Written August 2010
by Cliff Feldwick
Two recent events deserve to be noted: AOL had its 25th anniversary in June, and Facebook hit 500 million users. Their sagas really couldn’t be further apart.
AOL started before the “real” internet became usable. Back in 1985, there were no real browsers available – the Mosiac browser for Macintosh came out in 1993 and Netscape debuted in 1994, so AOL for many years was a little club of people chatting amongst themselves and using whatever features AOL could design. Microsoft created a rival in MSN, which still exists but always was a minor player. Few remember it as a subscription dial-up service, which is how it started. Apple’s attempt was called eWorld, and lasted less than two years. (So it looks like Apple’s fixation with iThis and iThat started with an earlier vowel).
AOL grew. From around a half million in the early 90’s, it exploded from 1 million in 1995 to 5 million in 1996. Its peak was in 2002, when it claimed 27.2 million. You couldn’t open a magazine or pass a checkout counter without being offered an AOL sign-up disk. Many computer people used then as coasters, in an obvious put-down. Yet AOL was useful for many people who traveled, because you could always use their toll-free numbers to find a local connection in just about any city you visited (younger readers – this meant a phone connection using a dial-up modem – you know, that useless connection you wonder about on the side of your laptop). And there are still people in remote areas who won’t go for satellite modems who use it.
It was never without its flaws. As a computer tech in earlier years, I remember that some of the most dreaded words you’d hear from a customer were “I’m having trouble with AOL on my Packard-Bell.” The only rational reply, which you couldn’t say, was “Well, of course you are!” Run an often buggy piece of software on a piece-of-dog-poo computer and see what happens. This no doubt contributed to the contempt that some computer people displayed for anyone with an AOL address. These same people probably think that my $12 bottle of wine should be used to marinate meat, so let’s ignore them. But there was a certain truth to “AOL is the Internet with training wheels”.
AOL made so much money that, in probably what has become a case study in stupid in business schools everywhere, it bought Time Warner in 2000. We all know what happened there. If there was ever an example of how “synergy” was a completely bogus concept, it shines as perfect. Maybe this should be a warning for Google, who keeps using its massive cash to buy interesting things.
Facebook as a nation
Much has been made of the size of Facebook – if FB was a country, it would rank third in population, behind China and India. If China didn’t ban it, it would probably be bigger.
Like many computer things, FB has changed non-computer things around it. Probably the biggest is people’s concept of privacy. Posting things that the world, often more of it than you’d like to contemplate, can see will do that.
And we’re not just talking stupid posters either. But while we’re contemplating dumb, note that a survey by Oxygen Media found that 42% of women 18 to 34 think it’s OK to post drunken pictures of themselves on FB. Does this portray a serious lack of an “oh-oh” meter or what? As my friend Roy is quick to note, as a comment comes out inappropriately at a party or tavern, “This can only end badly”. So what could be the possible up side of this? Letting men know that you like to get drunk and do stupid things? Well, Hello little lady…
But back to the majority of us, those who watch what we post. The best mental approach is to view FB as a giant postcard, open to whoever takes a look at your mail. One giant leak, as far as I’m concerned, is when a third party, who you have as a friend, makes a comment on someone else’s wall – it shows up on your “most recent” as a post. You may not know the original person – chances are you don’t – but suddenly you have their musings available.
Most of us still want privacy. Yet David Kirkpatrick, author of “The Facebook Effect” argues that privacy is a dated construct – what FB is creating is one identity, open to everyone you know. Pretty chilling – do you really want your boss or your kids to view the same you that your old college buddies do?
Some of my neighbors, being in the early twenties stage that still passes as adolescence, like to over-indulge and do what results from that. There is, for example, that particular instance of a tree limb coming down one night when I never heard a storm or saw wet sidewalks the next morning. Could it involve people swinging on the limb? Perhaps. Do they want their bosses, who probably wouldn’t see this as a great career move, to see this junk? “One identity” says they will. Not cool.
Where Facebook will end is anyone’s guess. It will no doubt continue to collect users, but I’m betting that a fair number will drop out as things become more vapid and crowded. It will never be as random as AOL is now, with their constantly changing focus/concept of who they are. Maybe Facebook will be the one to connect us with other worlds. I wouldn’t put it past them.