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Facebook Releases Instagram Clone, Two Months After Acquisition 138

redletterdave writes "Six days after the company's IPO and two months after it acquired photo-sharing app company Instagram for $1 billion, Facebook debuted a photo app of its own on Thursday, called Facebook Camera. The app is now available as a free download in the App Store, and it's currently only available for iPhone and iPod Touch owners. Facebook Camera is set up very similarly to Instagram and includes most of the same features (including photo filters), but Dirk Stoop, Facebook's product manager for photos, said Facebook was working on this application long before the Instagram acquisition on April 9."
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Facebook Releases Instagram Clone, Two Months After Acquisition

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  • by Pecisk ( 688001 ) on Friday May 25, 2012 @04:54AM (#40107547)

    It seems that Facebook not only have taken Bill's money, but also followed his footsteps in dealing with competition.

    Actually I don't even care anymore. I don't use FB that frueqently, and slowly migrating away to G+ for geeky stuff. For rest I have email :)

    • I think this represents an interesting dichotomy for geeks.

      For instance, you might have the whole "going to dinner parties with the wife" thing in order to maintain a social norm. Meanwhile, you'd rather be in your garage tinkering with a Raspberry Pi or Arduino or something in your garage and making an anti-squirrel turret for your backyard.

      As I'm getting older I'm realizing more and more that the hobbies I find intellectually satisfying are rarely something that can be plugged into a social component. As good (and intelligent) as my friends are, most of them wouldn't want to spend an afternoon learning something interesting in Perl or building a robot for the fuck of it. We go out for drinks or to a diner or something like that. I'm finding that I have to divorce "intellectually stimulating" from "social interaction" more and more every day.

      No wonder we spend all of our time in the basement. It's the only place we can get any of the really interesting shit done, and almost no one wants to join us.

      • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

        by Anonymous Coward

        Pick up a hobby that blends well with a social component. Homebrewing beer, for example.

        • "Pick up a hobby that blends well with a social component. Homebrewing beer, for example."

          Or meth cook. You'll have LOTS of new friends.

      • You just need to branch out and find more friends. Not uncommon for my friends to get together with their laptops at one house and code all night with a few movies playing in the background. I will hop over to another friend's house, help him with vehicle wiring and electronics issues.

        It does help that the only thing to do in the city around here is go out and get drunk.

        • You just need to branch out and find more friends.

          Or, you need to branch out and engage in the kinds of things other people like to do.

          It's not uncommon for my friends to get together at someone's house for a potluck or a pool party and mill around the various conversations and groups that form.

          You know, 40 or so people interacting and socializing, variously discussing work, kids, vacations, cars ... that kind of stuff.

          There is life outside of geek, and it can actually be quite rewarding.

          • by Stele ( 9443 )

            Key parties yo!

          • Or, you need to branch out and engage in the kinds of things other people like to do.

            Or maybe you need to branch out and get some reading comprehension. The GP explicitly said

            As good (and intelligent) as my friends are, most of them wouldn't want to spend an afternoon learning something interesting in Perl or building a robot for the fuck of it. We go out for drinks or to a diner or something like that. I'm finding that I have to divorce "intellectually stimulating" from "social interaction" more and more e

            • ...The issue is that doing so presents a dichotomous life where his social interaction doing things others like is not intellectually fulfilling.

              So his social interactions aren't intellectually fulfilling. His intellectual endeavors clearly aren't socially fulfilling either. What's wrong with doing both?

              • by yotto ( 590067 )

                Nothing, and from what I can tell from the original post he has nothing wrong with them either.

                But doing both TOGETHER? No. Not very fun.

                I wonder if this is just a better explanation of why I don't like Facebook. My explanation is, "it sucks."

          • You know, 40 or so people interacting and socializing, variously discussing work, kids, vacations, cars ... that kind of stuff.

            Honestly, to me this sounds horrifying.

            There is life outside of geek, and it can actually be quite rewarding.

            Different people like different kind of stuff.

