Is Facebook Wrong in the Facebook vs. Google+ Battle?

Rob Williams

Editor-in-Chief
Staff member
Moderator
We've all heard of the 'Streisand Effect', named after American singer Barbra Streisand, where trying to keep something quiet or stopping a piece of information from getting out can only lead to even greater publicity, making the situation much worse. This wouldn't have been too common prior to the Internet, but today, things can explode online within a matter of minutes. Is Facebook the latest victim of this phenomenon?

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Read the rest of our post and then discuss it here!
 

marfig

No ROM battery
There's an intense sense or irony to all of this when we remember some of the for-the-good-of-mankind dialog lines we are constantly thrown into when watching the latest and greatest internet-has-changed-the-world-OMG-LOLZ flick, named "The Social Network".

For the good of what?... Nothing like a dose of reality coming down crashing on anyone's head for priorities to suddenly change and those bleeding heart higher values to suddenly shift. Well done Mr. Zuckerberg. Welcome to the land of the living, the lousy breath, and the can-shitting folks. In short, welcome back to being a regular guy, and not some greek god.

For the rest of us, a lesson in loyalty perhaps. That a company, any company, serves only paradise if it comes as a byproduct of their own financial objectives. That playing the fan should be reserved to sports and playing the zealot should be reserved to religion. That it is ok -- really it is. don't be afraid -- to like a product without making a spectacle of ourselves anytime someone either doesn't like it, or likes something else better. Unless we actually have shares, we should quit the fanboy hollering and look at any company (any company!) has a self-serving entity that we can in fact milk something from, but only if we are smart enough to always have it on its toes, instead of letting it lax with all that ass kissing BS, that one should only realistically expect (and hope) from a child awed at how his father looks so cool when driving a bike.

As for G+, same all, same old. We do no evil until we do. Put money into Mozilla, but let's build our own browser to put mozilla out of the picture. Let's invest on social networking because that's where the money is. Don't forget cellphones too and jack off those Java patents. Btw, did you remember to plant all sorts of user traffic monitoring scripts? Good thing we say on our TOS we can change our TOS, everytime we fell like changing our TOS for no reason other than wanting to change our TOS. And by the way, how's it going with the PR? We still holding up as the good samaritans on the web? Still kicking those balls? That's good, that's good... What did you say about our shares? Up? Capital man! You rock.
 
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Rob Williams

Editor-in-Chief
Staff member
Moderator
marfig said:
As for G+, same all, same old. We do no evil until we do. Put money into Mozilla, but let's build our own browser to put mozilla out of the picture. Let's invest on social networking because that's where the money is. Don't forget cellphones too and jack off those Java patents. Btw, did you remember to plant all sorts of user traffic monitoring scripts? Good thing we say on our TOS we can change our TOS, everytime we fell like changing our TOS for no reason other than wanting to change our TOS. And by the way, how's it going with the PR? We still holding up as the good samaritans on the web? Still kicking those balls? That's good, that's good... What did you say about our shares? Up? Capital man! You rock.

Haha, oh man. Your coffee awful bitter today, aye? :D

I couldn't agree more though. But I still think it's lame that Facebook are being such babies about this... I am fairly confident Google wouldn't pull the same stunt. But I can't say for sure. If Facebook wants to retain users, maybe it should stop doing things people don't want it to (such as make it difficult to have actual privacy).
 

marfig

No ROM battery
But I can't say for sure. If Facebook wants to retain users, maybe it should stop doing things people don't want it to (such as make it difficult to have actual privacy).

Absolutely. They brought this on themselves. Not that they asked anyone to compete, but that over the past 2 or 3 years their actions (or lack thereof), particularly on the privacy front, opened a real window of opportunity in this market. Facebook had lost much of its sex appeal, a problem that wasn't so visible because there wasn't any real alternative.

The best gauge of a company business model is when it's faced with real competition. If Facebook starts bleeding users left, right and center, all will be said and done concerning how Facebook conducted business in the past years.

The #1 priority for both of them is revenue. That's about all I see.

And a little more, I think.

Let's face it, two social networks are one too many. What is anyone going to do when half their friends and family are on Facebook and the other half on G+? Can you say anti-social network?

I think both companies know this. Why this is war.
 

Yangster

Obliviot
Mmm well there's already history of social websites disappearing and fading out once newer and better ones come out right? Who still uses Myspace? Xanga?

I can understand where they're coming from. To me it seems like going to McDonalds and then giving the other customers ads for Burger King. Obviously the managers at McDonalds wouldn't be too pleased with that and would try to stop it.
 

Kougar

Techgage Staff
Staff member
As for G+, same all, same old. We do no evil until we do. Put money into Mozilla, but let's build our own browser to put mozilla out of the picture. Let's invest on social networking because that's where the money is. Don't forget cellphones too and jack off those Java patents. Btw, did you remember to plant all sorts of user traffic monitoring scripts? Good thing we say on our TOS we can change our TOS, everytime we fell like changing our TOS for no reason other than wanting to change our TOS. And by the way, how's it going with the PR? We still holding up as the good samaritans on the web? Still kicking those balls? That's good, that's good... What did you say about our shares? Up? Capital man! You rock.

No single entity can grow to be a large company without eventually doing some action that tarnishes their image or is perceived to have been wrong. Even is considering some of the most upstanding companies or nonprofits, I don't think a one hasn't had corruption or scandal or hasn't done some perceived wrong.

I still like Google. And I see nothing wrong with them deciding to make their own browser.. both are free, Mozilla gets to keep their money, and they still have pretty strong marketing tie-ins with each other. Google is one of those rare companies that follows the adage, "If ya want something done right, do it yourself". Or at least they try.

As far as the ridiculous TOS issues go... legalese has never been pleasant. But I don't blame most companies for them, I think the people that work to exploit loopholes and find stupid reasons to take these companies to court over perceived "damages" done to them to gamble for a quick buck are the main cause behind those.

Haha, oh man. Your coffee awful bitter today, aye? :D

Hah, you noticed too? I felt like I'd just had a cup of pure black coffee after I read that. :D

Mmm well there's already history of social websites disappearing and fading out once newer and better ones come out right? Who still uses Myspace? Xanga?

Well, every time I look up some DJ they always have a myspace page... :D Even they are starting to migrate to their own sites though!
 
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Rob Williams

Editor-in-Chief
Staff member
Moderator
Kougar said:
Well, every time I look up some DJ they always have a myspace page... Even they are starting to migrate to their own sites though!

This is the kind of thing that first turned me against social networks. It seemed like, out of nowhere, most of my favorite bands had adopted MySpace as their main website. I mean... main website, where you type in their URL and get forwarded straight to MySpace. Oh, and those auto-playing music players at the time... yeah, not fun.

Like you said though, a lot of them are starting to migrate back. To my knowledge no band I like is using Facebook as its only website, so that's a plus I guess. We'll see how things fare once Google+ really takes off. If it does that is.
 
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