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Comment by hrktb | Hacker News Reader

> Facebook was the last Silicon Valley company to create something that literally has disrupted the way we live and interact.

I feel completely out of the loop. What has facebook created that is so impactful ?

I see them as a company that incrementaly executed better than the previous social networks and successfully killed/absorbed competition. But is there any critical thing they really created from the end user point of view ?

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I'm also out of the loop, there were tons of social media companies before Facebook so no creation of something new and disruptive. The comment you are responding to reads to me as survivor-ship fallacy of whatever social media company managed to move away from investor money and into ad money in an effective way. Which, in my opinion, seems like a luck factor mixed with more luck regarding on how the end users react to it (or if ad-free investor backed competition came at that moment too). In another world, MySpace would've done this transition but they didn't and someone would be arguing that MySpace and Tom is an excellent executive and that only them could achieve what was achieved.

Or even Flickr. There were also lots of more regional social network sites going on, at least in Europe.

1. Their Ads product. Seems obvious today, but was revolutionary. There are an incredible number of companies, from massive DTC brands to SMBs across the US, that would not exist today if not for Facebook.

2. No other social network has even come close to how much FB has connected the world.

> I feel completely out of the loop. What has facebook created that is so impactful ?

Social network that spawns most of the world. It's a very valid to argue about upsides or downsides of it, but no one else came even close in creating such a huge, powerful and diverse network.

This is a matter of scale more than disruption though.

For instance Shimano crushed all other cycling equipment vendors in an unprecedented way, at a scale never see before and built a worldwide empire.

But did Shimano’s entry fundamentally change the field ? I’d argue no. They iterated and executed flawlessly, actually not disrupting what was a good business to them from the start.

I’d argue Facebook is in the same position. They brought unprecedented scale and became the massively dominant player, while keeping the field mostly the same in quality (targeted ads, social games etc. were already a thing, older SNS already pivoted on that before facebook coming in)

Facebook broke through. We could have easily had a world with dozens of major social networks, each catering to a different subset of the world and consumer groups. Facebook, though, was able to gain nearly universal acceptance -- outside of countries where it is explicitly banned. There was no guarantee one company would take that prize. In fact it was more likely that we'd have Reddit, MySpace, TikTok, etc all catering to different audiences with no one platform that basically everyone at least has an account for.

We get it, you <strikethrough>run Arch</strikethrough>don't use FB.

> What has facebook created that is so impactful ?

facebook.com

I don’t mind the downvotes, but would want some guidance. I don’t use facebook, so I’d genuinely want to know what it has disrupted in the way you live that the other SNS won’t do.

They are so incredibly large in user numbers that they have the ability to reach almost anyone in developed countries through their platforms.

It's not the product but its magnitude. That's the disruption IMO.

But is it a disruption if they operate as a larger version of an already successful phenomenon ?

I’d see how a service like Streetview would be seen as disruptive because of bringing a fringe fonctionnality to a mass market in a unprecedented scale.

But I feel like calling Facebook disruptive is like saying Samsung is revolutionnary, by the sheer massive number of smartphones they sell.

I mean. We clearly have different definitions of disruptive. For me disruptive != innovative.

For me disruptive boils down to how likely is something to produce a change in the behaviors of a general population and improve (or worsen) their lives.

Streeview is very innovative, for sure. But it hasn't changed me or anyone that I know in any significant way.

On the other hand Facebook services allow me to stay in touch with my elder parents who live in Colombia and stay in touch with people I care about. The technology or the concepts may not be incredibly innovative but I can characterize them as disruptive just because of their size (reach).

Also I have discovered interesting products through Instagram Ads. That seems minor but ultimately many of those things have had a certain impact in my overall quality of life.

I can very, very easily find my old eighth grade teacher and thank her for being an influence on my life. Good luck doing that with any other social network.

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