[moylan]

the telegraph service western union turned down a chance to buy the patent for telephones as they thought it was merely a toy. it's still a custom in ireland to send telegrams for weddings, other than that...

facebook is merely a service that will exist till some better service comes along.

disclaimer. never had a facebook account.

[necubi]

Sure, but that doesn't make telegraphs a "fad." Nothing lasts forever--particularly not when it comes to technology. But I don't think you've refuted the parent's statement that facebook won't "be easily displaced." It took a vastly superior technology to supplant telegraphs. If the same is true of Facebook, it could have good staying power.

The inevitable comparison when this comes up is to Friendster or MySpace, but it's really a poor one. Neither had anywhere the reach of Facebook even at their height, nor a large percentage of the world's internet users. Earlier social networks had significant competitors. Isn't it remarkable that in the ~4 years that Facebook has been dominant, _nobody_ has successfully challenged it?

Facebook will likely diminish in importance at some point, but it's not going to happen any time soon.

[jack-r-abbit]

Perhaps it is hard to come up with a comparison in this space (social media) because it hasn't had a tremendous run time with very many rises and falls. But perhaps looking at something like "browsers" can offer another comparison with more history. We've seen several shifts in the dominant players there. Some have gone away. Some have been slow and steady. Some have risen and fallen... but never died.

I don't think Facebook is a "fad" but I do think that it has a shelf life. It annoys me. I do get to keep up with the lives of people I once knew... but it annoys me. And honestly I'm not sure what annoys me more, Facebook or the people that treat Facebook like the Golden Calf. I would rather be on G+ but their lack of a full feature API is a barrier.

[qq66]

But Western Union still exists. Facebook will be around for a long time, even if different things come along as well.

[hammock]

So does AOL.