Ask HN: Will Facebook export allow competitors really start?

2 pointsrakkhi1 comment

Export allows a reduction of a major barrier to the network effect will this allow clones and competitors like Dispora a real start with the ability to get a few million users quickly? Will it lead to some real innovators who were previously put off due to scaling up to Facebook?

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No. Social networks are only useful when you can access a critical mass of your friends in one network. Thus, fragmentation of social networks reduces their utility for most people.

Uber geeks may want to try something else, but for most people facebook works and thats what counts.

The thing that would allow growth of some networks would be an open id style profile API so that I can interact with users from social network X from within social network Y. But why would any leading social network adopt such an API?

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