Facebook needs to be more open

Jun 5 2008 by Lewis Harrison, The Journal

A FEW months ago Facebook was all but declared dead. So how has the site fared since then?

Think back a year, and practically everyone in the UK was joining the Facebook revolution, gathering as many “friends” as they could find. Best mates, colleagues, some bloke you never really spoke to at school. It didn’t matter at the time, so long as you could add another notch on your friend list.

Then, in February, it all went wrong. The site suffered its first drop in users and the cry went out that Facebook was over. “Facebook’s death spiral has begun,” claimed PC Mag, as similar articles appeared in national newspapers and throughout the web.

A few months on, though, Facebook is still breathing. In fact, signs suggest it is hale and hearty.

So what’s the story? If you look at the stats, the site is still going remarkably well. Last week it was named the website mobile users spend most time browsing. And analysts ComScore reported that Facebook had record numbers of UK visitors during April.

Nevertheless, Facebook faces a number of challenges if it’s to remain the king of social networking – or to grow into something bigger.

First off, many older users are being put off by the proliferation of applications, which clutter up pages. Mark Zuckerberg, the company’s 22-year-old CEO and founder, must do something about it. Perhaps a redesign is in order.

So that’s one thing the company must sort. But there’s a bigger challenge – a choice, really – facing Zuckerberg right now.

At present, Facebook is concerned about keeping control, particularly in regard to our privacy, about which it has been criticised in the past. But, if the site is going to live a long and healthy life, Zuckerberg needs to become more open.

Web users want to be able to see their online identity all in one place (their blog, Twitter feed, social network profiles etc), and they’ll soon also want to be able to meet their friends online and watch a TV show together. At present, they can’t, but there’s a big appetite for it. Facebook is in a prime position to offer that; if it doesn’t, someone else will.

If Zuckerberg insists on remaining in control, he faces the possibility that Facebook could go the same way as AOL or Friends Reunited.

If he opens up, he risks further incurring the wrath of those who’ve slammed the site for the way it handles privacy issues … but he just might fulfil his ambition of becoming the Google of people.