            May be I'm just getting old too fast, but I find these social interactions more and more shallow and pointless. When I was young, going to this kind of social events was a good way to meet girls, but now that I'm married this point is gone. It can also be good for "networking", getting to know people you can have business relationship with. Looking back, however, I see that all my relationships with people I met this way ar

      • For instance, you might have the whole "going to dinner parties with the wife" thing in order to maintain a social norm. Meanwhile, you'd rather be in your garage tinkering with a Raspberry Pi or Arduino or something in your garage and making an anti-squirrel turret for your backyard.

        As I'm getting older I'm realizing more and more that the hobbies I find intellectually satisfying are rarely something that can be plugged into a social component. As good (and intelligent) as my friends are, most of them wouldn't want to spend an afternoon learning something interesting in Perl or building a robot for the fuck of it. We go out for drinks or to a diner or something like that. I'm finding that I have to divorce "intellectually stimulating" from "social interaction" more and more every day.

        -----------

        When socialising becomes boring, just as you describe - I can relate to that, btw. - it's because today people rarely have any time or interest in cultivating social forms of engagement. It's still a relatively thin wholy educated layer of demografic that does these things, if at all.
        If you want something stimulating to do that you do with other people it would be making music together, singing in a choir, staging a play or something like that.

        4.5 years ago I discovered Tango dancing. And while I actually do have a diploma in performing arts and did that professionally in the 90ies (although not for a living really, you can't live off that), I never would have thought that I'd be doing that. I basically discovered Tango by accident, because a friend of mine asked me to come with her as her partner. Since then it's been like a drug. I go out 3 or more times a week at times and it only takes a little nudge to overcome the notion of just staying at my desk and doing a little programming or something.

        Seriously, once you find a social activity that is stimulating beyond sitting together and chatting and getting slightly drunk, you're heading the right way. You can't dance while drunk, and you wouldn't want to, because you're having a ball (quite litterally at times :-) ) giving the ladies and girls a good time and improving your dancing skills. Just Tuesday I came back from Heidelberg with my feet hurting from dancing to much again. With a ladies/guy ratio like that (note the background) [ytimg.com], a mans gotta do what a mans gotta do, ... I guess. :-)))

        Bottom line: Find a higher cultivated social activity than drinking and clubbing, such as the above mentioned, and going social won't be so one dimensional anymore. A few years ago it was Aikido for me, but since I've discovered Tango, I think I've found my contrast programm for the rest of my life.

        My 2 cents.

        • Don't be so modest, your English is better than just about any American's I know. The only tip off to you being across the pond was "socialising" which I believe is spelled correctly for Europeans. Not sure about "demografic" though, it's demographic in the USA. Also we usually spell the "90ies" as 90's Otherwise, you've fully embarrassed my writing abilities, well done! :)
        • Glad I'm not the only geek guy who discovered dancing as a great social activity. For me it was salsa and more recently blues and swing. All are great for being around and interacting with women, and without a whole lot of talking either (while dancing anyway--I'm still working on follow-up *after* a dance...).

          And although I'd have a panic attack doing public speaking and am still anxious talking one-on-one (really great during a date [rolleyes]), I realized recently don't have (much of) a problem partner d

      • by Pecisk ( 688001 )

        Then I must be happy, because while my spose isn't computer geek, she is in literature and libraries and other really engaging stuff. And my friends and former classmates are geeks more or less too.

      • by nozzo ( 851371 )
        "I'm finding that I have to divorce "intellectually stimulating" from "social interaction" more and more every day" wow, you've just described the way I feel. What we need is to combine the two to have "intellectually stimulating social interaction". Something like a geek club where you can bring your projects to show-off or have a brainstorm debug session, drink beer and have a good time.
        • The various animal clubs around here - Lions, Elks, Moose, etc - are basically a way to get together and drink beer. They do some community activities but I know at least the local lions is more of an excuse to get together twice a month for a dinner with the guys. Although this is changing now that our Lions is now co-ed. One downside of being a non-drinker, after awhile at any party there are far fewer brain cells working around you than when it started with.

          Perhaps it's time to take our cue from O'Reil

          • Not too smart, the best the regional Mensa does I believe are a few brunches. That doesn't seem all that entertaining.

            Not to slag Mensa too badly here, but the few people I've met who are Mensa members have made me go "if it's a club full of people like you, I'm not really interested".

