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Facebook to supplant email?

Categories: Social Networking, Web UsagePosted on July 15th, 2007

A few weeks ago, I had a discussion with my kid sister, in a humerous way she told me that she “Only uses email to communicate with old people like me“. And I’m not even in my mid 30s.

Apparently social networks like Facebook, MySpace, and now Twitter are moving up the age chain, and older folks are adopting it. In fact recent statistics showed that the largest growth in Facebook is actually 35+.

Aiden wonders if Facebook messages will replace email, maybe for certain demographics of heavy users, but not all.

“Many of my friends and colleagues are now using the internal Facebook messaging system more than e-mail. It has almost become an e-mail substitute. Having said that, they still check their e-mail as it is essential to daily life on the Internet. Nonetheless, messaging between Facebook members is usually accomplished within the social network rather than e-mail.”


Jason gives 5 reasons why Facebook messages are better than email:

1. Permanence
2. Spam Blocking
3. Space Savings
4. It’s E-mail (plus)
5. It’s Also The Phone Book

One should note that Facebook is a limited phone book, as users not in Facebook (or users that dont want to be bothered) can’t be contacted.

The bottom line? Messaging is evolving and now has stronger network hooks, understanding these changes are key to being an effective communicator. The company trying to reach an audience on Facebook will obviously have to join this community and adapt to their tools.

Even adoption of these new applications are happening in a new way, if someone in my network starts to use one of these tools (like this mapping application) then users will sign up because of their connections and network within Facebook –likely not because of email.

I cut out instant messaging about 8 months ago and haven’t looked back, I’m much more productive and look for one-to-many tools to communicate. Email or the phone is a better way of communicating one on one.

On a personal note, I’m still putting most of my focus in blogging, as it’s an open network, in fact, I just upgraded to the latest version of wordpress and renewed my web hosting.

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This entry was posted on Sunday, July 15th, 2007 at 11:12 am and is filed under Social Networking, Web Usage. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Comments
  • Email is superior to Social Networking mail systems like Facebook, for the simply reason that Facebook does not provide an easy way to download and archive the mail. Thus you must place your trust in a corporation that could delete or 'lose' your data at any time. Also, aside from the inability to archive messages, you also cannot search them, and even today you are limited as to what attachments you can add to a message. For all but the most frivolous messages, Facebook is worthless as a communication tool.
    Twitter is in a similar league. I think the popularity of these applications shows that they provide people with a 'sense' of connection with others. That is a good thing, but so far they offer nothing superior to email in terms of features and user control over the data.
  • Я тоже такого мнения был, пока не прочитал несколько подобных статей по этой теме.
  • Joe
    Interesting post. Im not sure i am ready to give up on email just yet. I use facebook for my friends and family and email for business. I like keeping them seperate.
  • Fred
    Interesting read.

    All posters seem to question whether Facebook could take over email service ... but let's turn it around: Could an email service (Gmail being the best candidate) be able to move towards social networking ?

    Because let's face it:
    - Google employs the best IT brains walking around and they're well up to date on this little revolution
    - they're fond of experiments like this
    - from a software point of view, it's easier to turn an email platform in a social platform (all the bits are there yet) instead of adding all of Gmail's bells and whistles to Facebook software.

    Take my word for it: one of the next few trials to come out of Google's labs is a small little feature to add Facebook-like functionality to your Gmail account.

    Alternatively, Yahoo is also a good candidate - they already have an established system (Yahoo ID) which enables merger of several of their spin-offs such as Flickr.
  • mohamed ramadan aid
    i want to know how to make an e_mail on face book
    i also want to know how to be good at using the face book web site
    iwant to know if i want to regist on face book
    ur new friend mohamed ramadan
    the tourguide
  • lars
    sugestion to facebook... unntill now all programs have on the option choose nationality 1 country at time to choose... why not more... allot of people are mixed.. to make cobinates of country chooise....... had it just now in mind wanted to share tought hehe....
  • anonymous
    Agree with Knight. I think Facebook will have a very viable option if it's somehow possible to archive messages as text files. Actually, that'd be pretty useful for Gmail as well.
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  • Why do people keep saying that one of Facebook's highlights is permanence? You can not download your messages at all so when Facebook dies they are all gone. Don't think for a moment Facebook won't die. They all die sooner or later. Facebook is popular right now and as soon as something better comes along everyone will jump ship to it the same way they did to Facebook. Even if that doesn't happen nothing lasts forever. Personally I prefer the ability to download my messages. Online access to them is great, but a personal backup of them is better. This is where Gmail excels. They have a great web interface where all my mail lives and yet at the same time I can still download the mail to my system for access offline should the need arise.

