Why does steemit.com contact Facebook servers?

cryptoctopus (74) · 8 years ago (edited)

#1 source of traffic: google
#2 source of traffic: facebook

Avoiding facebook is suicide if you want to launch anything. Stop being purists.

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hagbardceline (60) · 8 years ago

How is not having a facebook share button suicide for Steemit? I don't get this argument.

cryptoctopus (74) · 8 years ago

1 billion users -> Traffic -> New Users

Have you ever built an online business?

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hagbardceline (60) · 8 years ago

Well, no. But I know that I can simply copy & paste a link to my Facebook friends if I really want to. No need to have an embedded button sending data to Facebook on Steemit.

cryptoctopus (74) · 8 years ago (edited)

Ugh...can't wait for the comment limit to be done with!

I understand where you are coming from but it's not realistic to hope to build something without the #1 source of traffic on the internet.

Here is my suggestion, if you think you can build something better than steemit.com without social sharing buttons, you can! The code is there for you to play with and start a competitor that focus on privacy.

There is also "ESTEEM" desktop app if you want to.

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hagbardceline (60) · 8 years ago

"Ugh...can't wait for the comment limit to be done with!" I agree. This is really a pain.

"The code is there for you to play with and start a competitor that focus on privacy." Building a competitor to a platform which is as small as Steemit doesn't look like a win-win situation for me. But you're right: I could indeed do that.

For now, all I wanted to achieve with my post was to raise awareness and get a discussion going. Even if 99 % of the internet users don't care...

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cryptoctopus (74) · 8 years ago (edited)

Ok, I challenge you to start a blog without social sharing buttons nor a facebook page or twitter handle. Tell me about your success...I can't wait.

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hagbardceline (60) · 8 years ago

Well, I already would have one if Steemit would disable all those share buttons. ;-)

I just see a huge privacy problem with those buttons. Let me quote from http://panzi.github.io/SocialSharePrivacy/ : "More and more websites use like-buttons from Facebook, Google+ and Twitter. However, these buttons send information to these social networks even if the user doesn't click them, but even if they are just present on a webpage. This way these networks are able to track which websites users are visiting and are able to build fairly complete browser histories of their users."

I know that a share button is not a like button but I still don't feel comfortable with Steemit sending ANY data to Facebook at all.

cryptoctopus (74) · 8 years ago (edited)

Again, try to build a business and come back to me when you face reality. If you are concerned about privacy, don't use them. But don't go on a crusade when you've never tried to build a business online and say how things should be run.

In fact, it's because of elitist techno-geeks who don't understand how people think that blockchain can't reach the masses. Go out there and speak with normal people, walk a mile in their shoes. They EXPECT the social sharing buttons, if it's not there, they won't share. If they don't share, we don't get traffic. If we get no traffic, we got no new users.

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hagbardceline (60) · 8 years ago

Ok, having some privacy concerns apparently makes me a "purist and an elitist techno-geek" being on a "crusade". Interesting point of view.

Interestingly, I still get your point though. I just think that such a share button is simply not necessary. If you want to share a Steemit story on Facebook you can just copy and paste the link, can't you?

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cryptoctopus (74) · 8 years ago (edited)

If people were really concerned about privacy concerns, there wouldn't be a billion users on Facebook. People would be running for the hill for alternatives. They don't. Only really geeky people care about that.

@harbardceline YOU can share the link manually. Now can you say the same thing about 20 million people? My job is to make my client's website money. It's my job, I spend everyday wondering how to make it better. One thing you learn when you create UI is that people won't do anything complicated. If you ask any efforts to your user, your conversions drops like a rock.

You have to forget about what YOU would do and think about how masses of people use a website. Would Forbes.com be successful without sharing buttons? Think about it. And if you don't believe me, try building a blog without any way for people to share easily. I can GUARANTEE an epic failure.

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hagbardceline (60) · 8 years ago

"[...] Only really geeky people care about that." Unfortunately, you are right about that. But does a bad thing become good if a billion people go for it? I don't believe so...

"My job is to make my client's website money." But isn't that exactly the point of Steemit? To make money without having to rely on any centralized platform? I agree with you that Facebook is important for marketing, I agree with you that only weird people like me care about privacy, I agree with you that it's too inconvenient for millions of users to press "Control-C" and "Control-V" from time to time but I don't agree with you when it comes to connecting Steemit and Facebook. I came here because I don't like Facebook and I want to follow a different approach. How can Steemit be radically different from other social networks if they partially integrate their technology?

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uwelang (74) · 8 years ago

Agreed with @cryptoctopus - it is a no brainer to me. Building successful sites without that is simply not doable - and secured privacy in the internet is anyway a dream :-). We do marketing for such stuff and like it or not we need to have FB linked. I would rather add more share buttons, where is G+?

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jaki01 (74) · 8 years ago

Thanks for opening this discussion!
I am one of the 1 % who care about privacy as well. So at least you are not alone @hagbardceline . :)

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hagbardceline (60) · 8 years ago

Thanks a lot for your support, my friend. :-) Now the only question is: How do we make sure to gather enough support in order to make the developers aware of this issue?

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schamangerbert (74) · 8 years ago

Me too! Count me to the 1%. I have a FB account but my try to get anyone from there to here was a total disaster. They can not read more than one sentence or looking to more than one picture, and they will never be able to write a post here, except the 1 %, but to find them is an other question.

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tfj (54) · 8 years ago

Great question... My only assumption is that maybe Facebook has a tracker or ads or something running on Steemit. Otherwise I have no clue.

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hagbardceline (60) · 8 years ago

Well, isn't steemit.com supposed to somehow be a competitor to Facebook? We would you want to execute code from one of your biggest ~~enemies~~ competitors?

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4 votes

tfj (54) · 8 years ago

They may not even be aware. "Here's an ad space to generate revenue" and the ad links back to Facebook. But who knows. We'll need to do some more research for sure.

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darth-azrael (67) · 8 years ago

Why do people keep saying that Facebook is a competitor to Steemit? Steemit might compete in the same space as Blogger, Wordpress.com, maybe even Tumblr, but Facebook? To me they don't share the same use cases. I use both for completely different reasons. I suppose I could use Facebook in the way I use Steemit but I could never use Steemit in the way I use Facebook.

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hagbardceline (60) · 8 years ago

Well, actually you're right. In its current form Steemit is not (yet) a competitor to Facebook but maybe it will be in the future. Maybe not. But in any case I reckon that it should not, under any circumstances, start to rely on Facebook.