Facebook=Myspace+Brains

Facebook is commonly referred to as, "Myspace + Brains", which is somewhat truthful if you look at some of the Facebook statistics:

General Growth

• More than 300 million active users
• 50% of our active users log on to Facebook in any given day
• The fastest growing demographic is those 35 years old and older

User Engagement

• Average user has 130 friends on the site
• More than 8 billion minutes are spent on Facebook each day (worldwide)
• More than 45 million status updates each day
• More than 10 million users become fans of Pages each day

Applications

• More than 2 billion photos uploaded to the site each month
• More than 14 million videos uploaded each month
• More than 2 billion pieces of content (web links, news stories, blog posts, notes, photos, etc.) shared each week
• More than 3 million events created each month
• More than 45 million active user groups exist on the site

International Growth

• More than 70 translations available on the site
• About 70% of Facebook users are outside the United States

At least, the developers are the people with the brains. So how did they do it? Development, presentation, platform, and mobile.

Platform

• More than one million developers and entrepreneurs from more than 180 countries
• Every month, more than 70% of Facebook users engage with Platform applications
• More than 350,000 active applications currently on Facebook Platform
• More than 250 applications have more than one million monthly active users
• More than 15,000 websites, devices and applications have implemented Facebook Connect since its general availability in December 2008

The developers (all one million of them) have created a personal profile page that is easy to navigate, clean, and organized. In comparison to a Myspace page, which is more like digital vomit than a personal profile, Facebook appeals to users and appeals to users' friends. It does not allow embedded HTML and CSS, which Myspace does. The advantage here is not allowing users to create large swathes of profile pages or to embed hidden links to viruses which poses security risks. There is a disadvantage of limiting customization options, but Facebook makes up for it with Facebook Applications and the Facebook Platform. Facebook utilizes a different method to allow users to be more involved with their personal pages while avoiding inherent security and unattractiveness risks. The platform allows developers to create applications of anything imaginable, from the useful to the irrelevant. Since there are so many options on Facebook, how can one be bored? Apparently, they don't get very bored. (see chart). Facebook writes, "a Facebook application uses Facebook Platform to access information from the social graph, offering users an experience that's relevant to them". Facebook's Platform is considered a Web Operating System (WebOS), where its applications are taking the place of those on other operating systems because they are easier to use and free. People do everything on Facebook now, and that is why it has become so popular.

One ingenious, yet simple marketing technique that Facebook used to generate its user base so quickly was the automated e-vites new users could send out to their friends in seconds. After joining, you upload your typical e-mail contact list and Facebook uses those e-mails to send an e-vite with your name on it inviting your friends to join. The next level was Facebook Mobile, a powerful yet, simple method of making the site more accessible.

Mobile

• There are more than 65 million active users currently accessing Facebook through their mobile devices.
• People that use Facebook on their mobile devices are almost 50% more active on Facebook than non-mobile users.
• There are more than 180 mobile operators in 60 countries working to deploy and promote Facebook mobile products

Looking these statistics Facebook is clearly taking advantage of the growth in Internet use on mobile phones. People can check their page, update their status, and check the statuses of others almost instantly. All of these methods have created a tremendous social networking site, that has become a WebOS and does not seem to be faltering. However, I do think there are a couple of challenges it must overcome.

So I pose a question to the Facebook Developers:

With the growing usage of the Internet on mobile devices, it seems as though Facebook activity will occur mostly on mobile devices in the future. Facebook even says,"People that use Facebook on their mobile devices are almost 50% more active on Facebook than non-mobile users." Doesn't using mobile devices assume limitations on the usage of Facebook applications and thus eliminate the addictiveness of the site?

Lastly, whether these strategies can maintain growth and constant activity is another matter. Facebook has yet to be complained about for being used inappropriately--at least in the way Myspace has. However, this seems very unavoidable as it continues to grow. In order to fund such technological expansion to match network growth Facebook will have to find another way gain revenue, which will be a challenge. Plus there is growing number of privacy-related complaints.