Facebook got popular when I was still a freshman in high school, probably earlier, because I was a stubborn late adopter. I think my first Facebook update was trying to convince people to go back to Myspace. 🥲 Even back then I thought it was sterile and boring.
Part of me wonders how many people liked how Facebook catered to the “lowest common denominator” and didn’t allow for much else. I think of how Myspace allowed people to customize their profiles extensively with HTML. A common joke is how either Neopets or Myspace taught millennials the basics of web development through allowing custom HTML. I’m curious how many people on Myspace couldn’t figure HTML out and were envious of those who understood it/could make their profiles “look cool.” And viola! Here is Facebook! A social media platform where no one can make fancy customizations.
I know there’s plenty of other reasons Facebook succeeded, like “the feed”, which made it easy for people to stay up to date on everything going on with their friend group, which of course made it an excellent vector for the enshittification and propaganda generation observed later on.
I’m curious how many people on Myspace couldn’t figure HTML out and were envious of those who understood it/could make their profiles “look cool.”
Used to be websites that would have pre-made “themes” you could copy/paste into your myspace, most of those un-savvy people would just use one of those, slightly more savvy people would do that and then customize individual bits of it (to say change a color or two).
Facebook got popular when I was still a freshman in high school, probably earlier, because I was a stubborn late adopter. I think my first Facebook update was trying to convince people to go back to Myspace. 🥲 Even back then I thought it was sterile and boring.
Part of me wonders how many people liked how Facebook catered to the “lowest common denominator” and didn’t allow for much else. I think of how Myspace allowed people to customize their profiles extensively with HTML. A common joke is how either Neopets or Myspace taught millennials the basics of web development through allowing custom HTML. I’m curious how many people on Myspace couldn’t figure HTML out and were envious of those who understood it/could make their profiles “look cool.” And viola! Here is Facebook! A social media platform where no one can make fancy customizations.
I know there’s plenty of other reasons Facebook succeeded, like “the feed”, which made it easy for people to stay up to date on everything going on with their friend group, which of course made it an excellent vector for the enshittification and propaganda generation observed later on.
Used to be websites that would have pre-made “themes” you could copy/paste into your myspace, most of those un-savvy people would just use one of those, slightly more savvy people would do that and then customize individual bits of it (to say change a color or two).