Today, The Guardian reported on a study suggesting that Facebook will lose most of its users over the next few years, and fade from relevance. A lot of it is based on esoteric statistical observations of social networks and their similarities to the spread of diseases. The biggest piece of evidence that's directly related to Facebook is that there's been a significant reduction in Google searches for Facebook.
So yes, a reduction in people's interest in Facebook is one explanation for that. But might I offer my own explanation, which is that EVERYONE ON THE %$@#& PLANET ALREADY KNOWS THE #@$&# URL. Granted, lots of people Google a site, even if they know the site's name. For instance, in looking up The Guardian, I typed "Guardian" in Google, rather type it in the URL bar and play Russian Porn Roulette. But if I read The Guardian daily, I'd know it is theguardian.com. I memorized the URL of Facebook on about the second day I used it. I also bookmarked it, which brings me to a second explanation for the reduced Googling of Facebook: People have figured out the "bookmark" feature on every browser in existence. I'll give the researchers credit that they did think up the third explanation I came up with, which is that more and more people are accessing Facebook through apps.
So no, I'm not convinced that Facebook will be going the way of the Bubonic Plague. I may have been critical of Facebook in the past, but I do admit that it does have a real purpose in allowing people to communicate and keep in touch, and that usefulness isn't going away just because the hype has died down. So just as the people saying Facebook will take over the world were exaggerating, the predictions of its doom are just as inaccurate.
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