    Don't get me wrong I like Facebook.. I don't love it, but I do like it. I just prefer having the ability to backup my mail myself. I will keep using email for important messages and for as much communication as I can. There is only one person I know who has given up email and uses Facebook only. It is annoying as now I can't keep any of our mails. If someone would write a utility to download Facebook mail then it will have a chance to replace email. Until then.. nope... Nothing is better than a permanent copy you have access to offline if needed.

    Hummm... Maybe I will write that app... Who knows.
  • I don't think Facebook will supplant email completely, at least not any time soon. However, I do use the Facebook messaging system a LOT to contact friends and colleagues.

    I find the Events system particularly useful. It's so easy to use, and much easier to keep track of than email, as far as organizing an event is concerned.

    Instead of looking through the threaded convo in Gmail, you can just glance down at the "confirmed guests" spot and see in an instant who is attended the event (as well as who isn't, and who is a maybe).

    For regular, day-to-day messaging, I still use email far more than the Facebook messaging system, but I find Facebook is incredibly convenient as far as planning events and get-togethers is concerned.
  • Valerie
    I am a big Facebook user, but I completely agree about Gmail. It's use and features far bypass messaging in Facebook.
  • Facebook is going to get rid of the need for other sites - not just email - because of their apps.

    That being said, email is still better for some personalized messages. The relative lack of spam (for now) on social networks does give them a very strong edge, imho.
  • CJ
    Agree with Adam (@22).

    I will only use facebook for small pointless messages. ANything of importance will go on Gmail.
  • I expect Google to attach personas to emails soon enough, enabling users to manage communications with faces in much the same way.
  • I really do love Facebook and admittedly log in at least once a day, but really don't get why people find its messaging system so intriguing or useful.

    Ways I feel Gmail beats the pants off of Facebook for messaging:

    1) Search! ('nuff said)

    2) Speed (Gmail seems to load faster)

    3) Clarity (rich text / attachments)

    4) Flexibility (cc, bcc, quick groups, etc.)

    5) Permanence. I expect I'll have Gmail for a long time. Facebook, though I hope and expect it to be around for ages... well, I'm not as sure.

    6) Openness. What if someone else creates the next best thing in e-mail? I can POP my mail out of Gmail! Sure, it'll take a long time, but it's possible. What if someone creates a better social network than Facebook? I sure don't see how I can take my messages with me! :(

    7) Organization. I can make particularly funny, memorable, or important threads with just a click or two on Gmail. I can't annotate my Facebook messages at all... with anything!

    * * *

    Now with that said, a few ways that Facebook messaging beats Gmail'ing:

    1) Mails are attached to a friend, not an address. If my friend changes e-mail addresses, Gmail won't necessarily know it's the same person. But Facebook does. The transition is seamless.

    2) Er... I can't think of anything else! All these reasons:

    - Permanence
    - Spam Blocking
    - Space Savings
    - It’s E-mail (plus)
    - It’s Also The Phone Book

    ...just seem nonsensical to me. Permanence? Spam blocking (already near-perfect in Gmail). Space savings? Uh... why? It's E-mail (plus)? What is this, marketing 101? :P It's also The Phone Book? Gmail autocomplete is chopped liver? :P

    The usual disclaimer applies: I work for Google, but am not associated with Gmail except as a happy user.
  • FWIW, my daughter (16) has long preferred that I send her an instant message (GTalk has won out as her favorite network) instead of an email. Sure, she's on Facebook - and MySpace, and Twitter, and Pownce, and just about any other network you can name. She has her own blog, of course, and an LJ, etc. But she and her friends live by instant messsages and SMS - not Facebook. I don't see that changing.

