US tech companies dumbed down their own content algorithms and are somehow shocked that they are now getting destroyed. Social media is a drug, TikTok is providing the purest form right now
https://theintercept.com/2020/03/16/tiktok-app-moderators-us...
> The makers of TikTok, the Chinese video-sharing app with hundreds of millions of users around the world, instructed moderators to suppress posts created by users deemed too ugly, poor, or disabled for the platform, according to internal documents obtained by The Intercept. These same documents show moderators were also told to censor political speech in TikTok livestreams, punishing those who harmed “national honor” or broadcast streams about “state organs such as police” with bans from the platform.
Also, the big TC numbers (for most ICs, not sure about high level execs) are mostly inflated illiquid RSUs.
This point is perhaps clearer if we take Google as an example instead. Mid-level engineers attach themselves to a project or initiate it, then guide it past a certain point. Once promotion is secured, the project is dropped by its initiators. Staffed with lower-status engineers who were enrolled without the prospect of promotion, the project begins a gradual rot and the Google graveyard deepens.
The key concept here is that the projects are launched and fueled at the start explicitly for the chance of promotion. In the strategy you describe, with Facebook higher-ups mandating the top-down creation of various projects as part of the global strategy of the company, it would become risky for mid-level engineers to ever get involved. They would not have their names connected with the success of the projects as higher-ups would have imprinted themselves on it beforehand, but would be connected to its failure, whereas in the Google scene the 'moonshot' culture is well-established and limits this sort of blame. Due to massive opportunity costs, Facebook employees would be better off trying to get promoted through the traditional channels, or to quit and pursue the promising ideas themselves and hope to get bought out eventually.
I get that advertisers pay more to target a younger audience, but that's fine. It's offset by less competition in the space targeting older people
I don't think social media is like a minivan, where a different lifestyle suddenly makes it make sense to switch. People are on social media for the other people that are there, I don't see the incentive the other people would have to migrate at a certain age, seems more likely they'd change how they use it (as indeed happened with Facebook). Maybe I'm misunderstanding your premise?
In my life a lot of the reason folks got off FB was 1. the experience became trash and 2. the brand became toxic. Neither of these things are about folks moving to the better, newer social network just cuz that's where everybody was.
In general I think the social media companies have no actual vision but are spooked about becoming the next Friendster/MySpace so they constantly react, desperately trying to not become irrelevant.
I think also that figuring out something that works in social media is hard and somewhat random; absent a framework to help imagine new futures people will always become reactive and defensive. Of course SM companies have to frame that as innovation and convince their shareholders that "becoming tiktok" is somehow visionary and helpful because "yes we're losing eyeballs but we're going to double-down on what we do really well and learn from it because we think the future has space for many types of social media" doesn't convince shareholders.
Idk, rambling now, but so frustrated at the whole market.
I thought you were going to call this out. It should read "something more shallow"
Nah. Buy the good ones early enough.
So it must be the content creators right? But this is rediculous too! Because virtually every content creator worth a damn on TikTok will have a linked Instagram! What's more, many of them will often have a Linktree or similar url either in their profile description or linked on their insta that will include everything from YouTube, to Patreon, to OnlyFans. People who understand how to make money making content on these platforms aren't one trick ponies, they're using sophisticated marketing approaches that leverage the strengths of different online platforms to compensate for the fact they often have handle their own marketing.
So if the content of the knockoffs is bad or the creators arent finding the competition worth considering then the only question remaining I would argue is whether the problem is in the reccomendation system (TikTok was, and still is, famous with users for doing a solid job at this), the moderation system (TikTok, maybe because it's Chinese, is not so fixated on implementing the SJ nonsense that YouTube, FB, etc. pander to at the moderation level), or the compensation system (Again, probably because they care less about demonetizing you for wrongthink against whatever miniority or "important cause" is the pet of the week. Content competes primarily on its merits as likeable content).
In short, TikTok might have had an early mover advantage but the reason no one catches up in the current environment is because they can't get their heads out of the sand enough to realize it's their own fault no one entertaining wants to produce anything but TikTok reposts for them.
I think this is really funny. The conclusion I would draw is slightly different - that Instagram isn't Tiktok and it's never going to be Tiktok. You can make Instagram's algorithm exactly like Tiktok and it still won't be like Tiktok because the users and content creators on Tiktok aren't on Instagram, they're not going to join instagram and the content creators you already have will leave.
Given this feedback cycle I find it quite interesting that Facebook don't have a team of engineers just constantly building and launching new social media sites. Just massively raise the odds that the thing that displaces facebook is also owned by facebook.