list. Leave me a comment and maybe some other visitors will subscribe to you, too.
Remember again – nothing lasts forever. Especially things that are being given to you for free. Choose the place you converse and make connections wisely, because it might not be around tomorrow.
I haven’t written a blog post in about four months. Life has been getting in the way and I just haven’t had the time to sit down and put some thought into a serious post. This is the first time I’ve felt compelled to write in that span of time and it pains me to do so. Whether this strikes a chord or is just another post echoing around inside the chamber, this is how I feel.
Betrayed.
Earlier today, FriendFeed sold itself out to Facebook for a reported $50 million. What will Facebook do with FriendFeed? No one knows for certain, but many suspect this was not a purchase of FriendFeed but instead a purchase of FriendFeed’s tech and talent. Much like Twitter acquired I Want Sandy a few months back and later shut it down, this might not bode well for FriendFeed users.
I’m a bit sickened by FriendFeed’s willingness to sell. I can’t quite put my finger on why, but I have a few theories.
Maybe it’s the way the early FriendFeed adopters contributed so much and are now getting so little. Robert Scoble and Louis Gray, for example, evangelized the hell out of FriendFeed and did so for good reason – they loved the service and thought it could do big things. My idea of a big thing was not selling to Facebook, but I’m not sure how Louis and Robert feel. And it wasn’t just Robert and Louis but tons more. If I named every single person who talked up FriendFeed like it was the light bulb, I’d be writing here for days.
Maybe I hate this move because I will miss the FriendFeed community – the people I’ve met, shared laughs with and learned from. What happens to them? Do they vanish into thin air? I don’t know. For those who want to keep in touch, find me on Twitter (@shawn) or send me an email – shawnfarner (at) gmail (dot) com.
There’s one last reason I could be disappointed by this – maybe I thought the FriendFeed crew was above selling themselves out. Maybe I thought they wanted to innovate on their terms. After all, these guys left Google to strike out on their own. That led me to believe that they were going to do their damnedest to make sure FriendFeed became all it could be, and by that I mean more than just a few new buttons in Facebook. Guess not.
I’m sure a lot of others are let down by this news and are standing at the same crossroads, too. FriendFeed is saying it still wants to be my friend (for the time being), but I’m not sure if I can do it. If Facebook decides to keep FriendFeed intact, that will take some of the sting away but it won’t repair the trust – and what’s a relationship without trust?
Are you a fan of Scrabulous? If so, you’ve probably noticed that the popular Scrabble-clone has vanished from Facebook. I’ll let you go for a few minutes while you blow off some steam.
. . .
Feeling better? No? Don’t worry – about half a million other Scrabulous players are feeling the same way. Severalblogpostsexplainthesituation, but nowhere is the frustration more obvious than on the Facebook walls of both Scrabulous and Hasbro’s SCRABBLE Beta.
Here are some snippets (viewer discretion is advised):
“I didn’t have an interest in playing the board game until I started playing scrabulous online. Have several friends who’ve purchased the board game simply because they became hooked on scrabulous.”
“This is a sad day. In the big Scrabulous game of life, Hasbro made a BAD MOVE!!!”
“I will personally ban the Hasbro application, they have left a very negative impression over this whole issue….I am moving to Europe where I can once again enjoy playing scrabulous!”
“Hasbro sucks big fat donkey d*ck!!! I looked forward to 2 things daily… my morning cup of coffee and playing scrabulous… Sad sad day”
“What the shit! Don’t they realize that because of this app I actually went out and BOUGHT a scabble board! I’m sure alot more people have done the same, now I dont even want to play the real thing I am so pissed. What a bunch of losers!”
“Just more corporate greed. The folks at Hasbro can go screw themselves!”
“Are you fucking kidding me??????????????????? I met the possible love of my life playing this game. I shall never, ever buy another Hasbro product again!!!!!!!”
“This is pathetic. Who was being hurt by people playing this game? I’ll be sure to remember this when it comes time to do my Christmas toy shopping.”
“So you fucking take scrabulous down and cant have a working application? Fucking ridiculous.”
“wait. now i have zero scrabble options. this is better how? AT LEAST PUT YOUR CRAPPY BETA BACK ONLINE.”
“Your application is pitiful. I can’t believe you killed Scrabulous for this piece of crap.”
“Gosh, this application is awful, a bandwidth/CPU hog, and buggy as hell! I expected more from the combined corporate resources of Hasbro and Electronic Arts. How do you spell L-A-M-E?”
“Great idea to shut down Scrabulous before you even have a working replacement…Jackasses.”
“oh. and please note that every 5 minutes ur getting a new negative message about your game. Oh and also I can still play scraboulous by proxy. Lick my balls.”
“BOYCOTT Hasbro!!!”
This is surely not the PR Hasbro wants to be getting right now. Still, they should have seen it coming. Did they think they could shut down an application with over 500,000 daily users, not offer a working replacement, and get away unscathed? If so, they are severely overestimating the power of their brand.
Well, the new Facebook layout is here – that is, if you want it to be. It is accessible by visiting www.new.facebook.com and logging in. I personally have been looking forward to the upgrade to see what features Facebook would implement to take on Twitter and FriendFeed. They had a real opportunity to turn the News feed on the Home Page into a FriendFeed of sorts by adding likes and commenting, and to take on Twitter by making status updates more of a conversation and less of an away message.
They did none of the above.
