Hacker News Reader

Comment by two2two | Hacker News Reader

"The tricks, hooks, and tactics Facebook uses to keep people coming back have gotten more aggressive and explicit. And I feel that takes away from the actual value the platform provides."

This is why I stopped using Facebook. I really didn't mind the platform until they crossed the threshold of being a useful product to reminding my each time I used it that I AM the product.

I like to fly under the radar and prefer people to find my pictures and posts naturally. Once they started force feeding people my content I decided to stop inflicting my peers with fuel for facebooks social cannons.

View on HN

Agreed. I wonder how long before most of FB's users notice how aggressive this is and, perhaps more likely, how boring the feed becomes with these tricks.

Is FB getting more aggressive because it wants even more or because it is actually losing clicks/logons/attention?

> Is FB getting more aggressive because it wants even more or because it is actually losing clicks/logons/attention?

Probably the latter. I only recall getting the clingy email messages when I haven't checked it in a few days.

I've never had a problem with Facebook over-use, but I know people who have. Those notifications are so slimy and akin to waving a drink in front of an alcoholic's face.

Facebook is definitely losing engagement.

http://fortune.com/2016/04/07/facebook-sharing-decline/

I think a lot of new companies are going to be burned by this eventually.

Every time Facebook turns up the notification rate, they see more engagement. Every time they encourage Boosting a post, they make more money. And then later, when they can't link cause and effect, people like you and me and OP give up on the site completely.

Similarly, sites that A/B test and adjust features and "improve" their design constantly pay a real price - their users feel like guinea pigs and can't ever learn to use the product fluidly. But a .1% conversion boost is measurable now, while a slow bleed of users who want reliability can't be proven.

At a certain point trading goodwill for bigger numbers actually does become a problem, and I think we're getting there.

What do you mean exactly? When did they started doing that? I've always been of the "under the radar" type myself, not too popular and so on, and I can't imagine how Facebook would be forcing my content over people.

(I've closed my account on 2013, so I don't know exactly what happened since then.)

Right when they decided to let the world know you changed your profile picture with no option to do it silently.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com