The problem with lots of social software sites that have launched over the last 10 or so years is that for a large part, they have relied on the “If everyone comes here then…” approach. They work if enough (or all) people join in, they fail when enough people don’t quite get exited enough, it’s a difficult tipping point thing and is almost impossible to predict.

As old usability duffer I can’t believe so many people are into MySpace, as a once lame wannabe rock star I can completely get it. It’s where the people are and that’s enough.

So when I heard that Facebook creators had turned down a gazillion quid, instead making claims they are only gonna get bigger (and be a platform no less) I rolled my eyes (I do that a lot) and decided to register and see what all the fuss was about. Maybe turning that amount of money down was the best marketing and confidence trick ever. 90% of what Facebook needs is for everyone to believe… it’s a confidence trick.

We’ve perhaps got too used to social software sites nose-diving because we’ve seem them pumped with cash and promises still not get enough people get onboard who stay onboard. But one day… you never know, perhaps someone will crack the place-where-you-connect idea. And whilst we are all rolling our eyes they take over the world.

p.s My identity issues with both Flickr and Picasa are both made moot by Facebook… I made a quick photo album called Things you didn’t see (and didn’t get caught in a login loop). If Facebook really are what they hope to be the sites like flickr may just not matter anymore… how many photo sites does one need?

Because of the Facebook widgets I also hooked in again to my LastFM account (who did take the money).
It seems to me that if something like Facebook is gonna fly it is going to add value to all existing social software sites (like LastFM) and make them better for being connected to it.

Is Facebook the last mashup?