            Mensa is a group that self selects to get together and wallow in how smart they are. It just may not be everybody's cup of tea. There's a perception that it might be a bunch of insufferable boors who like to feel smug togeth

            • by Nadaka ( 224565 )

              Mensa is full of people dumb enough that they have to pay someone to tell them how smart they are.

            • When I was in high school, one of the first honours I got was to be a member of the Arista, which is a group of kids who got good grades - eh? - and everybody wanted to be a member of the Arista, and when I got into the Arista I discovered that what they did in their meetings was to sit around to discuss who else was worthy to join this wonderful group that we are - okay? So we that around trying to decide who it was who would get to be allowed into this Arista. This kind of thing bothers me psychologically

        • by tlhIngan ( 30335 )

          "I'm finding that I have to divorce "intellectually stimulating" from "social interaction" more and more every day"

          wow, you've just described the way I feel. What we need is to combine the two to have "intellectually stimulating social interaction". Something like a geek club where you can bring your projects to show-off or have a brainstorm debug session, drink beer and have a good time.

          They exist, and have for a few years now - they're called "hackerspaces" and while generally places where people

      • by Tackhead ( 54550 ) on Friday May 25, 2012 @10:07AM (#40109195)

        No wonder we spend all of our time in the basement. It's the only place we can get any of the really interesting shit done, and almost no one wants to join us.

        Old joke:

        Three NASA engineers, one from headquarters in Washington, one from the Johnson center in Houston, and one from the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena were discussing whether it was better to have a wife or a mistress.

        The HQ guy said it was better to have a mistress, because they are more understanding of the long absences required of a NASA employee. The Johnson guy retorted, "Oh, no, one must always follow proper rules and procedures, and marriage is the proper procedure, so it is better to have a wife."

        The JPL engineer replied, "No, it is better to have both. That way, you can tell your wife that you're with your mistress, your mistress that you're with your wife, and go to the lab and work."

      • by Sloppy ( 14984 )

        As I'm getting older I'm realizing more and more that the hobbies I find intellectually satisfying are rarely something that can be plugged into a social component.
        ..

        I'm finding that I have to divorce "intellectually stimulating" from "social interaction" more and more every day.

        You're already half way to finding the exception, when you go out for drinks. Ever thought of making the drinks? Brewing is social and (somewhat) nerdy. Ok, it's not going to be as intellectually stimulating as programming (wha

      • you'd rather be in your garage tinkering with a Raspberry Pi or Arduino or something in your garage

        Yo dawg...

      • "geek" = "nerd" + "gay"
    • by Anonymous Coward

      And how do you think every other corporation handles it? Google, Apple, Oracle, ... whichever you like the most, also does it. Buy, disassemble, take the interesting bits, and throw away (or sell) the leftovers.

    • by antifoidulus ( 807088 ) on Friday May 25, 2012 @06:20AM (#40107807) Homepage Journal
      Actually they are turning into something akin to Microsoft, but not for the reasons you described. In the past(and to a lesser extent even today) Microsoft would often release several different, but completely incompatible, versions of the same thing. For instance 2 different DRM schemes, neither which was compatible with the other or even many of Microsofts own products for that matter. At one point they had THREE mobile operating systems on the market, all incompatible with the others software. This is not a recipe for success, and Microsofts slow, painful, but inexorable decline proves it.
    • Enjoy only speaking with Wil Wheaton and Google engineers bemoaning their failed social network.

    • They discovered a billion dollars worth of junk that doesn't work on all platforms.

    • I think that purchasing Instagram was to beef up there weak IPO. I never heard of Instagram until Facebook purchased it. I think over all Mark Zuckenburg deals with his competition by buying them out or patenting code. We will see if Facebook can hold on with all these lawsuits coming down the pipe.
    • For rest I have email :)

      Email? I remember that. We had that back when I was alive...

  • by dejanc ( 1528235 ) on Friday May 25, 2012 @04:59AM (#40107559)
    Just how bubbly was it for Facebook to spend $1 billion on Instagram? Whether they wanted to destroy competition or whatever they wanted to do, this just makes no sense at all. I am sure people at Facebook know stuff that the general public doesn't, but this just seems like a ridiculous way to do business.
    • by Theophany ( 2519296 ) on Friday May 25, 2012 @05:05AM (#40107581)
      Yeah, which is weird because getting served with a class action lawsuit and an SEC investigation days after your IPO generally points to a company worth handing your money over to.

