That's what this article highlighted the most to me. It's hard to make something that feels small and personal and quirky yet appeals to everyone. If you make something beautiful and targeted inevitably someone says "Hey! You should expand!"
I had this conversation with the owner of a tiny Japanese steakhouse in Tokyo where I had the best steak of my life. There were only like 8 tables and I was there alone so he sat down with me and we talked for a half hour. He told me how many times he had been approached to expand to other cities or the US over the 30 years they'd been open. But he didn't want the stress and he didn't think he could deliver the quality of meal if he did. Sushi and ramen places are like this in Japan too. They may be the best but they often stay small.
I think we've lost track of that in the USA and particularly Silicon Valley (or maybe we never had it.) Would we be happier if Facebook had stayed elite university only and there were 100 social sharing websites for different niches? I dunno. Probably not. But I think we're also learning that one size fits all social is not as interesting on a massive scale as we thought it would be. Path isn't doing that well either though. Maybe the best we can do is subreddits. God save us.