The News Feed is pretty much the same – and by pretty much, I mean EXACTLY the same. Ball dropped. I’m confused as to why Facebook felt it needed to add commenting to the Profile’s Mini-Feed (which I rarely look at) but not to the Home page (which some people scan religiously for the latest gossip). They had a real chance to put FriendFeed away – Facebook’s user base easily dwarfs FriendFeeds. A definite blown opportunity.
Status updates are primped up a little bit, but not much. The Profile page now has a box at the top that asks, “What are you doing now?” Very Twitter like, don’t you think? However, that’s where the similarity ends. First off, I don’t quite understand the rationale for treating status updates like Twitter on the Profile page but treating them like the status updates of old on the Home page. It’s confusing – I honestly believe that those new to Facebook (and even some veterans) might not understand that these two status messages are, in fact, the same thing. On top of that, there’s no way to communicate with others through updates (no @replies like Twitter). To see the status updates of all your friends, you have to visit the “Friends” link at the top of the page. However, these status updates are only that friend’s most recent – you won’t find multiple updates and it is nearly impossible to look at old updates. Lame.
There are a bunch of other things I don’t like about the new Facebook interface, like the Wall Post/Activity mashup where a clean, uncomplicated Wall should be. However, the News Feed and Status Update features are the ones I’m the most disappointed with. I really felt like Facebook had a chance to capitalize on its user base and establish itself further as a hot spot on the web by implementing FriendFeed and Twitter-like features. They didn’t, and that is an epic fail.
I’m getting really fed up with all the FriendFeed evangelists who insist Twitter is on its way out. I can’t go one day without reading a blog post, a FriendFeed comment or a tweet (the irony) suggesting that the takeover of FriendFeed is imminent.
Let me tell you what is going on in my FriendFeed right now – lots of tweets, a few posted FF messages and blog posts. Most don’t have comments. I’m following a lot of not-so-well-known techies who are getting no love. It seems that most of this “world-wide talk show” revolves around items shared by Paul Buchheit (a FriendFeed founder) and well-known FriendFeed trumpeters (Robert Scoble, Louis Gray, etc.).
Moving over to Twitter – someone is clearing out their spam folder. A local journalist is @replying back and forth with residents in the area. Robert Scoble is on his way to HP labs. These people are telling the world what they’re doing and what they think is interesting – quickly and concisely. In Twitter, it seems to matter less how popular you are. It doesn’t matter that @problogger has thousands more followers than @floor9. Their tweets are weighed the same – unlike FF, where the popular users gain more comments, which in turn bump their items to the top and bury the rest.
Does Twitter have downtime problems? Absolutely, and I complain a lot, believe me. The truth is, though, that Twitter’s network dwarfs FriendFeed’s. The users are hooked. Think about how many times Twitter has gone down or deactivated key features. The fact that they still have such a strong user base speaks volumes. If anyone thought there was a viable alternative to Twitter, they’d be there. There isn’t. Those who insist that the Twitter exodus has begun or that FriendFeed has somehow “taken over” are being sensationalists. FriendFeed will never kill Twitter. I’ve stated this a few times, but one more won’t hurt – if Twitter is killed by anyone, it’ll be Facebook. And FriendFeed will share the same fate.
I will continue to play in both, because I do believe that each one has value. FriendFeed does a lot of cool things and aggregates social networks better than any other app I’ve seen. But FriendFeed replacing Twitter is nonsense, and I invite anyone who truly believes it to totally delete their Twitter account and put their money where their mouth is.
To start off, the food court on campus here (Folger) has the most terrible sushi on earth. After having decent sushi over the weekend, Folger’s just doesn’t cut it. One thing I noticed is that their rice is really, really wet, and they use a lot of it. A lot of rice and very little of anything else does not make for good sushi. Seeing as I’m probably the only person who buys it from them, they should improve it for my sake.
How many of you use Twitter? You should start. It’s terribly addicting, though I haven’t discovered any real solid use for it yet. I basically just update it via the web or text message it with some random thoughts every once in awhile. If you came to this post via Twitter, I’m obviously not talking about you. :-P And by the way, follow.
Speaking of web apps, I’ve been playing around lately on Ustream.tv and blogTV. If you have some time to kill and want to see people make fools out of themselves, those are pretty good places to start. I’m still a big fan of YouTube, but I feel it’s a bit flawed in that it doesn’t offer any sort of way to go live. Until they do, these other services will fill the gap. Here are some pretty funny shows you should watch if they’re on:
I really need to get my Last.FM account rolling again. The last time I even logged in was in 2006, and it seems as though people still use it. I swore it would be something that was cool for a little bit but would then die a quick death. Me, wrong? Who knew such a thing was possible? Is anyone else still using Last.FM?
I might have to start an end-of-the-week roundup of the most hilarious Facebook status messages I’ve seen throughout the week. That’s an idea I’ll kick around. This one is just way too good to save until Friday, though. Ladies and gentlemen, my friend Davis Ly: “All that studying counts for nothing….. Does Temple not want me to Gratulate!!!”
I haven’t written a blog post in about four months. Life has been getting in the way and I just haven’t had the time to sit down and put some thought into a serious post. This is the first time I’ve felt compelled to write in that span of time and it pains me to do so. Whether this strikes a chord or is just another post echoing around inside the chamber, this is how I feel.
Are you a fan of Scrabulous? If so, you’ve probably noticed that the popular Scrabble-clone has vanished from Facebook. I’ll let you go for a few minutes while you blow off some steam.