      The company, by its own admission, is not convinced that they can monetise the mobile user experience, so for them to be wasting time, money and resources on flash in the pan shite like Instagram points to a company that isn't worth the paper its shares are printed on.
      • by Rich0 ( 548339 ) on Friday May 25, 2012 @06:14AM (#40107777) Homepage

        Just ask anybody who made a ton of money off of credit default swaps in 2007 - paper is worth whatever you can get somebody else to pay for it. I'd say that 80% of the "value" of the stock in most trendy companies is based on hype, and you can make a lot of money off of that hype if you're an insider.

        If you come out with a new laptop everybody yawns. If you come out with a new tablet people invest money. If you come out with a new pink sleeve for an iPad your stock will soar. Investors are like a big stampede, and if you wave a red flag in the direction they're all running in you'll get lots of money.

        The thing is, it doesn't matter how many people are screaming about how great an investment CDS's, or tulips, or whatever is. Eventually you run out of new money, and the whole thing has to stand on whatever real-world earnings it can find. If those aren't there, then the whole situation gets ugly fast, and everybody is screaming for a bailout because "nobody could have seen this coming."

        I think K summed it up fairly well - a person is intelligent, but people are dumb.

        • by TuringTest ( 533084 ) on Friday May 25, 2012 @07:29AM (#40108113) Journal

          And this is the optimal most efficient possible solution that a free market creates, how again?

          • And this is the optimal most efficient possible solution that a free market creates, how again?

            It's not. A free market economy would let these company fail, and allow a lower barrier of entry for competition. The free market truly shines when there is high liquidity and many participants. The current economic system we have favors the former, but not the later.

            • by Rich0 ( 548339 )

              The other issue I see is too many disinterested investors - tons of money in 401ks that is not closely monitored, or where the investors have little control over their investments. That leads to complacent boards and powerful CEOs. The CEO doesn't really care about company performance, as long as he can collect his bonus. If the company collapses the investors might lose out if they're not bailed out, but the CEO keeps his bonuses, as do all the other execs. That means that they have incentive to take l

        • If you come out with a new laptop everybody yawns. If you come out with a new tablet people invest money. If you come out with a new pink sleeve for an iPad your stock will soar. Investors are like a big stampede, and if you wave a red flag in the direction they're all running in you'll get lots of money.

          I hope you're not implying that Apple fits in that category of 80% overvalued "trendy" companies... AAPL's one of the cheapest stocks out there when you consider real earnings and real growth trends. People haven't invested in Apple because tablets are hypothetically cool, they've invested because tablets (well, iPads) are actually cool, as determined by the millions they've sold.

      • Too bad there aren't any actual paper shares.
    • by Anonymous Coward

      The idea is probably to get the press talking about something else other than the IPO lawsuit (think this tactic will work for about two days)

    • by ericloewe ( 2129490 ) on Friday May 25, 2012 @06:16AM (#40107781)

      It's absurd. While I have never (and am not planning to) used Instagram, I find the whole concept redundant, especially because if you must absolutely share your pictures, any decent smartphone OS will do that automatically, or at least with minimal fuss.

      This reminds me of the .com bubble - worthless companies with no real products (social networking is not a tangible product capable of surviving something big) having their value inflated to absurd levels, with billion dollar transactions being thrown around.

      • by N1AK ( 864906 ) on Friday May 25, 2012 @06:37AM (#40107865) Homepage

        It's absurd. While I have never (and am not planning to) used Instagram, I find the whole concept redundant

        And what exactly does your own inability to find a use show? I've toyed with Instagram and still use it to upload some images to FB/Twitter etc; that doesn't prove much of anything. A lot of people use Instagram, they evidently have found something about the concept that isn't redundant.

        Personally I see nothing worrying about Facebook doing this. They probably started devoping it before they acquired Instagram. Generally dev costs aren't that huge and this allows them to try different functionality/integrations on the two platforms while taking the best of each and incorporating it into the other.