    E-mail may be for old folks, but so are web communications according my girl's generation :-) Tell your sister, "Welcome to being an oldster!"
  • great observation, and i'd say i agree for folks who have mroe than 80-90% of their contacts on facebook, why even bother with email?

    certainly the no-spam item you mention is a huge benefit (altho i've gotten lots of spam msgs on myspace, wonder if facebook isn't also subject to that over time).

    how strange to think of email as an anachronism.

    damn i'm getting old.

    - dave mcclure
    http://500hats.typepad.com/
  • in singapore here, we are seeing the strongest adoption of facebook since it opened up to us mid-last year.

    i think facebook definitely beats email in terms of providing a richer context of personal messaging.. unlike traditional email. note it is not just the email-like feature in facebook that rocks, but also importantly, the wall-posting (reference aiden and jason who only seems to consider the internal messaging system)that provides a one-to-many function that is very appropriate for close circles of personal friends. The rich context of facebook is also reflected in the many social lifestyle verticals such as travel, food, movies, mindless humor that is now reflected in the Facebook Applications. All these apps now reinforce the intrinsic network effects of Facebook. An example is that Zombies app you (Jeremiah) added recently. =) Sending that kind of app last time in email is SO DIFFERENT from sending it in facebook now. There's definitely a higher social connection factor for the latter facebook option.
  • To pick a nit in the name of making a point: Email is a limited phone book, too. So is a phone book, for that matter.

    All these systems work better the more people use them.
  • Site messaging and other types of social sharing of information may be the key to getting rid of broadcast or informational email but there will continue to be a need for one-to-one or one-to-few private communication. It will be interesting to watch as enterprises benefit from the work habits of a new generation of workers. Great post.
  • Jeeez I'm amazed out how many comments are here.

    I wrote this post before going to see Harry Potter and am back to find this, excellent.

    Oh and Harry Potter 4 is no different than Harry Potter 3, or 2 for that matter. Rental.
  • Good points, and I completely agree. I wrote about this in May when I received my first facebook spam

    http://liako.biz/2007/05/social-networks-as-the...

    My key points ring similar with what you discuss: the one-to-many discussion is much more powerful (through 'wall posts' and the like), and they extend conversations beyond what e-mail is capable of.

    I see social networks as a form of communication, as a paradigm shift to how we communicate.

    Regarding the discussion above about blogging as a social network: I consider blogs, facebook, and e-mail for example to all fall under the same category as "social computing". They are all their own distant categories within that subsector of the economy, however the key feature is the interaction with humans via technology - which by definition, is one big network interaction.
  • Yep - I find PM is much faster and, like GMail I can check to see who's online.
  • so much for that! :) here's the non-pretty one

    http://digiscrapinfo.com/wordpress/2007/07/08/w...

    and I like the PM feature on Facebook too - it doesn't have the repetitive quoting... it's quite sensible.
  • Jeremiah, have you tried (or are using) Windows Live Writer for publishing to Wordpress? It's ability to compose offline, embed images (by copying & pasting), videos, podcasts, & manage multiple blogs & synchronize makes it an amazing tool that's a huge timesaver.

    (I'll see if my html link works)
    Windows Live Writer makes blogging easier
  • If all of my friends and contacts were on Facebook, I would definitely use it to replace e-mail.

    Facebook has a really nice messaging system, that I'm sure will only improve over time.

    The ability to record video messages is also a nice touch.
  • Kempton

    Wordpress is a blog, which is not a 'social network' in the ways that most think of it.

    I do think it's an 'open' social network as anyone can leave comments --without registering.
  • Interesting piece.

    Don't think I've mastered the art of blogging and social networking. Tried a few networks but not Wordpress.
    If you like it, it must be good so i'll give it a go

    Cheers
  • Hey Jeremiah,

    Thanks for the nod. I'm still not convinced that social network messaging will take over for e-mail, but it is definitely playing a big role in the evolution of online communication. The advantages that Jason lists are hard to argue against, although the inability to message contacts outside the SN is the big downfall. It will be interesting to watch this scenario unfold...

    Cheers,
    Aidan
    www.MappingTheWeb.com
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