Facebook Is Pulling Back from Its Foray into Podcasting
bloomberg.com
bloomberg.com
The only reason these audio-focused projects were started was that at the start of 2021 people believed it was a "Mark priority", and everyone wanted to ship something by the end of H1 2021 so it would make it into their performance reviews. (This is also the explanation for why so many companies including Twitter, FB and Spotify shipped audio products around May-June 2021. Everybody ran on the same review cycle.)
It's hard to exaggerate how much of FB's flailing is explained by internal beliefs in something being a Mark priority, which then shifts to something else by the next half. It's a downside of being a founder-owned company at this scale – the signals from the top become caricatures of "Great Leader probably wants X now."
Or that they are clear but changing on a whim?
When these products were chartered Clubhouse was in the middle of a massive upswing and the industry was convinced that live audio was the next format threat akin to TikTok’s short form videos or Snap’s stories format. Just as we’ve seen with those formats, every big company got the wheels turning to compete in the space.
It turned out that the hype around Clubhouse was because it was a particularly great product for tech influencers (VC and media), but consumer experience wasn’t enough to cross the chasm and retain users at scale. When it became clear that Clubhouse was destined to be more like Houseparty than TikTok, all the big platforms except for Twitter basically cooled on the space and focused elsewhere.
This doesn't add up with Facebook going "all-in" on the metaverse imo.
One thing I always tell people like you is: concentrate on your content. Anticipate every possible question, and have an answer for it. Don't think about hand gestures, eye contact, and all that Toastmasters stuff at all.
Have little note cards with reminders to yourself on what points to hit.
You can only think of ONE thing while you're talking. So let it be this:
I know the stuff.
They don't.
They want to know it.
Maybe that's three things.
"hope that some people will still listen" : Yes, they will, If those three things are true.
I definitely fine myself more engaged by Elon's presentations despite his performance.
I'm not sure if that counts as charisma, but it's not nothing.
* The world adopts something (ie podcasting)
* It starts becoming mainstream
* All the big players become established
* Facebook shows up with a half hearted attempt
* You never hear about the FB product again.
I expected this.
That kind of content is okay live, especially in a venue like a Twitch stream where you can actually participate in the mayhem. But as a recording? I end up just changing to something else.