        • True enough, but it boils down to this: How is that trivial (at least compared to other software that people would gladly pay a billion bucks for) service worth a billion dollars? You admitted that the dev costs aren't "that huge", so where does the value come from?

          There is no basis for suing Facebook if they made their competitor independently, which wouldn't be difficult: some cropping, some filters, maybe some effects, uploading system, simple UI. So, again, why the billion dollars?

      • It's absurd. While I have never (and am not planning to) used Instagram, I find the whole concept redundant, especially because if you must absolutely share your pictures, any decent smartphone OS will do that automatically, or at least with minimal fuss.

        Ok, so you admit you've never used it, don't understand it, and declared it redundant based purely off of your perceptions. You then go on to unintentionally prove how clueless you are about its' function. Well played.

        Let me help you out here: For me, Instagram is about sharing and viewing snapshots in my life and my friends' lives. It cuts out all the "sponsored tweet/story/ad" bullshit if FB and Twitter, leaving you with (mostly) all content and no filler. That's why my friends and I use it. This

        • As I said, it's mostly a pretty interface for applying filters and uploading stuff. My N9 does that out of the box.

          It is not worth a billion dollars. We could keep discussing Instagram's features and usage scenarios, but I think anyone will agree that it is not worth that much money.

    • by jo42 ( 227475 )

      seems like a ridiculous way to do business

      This is what happens when a company is run by an in-experienced 20-something kid.

  • Patents (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Teun ( 17872 ) on Friday May 25, 2012 @05:03AM (#40107575)
    They (FB) must have felt it was cheaper to buy the whole company then to litigate about stupid patents and copy rights.
    • by hantms ( 2527172 )

      They (FB) must have felt it was cheaper to buy the whole company then to litigate about stupid patents and copy rights.

      One billion buys a lot of litigation.. And besides, Instagram wouldn't be the only company in the world with any patents related to messing with saturation and hue of a digital image.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward

      They (FB) must have felt it was cheaper to buy the whole company then to litigate about stupid patents and copy rights.

      Um... so they reduced the field of potential litigants by one small company that hasn't been around long enough to build up much of a patent portfolio and doesn't have any particular history of litigating?

    • Or they wanted the user base more than they wanted the app itself.

      By buying Instagram, they can now choose to port the stuff they like about their own app over to Instagram, or port the stuff they like about Instagram over to their own app. But the bigger win is probably that now everyone using Instagram will be moved over to keeping all of that information in their Facebook profile instead. I still don't know whether that's worth it, since I have a hard time imagining how Facebook makes enough money to

  • by game kid ( 805301 ) on Friday May 25, 2012 @05:39AM (#40107665) Homepage

    Facebook Camera is set up very similarly to Instagram and includes most of the same features (including photo filters), but Dirk Stoop, Facebook's product manager for photos, said Facebook was working on this application long before the Instagram acquisition on April 9.

    Read that as "We shackled our own workers to the desk, but none of them could figure out how to make something that could share and filter images like that so we kept giving those geniuses offers until they buckled. They also got kinda pissed after the 8-or-9th offer and started throwing goldfish, tomatoes, and smelly socks at us, but our combination bodyguard/repo-men dealt with that little threat in a Facebook Timeline minute."

  • Stick a fork in it (Score:5, Interesting)

    by arcite ( 661011 ) on Friday May 25, 2012 @05:40AM (#40107675)
    This Social network fad is done. Yoked of innovation, on the path to mediocrity and disdain.
    • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

      by gatzke ( 2977 )

      My FB feed seems to be going that way. I don't know if people are dropping it, friends are blocking me, I am just losing interest, or FB is editing posts out with some algorithm. It is just not that interesting anymore.

      Email took off and stayed established because it was an open interface and anyone could set up a server.

      IM did well, but there were issues on the server side. At least you could write your own client. Later clients would handle a variety of servers.

      I think twitter clients are fairly open,

      • by Rosco P. Coltrane ( 209368 ) on Friday May 25, 2012 @06:28AM (#40107839)

        Email took off and stayed established because it was an open interface and anyone could set up a server.

        No. Email took off because it was *useful*. Even closed source email tools such as Exchange have success for the same reason.

