Founded in 2004, Facebook became the world’s most used social networking service. The key was to get customers swiftly and expand their customer base to the point where it would be exceedingly challenging for competitors to enter the market. Facebook already passed that stage.
Pride: The Rise
From its ideation, the site turned to an app, and had one clear picture in mind; interaction between people. With this in mind the initial premise stood upon the grounds of the ‘Hot or Not’ concept, within the walls of the Harvard campus which was eventually dropped. Later the app became a social tool for people to show photographs coupled with a comment section that allowed for people to share their thoughts on the post. Mark Zuckerberg claimed it was a social study tool. After a tumultuous 4 year development process, in 2006, Facebook opened its doors to anyone at least 13 years old with a valid email address and saw great success. The site became the season’s “must have.”
The company has since seen many changes in its structure; from initial design and user interfaces to the acquisition of Instagram and WhatsApp. Over the years many features took Facebook by storm including Chat, Pages, Facebook Ads, video and support but the feature that changed the game for them was the Like button. This opened the doors to the public being able to show appreciation in the simplest way possible, a feature that many apps and sites have since implemented.
The site, as of November 2022, is worth a whopping 296.63 billion dollars with various apps and sites using the Facebook open source to allow users to sign up for their accounts or share content on their feed. But if the app is seemingly doing so well, why does the number of users not match up to the app’s counterparts such as TikTok, Instagram, or Twitter?
Prejudice: The Fall
The release of various other social media platforms, including Snapchat, Vine, Twitter, Instagram, and TikTok, has resulted in Facebook’s popularity quickly decreasing as their competitors gained increasing significance. Due to Facebook’s experimentation and lack of self-discovery, alternative social media networks grew. They were all creating bite-sized content and taking the chance on brand-new discoveries.
Many onlookers must have been perplexed by Zuckerberg’s recent preoccupation with TikTok. TikTok isn’t a social network after all. Short user videos are hosted by this service. Facebook, with its aged parents and grandparents, doesn’t seem to be serving the so-called younger generation very well, while TikTok does an excellent job at doing so. However, TikTok’s monopoly on user attention, which provides funding for surveillance capitalism, is Facebook’s true issue.
The Comeback Kid: The Metaverse
Following this disaster, on October 29, 2021, Zuckerberg declared that Facebook is changing its name to Meta in order to better reflect its new goal of creating the metaverse. Many people view this as a last-ditch effort to distance “Facebook” from its negative reputation. Despite the rebranding and a fresh outlook, Meta nevertheless has its demons from the past. Numerous challenges still exist for it in the shape of technological, legal, ethical, and social problems. However, the corporation is accustomed to functioning in difficult circumstances; as a result, it will probably keep expanding despite controversy and forays into new markets.