You’ve got Facebook! A love story about a company desperately trying to be what AOL was.
You kids have it so damn good.
Back in my day you had to make sure no one was expecting or making a phone call in the entire house, wait through 20 minutes of busy signals before you heard that god forsaken connection sound, and then wait for another 30 minutes of downloading at 14.4 kbps just to see part of a nipple. Might have even been a man's nipple but after waiting that long, who gives a shit.
Every other day in 1996, you could open your mailbox to find a cellophane wrapped CD with the America Online logo blazoned across the front. They spent around $300 million producing and sending these things out and at one point, were 50% of every CD manufactured. That’s even more than Adele has done with all her Eeeking and whining!
AOL was fantastic for meeting new people, which was still kind of taboo at the time because what kind of weirdo would meet a random person off the internet?!? The chat rooms were super fun and the only line you needed to open up with was, A/S/L (age/sex/location). My twist on this was always, 112/gas-huffer/Cambodia, because you obviously meet the most interesting people that way. Let’s say you met someone that seems pretty cool, well just IM them for a private conversation because that other dude in the chat room keeps trying to drink your kool-aid.
Soon after the IM, AOL thought there has to be an easier way to get pervs, flat out weirdos, and just regular folks all in the same swimming pool together. Introducing AOL instant messenger! One place to communicate with anyone in the world right in your sidebar. This is when the competition at the time, MSN and Yahoo, finally had enough and made their own messaging platforms that actually passed AOL because of webcam integration. Welcome to “Show me your tits-ville” population you.
The AOL ecosystem.
The best part of AOL was that once you signed on, you really didn't need to go anywhere else. On top of that, 95% of the user base had absolutely no idea that the rest of the internet was even out there just waiting for them. Except those Netscape assholes, they would remind you all the time.
All your friends, your email, and all the information you would ever need was right there in front of you so why would you go anywhere else? Welcome to Facebook's underlying motto: “You don’t need to go anywhere else and if you think you do, we’ll copy whatever it is so you don’t escape anymore.” That’s not verbatim, but it’s probably really similar.
How Facebook is holding you captive even when you hop the fence.
Facebook is using the same model that worked so well, until it didn’t, AOL had it’s success with. Keep all your friends in one place. They did such a phenomenal job of brainwashing the user into one atmosphere that everyone used the same excuse not to leave even after they were embarrassed for being on Facebook, “It’s just so easy to stay in contact with friends and family.” It seemed so hopeless, but wait! It’s Instagram! Go share all the trendy pics you’ve taken and meet new people again based on common goals and interests! Have fun adding filters and acting like that failed art student you always were but now in your late 30’s. You’re free!
Guess again. Can’t have you just running amuck throwing, what appears to be your friend Karen acting like a model drowning in the Kelvin filter, all over some other network. Facebook acquires Instagram and now you’re just in the side yard of the Facebook mansion. Hold on a second, “I don’t even live in America!” you say. I’ll just use WhatsApp to talk to my friends, family and work colleagues. Ha! Screw you Facebook!
Well Facebook had some eyes out and noticed you sliding under the fence looking at a shiny green text bubble logo like you wanted to give it an inappropriate hug. Go ahead and escape to your devil lady of a text app because we own that too! Hump away you sneaky messaging addict. Hump it all day long.
Things are looking bleak in the world of social media because at this point, your only way out is Twitter, Snapchat, and the apps 12 year olds use like music.ly and you don’t really want to be caught in that neigborhood lipsynching to Beiber.
Twitter recently has been live streaming every sports event known to man and had buy out offers from Disney, Google, and Salesforce. The last one sucks for regular people and will probably be the one that sticks but get this, the CEO doesn't even want to sell. What kind of brownies are you guys making over there?
Snapchat has been having a pissing contest with Instagram lately but Facebook forgot the rules and just decided to leave the seat down and copy, almost exactly, the entire app and throw it into not one, but two (Instagram and Messenger) of its platforms. So where you going now butterscotch?
I’m going to hop on Tinder and hope that after 20 years of the same dating sites and apps that this will finally have actual recent photos of a woman instead of the 5 best pictures she’s had taken in her entire life. When it works out, I’ll make sure to post pics of us vacationing in Cabo on Facebook and add some moments to my Instagram stories.
Face it. You’ve got mail, again.