        Facebook on the other hand is not useful. It may be fun (to each his own), addictive, a great time waster, but it's not essential. I've had friends - real friends - with whom I've exchanged messages way before FB even existed, through email, Fidonet before that, and *gasp* telephone and hamradio before that.

        You can do without FB, and ultimately this will be FB's undoing: either people will move on to some other nonessential such service to get their kicks, or they'll waste their free time on something else if Zuckerberg tries a little too hard to squeeze money out of them.

        • by jareth-0205 ( 525594 ) on Friday May 25, 2012 @06:40AM (#40107877) Homepage

          Facebook on the other hand is not useful.

          Balls. Facebook is useful, it's just not *as useful or essential* as the media hype has made out.

          It's great for keeping in touch with distant friends (and that is a valid form of friendship, despite what some people on /. seem to claim that friendships are a binary go-out-for-a-beer-or-you're-dead-to-me), organsing events/parties whatever, publicising trivial stuff, whatever.

          It won't go away, but it probably won't change the world (any more).

          • Facebook is useful, it's just not *as useful or essential* as the media hype has made out.

            There are a few game creators that would argue over the essential portion of that argument. And it's worth remembering how much money those games have made to date in addition to how much time people play them.

          • by pongo000 ( 97357 ) on Friday May 25, 2012 @09:38AM (#40108957)

            It's great for keeping in touch with distant friends

            Unless you have "distant friends" you'd rather not have find you. I don't know about your history, but there are several people in mine I simply don't want showing up in my life. Hence, no FB.

            No great loss....I don't consider someone who I once knew 25 years ago a "friend." In fact, FB has served to bastardize the word "friend" into something alien that isn't even close to the original definition. So sad.

            • Must like the word bastard, but that didn't stop you.

            • by gatzke ( 2977 )

              Maybe the anti-social introverts of the slashdot crowd are not the typical audience for facebook. For a lot of people, we don't mind having folks we knew 25 years ago in our friend list.

              I have people in my list that I knew very well in elementary and pre-school. We drifted apart in middle school / high school but there is no reason I can't still call them a friend. Seeing a small tidbit of their life does not take much of my time and when we do meet again we are already somewhat caught up and have some r

            • You can actually reject (they actually don't see a rejection, just don't see the friendship approval) friendship requests.
              Yeah, some might feel it to be a bit rude but if you really don't want those people in your life I guess you can reject them fine on Facebook.
              Anyway, Facebook really needs better privacy options but that's another completely different topic ...
            • It's great for keeping in touch with distant friends

              Unless you have "distant friends" you'd rather not have find you.

              Quite often, distance is not a coincidence.

          • by longk ( 2637033 )

            Us Dutchies used to have CU2.nl for that. Then we moved to Hyves.net, which sold for millions, then we moved on to Facebook. Something will be next. Facebook has already changed from something hip to something ordinary, the next step will for it to be more boring than TheNewThing.

    • Re: (Score:1, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward

      facebook lost a lot of value to many people when adults and teens started joining. facebook has its roots in the college culture and was at its most powerful when the majority of users were college users and there was a "2 networks policy" and your college email needed to be verified when you joined. i loved reading posts like "man you were so wasted last night, wtf happened when u left the bar?" or "what the hell was that in math 235 today?", it was such a cool way to meet new people, and the atmosphere wa

    • Isn't this social media thing just a different name for web 2.0?

      • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

        by Anonymous Coward

        No, it's web 3.1 for workgroups

    • by whisper_jeff ( 680366 ) on Friday May 25, 2012 @06:30AM (#40107849)

      This Social network fad is done.

      Except that's not remotely true. Facebook may fade away (eventually) but some form of social network or another will take its place. The internet has been one form of social network or another from the very beginning. I remember in the early days logging into a BBS waaaaay back in the day. What was that? It was basically the internet _and_ a social network in one. Then when I got the real thing, there were use groups and various forums. Again, social networks. And then came things like MySpace and social networks took on a whole new meaning. And MySpace faltered and faded and was replaced by Facebook. And odds are that Facebook will stumble at some point and be replaced by something else but social networks are not done. They've been here from the very beginning and they will be here when the entire internet is closed down and the lights get turned off.

      Not a fad. Not done.

