The Next Generation Not Liking Facebook

Poor Facebook. It lost a big advertiser, faceplanted its hyped IPO, got sued by a bunch of irate investors, and now it's being "defriended" by the next generation:

Facebook itself is no longer an adolescent. At 8, it's getting long in the tooth for a social network. And for some teens, the novelty has worn off.

"Facebook is just not the big fad anymore," said Kim Franklin, a 15-year-old from Gaithersburg, Md., who does not have a Facebook account and prefers social media site Tumblr. "It was like everybody was constantly on there, but now not so much."

Franklin said her 13-year-old sister Nicole hasn't signed up for a Facebook account either.

Meanwhile, Laura Franklin, the girls' 37-year-old mother, always has Facebook open on her computer while working on her parenting blog, Better in Bulk. That, she said, has led her teen daughters to dub Facebook a "mom thing."

Jessica Guynn and Ryan Faughnder of the LA Times has the story: Link 

(Image: Tomislav Pinter / Shutterstock.com)


This is kind of a misleading article title, looking at a line like "still, for most teens, Facebook is still tops". I guess there should be an emphasis on *some* teens, namely, the *one* teen she uses as an example. My sister is in her mid-teens and connects with all of her friends through Facebook.

The passing popularity of Friendster and MySpace as social networking sites may have presented a pattern to us, but Facebook is way more of a behemoth than they ever were. It's like saying that Google is a fad of a search engine because AltaVista and Ask Jeeves are now passé. If Facebook DOES lose its popularity, it won't be to Tumblr. Tumblr isn't really in the same website category as Facebook; it's a blogging service, so it focuses more on sharing content than connecting with others.
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Facebook has a shelf life. Another site will gain more popularity and the crowd will move from Facebook to that site. That will be the nature of social media sites. Facebook will join Myspace and wonder what happened.
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but unlike myspace and friendster facebooks appeal is no longer the site itself but how large it's base is

you can't say no to facebook because there are no other options and everybody is already on it
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Buzzbo/surferdude69:

The piece isn't about the overall popularity of Facebook, it is about how younger people are starting to turn elsewhere for their networking needs.

"With more than 900 million users, Facebook remains the most popular online hangout. But some young people are turning their attention elsewhere.

Fickle young consumers can make and break social networks, as evidenced by pioneers such as Myspace and Friendster whose appeal faded as tastes changed.

In fact, 8 of 10 teens who are online use social networking sites — and more than 93% of those users have a Facebook account, according to the Pew Internet & American Life Project. Millions more kids under the legal Facebook age of 13 fib about their age to use the service.

Still, older people are the ones driving much of Facebook's growth. Users age 50 to 64 made up nearly a quarter of Facebook's audience in March, according to research firm Nielsen."
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it's a well thought out site with lots of good uses for regular people.

it's not a lambo but it will get you to the post office.

tumblr, twitter, and other sites are more ego driven in their social networking capacity.

(also buzzbo has made a good point with his non-anecdotal evidence)
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Signed my son up when he was younger as long as I had full access and he'd 'friend' me to monitor his usage.
And so I became a FaceBook user.

Years later 'Join this game' and 'Hey, I took my dog for a walk!' or some political rant seem abound on my page. I'm down to checking it once a quarter for no apparent reason.

Off to shoo kids off my lawn and yell at a cloud!
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I only liked it in 2005 when I started college and in 2006 when you still HAD TO HAVE A COLLEGE EMAIL TO SIGN UP...I stopped using it when they let people sign up with no network
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