What Facebook needs to do to cross the chasm
From the consumer perspective: They need to become functional at a faster rate than people get bored with them.
From the business perspective: They need to become boring at a faster rate than they become functional.
(The above is reprinted from a comment I left on Read/Write Web.)
I know, Facebook hasn’t become boring yet: average time spent on the site is up, although it’s flattening, at least in the UK.
Nonetheless, Web offerings follow a predictable pattern. At first, they are fun and cool and new and interesting, but nothing can be new forever. Ipso facto, for a site to have longevity, the attraction must morph to something other than pure novelty.
Take email. Remember when getting an email was cause for boasting? It was a while ago, to be sure. The reason we’re all still using email is that its utility increased at least as quickly as our fascination with it waned. Same with Google.
Neat for neat’s sake doesn’t last—but that doesn’t mean it can’t be supplanted by useful.
When I first signed up to Facebook, it was interesting just to find old friends and watch the connections grow. Now I use it mostly to play Scrabulous. What about you? How has your Facebook usage evolved?