      • I remember in the early days logging into a BBS waaaaay back in the day. What was that? It was basically the internet _and_ a social network in one.

        Ahh, animated ASCII art pr0n over modem. Only 4 users could jerk off at any one time. Those were the days...

      • by dskzero ( 960168 )
        I miss the BBS era. People were expected to post valuable content about the subjects at hand and not just randomly go to clubs and having such a great time that they spent all night taking photos to post them online. You know, back then, I actually thought that spending time in forums was productive. Nowadays it's literally the way I have to waste time.
        • by istvaan ( 66491 )

          There were a handful of BBSes in the Pittsburgh area that I would regularly frequent, and goodness do I sometimes miss them.
          We had one, "Data's Exchange" it was called, running WWIV and using two modems. Made Trade Wars pretty interesting.
          But we always knew how many subscribers there were, and that only so and so many could be on at a time.
          I think that fact, the dearth of time, made it so that our conversations in the message boards were poignant and well-written.
          Discussions were quite often heated, to be

      • by longk ( 2637033 )

        Not a fad and not done indeed. Facebook is really quite a poor implementation of a social network when you compare it to offline social networking. Something better will surely come along.

    • >> Yoked of innovation

      So you say, but the next big thing is just around the corner. It's called Social IRL. Right now there's a whole industry building out places to meet and socialize in meat-space (mostly food and drink based forums). Those on the cutting edge are just getting involved in this technology, but soon it will be the biggest social networking innovation ever! Social IRL - the next, next thing.

    • This Social network fad is done. Yoked of innovation, on the path to mediocrity and disdain.

      That's it. I'm buying a ton of FB stock. Every damned time Slashdot disses something, it turns out to be a hit with the rest of the world.

      "No wireless, less space than a Nomad. Lame."

  • "and it's currently only available for iPhone and iPod Touch owners". Right. This was part of the FB app update for the droid 2 weeks ago. I got so confused when I first read this story yesterday because I knew I'd had it for awhile.

  • Visionary (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 25, 2012 @06:01AM (#40107737)

    I'm sorry, but this just shows how fast FB is going to tank. A billion dollars for something that they were already developing.......clever. Obviously someone felt that this was a threat to the "release" of their own version, planned right after IPO (coincidence.....lol). So there ya have it, now we'll see if investors catch on, that FB is being managed like a circus.

  • Invest your money safely on Facebook so we can waste one more billion, or two ;-)
  • by Arancaytar ( 966377 ) <arancaytar.ilyaran@gmail.com> on Friday May 25, 2012 @06:35AM (#40107857) Homepage

    ... they spent a billion dollars on something they already had.

    • That might be what they're saying, but that's probably not what actually transpired. Therein lies the difference.
  • by Lumpy ( 12016 )

    It was pushed to Android phones over a week ago with the last app update.

    I tried it twice and deleted it as it sucked.

  • by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 25, 2012 @09:06AM (#40108729)

    They bought it for mostly Facebook shares, which they CLAIMED were valued at $1billion. That was the whole point of that exercise, create a false third party confirmation of Facebook's share valuation!

    It had nothing to do with Instagram's products or services, it was entirely about pumping a fake valuation of Facebook shares. A simply Pump-And-Dump.

    It could have been ANY company prepared to cooperate in this that plausibly had a product with any product, overlapping or not.

  • Should companies be allowed to buy up other companies for the sheer purpose of removing competition from its current or upcoming competition? It's one thing to do it once but what about 50 times until there is nothing left to buy and you are the only game in town??
  • Once upon a time... about three months ago.... a Facebook user would press the "Share on Facebook" button in Instagram, and the selected photo would be uploaded to their "Instagram Photos" album.

    "$USER has uploaded $NUMBER of photos to the album Instagram Photos" would appear on their timeline or wall, along with a collage of thumbnails. Comments and likes associated with the wall post were attached to the photo itself.

    Now, the same action produces a completely different result that is a UI disaster. The po

  • This appeared on my android device a good few weeks ago now right next to my handsets "camera" icon in the app draw. I even remember thinking to myself "oh for facebooks sake, thats confusing!" a few day's later the thing changed and a little facebook "F" icon appeared like an icon overlay on the main icon

Keep up the good work! But please don't ask me to help.

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