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[pmcd9]

Reaganbook

There's a new social network in town to do battle with Facebook. Well it was shut down in less than 24 hours when it was overrun by trolls. The goofballs that set the thing up didn't foresee that inevitability. I mean c'mon, Reaganbook? The Facebook for patriots? Ha ha, I just don't know what they expected was going to happen.

Lost amid all the laughter one of the stated goals of Reaganbook, one that most of us would be in favor of, that they weren't going to share our information with the government or sell it to advertisers was lost.

Isn't it time for that social media site to exist? One that looks a lot like Facebook, but actually shows us everything we want to see, not what it thinks we want to see, or what it's advertisers want us to see. One that doesn't gather, then sell our information to whoever will pay for it. One that doesn't treat us like lab rats in their ongoing research. Man oh man, I would sign up for a service like that in a heartbeat.

[AugustWest]

Man oh man, I would sign up for a service like that in a heartbeat.

Yeah, but how much would you pay? 

The thing to remember about Facebook is that you aren't the customer, you're the product being sold.

[pmcd9]

Yeah, but how much would you pay? 

The thing to remember about Facebook is that you aren't the customer, you're the product being sold.

I understand that completely, and that's the problem. I don't want to be their product. And I don't really know how much I would pay. I know that I've been paying for Flickr for years. It was my social network before Facebook. Most of my Flickr friends have migrated to Facebook so it kinda sucks for social interaction now. And they've made a lot of stupid changes to their interface so it sucks in general now.

I don't even mind so much being constantly sold to, but I would sure love to have control over my feed.

Do you think the kind of social network I am describing is unfeasible? That there is no way to do it unless you do it the Facebook way?

[wombat]

I think I already have what you're describing and it's called Twitter with Adblock installed.

[AugustWest]

I think the appeal of Facebook is its universality.  People who wouldn't otherwise be on social media are on Facebook because it's the default and it's free.  A huge portion of those folks will not pay for a better social media experience.  They're either incapable of recognizing the benefits of what you describe or just don't give a shit about it.  Facebook is the McDonald's of social media.



 

[pmcd9]

I'd be  happy to leave those people behind. THIS place, TOUAMB is exactly the type of place I would love to see, but we've become so diminished we hardly exist anymore.

[AugustWest]

I think there's a place for both sorts of sites, it's just important to know the difference.

[pmcd9]

It seems to me the major difference is there are people on Facebook. So Wombat, tell me about this Twitter.

[wombat]

I think one of the main things about Twitter is that unlike Facebook, the expectation is NOT that you will follow people you know in real life. So it's much harder to end up in stupid arguments with relatives and people you haven't seen since grade school. And there are still people who are all "waah waah I don't get Twitter" and that is actually a good thing.

[pmcd9]

Okay, I'm @pmcd9. Please retweet me, or whatever you're supposed to do.

[Carlos del Vaca]

So it's much harder to end up in stupid arguments with relatives and people you haven't seen since grade school.

But you CAN end up in stupid arguments with complete strangers! So it's like the old days of the internet.

[wombat]

Yes! And isn't that a million times better?

[wombat]

Yeah, I can't figure out what the business model is there.

There are lots of accounts that follow people just in the hopes that they will get followed back. Some of those accounts are for businesses where it might be useful for them to be able to say that they have zillions of followers. Others, I don't get it.