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Comment by brc | Hacker News Reader

I don't know about this. I've already seen a few regular posters leave facebook. Facebook grew really quickly. Now that people know such a thing can exist, and know what to expect from it, I wouldn't be at all surprised to see some great exodus to a different site. It's not beyond the realm of possibility. I think what these articles (facebook is safe) fail to factor in is the invention of some really cool new thing that some other site comes up with. Facebook quickly aped the Twitter-style feed, but the next big thing they may not be able to do so quickly. After all, people have only so much free online attention, and if something new and shiny is perceived to be better than facebook, then it could happen, and quickly.

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Precisely. Of course people don't plan an exodus from Facebook yet. Exodus to what? There are no prominent Facebook competitors with better privacy constraints. Nobody bothered to start one over the last few years, because that space was dominated by Facebook itself, before the company decided to abandon it! Nobody wants to pick a fight with Facebook on its own turf. And nature may abhor a vacuum, but a vacuum doesn't fill up instantly.

It will, of course, be harder to grow a privacy-enabled service than a promiscuous one. It's harder to establish the viral loop. But that doesn't mean it could not happen, and it is probably too soon to tell if or when it will.

Facebook will look fine for a while, but the damage to their brand is permanent. People don't jump ship without motive, means, and opportunity, but now the motive is firmly in place for a lot of users. Wait and see what happens if and when someone invents the means and offers the opportunity.

The key value of Facebook is mass-opt-in messaging, including photos/videos as a sort of message. So if I'm going to such and such a party, I don't need to seek people out, I just post it on Facebook and people will know what I'm up to if they want to join.

Until a service exists and I can migrate there with all of my friends, I need Facebook to fill that role. Yeah, I could just restrict myself to those who seek me out (or I seek out), but that would likely mean discarding some people who might have been great lifelong friends.

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