It’s almost impossible to put details to a world without Facebook. Millions of Facebook users think it’s the internet.
Facebook may have become suspect, with industry watchers questioning the goals of its Internet.org (or Free Basics as it’s now called), but one can’t question its dominance in the social media space. A lot of services have attempted to shove Facebook off this pedestal. In 2013, a report found that the number of active teenagers on Facebook fell from 76 percent 56 percent, and messaging apps like WeChat, Flickr and Vine grew popular among that demographic.
In effect, the prediction was that in a few years, Facebook will become irrelevant in social media. It’s 2015 and Facebook has picked up its stride. Perhaps in the future, Facebook, like MySpace, will become relegated to the bottom of the barrel, and the whole world would use SnapChat (Yuck).
But what if Facebook never was. If it never existed. If Zuckerberg and his Harvard dorm mates never dreamed it up.
1: We’ll all (probably) be stuck on Myspace
MySpace was a multi-billion dollar company (what we call a Unicorn these days). As at 2007, it was valued at $12 billion, two times Chrysler’s market capitalization. So things were looking pretty good. It’s probably (certainly) why they didn’t innovate and Facebook compressed them into irrelevance. But if Mark had been hungover the morning the muse checked in to drop the Facebook idea, we’d be telling a very different story. Meanwhile, I kinda I liked MySpace. It was where I first discovered Asa and I’m still hooked till now. Ah, memories.
2: We won’t have these internet drones with such beautiful name – Aquila
Aquila is one of Facebook’s impact projects; high-altitude internet-bearing drones designed to beam connectivity to previously unconnected parts of the world. If Facebook isn’t the $100 billion behemoth that it is today, well, bye bye to Aquila. We’ll also not have internet.org.
3: We’d all hate millennials less
Millennials. The demography the baby boomer generation loves to hate. For good reasons too, they can love to take a piss, even when they know the boss man has no time for it. In 2014, the average millennial spent up to 18 hours a day consuming media, with 40 percent (5.4 hours) of that time spent on social media – mostly Facebook. That number is declining, with most millennials taking to Twitter, but if Facebook never existed, millennials might meet deadlines more often.
4: Zuckerberg would probably be a tech blogger, or work with NSA or own a Y combinator-backed startup, or work for Google …or be a priest
Mark is a smart one. In a universe where Facebook never happened, dropping out of school would be an exercise in futility. Or maybe he did start Facebook but no one liked it. Then gave up to go found another company. Because Y-combinator is the most talked-about startup incubator in the world, his company would apply, and because Mark is a genius, he’ll get admitted. Really, Mark could be pretty much anything, even a priest. Alas, we’ll never know.
5: You’ll forget it’s your birthday. And your friends’. Every. Single. Year.
Nothing more to be said here.
